Three days after arriving in Oreburgh we were sitting in Ranger Kimura’s office, and I had to admit it was a nice place. It was a shame I hadn’t visited it last time I was here.

The Rangers had arranged beds for us at the Pokémon Center, and a doctor checked over each of us- including our Pokémon.

We all were a bit malnourished and low on vitamin D, but thankfully, none of us had any serious issues.

Sleeping in an actual bed for the first time in weeks was a dream come true, I must have slept for at least twelve hours straight that first night. The showers were even better; although I had to book a last-minute session for a groomer that specialized in Fire-type Pokémon so Kōjin wouldn’t be uncomfortable.

After some much needed R&R, we had to give our official reports. Another day of waiting later, we were called into Ranger Kimura’s office.

“So good news and bad news.” He said, and I felt a little bad for him.

While we were resting he had obviously been burning the midnight oil, with dark bags under his eyes.

“You all are receiving an official citation on your records with the Pokémon League of Sinnoh for endangering yourselves and your Pokémon in an unnecessary fashion.”

“What!?” Lucas said, shooting out of his chair. “That’s not fair!”

“Sit down. It’s entirely fair, the Rangers managed to break through into the collapsed cavern two days after you had left and found your note. There’s a reason why we tell Trainers that, in case of an emergency, you stay put and wait for help to arrive.”

Lucas sat back down, chagrined.

Ranger Kimura collected himself and continued. “In addition to the official citation, you all have received an award from the League for “Going Above and Beyond the Duties Entrusted by the Pokémon League.” Your adventures, as ill-advised as they were, did manage to find irrefutable proof of a massive tunnel and cavern network spanning Sinnoh that we are officially referring to as the “Grand Underground” as you called it in the report, Alina. Arceus knows where else it goes; it might even extend into the rest of the Four Islands chain. Plus, you all discovered Pokémon species living down there, that by all rights, should most certainly not be able to exist. It’s only been a day since I’ve submitted the report and I’ve already had numerous Pokémon Researchers clamoring for the opportunity to explore the caves.”

He massaged his eyes and sighed.

“We’ve had to declare the tunnels a Protected Area and make the entirely off-limits without permission, just based on the potential dangers involved. You all nearly died to a Tenatacruel, and you’re assistants to Professors Rowan and Birch. What would happen if a new Trainer wandered into the caves? The worst part about this is that we don’t even know where all of the entrances and exits are until somebody stumbles across one, so how are we supposed to enforce it?”

“Is there anything we can do to help?” Lucas asked.

“You’ve already done enough. No, I’m sorry, that was rude of me. No, there’s nothing you can do to help right now. The Rangers are taking over from now on, it’s just going to be a headache to figure out how to manage all of this on top of everything else.”

“For what it’s worth,” Ted said contritely. “I am sorry. I recognize how impulsive it was of us to go into the caves when we should have waited.”

Ranger Kimura fixed him with a penetrating stare. “If you were in the same situation again, would you stay put, or try and explore the caves again.”

Ted smiled, and Kimura sighed again.

“Thank you all, you’re free to go. If the Rangers need anything else from you all, we’ll reach out. Oh, and Alina? Next time we meet, it’d be nice if it wasn’t about you getting in trouble from some caves.”

“At least we figured out that the tunnels I found a couple months ago were probably connected to the Grand Underground?”

He stared at me for a second, and I swear I saw a bit of his soul leave his body.

“Please go,” He whispered. “Before you give me even more work.”

/^\

“I don’t know, I think I might keep it.” Lucas said, feeling the freshly grown hairs on his chin. “I’ve never tried growing out a beard, do you think it’ll look good?”

“No.” Ted said quickly. “Listen, I shaved almost immediately once we got to the Pokémon Center- you should too.”

“Yeah but you have that blond hair. Mine is dark, it might look better.”

“Or it might make the few hairs you manage to grow look even worse. You should shave.”

Lucas pouted for a second, before turning to look at me.

“What do you think Alina? You’re a girl, right?”

“Wow, how kind of you to notice.” I said flatly. “Last time I checked, yes, I was.”

And thank Arceus for that.

