Plan for Progress (Yuletide 2018)

Here's my Yuletide submission, for shadowlucario50. It's a standalone oneshot based on Pokémon Mystery Dungeon: Gates to Infinity. Enjoy!


The whole word was spinning. Something invisible grabbed my legs, tail, and ears and yanked them in different directions. I wanted to scream, but couldn't find my voice. Lights and colors streamed too quickly around me. I thought I might be sick.

"Oof!"

As soon as the spinning started, it went away with a loud squelch. Now, my world was brown. A cold, slimy brown. It was on my snout, my chest, my belly… heck, even the forked ends of my tail weren't safe.

I groaned and slapped the mud puddle with a forepaw. Pain shot through my limb, making me regret the outburst. Wincing, I rolled onto my side. The cool mud dulled some of the aching in my flanks. I wiped mud out of my eyes as best I could.

As if getting knocked out in Seabreeze Springs wasn't bad enough, the dungeon's chaotic winds ejected me into the one muddy patch of ground at the entrance. This couldn't have been a coincidence. The powers that be were laughing at me and rubbing salt in my wounds.

Well, regardless of what was actually going on, a mud puddle was no place to lay around having a mental pity party. Sighing, I staggered to my feet. I looked to my right to confirm my travel bag had survived the ejection. It did, but to my dismay it was equally as mud soaked. Lighter, too, but that was to be expected. I thought today would be the day I got through Seabreeze Springs, but fate had other plans in mind.

I walked away from the swirling cloud of gray mist marking the dungeon's entrance. The rows of trees gave way to a cliffside path. I stopped to look out at the ocean. Even if the water was salty, I'd have loved to jump in and get rid of this filth. But the drop-off was a bit too steep. I'd never get back up to the trail safely.

Ears and tail drooping, I began the walk of shame back home. Blossoming trees and bushes to my right, sparkling ocean to my left. Normally the serene sights would calm me down, but today they just upset me.

A week. That's how long I'd been trying to make it through Seabreeze Springs. I'd heard rumors that there was a beach on the other side with some of the most beautiful seashells you could ever find in the Mist Continent. When I heard about it, I just knew I had to go there. I'd gather up some seashells and make necklaces. One for me and one for Umbry.

But every time I went into Seabreeze Springs, I failed to make it through. Today's defeat stung the hardest. I had climbed ten whole floors. I could feel the end growing close… only for that hope to evaporate in the face of a Monster House.

Bile rose up in my throat at the memory of two panpour giggling to themselves while three klang blasted me with Charge Beams as I kept trying and failing to deflect them with Light Screens. Ugh, how I wished I could smack those grins off their dopey faces. I glanced down at my muddy paws. Okay, maybe it was for the best I got a mud bath. Otherwise, every step I took would release some lingering static and do even more harm.

Wait, why was I even limping along like this? I knew Morning Sun! Gods, it was like getting ejected had turned me into a slowpoke or something. Shaking my head, I tapped into my psychic powers. My head throbbed, begging me to stop. I was clearly tired, but better tired than hurt. Soft light formed over my head. I looked up as the light spilled over me. The pain along my torso dulled.

I stumbled forward, my vision going fuzzy. Okay, I wouldn't be able to fully heal myself, but this was good enough.

The rest of the walk home proved uneventful. I got to the part where the cliffside trail descended toward my hometown and turned right to sneak past the small, circular houses. Luckily, there weren't any windows behind them, so I had a perfectly safe path to the small, grassy, green hill where my tan, dome-shaped house sat.

But my luck ran out. Umbry was outside, a paintbrush in his mouth and a can of paint on our doorstep. He was tending to the front door he had recently replaced. His ears twitched and he turned in my direction.

"Oh, hey, you're home early," he said, paintbrush muffling his speech. The moment he laid eyes on me the paintbrush fell out of his mouth. "E-Espy! What happened? You're an absolute mess!"

I froze, unsure how to respond. Part of me wanted to make a joke and laugh it off, but another part was ready to just fall on the ground and break down crying. I was doing this to give Umbry a gift. Why were the gods making this impossible for me?

"It's not as bad as it looks. Got kicked out of a dungeon and landed in a mud puddle, that's all," I said.

