Hard Enough

Gengar and Haunter led us into the building, with Gawain and Hypnotoad following behind them.

Outside, the building had blended in with the valley wall, with a few sparse windows that initially looked like cave entrances. From closer up, I could see that they were large sunlights that allowed light to filter down into a much larger structure.

Much to my, and the others' surprise, even with Sabrina’s map, we didn’t instantly walk into a building, however.

Instead, we walked into a long hallway of narrow, uncovered tunnels that caused us to walk single file. I instantly didn’t like it.

It was like walking through a trench, only the trench was too deep to allow you to peer out of. It was, in fact, a chokepoint. “Shrek, hop up there,” I said, jerking my head upwards.

Gengar noticed the order and turned. “Geng, gen, gaaaaar!” he said mockingly.

I frowned and shook my head. “I’m not sure I follow."

Jenny stepped up. “I think Gengar is saying that he’s already cleared out the Team Rocket members that would have held this chokepoint.”

Jenny’s announcement of what we were walking through caused a few of the police officers to stiffen. They quickly threw some pokeballs up onto the upper level. A few Machoke got on their knees and tried to lift up their trainers, only for the gap to be too tall.

I hummed and started looking along the tunnel walls.

The open tunnel was a trick I’d heard Surge mention once about allowing defenders to have the high ground while limiting the flow of attackers. According to him, there would be hidden ladders in the walls that would allow defenders to reach the upper level, where they could launch attacks.

“Check the walls for inbuilt ladders!” I called, moving further along. After twenty metres, I found a door embedded in the wall that I couldn’t open from my side. “Get one of the Machoke—” I started to say, only for the door to click and open to reveal the pleased face of Gengar.

He waved me on, and I followed up a circular staircase that allowed me to walk out onto the raised level overlooking the entry tunnel. I found a number of snoring Rocket Grunts lying to the side where Gengar lounged, floating in the air with feigned nonchalance.

“Done this before, have you?” I asked, eying the ghost.

Gengar pointed at me like I’d won a prize, and I could only nod. For all that Surge had told me about these sites, I had no doubt Agatha and her pokemon had actually done this… probably a lot, considering how useful she and her team would be at phasing through walls.

I glanced around and realised just how much open space there was in this cavern. The building itself was a few hundred metres back from the valley wall and where beams of light shone down a number of gardens had been set up.

The building itself was modern in every sense. It had bright lights all around it that made it as bright as walking around under the sun for what looked like a multistory school complex. Large antennas extended up from the roof of the school into the cavern with support pillars rising up in certain areas to hold the overhead structure. It was a phenomenal work of engineering.

I had to shake my head and wonder how Team Rocket had managed to get all the work done on it. Was there a secret evil building corporation they could contract with for this sort of work?

It was an impressive setup and more than I had been expecting.

“All of this for a school to teach criminals out of?” I said with a shake of my head.

Jenny sighed. “The lengths that criminals will go to so that they can have an edge…” she shook her head as she cuffed the hypnotised Rocket Grunts.

A rumble from outside caused me to frown as a section of wall on the far side crumbled. I watched the rocks tumble down, only for them to suddenly glow and shift to the side. A giant Onix appeared, and it stared at us as we in turn looked back. Then it roared, causing a number of the G-men to shift and bark orders for their pokemon to get ready to fight.

I scowled at the pokemon that was revealed. “Hold your pokemon back,” I called. “That’s Bruno’s Onix,” I said, recognising it from matches I’d observed on Battlecast.

Sure enough, the Onix drew back and Bruno appeared a moment later, followed by a floating Sabrina who was scowling at Bruno. Bruno didn’t seem to care as he merely walked on.

Sabrina swept her gaze over our group and locked onto me. She lowered herself into a walk as the rocks that Onix had knocked from the wall rose and wedged themselves further into the wall.

I glanced at it. “Good to see you; that was a strong entrance,” I said grinning only to falter as Sabrina gave me the flattest expression I’d ever seen.

