Hello everyone, and welcome to what appears to be the first crossover for Monster Hunter and Nicktoons Unite!

My name is JustAnotherFan15, but everyone calls me JAF, and I shall be your host for however long this story manages to capture your interest.

Quick shout-out to Voltaradragoness, who I spoke to last year when I first thought of this story. I told them about it, and they encouraged me to write it. Sorry for the long wait, but I'm back and ready to share this with everyone!

To a degree, since I only have this chapter complete and I realized that the entire story was goin' to be my longest one ever. Seriously, this is goin' to be a monster of a story! *crickets chirp* Well, I thought it was funny...

Anyway, there is no set update schedule for this story because I'm still on chapter one, and have zero idea how long it's goin' to be. I'm completely serious, I have no idea how long my chapters are goin' to be. I have so much story to cover since this is basically the Monster Hunter Stories game with some twists. Heck, while planning ahead, I think I accidently threw in Monster Hunter 4 Ultimate and Monster Hunter 3 Ultimate! Or at least 4... I think I might be goin' backwards...

Another reason for no set schedule is because, like I said, this is the first of its kind. I don't know how many people will even see this. That makes it pretty much perfect for someone still struggling with Writer's Block. I can go as slow as I need, and (hopefully) not lose readers! Watch, now that I said that, I'm goin' to have the most readers I've ever had for a story.

Well, with that out of the way, and more Author's Notes at the end, let's get on to the Summary! The full one that is!

Summary: SpongeBob 'Bobby' SquarePants: food lover and newly fledged Rider. Just two years after a horrible attack on his village by a strange Nargacuga, Bobby has finally become a Rider, just as he always dreamed he would be! Things turn bittersweet as his best friend, Patrick, leaves the village to hunt down Blighted monsters. With all his friends leaving the village, Bobby soon follows. But beware! Riders haven't been seen or heard of for years. Mistrust with be strong, will he be stronger?

And that's the full summary! Will SpongeBob be able to survive in the outside world? Will Patrick be found before it's too late? What's the Blight?

Only one way to find out! Read on, and Ride!

Disclaimer: I do not own Monster Hunter Stories or Nicktoons Untie! Or their respective creatures or characters. I merely own my own imagination, ideas, and thoughts. Thank you for understanding.

Prologue: So it Begins

"Guys! Come on, hurry!"

SpongeBob 'Bobby' SquarePants blinked his eyes before squinting into the trees surrounding him. Bobby was a young man of thirteen, with wavy blonde hair tied back in a braid with clams and shells between his shoulders. Large blue eyes blinked again, crossing as a butterfly landed on his freckled nose, the orange freckles trailing across his cheeks.

The butterfly flew off as Saraday 'Sandy' Cheeks, one of his best friends, and the one who spoke earlier, trotted up to him with his other friend, Patrick Star.

Sandy was a tough girl Bobby's age, with blonde-brown hair in ringlets around her round face and slightly darker skin and deep brown eyes. She was wearing a pale yellow, light blue, and orange long sleeved shirt she had made herself and dark blue trousers. Though her sandals probably weren't the best choice for walking in the forest, she didn't seem to be having any discomfort, despite the fact that they had been walking for almost an hour without a break.

Patrick, who was also their age and two inches taller then both Sandy and Bobby, groaned. Sweat matted his short pinkish-brown hair, and his black eyes squinted in annoyance at the girl, his normally palish skin flushed pink and red. He was a slightly more overweight boy, though he didn't seem to care, wearing a white short-sleeved shirt, black trousers, and brown boots.

"Come on, Sandy! Can't we have a break at least before we get to... wherever you're taking us?" Patrick complained.

"Oh, get a grip, Pat!" Sandy huffed good-naturedly. "We haven't been out here that long!"

"No, but you haven't told us where you're dragging us out to, and if we don't get back soon, we're going to get into trouble for leaving the village!" Patrick said.

"Don't worry, Patrick, it's not too much farther," Sandy said, ignoring the last part of his sentence.