Unfortunately, that didn't placate Umbry. In fact, it made him more upset. He bounded toward me, knocking over the paint can in the process. Streaks of red trickled through the grass as Umbry skidded to a halt in front of me.

"You're not hurt, are you?" he said, worry filling his face. "Do you want me to get Cincinno over here to take a look at you?"

"It's fine, Umbry. I'm a bit sore, but I healed off the worst of the damage with Morning Sun," I said, taking my slimy bag off my shoulder and setting it down. "Things were going fine until I stumbled on a Monster House. I had some lousy luck, that's all."

"But this is the sixth day in a row I've seen you come home with an empty bag," he said, looking down.

Dang it! How did he know? I was sure I had kept my bag hidden from him all week, in case I was actually successful.

"Espy, I'm a bit worried. We only have so much money and I can't have you burning through all our supplies."

"It's fine, Umbry. I didn't even take anything with me, today. Found a bunch of items during my trek. I didn't lose anything important, honest!" I said.

"I'd like to believe that, Espy. Really. But yesterday I bought four apples from the Kecleon Mart and this morning two of them were gone," Umbry said, frowning.

"That was breakfast," I said, trying to keep my tone as even as I could.

"Espy, please. We both know you've never eaten apples for breakfast," Umbry said.

"Totally not true!" I said, pouting. "I did it all the time when we were pups."

"Those were apple pies. And, as I seem to recall, you used to tackle the windowsill so hard the pie would fall on you and you'd just lick it out of your fur," Umbry said, shaking his head. "The missing apples aren't that big of a deal. Why are you being so defensive over this?"

"Defensive? I'm not being defensive. Why are you asking me so many questions, huh? I told you, I got kicked out of a dungeon. There's nothing more to it," I said, stepping back. My voice was growing shakier. Umbry's red eyes looked right through me, like they always did. But I had to hold tough. I wanted to surprise him, not disappoint him. Why couldn't he just drop it?

"I already told you, Espy, I'm getting concerned," Umbry said, his brow furrowing. "The renovations to the house are taking longer than I expected—"

"Then why don't you let me help you like I've been offering since you started this stuff? C'mon, you know if I used my powers, we'd be done already," I said, rolling my eyes.

"You can't cheese repairs with psychic powers, Espy," Umbry huffed, stomping a forepaw down. "It requires a delicate touch and we both know you'd rather use your psychic abilities in battle, not for mundane stuff."

"And doing everything by holding tools in your mouth counts as delicate?" I scoffed, only for my ears to fold at the unintended harsh tone in my voice.

"It can be if I take my time… which is what I'm doing," Umbry said. He shook his head. "Besides, you are the stronger one. Someone has to keep taking job requests so we don't run out of cash."

"I know. I'm not slacking off or anything," I said.

"So, you keep getting kicked out of dungeons because you're failing jobs?" Umbry said, a worried look on his face.

"Huh? No, I finished a job this morning and put the funds in our storage box. This was… something else," I said, before realizing it might've been better to have lied about that. So, I quickly added, "And that's all I've got to say on the matter. Now, if you'd excuse me, I'd like to get myself cleaned up." Before Umbry could respond, I dashed past him, throwing the door open with my telekinesis.

"Hey, c'mon! Don't track mud into the house like that," Umbry said.

I paused in front of the doorway. Okay, yeah, he had a point. This conversation had gone bad enough. There wasn't any reason to make things worse. I levitated my towel and a bar of soap out of the house. Then I turned and trotted down the hill, taking care not to look at Umbry. I ran away from the village and the coastline, passing rocks jutting out from clusters of bushes. Eventually, my ears twitched at the sounds of trickling water.

Keeping the towel hovering a safe distance from me, I shoved my way through the bushes until I stumbled upon a rock wall. Water trickled down from a brook above the wall, forming a small, freshwater pond. I tossed the towel and soap bar onto the ground beside the pond and hopped in.

The impact freed most of the mud from my fur. Gods, I was so happy to be rid of that stuff. When I was an eevee, I didn't care much about cleanliness, but evolving changed everything. My grandma had warned me about that, but I shrugged it off. Now, I found myself cursing my espeon instincts out.