Sabrina stared at me like a woman who was just so done with today.

“You alright?” I asked.

Sabrina just shook her head. “No.” Her eyes flickered towards Bruno before coming back to me.

She rubbed at her temple. “We were delayed in our entry due to Lance’s group losing track of the Executives and some of the Grunts that attacked his group. They were disguise specialists, and Lance wasn’t sure how to proceed, so he called me in to find the woman and her lackeys.”

“She was hiding as one of the G-men?” I said leadingly.

“No,” she said, giving me a confused look. “She had burrowed into the ground and was escaping with a pokemon that knew how to Dig. She was close to getting out and Teleporting when I intercepted her.”

Sabrina tilted her head and inspected me. “Is that what happened to your group?”

I nodded. “Yeah, but Looker is something of a savant when it comes to disguises,\; plucked him right out of the crowd.”

Sabrina frowned and a lightbulb seemed to go off as she perked up. “I had best go and secure him then, there were a number of devices that we found on Executive Sham that would allow her to break captivity.” She pecked me on the cheek and then marched away quickly.

“Good luck with Bruno,” she said over her shoulder.

I blinked as she hurried away quickly. What was that about?

“Alright! Attack!” Bruno said, causing me to snap my head around, realising that Bruno had moved past me to the front of the group and was now pointing straight at the underground building.

“Hey, wait what?!” I said. We needed to clear the field first and check for traps first!

Bruno ignored me. “You all heard me! Let’s go! Follow my lead!” He popped a few pokeballs and a pair of pokemon were revealed. “Hitmonchan, Hitmonlee, get in there and start busting skulls! The faster we get this done, the faster we can get back to training!” he barked.

The pokemon sprinted away and I could only gape as they jumped through a window instead of the main entrance. The sound of fighting soon broke out.

“Woah! Bruno! What are you doing?” I said, inserting myself in front of him and putting my hands up to block him.

When he kept walking I dug my heels in and glowered at him.

“We need to secure this site, not destroy it!” I growled.

“Koga and Agatha can handle that; I’ll take out the threats,” he said.

“If you destroy the building, that won’t help! Team Rocket are notorious for trapping their buildings! We need to be smart about this!” I said just as an explosion went off in the room Hitmonchan had leapt through.

“It won’t break from a few lovetaps.” Bruno cracked his neck right and left. “It might draw out any other strong trainers, though.” He seemed all too interested in this line of thought. It did, however, cause him to stop pushing against me, so that was good.

I relaxed a little and ran through what he’d said. It somewhat made sense, even if it was only barely logical.

“Well…” I said trying to conjure up an argument that would appeal to him. “You should probably stay out here with a few people then! Chances are a strong trainer will come to pinch us off here! You need to stay here and…” I searched for the right words. “Be a threat they can’t ignore!” I said aloud while mentally designating him as securing the line of evacuation if things turned ugly.

“Hmmmmmm,” he said, rubbing his chin in thought. He nodded slowly and then unclipped two more pokemon. “I’m going to have to think about that… Machamp! Heracross! Get in there!” he shouted.

I whirled around but could only watch as the pair of pokemon charged across the open ground without setting anything off.

“Bruno! We have a guide pokemon to get us past some of the traps! You don’t need to do that!” I said, indicating the Gengar lying to the side. It waved lazily and turned back to watching Machamp and Heracross.

The Machamp leapt through another window while the Heracross went to the rooftops where a fight started to break out.

I felt a throbbing build in my head. Was this what Sabrina had been forced to deal with for the last… it couldn’t have been longer than half an hour, surely? I’d been with Bruno for no more than two minutes and he was already causing me a headache.

“Shit! They found us! Launch the ordinance!” shouted a voice on the roof.

Everyone in our group snapped their heads up as a wave of pokeballs were launched with a ‘choom’ into the air.

They released Graveler, Weezing, Electrode, and other pokemon that I could recognise as all being capable of using Explosion or similar moves.