Sighing and shaking his head fondly, Bobby walked over to a small pool of water to get a drink and cool off. He knew from experience that his friends loved to argue with each other and it would be at least a few minutes before they moved on again.

Kneeling next to the pool, Bobby scooped up some water in his hands and splashed it onto his face. He did this a few times before stopping to blink the water out of his eyes. Looking down, he glanced at his reflection for a moment. Taking in his features, he glanced at his clothes for a moment before getting a drink. He was wearing a light blue short tunic, leather belt and gloves, gray britches, and knee-high boots.

It wasn't any different to his normal clothes, except for the last addition that he had added before leaving the village: a short white and red accented cloak with two sticks tied to the sides of the hood, the cloak was held together with a thick yellow rope. It looked exactly like the ones both Sandy and Patrick were wearing, and similar to the cloaks that the Riders in their village wore.

That's what Bobby wanted to be, a Rider. Someone who has the ability to Bond with monsters with a Kinship Stone. His village, Bikinibotomu, was one of the last places where Riders still existed, living alongside monsters and working with them.

Monsters in Bikinibotomu were treated like family and with great respect. Even monsters they didn't Bond to and used as food or materials were shown great respect, as they gave their lives to allow them to live theirs.

To become a Rider, you had to show the potential and willingness to Bond and raise a monster. If you did, once you turned fifteen you would be given a Kinship Stone and a monster to raise. You would then take the Stone and monster to the caves behind the waterfall on the opposite end of the lake not far from the village to an ancient spring to purify the Stone. Once done, you returned to the village to begin your training to be a fully-fledged Rider and given a mentor.

It would be a lot of work, but Bobby was nothing if not determined. And he would have Patrick to work with, since he also wanted to become a Rider, like his late father had been. Sandy never showed much interest in becoming a Rider, which was okay, there was plenty of other things in the village to do. But she confided in Bobby one day as they were gathering water that she didn't want to be a Rider or anything like they have in the village. She wanted to find that one thing only she could do, and she wasn't sure she could find that in Bikinibotomu.

A hand clamping down on his shoulder startled Bobby out of his thoughts.

"Hey, SpongeBob, you okay? You zoned out there for a few minutes," Sandy said, looking at him worriedly. Shaking his head, Bobby got to his feet, grinning at his worried friends, showing off his two bucked teeth.

"Yeah, I'm alright, Sandy," Bobby assured her and Patrick. "I just got my head stuck in the clouds again, that's all! I was thinking about how I could be a Rider in just over a year." he admitted sheepishly.

Sandy rolled her eyes, but smiled fondly. "Don't worry so much about it, SpongeBob," she told him. "You and Patrick will become Riders, I just know it!" she assured him. She grinned suddenly. "And that's why I brought you guys out here!"

"Oh sure, you tell Bobby while we came out here," Patrick complained, not really upset.

"Hush, Pat. I brought y'all out here because... I found a monster nest!" Sandy revealed, grin widening when the two boys snapped their heads towards her in shock.

"Wait, really?" Bobby asked, a grin starting to form. "You found one?"

Monster nests were just as they were called – a monster's nest. Because monsters didn't want anything to happen to their eggs – or live young, depending on the monster – they hid their nests to keep unwanted company out, so it wasn't easy to find or get to one.

Finding monster nests was also the only way to get a monster for Riders. You had to find a nest and steal an egg. Only one, so you didn't mess with the ecosystem. Every egg was different, and you could tell what kind of monster you found if there was no adult around by looking at the egg.

Of course, just because there was a monster at the nest, didn't always mean it belonged to that monster. You had to be careful if there was a carnivore at the nest, it could be a protective parent, or hungry intruder.

"Yep!" Sandy said happily. "It's just a bit further, and a slight climb."

That got Patrick's attention. "What do you mean 'slight climb'?" he asked suspiciously.

Sandy smiled mischievously and didn't say anything.

"That's what you call a 'slight climb'?" Patrick huffed incredulously as he bent over his knees, gasping for breath.

