Matt was trying to not lose his shit at Isaac- it was refreshing to see that. It made him smile, rubbing the back of his neck. At least Isaac was still same old Isaac. Shaking his head, he went back to focus. Maybe they could just blow up the chest... he needed to steal Nico's gloves sometime.

At the question of the water, Matt.

Stared.

He wanted them to go in that? That was absolutely... disgusting. He didn't even have a water-type. Scrunching his face up, he looked at Josh. "You're lucky I don't sell you for one corn chip to Giratina." Huffing, he would take the Dewgong, trying to not gag on the smell.

"So the last time I help- jesus fuck." In a blind panic, he grabbed Oto's pokeball, the flying type cawing as it was released. "Shit- Hurricane, blow 'em away!"

Isaac Merlo Josh Devlin

"Thanks for the cover fire, both of you," Josh exhaled as Oto's howling winds flattened the water-types against the north wall, leaving them easy targets for Resheph's face-melting HYPER BEAM and Flapjack's PSYBEAM. Once the coast was clear, the Gym Leader reached into his supply bag to pull a vial of Antidote for Resheph to ingest, but it was already too late. The corrosive Toxapex venom had rendered her unconscious. He checked the bottom of his medical supplies, looking for crystals of Revive... but could not find one.

Resheph would be out of commission. He would have to get in that yucky water on the return trip. Furthermore, he was out of ways to fly. He still had three water Pokémon for swimming, but Josh would have vastly preferred to hover over the sewage on the way back. Shaking his head, he examined the large waterwheel chamber, seeing three grates that looked like they would crumble if significant weight were put on them. Taking a peek below each, he waved his friends around while referencing his map. "Looks like the north two are the ticket, and the south one is a shortcut back."

Josh sent out his Absol, who was quick to destroy the three gates with a NIGHT SLASH from her horn. He was quick to slide beneath where the far left grate was, his Absol following him as soon as she heard him land. In the corner appeared to be a small cache of inert Mega Stones, ones that were devoid of power. While they weren't immediately useful, they would sell for a pretty penny to the right people, especially researchers. Perhaps one of the Science Sisters would be interested.

He looped back around to the right side, as both upper levels of the basement were behind raised sluice gates they weren't going to be able to climb in reverse. Beyond the right grate were a pair of keys, each a different color. The small one had a chrome sheen to it, and looked like the one they used to get access to the levers that operated the west side's sluice gates. The large one was more ornate, and gleamed a hue of gold.

You obtained a SMALL KEY! This key will open any one locked door. You can use it only in this dungeon.

You obtained the BIG KEY! This is the master key of the dungeon. It can open many locks that small keys cannot.

Around the same spot he found the two keys, there was yet another lever that appeared to be for operating the sluice gates. He flipped it to see what it would operate. Instead of hearing the sound of a sluice gate moving, he heard the sound of thuds far to the east.

Returning to the central sluiceway through the shortcut back, Josh tried inserting the BIG KEY into the green, ornate chest's lock. It turned, the lid opening to reveal a marble-sized, black-and-white stone Josh could only recognize as a hunk of ABSOLITE. "This is it!! Eva Morales and illeana reyes 's lead did it!" he cried, sending his Absol back out. "Welcome back, Twilight! Now, MEGA EVOLVE!" He clicked the Mega Stone into place on the small pendant hidden beneath her fur, then pinched his primary two right fingers between the KEY STONE embedded within.

Twilight didn't react. She did not Mega Evolve like Josh expected.

With all the pokemon out of the way, Matt fell back into following Josh. This really was just some giant game of Zelda. But it was fun, even if he was the back up. Was better seeing Josh like this, than him having to run from him due to some idiot. Which he still needed to go punch in the face.

"... Eh?" Matt piped up, lifting a brow at Twilight. "You need some encouragement?" He asked, considering bringing out Ace, to see if that would help or not. "I'm not much into mega stones, as it was a fluke I even got mine, but uh, how's this work?"