“BRACE! Pokemon out and knock them back!” I shouted releasing the pokemon I’d withdrawn into their pokeballs once more. The air suddenly filled with rocks that acted like anti-air.

Bruno grinned and released his own team. “Knock ‘em flat! Hoo hah!” he said.

He then raised his hands wide as though he was welcoming the wave of pokemon arcing towards us.

His pokemon roared along with him and unleashed their own barrage.

Most of the Pokemon fell short, while others, capable of hovering, proceeded to slowly drift down towards us. Others hit the ground and rolled. Some of them began to glow as they did so. The threat of them exploding in our midst caused warning sirens to ring out through my mind.

Selene moved before me and glowed, causing a huge sweep of psychic energy to radiate out of her and push back the falling pokemon.

Some detonated early and a wave of force washed over us. A number of people stumbled and fell back, but none were harmed, with the explosive pokemon never getting close to us.

Bruno laughed. “Ha! That was great!” He cupped his hands around his mouth. “Got any more?” he shouted to the rooftop Rocket Grunts.

I, and a good number of the rather frazzled-looking G-men, glared at Bruno.

When Team Rocket launched another barrage, the glares intensified. Bruno just laughed.

I stepped back and took in the situation. The rooftops of the academy all played host to a team of Rockets that were firing what looked like mortars with pokeballs up into the air. I wasn’t sure how much ‘ammunition’ they had, but I didn’t want to allow them to keep arcing exploding pokemon at us.

I pointed to a few G-men. “Circle some pokemon around and get them up on the roof to join Bruno’s Heracross! We need those mortars taken out!”

“Sir!” said the pair. I scowled. If I hadn’t left Zephyr and Don outside, I might have had the perfect pair of pokemon to take out the bunkers. Instead, I had to delegate and endure the wave of pokemon that were being launched at us.

Inspecting the actual threat made me realise we’d been fortunate to not have advanced closer to the academy when we emerged from the tunnel.

If we had, we’d have been in the firing range of the mortars.

Bruno, for all that he’d leapt without considering or conferring on how we should approach this, had triggered a rather dangerous trap before anyone could truly be threatened by it.

Another rumble behind me had me looking back to see Lance knocking his own entrance into the side of the valley to lead his group in. He made sure to take a moment to stop with the light behind him.

“Having some trouble, Gym Leader?’ he said as his cape flapped around him grandly.

I huffed. “Stop posing and get in here. Bruno’s forcing Team Rocket to up their game, and we need the firing teams on top of the Academy taken out.”

Lance inspected the issue, ignoring how various pokemon from Team Rocket were being piled up as they exploded and knocked themselves out. I grimaced, knowing that the callous use of explosive pokemon in this fashion would see many of them not getting back up.

Ever.

The knocked-out pokemon were being blown around by subsequent explosions too much.

Lance took all of this in, and his expression shifted to one of scorn. “Blasted Team Rocket! G-men! Let’s move!” he said, tossing out a Salamance that he hopped on as other dragon pokemon flew in behind him, quickly followed by the rest of his strike team.

Lance soared through the air, and his pokemon descended on the now helpless group of Rockets. Shouts of surrender quickly followed, with Lance stepping up to the edge and waving at us. “It’s safe to proceed!” he announced.

A few people started to do just that, and I raised a hand. “We should check for more traps!” I shouted back.

Lance nodded slowly, and a group of Growlithe and Houndour were quickly sent forward to sniff out a safe path. The precaution turned out to be unneeded, as Team Rocket hadn’t trapped a potential walkway.

The lack of traps didn’t have me relaxing.

Instead, it had me searching the walls as we entered the Academy building proper. Gengar walked along in front of me, a huge grin stretching his face as he did so, his hands laced behind his head—the perfect picture of a pokemon without a care in the world.

He led us past empty lecture halls and rooms full of computers that I could only imagine the uses for. It still boggled the mind that Team Rocket had such a building. It was grandiose in every sense of the word and easily matched up to Pokemon Technical or some of the universities that I had walked through in terms of scale.