Bobby wasn't much better, red in the face and unable to form any sentences to express his agreement with Patrick. He settled for giving Sandy his best 'I-am-unable-to-breathe-but-know-I-am-blaming-you' look.

Sandy, the lucky vixen, was barely even breathing hard, a grin that hadn't left her face since the friends had arrived at the base of the giant tree they had just climbed.

"Yep! That was nothing," Sandy agreed, either ignorant to or ignoring the two out-of-breath boys. "Look!" she pointed towards the center of the nest they were in, which made up the entire top of the tree.

Glancing over, the boys gasped, this time in awe as they noticed that, yes, they were in a nest and that there were eggs in said nest.

Catching their breaths, the boys followed Sandy as she stepped closer to the eggs. Looking over them, Bobby noticed that they appeared to by Flying Wyvern eggs, because of the squiggly horizontal lines along their shells. He didn't know which Flying Wyvern they belonged to, but there weren't that many found around Bikinibotomu, and the ones that could be found... well, Bobby suddenly felt a strong urge to leave, before the mother (or father) returned.

"Whoa!" Patrick said, seeming to forget his irritation with Sandy. "Any idea what kind of monster they belong to?"

"Some kind of Flying Wyvern, but I'm not sure which," Sandy replied, smug as she watched Patrick's slack-jawed expression.

"Umm, guys?" Bobby started nervously. "This has been great and all, but maybe we should start heading back now? I mean, the sun's starting to go down, and we don't want to be caught outside the village by a monster after dark."

That was true, though the monsters he was thinking of could very well show up before sundown anyway.

"Oh, don't be a spoilsport, SpongeBob," Sandy said, waving her hand nonchalantly. "Hey, look at that one! It's different then the rest!"

Bobby sighed before following Sandy and Patrick as they jogged over the a white and red egg towards the edge of the nest. The three friends surrounded the egg, looking down at it curiously. It didn't look like any kind of monster egg that they knew.

"What kind of egg is it?" Patrick asked, frowning down at the mystery egg.

"I don't know, Pat," Bobby replied, frowning as well. "It doesn't look like any kind of egg I've ever seen."

"Me neither," Sandy agreed.

They stood around staring at the egg for a few moments, before Sandy got an idea.

"Hey," she said, getting the two boy's attention. "Why don't we just hatch the egg and find out?"

"What?" Bobby and Patrick asked in unison, confusion coloring their tones.

"You know, since y'all are going to be Riders in a few years, you need your own monster to raise, right?" she asked.

Patrick frowned. "But, they give us a young monster that they think we'll work best with so we can get our own monster eggs later," Patrick told her.

That was true, the chief and head Rider instructor would pair the new Rider up with a monster they believed would suit the apprentice Rider. As the apprentice grew with the young monster and learned to take care of them and how to handle themselves and the monster, they would eventually be sent out to find a monster nest and steal an egg to raise.

Sandy shrugged. "Sure, but what if you already had a monster? If you started raising one before you even became a Rider, then wouldn't that make you a better Rider by default?" she asked, putting her hands on her hips.

Bobby exchanged a look with Patrick. Maybe Sandy had a point. If one of them Bonded to the baby monster, would that help them to become a Rider?

"But we can't hatch it," Patrick said, sounding disappointed. "Only Riders with a Kinship Stone, and we're aren't Riders and we don't have a Kinship Stone!"

Sandy frowned for a moment, thinking. Suddenly, a smile came across her face as she whirled around and jogged a few feet away. Curious, Bobby craned his head around to see what she was doing as she picked something up from the ground. As she came back over, she handed both Bobby and Patrick a smooth river stone.

"There!" Sandy said, proud. "Now we have Kinship Stones! We'll start the Ritual, become Riders, and hatch this egg!"

Patrick didn't look convinced, and Bobby had to admit he was skeptical as well. But Sandy looked so happy, and he didn't want to burst her bubble, so he kept quiet.

