Pokémon Mystery Dungeon: Quenched Torch

Chapter 43: Cursed With Knowledge

Despite how much I'd like to say I came out of that subway tunnel confident and celebrating, I'll go ahead and admit it. I had no idea what was happening anymore.

From the moment Rye pulled me up out of that hole and into the desert moonlight, an air of tension had hung over our party, especially as Delcatty had taken our find from us. As they studied the bundle of paper, we'd tried to ignore it and turn in to make up for the night down in the ruins, but I'd found myself unable to sleep. Quite a bit nagged at me as I stared at the backs of my eyelids, watching as the light shining through them gradually grew brighter. The skeletons, the stadium, the rusted cars, and just about everything else I'd seen down there still weighed down on me, though my biggest question pertained to how I'd even found those papers in the first place.

What was that tugging? No, who was it? Was it the Voice again? For Arceus' sake, why couldn't it just leave me alone for once?

Ugh.

One thing I did notice as I laid there, though, was how the voices outside suddenly seemed to get far more excited as the sun came up. At present, I could hear Hitmonchan eagerly reentering the Guild's little camp as he spoke to someone unseen.

"No, no, it has to be a Psychic," I made out from the voice. "...yeah, a map... we need to reach our Guildmaster as soon as possible."

My ears stuck up as I pried open my eyes. Was that our papers he was talking about? I hesitated for a moment before silently pushing myself up and off the seedy cushion I'd been using for a bed. Tiptoeing to the door, I glanced back at my partners to make sure I hadn't woken them. Thankfully, Rye was still splayed out twitching his tail and Mavy still laid curled up, a stupid grin on his face as he dreamed of Darkrai knows what. With a quiet sigh of relief, I slunk out into the chilly desert morning.

It took a moment to gain my bearings among the sea of other Guilds' tents around me, but I soon picked out the biggest of ours and waddled over, being careful to not trip any explorers here going about their morning routines. Giving a quick look around, I gingerly opened the tent's curtain a crack to look inside. Inside, I found Delcatty and Hitmonchan standing around a Beeheeyem as it floated there, its digits floating rapidly. I couldn't tell quite what was going on, but kept watching as Delcatty continued.

"Yes, Guildmaster Arcanine, I understand this is very exciting, but please calm down for a bit. What action should we take?" she asked the air in front of her. A moment of silence passed before she continued. "Yes, sir, we'll be quick about it. Rest assured, we'll keep the artifact safe. You don't just find a map through... that and not do that. ...yes, sir, I'll pass that on to Haxorus. ...you, too."

With that, the Beeheeyem's lights went out as Delcatty sighed.

"That should be everything, Beeheeyem, thank you. You wanna stay for a quick drink?" she asked.

The Beeheeyem responded with a quick flash of one of its lights and a short beep, which apparently meant yes since Delcatty turned to fish something out of her bag, leaving me to try and consider what I'd just snooped in on. Before I could get very far, though, Beeheeyem snapped its large head towards me, apparently having sensed my presence. It immediately pointed at me with the flashing lights on its hands as it let out a series of frantic beeps like some sort of weird Morse code, and as I stumbled back, the tent's curtain doors flew open to reveal a panicked Delcatty and Hitmonchan. Their appendages glowed faintly in preparation for an attack, but the two settled down as they caught sight of me on the ground.

"Oh, it's just you," Delcatty sighed in relief, looking back at Beheeyem as it hovered behind them. "Don't worry, just an apprentice of ours. Uh, just go back to your tent, Oshawott. It's not polite for civilized to eavesdrop, alright? We'll explain everything later."