The next day Aleron looked at the water rather despairingly. "Are we sure we have to?" she asked mournfully. She'd already made sure the two Orbs and the Eevee egg were settled in her bag. Now all she had to do was get Gyarados to cooperate.

"Starmie can't tow us both, even with the Surf HM," Margaret replied, already digging out her Dive HM as well. "And neither of us have been there, or have the appropriate pokemon, so we can't fly there."

Aleron sighed. "Yeah, I know." She sighed. "Alright, let's get this over with..." She pulled out her own HMs, since she still had to teach Gyarados Surf and Dive. Hopefully this wouldn't be too bad. She released the pokemon, and he grumbled before lowering himself some to look at her. "Feel up to learning something new?"

Margaret was already working with Starmie to get it to learn Dive. She was reluctant to teach it, since it meant unbalancing the moveset she'd taught it before, but it was necessary to be able to get to Sootopolis City. Once she'd taught Starmie and stripped down to her bathing suit, she waited for Aleron.

Aleron stripped down to her bathing suit as well, stuffing her clothes in her bag, before she looked at Gyarados. He had learned both moves, which was good, now to see if he cooperated.

She got into the water since that was unavoidable and managed to get up on Gyarados's back, what of him was above the water. "Okay. I think we're okay for the moment."

Margaret nodded and grabbed onto Starmie.

"Feel free to Psybeam any Tentacool you see," she told it. "Keep them out of our way." Starmie flashed a few times and towed her out into open water, in the direction they needed to start off in. Margaret knew from the map that there were reefs to navigate around, but so far they were doing good.

"Follow Starmie, and if any Tentacool get in the way feel free to use force," Aleron said, sitting down for the ride. Gyarados grumbled and started after Starmie. After submerging himself enough that Aleron yelped and almost tumbled off, having to climb up and hang onto his neck instead.

Margaret looked around at the yelp and bit her lip to hide a snicker. Yeah, they had figured Gyarados wouldn't make this easy. Although it helped that he stuck out very vibrantly against the water and blue sky. It would be really hard for him to wander off without Margaret noticing, even if he took Aleron underwater with him.

Aleron scrambled up on top of his head as he went all the way under the water, although he didn't actually try to drown her. He came up again enough that she wasn't in danger.

Margaret couldn't help it, she had to snicker a little bit. Yeah, Gyarados was doing that on purpose and enjoying every second of it, she could tell.

Aleron growled and spat water out to the side, grumbling to herself, but she stopped complaining when Gyarados terrorized the Tentacool in the area to get out of their way. And this was why she had the giant water pokemon that could terrorize everything.

Margaret snickered a little bit when the Tentacool all got terrorized. She had no real sympathy for them; they'd gotten on her nerves in the past. Finally, the girls managed to get to the deep water around the naturally outer wall of Sootopolis City.

"This is where we need to dive," she said to Aleron.

"Okay." Aleron took a deep breath. "Hear that? You get to go diving now."

Gyarados grumbled and then sank under the water while Aleron scrambled madly to find a good hand hold on his head.

Margaret clung to Starmie as they went under, as well. Almost immediately, she could see the entrance to the city: there was a hole in the rock wall big enough for a Wailord, and it seemed to be connected to a tunnel that led inwards and upwards. She nudged Starmie towards it and gestured for Aleron and Gyarados to follow.

Gyarados followed, although he was taking his time swimming along, brushing close to the walls. Aleron was too busy clinging to him to try to scold him for it.

Margaret rolled her eyes. At least Gyarados was following at all. Once Starmie cleared the tunnel, the pokemon automatically surfaced again and ended the Dive. Now they were in the lake that the city was built around.

Gyarados took his sweet time getting to the surface, and when Aleron was out of the water again she started swearing.

"How to we get to this Cave of Origin?" she asked, glaring down at Gyarados still. He was far too smug.

Margaret looked around. The city was arranged in tiered rings around the walls of the caldera, so she could see everything on the terraces. She paused when she saw something smack in the middle of the terraced wall directly across from the entrance of the city. She pointed to the large gate set into the rock.

"I bet that's it," she said.

Aleron nodded and directed Gyarados that direction, looking at the large gate.

"Okay. So now what? We go in, set the Orbs down, and hope we don't end up with pissed off Legendaries?"

"I hadn't plotted quite that far yet," Margaret admitted as Starmie pulled her over to the base of the caldera wall. There was a path leading upwards to the cave opening. "Either way, the legends link the Cave of Origin with the gemstone orbs, so it's worth a shot."

"Alrighty then." Aleron got off when Gyarados was close enough to the edge, recalling him and settling the ball back on her belt. "Well. Let's see how this goes." She went over to the gate, pulling it open slowly.

Margaret followed Aleron, recalling Starmie and adjusting her bag on her back. She helped Aleron with the gate, and slipped inside with her friend.

Aleron started walking, glancing around as she did. Kind of dark, a little damp, but not bad overall. So far.

"It's a good thing this cave isn't vaguely creepy or anything."

"I'm just glad we haven't been swarmed by Zubats yet," Margaret replied. "That would suck."

"No kidding."

Which is why, not even five minutes later, a bunch of Zubat started screeching and flying away, startled by the girls.