Robin turned from the edge of the power spot and greeted Gwen dramatically upon hearing her arriving footsteps. "Gwendolyn Conway ," she government named her, pointing at the other Ranger, "are you reaaaaaaaaaaaadyyyyyyyyyy to dive in?!" The theatrics made it hard to keep a straight face, so she devolved into laughter.

It was nice to have this time with Gwen. Inside the power spot, which Robin had visited a few times, it felt like all the problems of Hoenn melted away. It was so isolated from the rest of the region that, for an hour or two, the war didn't exist. She was just a Ranger on a dangerous expedition with a team that could handle it. Sharing it with Gwen would give them guilt-free time to catch up; after all, the League needed the ore mined deep inside, so they were on the clock while chatting.

"Whatcha been up to? I feel like its been forever."

Gwen walked to the entrance of the Power Spot where she and Robin had agreed to meet just in time for the mission. She had been a bit busier than usual, mostly in part to her new duties on top of her Ranger ones. Some had notice that she was scheduled less frequently than usual, although a few in the know were understandable as to why that was.

But when she heard Robin's playful voice calling to her, she couldn't help but laugh. It was the first time in what was maybe a week of nonstop work that she could do so freely. It reminded her of the old times, before they went all the way to Hoenn and became Rangers. How more carefree those days used to be.

Gwen certainly didn't miss those old glasses of hers, now fully wearing contacts since her last pair was destroyed by nesting birds a month ago.

"O-Oh. Hey, Robin."

Gishath grunted in greeting, now familiar with Robin's scent that he waddled over and bumped his head against his leg, in some hopes of collecting spare scraps of food. His grumpy expression was still present, though he wasn't hissing, so it was progress!

Gwen, however, was still reeling from that sudden awakening she had when ameena abadi that she was reeling from how utterly perfect Robin was to her. The cute twintails of hair that bounced around, or that cute face she had when things weren't falling down around them both. The ginger haired youth couldn't help but stare for a moment, look away at some shiny rock out of the corner of her eyes, and look back at her afterwards.

It would be a good time to try and recall some of the advice noah faber had given her back during their arctic rescue operation with the Cacnea. She just had to be herself, no need to try and flaunt herself as somebody she wasn't!

"A lot." Gwen smiled fondly, closing her eyes for a moment. "Where to start? So I got a job as Freya's assistant, so I'm working less Ranger shifts while I get acqainted with everything. And I've also been studying and doing Ultra Space trips with another woman, Ameena Abadi. It's waaaay more dangerous than anything in Hoenn, but it's been a wild ride! I even caught an Ultra Beast of my own~"

She grinned and stood before the entrance, opting to be the one to go in first.

"What about you? Keeping out of trouble?"

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Whoa. Gwen had been super busy by the sound of it. "That's a lot of stuff..." She didn't think she'd accomplished as much since their last meeting besides some gym losses and a lot of Ranger work. "How's ultra space treating you? I know we only did the one trip." Robin hadn't been there often. "I saw Lesser Megalopolis with Noah Faber. That was pretty cool." She pulled a face. "Not a fan of guzzlords, though."

As they traversed the power spot, they found themselves at a fork in the road. "Left is the luckier path," she asserted just as she had the few other times she'd visited a power spot. "Let's see what we can scrounge up inside." Robin knew that a lot of spooky things waited around the bend, but it was always something different. She wondered what they would see.

"The "almost dying" part kind of loses its edge after a few times, but it's been a wild ride." Gwendolyn laughed again, letting out a cute sort of snort while the two continued to walk further into the caverns here. The report about what was to lie in wait here wasn't all read and memorized to Gwen, so this would be all new territory for her. They could handle it though, as Gwen was confident in Robin's abilities.

Their journey took them across a fork in the road, forcing them to choose between two paths. Before she could even speak, RObin already had a plan in mind. As questionable as it was, they didn't really have a better option. "Left it is, bestie." Gwendolyn took place up front, leading them into the great unknown, in case anything came for her friend.

"So, uh, do you have plans after this? Like, uh, food?"

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Bestie. If only Gwen knew how much Robin wanted to change things and take it further... but she felt guilty about it, too. Like she was betraying Gwen by having these thoughts. Like she was going to ruin their friendship out of selfishness.

Food sounded good. In fact, Robin's mouth watered as she confessed, "I could kill for unagi musubi right now."

She held her breath as they walked into the area of the power spot that often spewed hallucinations, dying to see what freaky monstrosity would great them this time. Instead of a monster or half-dead pokemon, what crawled out was... a skwovet?

"Man, that fucking sucks," she blurted out before she could catch herself.

"Unagi what now?" Gwendolyn asked Robin, having never heard of the food that she had just answered about getting. It sounded Kanton, or maybe she was just stereotyping super hard right now. But at the very least, it was an in! Some girl time and getting to hang out with the friend she loved the most. noah faber's little pep talk with her crossed her mind, thinking about the advice that he had given her. The head ranger had been one of the few people who knew about her feelings for the other girl. Maybe it would be a good way to show her feelings then and there? "I'd love to try that with you."

She readied herself for what would lie inside of the power spot here, but came face to face with a fearsome looking...skowovet? It looked at the both of them for a minute before bounding away. Gwen let her guard down a little, snickering to herself as she walked in further. "C'mon, let's finish up and get some dinner. I'm starving."

[Hallucination]

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"Ungnh, unagi musubi is gonna change your life."

With the most boring interaction in a power spot ever, the duo found themselves free to grab ore. "I'm feeling hungry too. If we leave quickly, we can get out before the energy here makes us sick." It often made her dizzy, but she'd been in these spots like ten times by now. She had developed a bit of resistance. "Let's drop off our rocks so I can rock your world, yeah?" She could imagine the unagi musubi clearly...

"I'll take your word for it~" Gwen said, happy to try something new for a while. "You're the one with the culinary palette, after all. I'm still reeling after a decade of instant ramen and soda." It was just what every growing adolescent in the world needed. Caffeine and copious amounts of artificial flavoring. Once inside of the cavern, Gwen quickly moved to collect as many samples as she could gather. There was a whole lot here to stuff inside of the sack. The energies inside of here were always a bit disconcerting, and it made her feel somewhat queasy. After ten minutes or so, the two collected their haul and made a break outside.

At Robin's flirt, Gwen could feel some color come to her cheeks. "Y-Yeah! I, uh, I hope you're....Um." Shit, she needed a good pun! But what was something rock related? The ginger looked frazzled at the pun as the other girl would do her best to think of something. Eventually, she thought of something! "We, uh, shouldn't take tonight for...granite? Eheheh..."

[Escape w/ loot]