Pokémon Mystery Dungeon: Quenched Torch

Chapter 40: Call to Arms

"Yeah, from what I've been told, they did get all that for sure. Magnezone and Bassa Village police said so themselves. Why you asking?" Bert asked. Pike took a quick look around the mess hall behind him, making sure no unwanted ears were listening in.

"...just makin' sure," he eventually muttered. Bert snorted, crossing his arms.

"What, you don't trust ol' Arcanine himself?" he asked. Pike instinctively puffed up his feathers, giving a little squawk of shock.

"C-course I do! Just... j-just don't... ya know, Reach's a rookie team, only 'bout a moon old. Bit hard to believe they pulled all that off, ya know?" he reasoned. Bert hummed.

"True, true, but hey, if they can get to a mad feral, then-"

"Wait, wait, wait. They did what?" Pike demanded.

"You didn't hear about Team Luster?" Bert asked. Pike didn't answer, only choosing to look back at the crowd behind him as the Wartortle continued. "Anyways, er, mightcha remind me what you told me your group was up to after a moon?" he asked. Pike considered for a minute.

"...cuttin' off the Serperior bridgehead," he sighed. "Ya got me there. Sorry to bother ya."

As Pike turned to hop back towards his teammates, Bert sat there for a moment before giving a little chuckle to himself and kicking back in his seat. While the rest of the Guild's staff clearly hadn't told him everything, he felt he'd heard enough. With his fellow trainers getting up to turn in their platters, Bert craned his head to look over the mass of Pokémon.

"Knew you guys were something special from the moment you saved my tail on the Serperior. Good job, kid," he said under his breath. With that, he got up and made for the exit, pride in both his teaching and his student bubbling up within him.

Pike, meanwhile, was far from proud.

"Damn fool, honestly. The fuck was he even thinkin', takin' up a feral like that?" he muttered under his breath.

Even as he quietly judged Bert for his decisions, Pike was not entirely sure what to make of this situation. As he turned his platter in, he looked to the floor contemplatively. Something was wrong here, he knew it. This sort of thing did not just happen, especially given the circumstances. How could a team go from the quiet apprentice and a dungeon feral to this in only a moon? This type of success story just didn't happen outside of children's tales, and Team Reach was most certainly not the Radiant Squad searching for sweets.

Unless... what if the Oshawott...?

No. No, that was impossible. Pike had heard more than enough to know what former humans were like, and there was no way in distortion that a dungeon feral, of all things, could be one. He simply could not associate a noble explorer, much less a human with... that, not after everything he'd been through.

There was simply no way.

Grinding his beak and stroking a feather over his Sharpbeak pendant, Pike followed his teammates out the door, then spread his wings to fly back to their base. As he circled the building, something caught his attention: the smashed remains of the team's mailbox. The Swellow's eye twitched.

"Bagon, ya little shit! I'm gonna-" he cawed as he landed, only for something among the wreckage to cut him off. Curiously brushing aside the debris, his feathers stood on end at what he found.

"Oh, sh..." he whispered.

The item in question appeared to be a scroll with a red rod at its center and adorned with the Guildmaster's pawprint. These distinctive features could only mean one thing: Team Apex had been sent an official call to action.