“Crime pays a little too well, I think,” I said aloud.

Gengar paused suddenly when a door that he’d been about to float past opened of its own volition.

“Hyp….no,” whispered a pokemon. A moment later, a crowd of Hypno slowly stepped out of the room. They moved slowly, and their hands twitched. When they sighted us, their noses twitched, and they began to raise their hands, medallions starting to swing.

Officer Jenny hissed. “Oh Arceus no! I’ve seen how this ends!” she hurled out her Arcanine and pointed straight ahead. “Blast them!!!” she shouted.

From her Haunter a Shadow ball was formed and unleashed while Arcanine let loose a Fire Blast that slammed into the Hypno.

The Hypno, for their part, each tried to raise a Barrier, only for the Shadow Ball to tear through it with the Fire Blast following in its wake.

The Hypno were blown back and off their feet. Jenny punched her fist forward. “Haunter! Hypnosis! Do not let them use those medallions! Gengar! Stop lazing about and get to work, or I’ll have you back in basic!” she roared.

Gengar twitched and raised its hands, only to pause and frown. It gave Jenny a surprised look before it smirked and did as she asked.

I inclined my head towards Gawain and Selene. “You know, they would have taken them out before we were threatened, right?”

Jenny shuddered. “Just! A group of Hypno like that in a dark corridor…” she clenched her fists a few times. “Yeah, that’s some nightmare fuel!”

Behind Jenny, a few other G-men agents who were women nodded in solidarity. Jenny shook her head. “My therapist is going to hear about this!”

“You see a therapist?” One of the men behind us asked. I turned and shot him a look and he blanched. “I mean! Not that there’s anything wrong with that! I guess?”

I grunted and turned back. “Good for you, taking care of yourself,” I said.

Jenny shot me an amused look. “Being a policewoman can be rough.”

I raised my hands. “Hey, no judgement!”

She rolled her eyes and waved for us to move forward when Gengar indicated he’d gotten all of the Hypno asleep. Behind us I heard something that sounded like a grunt of pain, but when I looked back a number of the women were sporting innocent expressions while the man that had spoken up was nursing his stomach. He shot me a thumbs up and I decided I didn’t need to poke my nose into whatever that had been just now.

Jenny paused when she drew level with the asleep Hypno. “Urgh, they’re starved.”

I nodded, noting how you could see their ribs. A sure sign of poor nutrition, especially with a pokemon that usually had a rather thick coat that obscured their bodies. “Team Rocket probably uses food to keep them in line,” I said.

Jenny growled and stomped her foot. She quickly opened the door to a room that had a number of chairs set up to look at an array of television screens.

She reached in and flicked a switch. The lights came on, but so did the televisions.

“Welcome to Rocket Induction. You are Rocket… or you will be!” said a dashingly handsome man.

On the screen, a woman joined the man and smiled winningly at the viewer. “You should hope so anyway! If you prove you have what it takes to become Rocket you will be joining a special group!”

I stared, unable to tear my eyes away from this… recruitment video? Jenny huffed and moved about the room, opening cupboards and drawers, looking for something.

The man on the screen grinned. “Few people know this about us, but we’re very discerning about who we recruit! Over the next few days, you will undergo—”

Jenny flicked the switch back off, causing the television to switch off as we retreated out of the room.

I worked my jaw back and forth. “That was a room for indoctrination… wasn’t it?” I said.

Jenny just nodded. She held up a few pokeballs that she must have picked up in the room. She pointed them at the various Hypno and returned them while pocketing them. I raised an eyebrow, and she sighed. “If we left them out… they might wake up and see the other passed-out Hypno as tempting meals… especially if they know Dream Eater.”

“Ah,” I said, before waving a hand so that our group could continue moving forward.

Our earlier fight must have caused some noise, because as we advanced we ran across a group of Team Rocket Grunts.

“Shit! It’s the po-po!” shouted one before hurling out a Raticate.

