After about ten minutes in Oran Acres, we had successfully gathered...twelve Oran berries. During that time, Ollie had fallen headfirst into one of the prickly Oran bushes (squashing most of the berries on it) and we had all realised that we had forgotten to grab the map from Simisage on the way out. Sparky was trying to remember the turns we'd taken after heading into Oran Acres. Eve was trying to figure out which direction we were facing and what direction we'd gone in when we entered. I was trying to make sure Ollie and Bill didn't eat any of the berries we'd gathered. Ollie was covered in blue mush and prickles from falling into the bush. Bill had offered to lick him clean but Ollie quickly declined ("I'm saving the berry juice for later!" he'd explained).

"Any luck?" Flora asked the two would-be navigators.
"Well, I'm positive we turned left as soon as we passed the sign post, but I don't really remember where we went afterwards, what with Ollie the Wally falling into the bush," Sparky said with a laugh. We all chuckled at his nickname. Something told me it was a nickname that would stick.
"Yeah, I dunno what way we came in, but I'm pretty sure that way's north," Eve said, pointing towards an area with a huge bush in the middle of it.
"How can you be so sure?" Flora asked tentatively.
"Uhhhh...gut feeling!" Eve replied, scratching behind her ear, a sheepish look on her face. "Anyway, there's a TON of berries over there, so it probably can't hurt to go that way, right?"
"That's true. Twelve berries wouldn't even make a small pie, let alone lunch!" Ollie explained, looking at the basket with the berries in it, which I was holding.
"Ollie, these are for the infirmary, not for lunch," I said, laughing and holding the basket behind my back.
"I-I-I know!" Ollie spluttered. He had clearly forgotten (or was pretending to have forgotten) the purpose of the job. Eve and I glanced at each other and laughed.

After we'd picked the huge Oran bush that Eve had pointed out dry, we sat down for a rest. My basket was just over half full, and I was surprised at how heavy it was. Picking all the berries from the huge bush had taken a while, and we were all hungry, so we each ate an apple from the supply bags. Flora made a point of guarding the berries, as well as reminding us of the fact that we were still lost.
"Ugh, I'm sorry guys," Sparky said, his ears drooping. "I think that was my fault."
"Well, none of us remembered to take the map," I said. "At least one out of the six of us should've remembered it before we left, let alone went into Oran Acres."
"Yeah, we all messed that up," Eve said, patting Sparky on the head. "At least being lost is better with friends, right?"
"Heh. True," he replied, smiling again.
"Well, at least we won't ever make that mistake again," Flora said. "Even a berry forest can be confusing if you get lost in it, obviously."
"Yeah...I'm not even sure about this way being north anymore," Eve said. "It seemed right before, but now...I dunno." She facepalmed-or rather, facepawed. "I can't believe we forgot to buy a compass! That's, like, an exploration essential! I guess you guys forgot too, huh?"
"Well, not exactly..." Flora began.
"We had one, but Sparky's Electric moves kept messing it up," Bill explained.
"Sorry," Sparky mumbled.
"Anyway, we should probably keep looking for berries," Flora said. "We can worry about finding our way out of here later."

About an hour later, my basket was full. And it was really heavy. My arms were tired. Unfortunately, Ollie was the only other Pokemon who would be able to hold the basket, and we probably didn't want to risk that. He was our friend, and we trusted him, just...not with food. Still, there wasn't much else I could do about it. I didn't want to put the berries in the supply packs in case they got squashed. I was huffing and puffing, and my long tail was drooping so much that it dragged on the ground. In fact, I had decided not to hover any more in case that was using up more energy. The others asked if I was alright a few times but each time I said that I was fine. It wasn't like anyone else could hold my basket, after all. Eventuallt, however, I had to stop and put the basket down; my arms felt like they were about to fall off. I stopped walking and was just gently placing the basket on the ground when someone crashed into me from behind. The basket and berries went flying, and so did I.

In an instant I activated whatever power allowed me to hover-it'd be a disaster if I fell and crushed the berries we'd worked so hard to gather. I put all my energy into it to make sure it worked. My eyes were closed, as they had been when whoever it was crashed into me and I fell. I didn't hit the ground, and after a few seconds of apparently being frozen mid-fall I finally opened them. I was shocked by what I saw.

Not only had I managed to stop myself from falling, I'd somehow stopped the berries from falling too. While some of them had hit the ground, more than half of them were levitating around me, with a blue aura surrounding them. I righted myself, still hovering, and stared at the floating berries. Everyone else was staring at me, with their mouths open (except Sparky, who was getting leaves and grass out of his fur-he must've been the one who bumped into me).