Why had I let myself get so riled up by Umbry? He was worrying about me, like any good brother should. We were supposed to be a team, but a week of frustrations had gotten to me and I had chosen to take them out on him… in a manner of speaking. Was I blowing things a bit out of proportion? Probably. Still, the whole reason I wanted to make a gift for him was to thank him for his work on the house. I doubt it would go over that well if I added unnecessary stress to his work with my bad attitude.

Satisfied the water had lifted as much mud as it could, I swam my way toward the edge of the pond to grab the soap bar. Except before I could, my ears twitched. I picked up a familiar energy pattern in my mind's eye.

It was Umbry. He was here to give me an earful over my crabby behavior.

I sucked in a breath and sank down underwater. Silently, I prayed Umbry would give up and retreat to our home. Then I remembered the towel and soap bar were still sitting up in the grass. Even with the trees shading the pond, I could see a black blob near the water's edge.

There wasn't any way around this. Sighing, I swam back up, poking my head out and blinking water out of my eyes. I bit back the temptation to say something snarky or fluster Umbry with a lascivious comment. This was a chance to apologize!

"Hey," I said, ultimately opting to wait and see what direction I could steer the conversation in.

"Hey," Umbry said, slowly sliding onto his belly and letting a forepaw dip into the pond. "I, uh, I get this probably isn't the best time or anything… but I feel bad about what happened back at the house. I'm not upset with you, Espy… though I wouldn't blame you for thinking that—"

"Umbry, stop," I said, reaching a forepaw out and putting it on his snout. He went cross-eyed, staring at his snout like a spinarak had jumped onto it. "You did nothing wrong." I pulled my paw back. "I'm the one who mucked up." I paused, then cringed at the cheesy wordplay. Apparently, racing thoughts weren't doing me any good in this situation.

I took a deep breath to collect myself, then continued, "It was wrong of me to get upset just because you were asking a few questions. The right questions, for that matter. If our situations were reversed, the first thing I'd want to know is why all our food and supplies were disappearing."

"Yeah. I still came off harsher than I meant to. I guess I'm a bit more frustrated with these renovations than I thought," Umbry said, ears drooping. He batted at the surfaced of the water. "Having knocked the can over, tomorrow's going to be the third day I have to try painting the door."

"You're not the only one who's had a sorry streak going this week. That dungeon I got knocked out in? I've been trying to get through it all week. Every time I went in, something popped up that I couldn't handle by myself," I said. "I definitely let that go to my head and snapped at you when I got home."

"If you don't mind me asking, which dungeon's giving you problems? And why?" Umbry said, his gaze fixed on his forepaw.

"It's Seabreeze Springs. The truth is… I heard Escavalier and Tympole at the juice bar the other day. They said Elder Druddigon had finally deemed Seabreeze Springs safe to enter again… and apparently there was a beautiful beach at the other end with seatacular specshells— I mean, spectacular seashells," I said, scowling as I went tongue-tied for a moment.

"So, I wanted to go there and collect some to make us necklaces." I swam over to the edge of the pond so I could rest my head on the grass. "I know you've been working hard on fixing up the house. That's why I wanted it to be a surprise." I squeezed my eyes shut. "I didn't think it'd be so dang hard to get through Seabreeze Springs."

With my explanation finished, I sighed. I poked an eye open to look at Umbry, trying to judge what his response would be. To my surprise, he sat up, looking at his reflection with a raised brow. "You wanted… to make me a gift?" he whispered.

"Yeah. Except I blew through a bunch of our supplies and now I've got nothing to show for it," I said. "I'm sorry, Umbry. This was supposed to be a pleasant surprise, but I turned it into a petty argument."

Silence followed. I rolled my head to the side, looking expectantly at Umbry. But I got nothing. Not even so much as a whisper. His red eyes were as sharp and unreadable as ever. I couldn't even get any hints from his aura. In my head, I was shouting, "Say something, you dummy!" But I held my tongue. Maybe he wasn't sure what to say? Besides, this would all be rendered worthless if I let my impatience get the better of me. And isn't that how we wound up at odds to start with?

"Heh. Y'know… it's funny," Umbry said, ending the awkward silence. "Elder Druddigon always liked to tell the kids at the town school that 'bringing out the best in one another is the hallmark of a good team.' I think we could've done with taking that advice to heart."

