[attr="class","samcam"]

"No, I hadn't. Funny how that worked out..."

Adrian is able to eventually catch up to the Arcanine, overhearing the endearing little exchange and finding himself at ease despite running across a stranger. What's more is he can recognize Angelo from their match during the height of the Hoenn Star Tournament last summer.

Arcanine manages a guilty huff before returning to its trainer, brushing against his leg as it circled back around to face Angelo, or more specifically where the treats had come from. They had a one track mind, dogs.

"Angelo, right? That was a pretty flashy match last year, huh?" His face softens into a smile and he affords himself a moment's respite, padding over towards Angelo before taking a seat upon the forest floor, feeling the grass tickling at him. Might as well take a breather for now.

"So what brings you here? I've got a few guesses, but..."

It would be quicker for both of them to speak plainly.

---

angelo vestri
"A DEADLY JOB"

[attr="class","samcam"]

"Oh? You'd better train well, then."

Adrian wasn't the sort to lose twice, but this kind of well-meaning banter suited him, even if his ego was bubbling to the surface throughout. Noticing a journal closing shut in their hands, he assumes they were here at their leisure. He supposes it doesn't hurt to ask, though.

"There was actually a pro athlete that's been reported lost out here. I'm trying to find him, or what's left of him..." Adrian stares around the environment, feeling ever so faintly on edge. Arcanine seems more than at ease, nipping at flora nearby while they converse, which gives him some reassurances. Besides, he had his suspicions.

"...I'm more worried they got lost in one of the distortions that emerged here recently." Many incredibly brave—or just insanely naive—Hoennians had punctured the volatile membranes housing the spatial distortions, despite the League's earnest warnings and cautionary measures. Some reported feeling older while inside, while others still remained aged when exiting, with only a fraction of those recovering over time after disembarking. And then there were those, forever altered by the magicks at work.

Yet you might argue them luckier than those who never returned at all, either stuck within the hellscape for the rest of their days, or perishing in some unsightly way.

"I'd like to be wrong on this one, to be honest."

A pensive silence lingers in the air after he speaks. Sometimes the cost of bravery and power led to unintended consequences. A box of cigarrettes emerges from a pocket as he clambers to find a lighter, lighting the coffin nail before tucking it in the corner of his mouth.

---

angelo vestri
"A DEADLY JOB"

[attr="class","samcam"]

"Someone who didn't come along prepared for it. Could've been biking along the trail right when it happened, or maybe something slipped out..." He'd never given it any thought before, but there had to be a very real possibility of pokemon following trainers back through, or passing through the distortion's membrane of their own accord.

Angelo remained optimistic, but he wasn't so sure. So far as he gleaned, it wasn't their first trip into the greenweald. Unless they'd struck out on an as yet unexplored trail, he had no reason to believe they could've gotten spun around.

...And this guy was supposedly fun at parties.

"We'd cover more ground that way," he conceded, giving his assent to their voluntary assistance. But he couldn't help shaking the feeling it was all for naught, though perhaps he was looking out at the world through a muddled lens; always betting on the worst outcome.

"I've got the forest floor covered. They gave me one of his old jackets for scenting," not that it'd been overly helpful so far. Rolling a satchel bag off his shoulder, Adrian rummaged through it before unfurling a sporty jacket. Once more Arcanine approached, huffing the scent before looking around in a sort of trance while it sniffed.

"If I find something, you'll know."

---

angelo vestri
"A DEADLY JOB"

[attr="class","samcam"]

"Dark-haired male in their early thirties, rides a bike. He was training for a triathlon." Adrian wondered what he'd be able to see from on high, but the emergence of two Pidgeot allayed his concerns. If anything, they stood a better chance of finding substantive evidence than he would from the ground—and diminished their chances of running afoul of something in the woods.

"Sounds good. Give a holler if you find something, and we'll come racing after." It wouldn't take but a minute for Arcanine to cross the forest with Adrian on its back, but for now they would scout the area at a measured pace. Running his hand against Arcanine, Adrian veered them towards an as yet unexplored neck of the woods.

"Hmm?" Apparently drinks were on him, which made sense after seeing the random lint and other junk they'd pulled out of their pocket. It suited him just as well, assuming they found anything reportable. "Fair's fair," he grins. Otherwise they were just wasting their time on a cold case.

---

They break off on their own trails, and Adrian pays heed to his senses: Rays of light break through the forest canopy while the sound of rustling leaves and the denizens of the forest buzz in his ears in their myriad ways, all while he scans the ground for signs. Arcanine pads up alongside him, occassionally sniffing at the winds, but otherwise cannot catch the scent in the air.