“Well, what do you think? I should grow it out, right?”

I stared at the three slightly curly hairs on his chin.

“You should shave.”

He flinched back at the suggestion, carefully shielding his three ‘beard’ hairs.

“Moving on to more important matters-”

“Hey! My beard is important!”

“What are we going to do now? I mean, we’re way off of our planned path.”

Ted frowned and looked around at Oreburgh City. It hadn’t gotten hit nearly as hard as Eterna City had because of the storms caused by Primal Kyogre and Archie, but it still wasn’t pretty. From what I had heard, the mines had suffered several cave-ins, and they were still trying to get back into working order.

The worst part was that one of the minor earthquakes had caused a section of the tunnel to collapse, revealing a connection to an underground aquifer that flooded the lowest levels of the mine.

The author's tale has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.

No coal had been shipped out of Oreburgh City for the past several weeks. The talking heads on the news were beginning to worry that without its fuel, many cities and towns would start to suffer electricity shortages. Oreburgh didn’t just supply the cities of Sinnoh, but most of the Four Islands and the rest of the world.

I wasn’t sure if it was as bad as people were worrying about. The Pokémon world was pretty good about using alternative power sources like solar and wind energy. Even so, it was just another consequence of Archie’s madness.

“Well,” Ted said slowly. “We’re here, so we might as well see if the Oreburgh City Gym has any spots open.”

“You think they will?”

Ted shrugged. “One way to find out.”

We wandered over to the Gym, only to be absolutely overwhelmed with noise as soon as we opened the doors to the building. Dozens of conversations washed over us, and I almost had to take a step back from the sheer force of the sound.

“What’s going on?” I had to shout to be heard.

“I don’t know! Let’s go find out!”

Lucas led the way over to the front desk of the Gym, where a harried looking man was trying to keep his head down as he typed into his computer.

There was a small bubble of space around the desk that was only slightly quieter than the rest simply due to the fact that there were fewer people standing there.

“Hi, what’s all this about?” Lucas asked.

“Oh, there’s more of you. Great.” The man said. “I suppose you’re all here to take part in the competition?”

“What competition? We’re here to schedule a Gym Battle with Leader Roark.”

The secretary looked over the top of his glasses at us. “You’re joking, right?”

“We just got into town a day or two ago.” I confirmed. “We’ve been out of the loop for a while. What’s going on?”

He sighed.

“Leader Roark, in his infinite wisdom, has set up a new task for the Trainers of Oreburgh City. In addition to the standard Gym Challenges, he has also created a weekly competition to help clean out the mines.”

“Oh?” Ted leaned forwards. “How does it work?”

“Trainers, under the supervision of mine workers and Gym Trainers, will go into the Oreburgh Mine. There they’ll do whichever task needs to be done to help get the mines operational. Usually, it’s something along the lines of pumping water out, clearing out the sections of tunnels that have collapsed- that kind of thing.”

I frowned. “What if there’s a Trainer with no Water- or Rock-types? Won’t they be at a disadvantage?”

“In terms of clearing cave-ins? Yes. But the pumps have been modified to allow Pokémon of different types to run them. Electric-types run generators, there’s wheels to run on, and they’ve even whipped up some steam engines that power the pumps for Fire-types.”

That perked me up a little. It might be good training for Kōjin.

“How do you measure it?” Lucas wondered, stroking his chin hairs like they were an actual beard.

“Simple, by how much mass of stone is excavated or how much water is pumped out. Each Pokémon type is a different prize category, since it wouldn’t be fair to measure a Water-type’s control over pumping out water when compared to a Fire-type, after all. Besides that, there’re sliding scales to accommodate different species, evolutionary levels- it’s a whole deal.”

“What about the prizes?”

He sighed again. “That’s what everybody wants to know. Each category has its own prizes. Third place wins cash. Second place wins a Technical Machine. First place wins an evolutionary stone.”

Lucas and Ted both spluttered. “An evo stone?” The younger man asked.

“What kind?” The older one said at the same time.

“Yes, and it’s random. There’s a random picking once the day of work is over.”

“How can the Gym afford that?” Was my question.