As it was, Sandy didn't give them any time to protest anyway, as she instructed them to hold their 'Kinship Stones' up above their heads. Exchanging looks, the boys did as told and listened as Sandy began to recite the Ritual.

"First, we need to formally introduces ourselves," Sandy said. She turned to SpongeBob. "Well, come on! Tell the egg your name!" she urged.

"Wait, why does SpongeBob get the egg?" Patrick asked, glancing back and forth between them.

"Because he hasn't been complaining the entire trip here," Sandy quipped, shooting a glare at Patrick, who grumbled but didn't argue.

"Hello," SpongeBob said to the egg as his friends argued again. "My name is SpongeBob SquarePants! But my friends call me Bobby!" he said, excitement beginning to overtake his nervousness at being found by the parent monster.

"Good job SpongeBob!" Sandy praised, ignoring Patrick's complaints once more. She raised the rock into the air again, and the boys followed suit. "O sacred Kinship Stone. Bind thyself to to the spirit of SpongeBob. The time of rebirth is nigh. Awaken now, let us here your cry!"

There was a pause, then they all looked down at the egg at once. Glancing at it, they noticed that there was nothing different about the egg. No cracks appeared in the shell, and no noises came from within.

"Huh, I must have gotten something wrong," Sandy said, frowning in disappointment.

"Or maybe it was because we aren't Riders, and these are just normal rocks," Patrick said, tossing his rock over his shoulder and off the side of the nest.

Sandy glared at him, but tossed her own rock aside. "Fine, whatever you say Patrick," she sighed. "Come on guys, lets go home."

As they were starting to turn away, a small noise came from behind them. Surprised, they quickly turned around, and were shocked. The egg was moving!

"What...?" Bobby murmured to himself, eyes widening. Did the 'Ritual' Sandy do actually work?

"No way," Patrick said, disbelief clear in his voice as the egg rolled onto its side and cracks spider-webbing across the surface.

"Yes way!" Sandy cheered. They crowded around the egg, excitement coming off them in waves as something started to break the shell.

A piece of the shell broke off, and Bobby could see something red moving around inside. They watched, fascinated, as the egg broke apart, the small body of a red monster with wings finally broke free. Pieces of eggshell flew in different directions as the small bipedal monster got to its feet, only a single piece of eggshell stuck to its head.

The baby monster shook it off, and the friends' jaws dropped as they realized what had just hatched.

A Rathalos. It was a baby Rathalos. The Flying Wyvern known as the King of the Skies. Bobby rubbed his eyes to make sure he wasn't seeing things, but when he looked back, the Rathalos was still there, wobbling slightly as it tried to get its bearings in its new world.

The little monster looked just like a smaller version of pictures they had seen of the Rathalos. Bipedal with a set of wings instead of arms, colored in red, orange and yellow along the body and wings. Small, stubby blue horns were on its face and wingtips. Its strong tail waved around behind it as it slowly got its balance, the tip curled in a half-moon like shape.

The Rathalos chick stood around half their height with its head held up to look at them, its bright blue eyes curious. It stumbled back and fell on its rear, still not used to having to use its legs.

"I can't believe it!" Sandy said, shocked and excited. "The King of the Skies! A Rathalos!"

"We...we really hatched it!" Patrick cheered.

Bobby couldn't keep the grin off his face. They had done it! They had hatched an egg! And not just any egg! A Rathalos egg! He hadn't even known there was a Rathalos and Rathian breeding pair in the area!

By now, the Rathalos had gotten back to its feet. Spreading its wings, it gave a quick, sharp flap, sending a burst of surprisingly strong wind at the teens. Caught off guard, the friends stumbled back, and Bobby was forced onto his back.

Catching site of Bobby's vulnerable position, the Rathling let out an adorable sounding roar and leaped towards Bobby, claws poised and ready to strike.

"SpongeBob!" Sandy and Patrick shouted fearing they were about to see their friend mauled to death by an adorable baby monster.