This goes on for what may have been an hour, as the angle of the lightrays begin to shift and the palette of the woods adopts the colors of a setting sun. A rich, golden aura deepens the canvas, admittedly making it harder for him to discern greater detail from his surroundings the more it progresses. Running out of time out here...

As he passes by some otherwise unsuspecting bushes, he notices one of them has been trampled over; stemming branches lie scattered along the ground, and there is a single groove in the earth. What even does that? Adrian insists on a closer look as Arcanine follows closely behind him, its ears folding back as it steps off the trail cautiously. It's not until he approaches the bush that he notices:


In his fixation he never noticed the sounds of the forest quelled suddenly, a shift in the wind that causes Arcanine's eyes to light up as it shifts its gaze upwind. He's unsure what to make of it when he hears a twig snapping, and all at once the silence becomes unbearably overwhelming.

The hairs on the nape of his neck shoot up, with a shiver rolling along his spine. Slowly he lifts his head upwards, noticing Arcanine has hunched low to the ground and is staring somewhere past his shoulder. While not always so easily perturbed, the unknowable, feral nature of the threat leaves him momentarily incapacitated. Arcanine sniffs once more at the air, a low growl on its lips.

And then it takes off in an instant, a flash of black-on-orange that comes bounding towards Adrian, knocking him down as it pounces over him and towards a patch of undergrowth. Its snarling maw opens up, its teeth gnashing as it assails some unknown entity, which forces from it a guttural roar that chills his blood.

It was so ferally raw and anguished, betraying its size and ferocity as an unseeable scuffle broke out beyond the bushes. But what's more alarming is that Adrian recognized its outraged call from his time with Mars in a recent space-time distortion. So it's actually happened...

Adrian, winded, sluggishly finds his bearings while the clash ensues; yowling and bellowing at one another, the creatures engage in combat until finally a torrent of flame erupts from beyond the undergrowth. Something massive and heavy begins barrelling deeper into the woods, causing a ruckus that could be heard as it disappeared into twilight. Arcanine emerges with a whimper shortly.

It's a soft whine, not a desperate cry for help, and so he can for the moment feel a sense of relief washing over him, all the while a looming sense of unease takes hold over him. This was definitely something to follow up on.

"ANGELOOOOOooooooooo!" Hands cupped to his mouth, Adrian calls out loudly, enough to rattle the birds from their safehaven in the trees and send his voice cascading through the forest while he and Arcanine lick their wounds.

---

angelo vestri
"A DEADLY JOB"

[attr="class","samcam"]

"No, not in a technical sense," Adrian suggested sincerely, taking a moment to recollect what he'd been able to see before casting Angelo a cautious glance. "There's a groove in the soft parts of the earth here, almost like... A wheel?"

Could've been the result of a pokemon battle too, he supposed, but there was more to it. Adrian had detected only a faint hint of its aura, but it was uniquely disposed, just like the ones he'd seen in distortions. It wasn't enough to be certain, but between that and how violently feral the pokemon was... The location of their disappearance, and the first few distortions... "There's some tracks up ahead."

Adrian stumbled forward feeling a little lightheaded, gesturing to the prints that disturbed the natural state of the forest floor. Whatever it was walked on four legs, but had differing amounts of claws on its fore and hind. He took out his phone and scanned it with his pokedex app, though it hesitated to draw a comparison until...



"Hmm... I think I would've seen it standing there if it were on two legs, besides—these tracks belong to something quadrupedal..." Adrian showed the results to Angelo regardless, but then he figured it might be worth showing it to the only witness among them: Arcanine.

"C'mere girl," he calls out affectionately, running a hand through their fur as they curled around him where he stood. "Take a look at this... Is this what you saw?"

She whined and hesitated to answer, her head tilting and her low grumble giving mixed messages to the way her eyes seemed to recognize the creature trapped in the screen. It remained inconclusive.

"I could keep going, but... It's going to be dark, and I don't know what we'll be running into. Could be dangerous." Like the Type:Null that a group of kids had run into unwittingly, or the Ultra Beasts that were suspected to be roaming the wilderness after the initial Megalopolan invasion.

And Adrian hated dealing in unowns as of late.

"I can leave a report with the League. Maybe give the family some closure that way..." It wasn't like he wanted to lie about it, and he doubted this would be the last time anyone went looking. But so far as he could tell, this particular sports star had fallen into the belly of beast.

And there was no climbing back out from that, whether you were a professional rock climber, super athlete or otherwise. Guy was likely dead as a doornail by now.

---

angelo vestri
"A DEADLY JOB"