The secretary laughed. “Miss, this is the Oreburgh City Gym. If Leader Roark doesn’t dig up at least one new evolutionary stone whenever he goes into the mines, it’s considered a bad day. He’s more than happy using the evolutionary stones as a prize if it means getting the mines back up and running.”

“How do we enter?” Lucas asked eagerly.

A clipboard with a sheet of paper was pushed forwards, many names and phone numbers already written on them.

“The competition officially begins at noon, you still have half-an-hour left. The miners will take you from here. Is there anything else you need?”

“Nop-”

“Yes, actually.” I said, pulling Lucas back a step. “Can you schedule us for some Gym Battles?”

“Oh. Right.” Lucas coughed.

The secretary pulled out another clipboard, and pushed it forwards.

/^\

“Oh come on Alina, isn’t this great?”

“No.”

“Where’s your sense of adventure?”

“Dead and buried in a tunnel beneath Eterna City.”

“It’s not that bad.” Ted said, throwing me under the bus. “We actually know that there’s a way out this time.”

“Ted,” I took a deep breath. “Not helping.”

The mouth of the mine loomed before us, although I did have to admit that it was much nicer than the one by Eterna City. It was squared off, there were plenty of supports, and it was well-lit with bright industrial-strength lights.

I even knew rationally that I was only going down to the first level of the mine where the pump generators were set up. I would still be able to see daylight from where I would be competing.

Despite all of that, it was still a cave.

Taking a deep, somewhat ragged breath, I looked down to Kōjin. He was sitting at my side, looking at the mine entrance with a doggy grin. His tail thumped against the ground so hard that his back legs were jittering back and forth.

He must have felt my gaze, and he arched his back so he was looking up at me. Then he took his head, complete with the rock-like fur, and rammed it into my leg as a show of support.

I sighed, leaning down carefully so I didn’t collapse.

“Kōjin, I appreciate the support,”

His grin grew wider, and he reared back to give me another headbutt, but I caught his head in time.

“But you really can’t keep headbutting me. I’m not a Hisuian Growlithe like you, I can’t take the same kind of hits that you can.”

Kōjin’s head cocked to one side as he stared at me, dark eyes wide under the fur.

“No, don’t give me the Baby-Doll Eyes.”

He whined.

“And none of that either. You’re my pal, no matter what, but you can’t go around smashing things with your head.”

Kōjin sighed, and pawed at the ground.

“Got it?”

He huffed.

“Good.” I scratched at his favorite spot, just behind his ears.

His leg thumped on his ground.

“Okay,” I said, turning back to the rest of the group who were trying not to smile. “Let's go.”

We followed the stream of Trainers who were challenging Roark’s mine competition, most of whom were wearing the dirty overalls and hard-hats of the miners who normally worked here. I wasn’t sure about how fair it was to have them take part in the competition when this was their job, but at the same time, I supposed that they weren’t actually able to work considering the cave-ins.

Soon enough we were all standing in a cavernous chamber that was filled to the brim with a motley collection of mining equipment and vehicles, along with a maze of conveyor belts that were stained with coal dust.

“Welcome, everybody!” Roark said from his position on top of a crate. “To the fourth weekly Oreburgh Mine Clearing Competition!”

A ragged cheer emerged from the crowd gathered before him.

“It’s been an interesting month hasn’t it? There’s been some problems with the past couple weeks and how we’ve managed them,”

Some jeers and chuckles flew up at him, and he laughed and waved them away.

“But we’ve managed to iron them all out. Or at least, until we find new ones!”

More cheers, and Roark held his hands up.

“You know how this all works! Those who wish to pump out water, please go to the left! Those who are looking to clean out the rocks, go to the right!”

Ted nodded. “Alright folks, I suppose this is where I’ll catch you later.”

Lucas and I had signed up to pump out the water, with our Fire-types working to operate the steam-pumps. Ted, on the other hand, had decided that Switchback would be better suited to cutting and breaking the rocks.

“Good luck!”

With a wave, he headed off towards the much larger group of miners who were waiting to break the rocks.

“Well,” Lucas said, cracking his neck. “Let’s try not to get trapped in the cave this time.”

I smacked him on the back of the head.