"What do you mean by that?" I wondered, edging myself slightly further out of the water.

"Whether it's taking on jobs in dungeons or helping out around the town, we've always done our best work together," Umbry said, laying back down so he could rest his head next to mine. "I'm the type of guy who likes to plan things out, right?"

He had a point. Umbry always planned how we could best tackle jobs, but if something unexpected happened, he tended to freeze up and get distracted. "Yeah… and I tend to do best thinking and working on my feet," I said. "Guess when you put it that way, we complement each other like… like…"

"Psychic-types and dark-types?" Umbry said, grinning cheekily. Gods, he was being serious with that one, wasn't he?

Frowning in disapproval, I used a telekinetic burst to splash him in the face. Umbry jumped up, hissing in annoyance, only for his right forepaw to meet air. He tumbled into the pond with an unceremonious splash. I turned to face him, shaking my head at the bubbles forming on the surface. Umbry poked his head out and spat out a mouthful of water.

"Okay, I deserved that," he said.

"Yes, you did," I said, watching him swim toward the rock wall and climb out of the pond. He hunched over to shake his fur out, though that didn't dry him off terribly well.

"The point is that, angry outburst or not, you were right. It was wrong of me to suggest I handle the renovations myself," Umbry said, tilting his head to the side so water could drip out of his ear. "We should've tackled them as a team, so that we could get back to taking jobs together."

My heart swelled in my chest. It wasn't that haughty sense of, "Nya, nya, I was right and you were wrong." No, it was something different: warmth. A gentle reminder of why I loved spending my days with Umbry in the first place. He was always so thoughtful, even when making a fool of himself.

"I appreciate that," I said. "That still doesn't excuse the way I treated you. Next time, if I don't agree with an idea you have, I should do a better job explaining myself… rather than complain. Does that sound good?"

"Definitely. So, what say tomorrow we tackle the door… together?" Umbry said.

"I dunno. Wouldn't tackling the door ruin all the hard work you put into it this week?" I replied, smirking.

This time it was Umbry's turn to splash me. Except he stuck his foreleg in too deep and, instead of scooping up water, gravity got the better of him. I turned away from his second splashdown of the afternoon, yet couldn't help but laugh. That proved my undoing, however, as Umbry popped up beside me and spat a mouthful of water onto my cheek.

"Okay, okay, stop. You got me!" I said, moving away from him. Umbry climbed back out of the water with a groan.

"Good thing I'd given up working for the day," he said, sighing. I was about to make a smarmy remark when I noticed a glint in his eyes. He furrowed his brow, only for his eyes to widen in surprise. "Wait a second… that's it!"

"What's it?" I asked, ears twitching from his shouting.

"I've got an idea for how we can deal with these annoying dungeons," Umbry said. "Our big problems are that we're always so unsure of what we're going to find in them, right?"

"Yeah. Isn't that the point?" I said. Where was he going with this?

"Right. And it's caused us a lot of headaches. Dungeons keep getting shut down because they're too dangerous and we keep losing supplies. But what if there was a way around that?" Umbry said, pacing back and forth along the edge of the pond. "What if we could make things a bit more predictable… or turn the dungeons on their heads for our own use?"

"I'm not sure I follow," I said, brow furrowed.

"Well, this is only just an idea. But I think that, if we work together, we might be able to figure out the source of a dungeon's randomness. If we do that, I'm sure we can come up with a way to manipulate that source," Umbry said. "That would make traveling the Mist Continent an absolute breeze!"

The implications of Umbry's idea sank again. It was so shocking, I almost dropped under the surface. "Is that even possible? Can we do something like that?" I wondered.

"Don't you think it's worth a shot?" Umbry said, staring right at me.

What was he saying? Of course I did! I nodded enthusiastically.

"Good. Then we should start planning right away." He paused, only to wince. "Err… after we finish working on the house, I guess."

"Sounds good to me," I said. "Now, uh, not to be rude, but could you scuttle along? I'd like to finish my bath in private."

Umbry glanced at the towel and bar of soap and his ears and tail stuck up. "U-uh… of course… right. H-How silly of me to forget about that," he said. Umbry dashed off into the bushes, leaving me floating in the pond, shaking my head.