Isaac Merlo

Josh brought the marble up to his face. "Hey Matt, do you have your Mega Stone on you? I want to take a look at them both, side by side." Provided he obliged, the Gym Leader would hold both next to each other, seeing that the one he just found was dim. He checked both with the device Eva Morales had loaned him before heading to the dangerous waterway; while both had INFINITY ENERGY readings, the reading Josh's new Mega Stone yielded was far lower. "It doesn't have the Infinity Energy needed to induce Mega Evolution." He would return Matt's Mega Stone to its rightful owner. "I want to get to the bottom of this place. The Absolite readings were pretty substantial. I wouldn't be surprised if there was an entire buried cache of them down here." The young man deeply sighed before simply mounting his Absol.

With the north gate opened now, it was trivial for Josh to access the door behind it and open it with his remaining SMALL KEY. Beyond was a dimly-lit, dry sewer that forked in two. The Mauville trainer's investigation would yield several objects of interest: a pair of closed sluice gates, one on each side, and a down-facing lever on the left. When he operated the lever, the sound of rusty sluice gates rising would creak from each side, revealing narrow passageways. "Bingo," he said with a fistpump, reining Twilight through the open gate. With another loud creak, the lever slid back into its down position as soon as he let go of it, trapping him in the fairly small room beyond.

"Hey, did that open the other one, too?" he shouted, the other two able to easily confirm the sluice gate had moved, and that it, too, was bone dry on both sides. "I'm going down the stairs!" With that, he hopped off his Absol long enough to get to the bottom of the stairs, finding a basement flooded with stagnant water that reeked of Pokémon poison. Both Josh and Twilight wheezed loudly before returning to the upper level.

"The basement's flooded with waste water, and I doubt we'll be able to swim through it! We gotta find a way to drain it! Can you let me--AGH!" Before he could finish his sentence, the three could hear sets of what appeared to be flying floor tiles whirling as fast as thrown ninja stars, coming at the three explorers at quite the clip. One of them collided with Josh's right side, neither mount nor rider able to see it in the low light. Twilight would be ready to defend Josh from the rest of them with well-placed PSYCHO CUTs.

There would be two more sets of floor tiles attacking Matt and Isaac as well, but what was causing them? Any Pokémon that either had access to Aura, or could detect the incorporeal, would be able to learn the position of three Jellicent using POLTERGEIST from the ethereal, animating the floor tiles to come flying at the humans and their Pokémon.

Matt handed over the stone with no issue, looking back at Isaac for any clues if he knew- but Josh seemed to be ahead of them in that department.

But the excitement wasn't over! The tiles came flying, going to hit Josh- Matt reached out thinking he could help, but he knew the damage was done. So he turned hard on his heel, digging his boot into mud as he slung himself in front of Isaac, arms out as he took the blow.

One nailed him straight in the face, that got a down right feral-snarl from the man. His nose bloodied and probably broken, he didn't move from in front of Isaac.

Was he trying to return a unspoken favor? Perhaps.

"Zeus!"

He called forward the dog from it's ball, who howled and used PROTECT to stop the rest of the coming tiles- but who knows if Isaac stayed put during it!

Isaac Merlo

Zeus' PROTECT did the trick, keeping both of them safe from the POLTERGEIST-possessed floor tiles. While it kept the explorers safe, the Jellicent had other attacks, too! That's where Isaac Merlo 's Mimikyu, Nemesis, came in. Able to see the ethereal Jellicent thanks to her own incorporeal nature, she was able to strike them with unerring swipes of her SHADOW CLAW.

With the intruding ghost-types down, Josh stood by the lever that opened the two gates leading to the bottom level of the waterway. "Can I get one of you to stay up here and hold this open? I'm gonna investigate downstairs." Provided his request was met, Josh would head through the now-open gate and head to the lower level with his Absol. The sound of rushing water filled his ears as he reached the bottom level, the Illumina Pokémon providing plenty of light to see by.

At the bottom of the stairs was yet another sluice gate lever. Without thinking, Josh pulled it to its opposite setting, hearing the sound of moving metal as a nearby gate dropped into place. The filthy, venomous, purple water drained out of a grate in the center of the room after the gate dropped. Conveniently, moving the large lever upward also unblocked the open path downstairs. Isaac and Matt may have been surprised when Josh came upstairs through a different entrance.

