[Silver]

He was trying to make a more light approach to leading the team. Neither of his new teammates seemed too keen on his more forceful methods of trying to get results out of them, so he had to adapt. He tried to think about all of the things that his elders taught him over the years about guiding his team more gently. He wasn’t sure he really ‘got’ it, but he was willing to try.

“I’ll go,” Typhoon said. He really wanted to redeem himself after having lost the journal.

“Looks like I’m a lookout,” Harbor said. He was pleased with this arrangement as it allowed him to float lazily about for a while more.

[Silver]

Oko quickly submerged himself under the waves to see what he could find. It was mostly just blurry sand and rocks. He decided he needed to take a closer look and swam out toward the deeper water. Typhoon, not wanting to be left behind, sped after him.

The only real problem was that they still had no idea what they were looking for. Oko was so excited about his first mission that he hadn’t even asked for details. All they could do was assume they would know what it was when they saw it, but that didn’t really make them feel better when things were as still and quiet as they were.

[Silver]

Typhoon couldn’t get the mad Octillery out of his mind. He was no longer afraid of her finding and attacking them (well… he was mostly not afraid, anyway) but he couldn’t help but to think that something was odd about it. Why did she attack? Why was she hiding? What was that shell from?

Typhoon was so lost in thought that he nearly got literally lost. He could only just see Oko’s white scarf in the water. He sped up as much as he could to catch up with him and couldn’t slow down before crashing into his butt.

“Hey! Watch out,” Oko yelled, surprised.

“S-sorry!” Typhoon squeaked a little as he spoke.

[Hunt Complete]

[Silver]

[Hunt #4 start.]

“H-have you found anything yet?” Typhoon asked.

“No, just more ocean.” Oko sounded very annoyed by the whole thing. At least the fight was exciting.

“Do you think it’ll be all the way down here?” Typhoon looked around. He wasn’t too sure that he knew which way they came from any more. He hoped Oko did.

“Possibly.” Oko rubbed his chin as if he were thinking very hard. It was something he had seen Charlie do over the years and he wanted to look like him.

“Ok lead the way,” Typhoon said.

[Silver]

Oko stopped and looked back at him. He felt touched that Typhoon was so eager to follow him. He really felt like a leader. Even if he didn’t really know what he was doing, it felt like Typhoon had some faith in him. It gave him new vigor for the mission.

“Follow me, I want to go this way,” Oko said. He darted through the water in a random direction and pretended that he wanted to go that way all along. He still had to look like a leader, even if he had no idea what he was doing at times.

[Silver]

Typhoon was happy to see that Oko was getting it together. When one of them was more confident, it allowed the other to feel more assured that things would be okay. Typhoon often needed some reassuring and Harbor wasn’t there to do it for him, so he had to rely on Oko.

Meanwhile, Harbor was lazily floating along the waves. Nothing of interest happened besides some Wingull flying by, so he closed his eyes to enjoy the salty breeze. This was the best kind of mission, as far as he was concerned.

[Silver]

He was minorly worried about what the other two were doing down there. They were strong swimmers, so he didn’t worry about that, but he knew that Typhoon could get lost easily, and Oko… well, he wondered what Oko was up to sometimes. In his usual style, he decided not to stress about it until something gave him reason to.

Unfortunately for him, something gave him reason to worry almost immediately after he pushed his teammates whereabouts out of his mind. He felt the water beneath him stirring and out from the ocean shot a Remoraid. It flew like a rocket out of the water and into the air. It only narrowly missed him.

[Silver]

“What the..?” Harbor said.

He rolled over onto his belly so he could look down into the water. The Remoraid sank as soon as it had disappeared, but it didn’t stay away for long. After that one came another, and another, until there were as many as a dozen darting around and bouncing in and out of the water.

“Now that’s strange,” Harbor said to himself. He thought he had better tell the rest of his team what he was seeing.

Harbor realized as he ducked into the water that he had no idea where Typhoon and Oko had gone. They had simply disappeared into the darkness of the water. He couldn’t see any signs of them. He was now starting to worry. Just a little bit.

[Silver]

Harbor tried to think about which way his friends might be. He thought that if they were coming from the same direction of the Remoraid, they would probably have come to him and mentioned it by now. However, if they were captured by them (or whatever was causing them to freak out like that), then they would be where they were originating from. He rubbed his head with his flipper and tried to think.

He had no choice but to guess and hope for the best. He thought he saw them going in the opposite direction from the Remoraid, but he couldn’t be sure. He really should have paid more attention. He wished he could take things more seriously some times.

[Silver]

Harbor took a deep breath then dived into the water in the opposite direction of his new fishy friends. He was just hoping that he was right and he wouldn’t be separated from his team for long. Why hadn’t he thought of this possibility when he said he would scout on the surface?

Oko and Typhoon were still swimming around aimlessly, trying to find anything that jumped out of them. Little did they know that literally that happened to Harbor already. If only they had set up a way or place to meet each other when something happened. They clearly still had a lot of learning to do.

[Silver]

Luck was on Harbor’s side, and he soon found a big white blur that was the back of his best friend’s head. It stood out like a sore thumb against the darkness of the water. He was so excited that he picked up his speed and crashed right into Typhoon, not even taking the time to make sure it was actually him first.

“Woah!” Typhoon called out. Oko was already ready to start a fight, but he softened up quickly when he saw who it was.

“What’s going on? Why did you leave your post?” Oko demanded, trying again to sound authoritative.

[Silver]

“What? Oh! Right. I needed to find you guys, you need to see this!” Harbor was vague about what they ‘had’ to see, much to Oko’s frustration.

Eventually, the reunited trio made it back to where they had started. If they had only stayed there and relaxed as Harbor wanted, they would have come across the strange behavior of the Remoraid without any effort. If only they had known.

Typhoon looked very concerned and Oko looked almost excited to see what the fish were doing. Something weird was going on, and Oko wanted to get to the bottom of it. Typhoon was mostly afraid that he was going to get smacked by a fish. Or even worse, that they were somehow hurting or upset.

[Silver]

“I think we have to follow them,” Harbor said.

“Yea, of course we do,” Oko said. He was all too giddy about it. This was absolutely something worth reporting. First mission success!

Typhoon still looked a little conflicted. This seemed entirely too weird for him. He was worried that they might get hurt, or that something weird would happen to them. Plus, he still couldn’t get go of that feeling that he had earlier with the Octillery. Wait, didn’t Remoraid evolve into Octillery?

“Guys, I’m not so sure that we should…” he didn’t even get to finish what he was saying. Oko was already gone, and Harbor was trying to catch up with him.

[Hunt Complete]