I looked around for the basket. When I found it, I tried to see if I could levitate it as well, while also keeping the berries up. As soon as I tried to focus on the basket, some of the berries fell, so I stopped trying. "Hey, uh, Eve?" I said, causing everyone to snap out of their awed trances. "Could you bring the basket over here? I'm going to try to put these berries back in." Eve ran over to the basket, picked it up in her mouth and returned. She placed it on the ground in front of me. I tried directing the levitating berries down into the basket one at a time-I didn't want to try doing too many at once since I'd failed to levitate the basket itself before. Fortunately I was more successful; one by one ten Oran berries slowly descended into the basket. As soon as each Berry touched the bottom of the basket, the blue aura around it faded and I felt my mind lose contact with it.

There were still lots of levitating berries, and placing them in one by one would take a long time. I also didn't know how long I could keep the remaining berries up, so I began lowering them in pairs, then triples, and so on until I finally got the last set of six berries in the basket. Once they were safely in the basket I sat down, and only once I did so did I realise how tired all that had made me. Eve walked over to me, holding an apple in her front paws. I gratefully took it and devoured it. We stayed there for a few minutes. I think the others were still trying to process what had just happened. There weren't any unpicked berries in the area we were in, and we were still hopelessly lost; it seemed we'd all underestimated just how large a berry forest could be. Fortunately the place didn't seem very dangerous. We'd seen some butterfly- and bird-like Pokemon flying around but they were all flying high above us and had left us alone. Eventually I got up and went to pick up the basket when I had an idea-and I felt stupid for not thinking of it before. "Hey, Flora, do you mind if we split the berries between the two baskets? This one is pretty heavy now that it's full."
"You know, you could've said something earlier, but sure," she replied. "After all, it's not fair that you had to carry them all."
After placing half the berries into Flora's basket, I had another idea. "Wait, guys," I said, addressing the rest of the group. "If I go higher, maybe I could see where some more berries are AND find the way out of here."
"CAN you go higher?" Bill asked.
"I don't know, but it's worth a shot. After all, I could levitate those berries and move them in any direction I wanted to-and I was already levitating myself before that, so I guess the berry thing just worked the same way as my hovering did all along."
"Makes sense to me!" Eve said, though her face betrayed the fact that she didn't quite get it.

It was easier then I thought it would be. "Flying" was really just an extension of the hovering I'd been doing before. I placed the basket on the ground before I flew so that I didn't accidentally spill the berries all over again while in the air. A couple of the bird Pokemon flying near me stopped mid flight when they saw me. They obviously weren't used to my presence in the sky. Eventually they just flew on by without speaking to me though. I was able to see some more bushes that were dotted with blue Oran berries, and called down to my friends to tell them which way to go. Eve pushed the basket I'd previously been holding along the ground while I gave them directions from the sky.

About an hour after I had first flown up into the sky, both baskets were full. Flora's arms had gotten tired holding her basket just as mine had before, so she and Sparky pushed her basket along, while Bill had joined Eve in pushing the one I'd carried as it was now full. I was glad that the baskets were now full as I was getting pretty tired using my mental powers to keep myself airborne.  Fortunately I had spotted the way out just as I was starting to lower myself. I yelled the good news down to the others. "Awesome job, Yuki!" Eve yelled back to me as I descended to the ground. Since we knew the general direction in which to go, and began passing familiar scenery, it wasn't long before we saw the sign that pointed into Oran Acres, which we'd passed going in.

"Thank goodness we're out," Sparky said with a sigh as we exited the forest.
"You can say that again," Eve replied.
"Yeah, I'm hungry," said Ollie. "Is it lunch time yet?"
"Yep," Eve replied. "Just hold on til we get back to PTOC and we'll get ourselves some of Toasty's awesome Berry soup!"
"Now you're making me even hungrier!" Ollie wailed, rubbing his tummy.
"Join the club," said Bill. "I'm starving!"
"Me too," I said. "To be honest, I could use a nap as well. All that flying's left me pretty much pooped. I guess I just need to build up my stamina."
"I'm not surprised," Flora said. "When I was just a Flabebe I couldn't really hover for very long. Not to mention the fact that I can't actually fly all, just hover."

We were sitting together at a rectangular table in the PTOC building's mess hall, with Eve, Ollie and I sitting opposite Flora, Bill and Sparky. Bill and Ollie were demolishing their berry stew and toasted bread rolls (in fact they were both on their second servings). Flora took one look at them and facepalmed. "It's not a race you know, guys," she said.
"I know, it'sh jusht sho good," Ollie replied, his mouth full of bread roll.
Eve sighed, then looked up from her food. "Anyhoo," she said, "I'd say that was a pretty successful job, huh?"
"Sure was," said Sparky. "And a fun one too, I might add."
"Yeah, even though we had a few hiccups along the way it was more fun than Berry picking usually is," Flora replied. "I guess it was a good thing we turned up late today. If we hadn't we probably wouldn't have ended up joining you guys on a job-and Eve was right when she said that the more there are, 'the more of a fun time you'll have'."
"I'll agree to that," I said, raising my soup spoon in the air. All five of the others chorused, "Me too!" and raised their spoons to mine with a resounding "ting!"