"It's all clear down there now! Let's head down!" With that, Josh would lead the way to the lowest level, completely missing two dark, corroded-metal chests that his friends may have been able to spot. Provided they were quiet about it, they would be able to pilfer their contents without the racer noticing.

Twilight let out a hiss as she carried Josh down the waterway and to a room that reeked of waste water. There were five miniature waterfalls covering the north side of an apparent dead end, with an access tunnel in the northwest corner. Josh and Twilight began circling the room, looking for clues near floors and walls covered with rapidly-drying toxins that were only harmful in their current state if ingested.

His fucking face hurt.

Pinching his nose, he snapped it back into place with a disgusting noise. Feeling light headed, the man stumbled. Dark face paled, staring off as he steadied himself from the pain. To go back to focusing, he fell back to Isaac.

Red eyes did spot those chests, but he was not interested in them. Glancing to Isaac, he nudged him and motioned with his head over towards them. See if he wanted whatever was inside!

"Don't go getting lost!"
Isaac Merlo

Josh had returned from the chamber ahead, having found treasure of his own: a PASSHO BERRY that had been stripped of its Z-Power. "I did, Isaac!" he replied over the roar of the waterfalls, showing them what he had found. "According to illeana reyes 's little device here, though, it is devoid of INFINITY ENERGY. Passho do have another use, though! Maybe it'll come in handy here."

You obtained a PASSHO BERRY! While it is devoid of INFINITY ENERGY, it can still be used by a Pokémon to reduce the effectiveness of the next Water-type attack that hits it by one step. Gone after one use.

Still without answers as to where to go even after looking at the access tunnel, Josh pulled out the longest object he had from within his backpack and thrust it into the waterfalls, one by one. When he did so with the fourth, he nearly fell off his Absol's back. "I think we found it! Just run through it! Hyah!" With that, he instructed his Absol to run at the fourth waterfall. Behind it was a hidden passage that led well above them. At its end was a gate locked with a large, golden lock that his BIG KEY would fit into easily. The Gym Leader unlocked it, then turned the corner ahead of everyone else.

Beyond was a large chamber shaped like an in-ground pool and surrounding walkway. The water within bubbled a vile purple, reeking of venom Johtonians and others who lived in regions where the species was native would be able to easily recognize it as Qwilfish venom. "I wonder if this is what's been poisoning the water in the waterway the whole time," Josh suggested. "Better not fall in."

Not long after he entered, Josh's bag began glowing a brilliant purple-pink, along with a large mass at the back of the room, splitting the walkway in two. The Gym Leader peered toward it and recognized it. It was an enormous deposit of ABSOLITE, its field of INFINITY ENERGY so dense it was almost tangible. Josh retrieved his own marble of the mineral, finding it had been recharged due to being within the dense field of energy. It was good as new!

"We did it!" Josh threw his left hand into the air as he slotted the recharged Mega Stone into its rightful position in Twilight's saddle. "Now, let's get out of--"

As if on cue, a mass of Pokémon floated out of the purple, bubbling water. It was a sphere of Qwilfish surrounding some very large spines those not native Paldeans or well-educated Sinnohites may not recognize. The many Pokémon began floating toward the trio lazily, launching barbs of POISON STING in all directions in a field so dense that it would be difficult, if not impossible, to avoid being hit by them. Furthermore, a high-pressure water jet, which was obviously being maintained by the Pokémon before them, prevented their escape. It was fight night!

Matt was chuckling at Isaac's excited attitude towards the treasure. It was nice to see. Honestly, he felt he should be at ease, but he felt all business right now. Wasn't exactly normal for him to be this up tight around the both of them. Things were crazy lately.

"Josh-" and he was off. Matt's face soured, crossing his arms. "Didn't he used to yell at me for this???" He questioned, throwing his hands into the air. "Did he not, Isaac??? Am I losin' my mind?" He asked, as if he was seeking some validation here. But Josh didn't come back as quickly as Matt liked nor did he hear him say he found the stone.

Going to sling himself onto Zeus' back, he took off through the waterfall, coming right in on the scene as Josh got into yet another fight.

"Protect!" Matt yelled, as Zeus barked, going to throw up another shining shield of light to attempt to protect the humans around him! He was a good boy!

Isaac Merlo