Frightened, Bobby jerked back and turned his head away, not wanting to look. He shook, arm raised in defense as he waited for the Rathling to strike. But nothing happened. A purring sound reached his ears, and something rubbing against his arm caught his attention.

Risking a look, he was shocked to notice that the Rathling was rubbing on him and purring!

"What's it doing?" Patrick asked, stepping closer now that he knew his friend wasn't going to be killed by a cute baby monster.

"Aww," Sandy cooed, surprising the boys. She never cooed. "Ratha thinks SpongeBob's his parent! Don't ya Ratha?"

"Ratha?" Bobby asked, not really paying attention. He was staring into the Rathling's eyes, a shade of blue similar to his own. Reaching up carefully, he began to stroke the baby's eye-ridges.

"Ratha the Rathalos!" Sandy explained, sounding very proud.

Vaguely, Bobby heard Patrick sigh and mutter something that sent the two off into another argument. He didn't notice, since Ratha seemed to like the petting he was getting, and purred louder, pushing his head up into Bobby's hand for more attention.

A smile spread across his lips as Bobby raised his other hand to scratch under Ratha's chin. The purring grew even louder, and the Rathling was practically a soft clay in Bobby's hand.

The group spent a few minutes arguing and petting Ratha before heading back down the tree, Ratha the Rathalos in tow.

The young Flying Wyvern was a natural at flying it seemed, as he stumbled over to the edge of the nest when he noticed his parent (Bobby) starting to climb out. Before they could try and figure out a way to get the Rathling down without hurting him or themselves, Ratha beat his wings a few times... and jumped off the edge.

The teens let out cried of dismay as they watched Ratha fall for a few terrifying minutes. Then, as though something clicked in his head, Ratha spread his wings and began to fly!

Realizing that Ratha was going to be okay, Bobby let out a breath of relief before returning back to descending the tree.

So far, it had been a good day, but something was wriggling at the back of his head. A small, black cloud of thought whispering that something bad was about to happen.

Bobby pushed that thought aside. No, nothing bad was going to happen, he was just being paranoid because they were close to the nest, that was all.

Still, that didn't stop him from glancing over at his friends or Ratha every few minutes as they made their way towards Bikinibotomu.

And, scene!

So ends the prologue of Mistrust! Honestly, I would have made this longer, and added in a certain event that will be skipped and only talked about next chapter, but since this is a prologue, I wanted to keep it short... what I got was a fifteen page monster. Also, when I say 'fifteen page', that's because the writing program I use doesn't tell me how many words there are, only pages. And since I write with Fanfiction guidelines (ie. two spaces between each paragraph) I have to go by that instead.

Also, I know that SpongeBob, Sandy and Patrick are out of character, but you have to remember that this isn't Bikini Bottom (even though Bikinibotomu literally means just that in Japanese (if you trust Google Translate that is)). This is a monster hunting world with no modern technology and set in a more primitive like setting. They can't be truly in character because of the world they are in.

This goes for all other Nicktoons characters that I will be bringing into the story. While I will try my best to keep as much of their original characterization as possible, I can't have Patrick being an idiot (sorry Pat) and SpongeBob shouting "I'm ready!" all the time. I love them, really, but they can't do the things they would in the shows here.

Also, for the Monster Hunter Lore, I'm mostly making it up since I can't find a whole lot about Rider Lore and I'm still playing through the game myself and don't want spoilers. Basically, it's goin' to be what I can dig up, and my own thoughts and headcannons for various things.

With that all out of the way, how did you like the story so far? Any thoughts or comments? Just want to say hi? Want to question what in the name of Chaos made me think to put Nicktoons in a Monster Hunter world? Go ahead and leave a review!

Now, to the questions!

SpongeBob and his two friends, Sandy and Patrick, have hatched a Rathalos egg! Will they become Riders? Will they get scolded for leaving the village? For climbing a giant tree with a monster nest on top? For hatching the Rathalos?

Find out next time in... Chapter One: The Rider's Test!

Until next time my fine, furry friends! -JAF logging out!