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This aggressive group of Trapinch seemed to follow a pattern: the stronger the individual, the closer its territory was to the original underground base. At least, that had been true when Nova first visited this place a few months ago.
He wasn't sure if the Vibrava had changed how they claimed territory since then, but Nova still believed that landing in an area where Vibrava appeared often gave him the best chance of getting close to the underground laboratory.
Next, it was time for the scouting members of his team to earn their keep.
This search wasn't simple, though. The place they were looking for was buried beneath the sand, so Growlithe's Odor Sleuth wouldn't help at all.
As for Marshtomp, its way of searching relied on reading air currents and the faint energy drifting from objects out in the open. But a lab buried under sand had no contact with the outside air, so Marshtomp's talent wasn't much use here either.
Perhaps because it was back on home ground, Azir's search turned out to be surprisingly effective this time.
By sending Supersonic waves deep into the ground, Azir managed to locate a large hollow space beneath the surface.
Taylor was the only one who could have dug a space that large under the desert, having spent years working on this hidden research base.
Following Azir's lead, Nova wandered nearby, pausing here and there, and eventually found some clues of his own.
He remembered how his Corvisquire had once used Brave Bird to slice open an Arbok's venom sac, spraying its corrosive fluid everywhere. The spray had drenched Corvisquire and splattered across the ground in scattered patches.
That venom was extremely corrosive, strong enough to eat holes straight through solid stone.
Nova found a stone nearby marked in exactly that way.
It looked as if it had been sprayed with gunfire, covered in holes of every size, the kind of sight that might bother anyone with a fear of clustered holes.
The venom that had scarred the stone had broken down naturally after months of weathering, but the damage on its surface still remained.
Back then, the entrance to Taylor's lab had been hidden behind stones just like this one. It blocked some of the wind and sand while still blending in with the surroundings; from a distance, it looked like nothing more than a pile of broken rock, easy for any Trainer to walk right past.
Finding this marked stone confirmed that the lab entrance was somewhere directly beneath Nova's feet.
Now that the location was confirmed, all that was left was to dig.
So, who on the team could dig out a wide, usable tunnel?
Nova couldn't help but smile, thinking about the reunion that was about to happen.
"Come on out, Onix!"
The Onix Nova had caught for a second time had been resting inside its Poké Ball for a full day. Its ball had been kept alongside the Rhyhorn's balls the whole time.
But while the Rhyhorn had been let out three times a day for meals and fresh air, Onix hadn't been released even once, saved specifically for this moment.
Waking up inside its Poké Ball, Onix realized it had been caught again. Having already gone through this once before, it wasn't especially shaken. At most, it planned to wait until its so-called new Trainer let it out, then find a chance to escape.
But the moment it actually stepped out, Onix completely fell apart. The massive rock Pokémon started crying like a child.
"Why is it you again?!"
Nova patted the hard, rocky surface of Onix's body, laughing as he tried to calm it down. "Guess we're just meant to keep running into each other, friend.
Look at you, you found a new patch of desert to call home, but you still can't kick that habit of stirring up trouble, can you?
My friend Little Blue was just flying over your territory, and you threw rocks at him. Did you really think he'd just let that slide?
And now here you are, caught by me again. Come on, let's not overthink it. Let's get some work done first, and we can catch up after."
With that, Nova handed Onix a bag of all-purpose Pokémon food, making it clear that if Onix agreed to help, the food would be its reward.
This was also why Nova hadn't fed Onix earlier in the day; a full stomach would only have made the negotiation harder.
This time, with Little Love translating, Onix and Nova understood each other much more easily. Once Onix heard that the job was simply to follow Azir's directions and dig straight down, it barely counted as a challenge, since digging through the ground was practically its favorite pastime.
Unlike last time, Nova wasn't asking it to fight anything on the level of the Elite Four, so Onix was in good spirits. Digging a hole? Easy.
Just watch, kid. Is there any hole the great Onix can't dig? Leave that bag of food right there, I'll come back for it once I'm through!
No sooner said than done. The ground trembled, and the last segment of Onix's tail vanished from view, leaving behind a tunnel wide enough for a person to walk through, sloping downward.
Azir flew in first. It needed to keep using Supersonic to pinpoint the lab and guide Onix's digging in the right direction.
About half an hour later, Nova followed them down into the tunnel.
By then, Onix had already carved out a space roughly the size of a small meeting room beneath the desert. Inside a display case sat the Pokémon eggs Nova had been hoping to find, Azir's siblings, resting quietly. Months buried under the sand didn't seem to have affected them at all.
Pokémon eggs work differently from ordinary animal eggs. They aren't fragile, developing embryos, but rather the very first stage of a Pokémon's life.
As long as hatching hasn't actually taken place yet, an egg can remain in this state for an extremely long time.
In the Pokémon stories Nova remembered from his past life, there were even accounts of eggs successfully hatching after hundreds of years.
So a month or two buried in sand was nothing to worry about for an egg.
Wanting to check the eggs carefully, Nova had Rotom switch on his phone's flashlight function, hovering nearby like a floating desk lamp. Say what you will, but Rotom really was a helpful little companion.
Nova used his Scan ability to look them over. At a glance, all seven Purple-Tier eggs were accounted for, and the several dozen blue eggs were completely unharmed as well.
If Taylor had done one thing right, it was building an incredibly sturdy case to hold these eggs.
Back then, he had worried that his Frosmoth wasn't strong enough to reliably keep the Flygon Queen under control.
If the Flygon Queen had ever broken free and caused chaos in the breeding room, these expensive display cases would have been the last line of defense for his research.
Of course, all that careful preparation had now simply become Nova's ticket to a small fortune.
"Let's give our thanks to Taylor," Nova said.