Bailey Owens was a fucking idiot.

It was basically rule number one in the ranger handbook. It was common fucking sense. It was something even some dumbass boy scout would think to remember:

Always carry a goddamn flashlight.

Some ranger he was turning out to be. First time a civilian needed his assistance his pokemon tore up a public path in the process of trying to eat a bunch of innocent wild pokemon (in his defense, they had attacked first), and now he was stumbling around in the dark like some kind of idiot, useful to absolutely no one.

But Bailey, you might be saying, why didn't your dumb ass just turn around once you entered this dark as fuck spooky forest and you realized what kind of idiot you were? The answer to that was this moron had somehow thought his phone battery would carry him through, for whatever reason not thinking that, you know, using his flashlight app would drain the absolute shit out of his battery. And now his phone was dead and he'd tripped over tree roots at least four times.

Trapinch was out because Bailey had halfway through thought hey, maybe Trapinch can see in the dark or some shit, since it can tunnel underground or whatever, but Trapinch wasn't having any of that guide dog nonsense. Trapinch was content to scuttle along at Bailey's side like the well-trained companion he most certainly wasn't, stopping every now and then to try and eat some hapless trainer's left behind items.

So anyway, there they were, up shit creek without a paddle. Wasn't like it was so pitch black out he couldn't see his hands in front of his face, but the trees were seemingly endless and all looked alike. The forest hummed eerily around them. Insects chirped monotonously and every so often he'd hear the cries of some pokemon fighting in the distance. If there was one upside about the situation, it was that he was fairly certain there were no other humans around.

Bailey, being the number one top ranger and all, he of course didn't have a watch in this situation (rule number two in the ranger handbook!!! idiot!!!), so he brought his phone out again in some hope it had miraculously come back to life long enough for him to check its clock. The one outdoorsy trick he did know was how to tell the time by the sun in the sky but guess what god hated him and the heavy foliage above blocked that hope out.

His phone was still dead as dicks and he mumbled a curse at it. Fuck. He needed one of those backup batteries you could plug your phone into — and while he was on the subject, he needed a flashlight, and some kind of watch that could withstand how often his clumsy ass tripped, and probably a better backpack too, his already had a rip, and —

Trapinch stepped wisely to the side as Bailey plowed face first into some kind of small wooden shrine. He coughed out a solitary "Fuck!" as he tripped backward, one hand flying to a nose that probably wasn't broken, but sure felt like it was. "Motherfucker," he said, eyes beginning to water. Listen: fuck you, he wasn't crying. Bailey Owens was no crybaby. But holy shit did it hurt.

Undignified to the end, he flopped down to sit on his ass and hold his face while glaring up at the shrine. He couldn't make out details in the gloom but whatever. A shrine was a shrine. Enju City had loads of 'em. "Dumbass," he told it, not sure if he meant it or himself.

Trapinch spied something left at the shrine's base — most likely an offering of some sort — and pounced on it. Bailey watched silently as the pokemon horked down whatever it was, trying to tell himself the jingles he heard weren't the sounds of something valuable being chomped to bits by Trapinch teeth. If he wasn't cursed before, he sure as fuck was now.