Pokemon Mystery Dungeon: Recovering Memories

Chapter 4: Thief!

Lower Coral Cove

Finally, the trio had arrived at the bottom of the stairs, emerging into a huge room with a pair of cascading waterfalls in the back and a thin layer of seawater covering the floor. Between the waterfalls was a section of the stone floor that was slightly raised compared to the rest of the room, slightly peeking out of the water. On top of it was a mid-sized pile of a multitude of berries.

"Oh," Ryan said. "The berries really were down here! What a pleasant surprise!"

"See?" Ben replied, "I told you two I knew what I was doing!" Him and Lena ran over to the pile and started shoving as many berries into their bags as they could. "Now we've just gotta grab as many as we can and-"

"Um, guys?" the eevee said, sniffing the area with his enhanced sense of smell. "Something around here smells... noxious..."

Lena turned to the concerned eevee. "So? We'll be done picking them up soon, just give us a sec, kiddo!"

Ryan bristled at being called a kid. "Lena, this is serious! I'm pretty sure the berry thief is in this very room with us!"

"Oh, don't be ridiculous!" the sneasel said dismissively, continuing to shove as many berries as she could fit into her bag. "We're the only three pokemon in here, you're just imagining things!"

All Ryan could do was watch as the pokemon he had caught the scent of jumped from the ledge near the origin of the twin waterfalls and landed with a splash between the eevee and the berry pile that his companions had nearly finished cleaning up. The pokemon had the appearance of a bipedal frog, and it had yellow eyes, a red sac on its throat, and red claws on each hand.

"Hey!" the toxicroak said, sounding angry yet sluggish. "You think you can just take these berries? These are mine! I rightfully stole- er, I mean borrowed them from that alcremie lady!"

"Borrowed?" Lena asked, acting confused while knowing full well he was lying to their faces. "How do you even borrow food?"

"Y-yeah," Ryan agreed, trying to hide his fear of the poison dart frog that towered over him. "N-next time, come up with a better story, a-and try not to make a Freudian slip like that!"

From behind the toxicroak, Ben gave Ryan a funny look as their aggressor steamed with increasing anger. "I don't know what that word you just said is, but what do little sheets of paper have to do with-"

"All of you shut up!" the toxicroak shouted, pivoting around and pointing a claw right in the scorbunny's face. "You took MY berries and now you must pay!"

Instead of attacking Ben, however, he instead leapt straight at Lena to catch her off guard with a jab of poison. Almost as quickly as he leapt, the sneasel rolled out of the way, taking the brief moment before the toxicroak got back up to close her bag so the berries wouldn't fall out. During that same window, Ryan dashed forward to tackle the frog and hit him just as he was getting up, knocking him back to the ground.

"They're not your berries," Ryan said, standing on the thief's chest to keep him down. "We're gonna return them to their rightful owner."

Instead of with words, toxicroak responded by lifting an arm and poison jabbing Ryan in the side. The next thing the eevee knew, he was once again flying across the room, only this time, it was a large enough room that he didn't hit the wall. He did, however, land facefirst into the water, getting some of it in his mouth, which he promptly spat out after getting up.

"Ryan!" Lena called as she kept trying to scratch the frog, who had gotten up by now. "Your side!"

A quick look at his side revealed that purple streaks had started to appear on his fur, and he started to feel weaker little by little.