The Raticate landed and glared, only to stiffen as the pokemon we already had out smirked at it.

Raticate turned and bared its fangs at its owner. The Rocket Grunt blinked and glanced around only to realise everyone else in his group had turned and run off. He joined them, with Raticate quickly following.

“After them!” shouted one of the G-men, only for me to reach out and snatch him back.

“Nope! Not yet! Secure the main targets first!” I said. I did not want more people running off getting caught in traps. No splitting the party. No way, no how.

Gengar quickly led us to the data servers, where Agatha appeared with a cackle. “It took you long enough!” she crowed as some of our group twitched.

Gengar stepped up and offered her a mocking salute.

Agatha gave her pokemon an amused look. “What’s gotten into you?” she asked.

Gengar pointed to Jenny who stiffened at the sudden attention she was given.

Agatha gave Jenny a once over before grunting. “A modicum of talent I suppose.” she sniffed. “Worth nothing without some work, though!” She waved a hand. “Well, with you here, Brock I think I shall as they say these days, go for a walk.”

She then strode straight through a wall before I could ask her to take the other G-men with her.

I sighed. That was rather typical for Agatha, I supposed.

I waved a hand at the others who had followed along with me. “Let’s secure the room. Make sure no one gets in.”

The G-men quickly guarded the entrances with their pokemon. Mine stalked through the server banks, Selene hovering over them with a looping orbit that saw the room under an impressive amount of surveillance.

Jenny patrolled sternly with her Haunter following along with exaggerated arm pumps, as though it was a clown following around a straight man in a comedy routine.

I snorted, and the Haunter shot me a pleased look. Jenny just rolled her eyes, apparently used to her pokemon’s antics. I got the feeling she was patrolling part from nervous energy, and part of doing so made her pokemon follow her to play around, thus keeping it out of mischief.

I leaned against the wall and considered whether I should move off to anywhere else. Koga would have the electrical grid locked down, and all we needed from there was the security complex itself, which would allow Sabrina and other pokemon to Teleport around at will.

Would I be better served anywhere else?

I played with that idea a bit more as I decided to walk around the room. I found a pair of G-men staring at a computer console embedded in a wall.

“Is it worth pissing off the higher-ups?” said one man.

“I took some courses on data security! This model doesn’t have a lock after too many attempts! We can just have a few tries!” said the woman emphatically.

I stepped up. “Something you found?” I asked, eying the strangely familiar computer setup.

Why did it look like… a Pokemon storage system from the games?

I blinked, realising that was what it was.

I frowned. How had I missed this when I’d checked the room over earlier?

The woman coughed into her fist. “Charles here found a hidden compartment in the wall and pulled it aside to find this computer. I recognise the software that the security system is using and was considering having a few attempts at common passwords to see if we could get in…”

She licked her lips. “If… that’s alright with you, sir?”

I chuckled and waved her off. "Technically, I’m just here as muscle and Looker is in charge of our group… but I have to admit to being curious as to what’s on this computer.” I suspected I knew without actually seeing it, but I wanted to confirm it.

The woman turned and tapped something out, and the man groaned. “Really? Password?”

“It’s the most common,” said the woman firmly as the password was rejected. “Hmmm what about Password but only one s?” she said trialing a few combinations.

I chuckled when she shifted to typing admin, Rocket, and other common phrases.

I coughed into my fist. “Don’t forget to look under the keyboard for any sticky notes,” I said, offering up my own two cents.

The woman smiled and did so, only to scowl when she pulled out a sticky note with a sequence of numbers and letters on it. We all stared at it. The woman dutifully tapped out the rather long string of letters and numbers, and when she was sure she had it, she hit enter.

A successful chime heralded the software opening up. Instead of a user interface, a series of pokeboxes presented themselves in the traditional storage system layout. I huffed and noted that the entire box was full of pokemon.

I could see Rattata, Ekans, Pikachu, Machop, Geodude, Graveler, and more. I glanced up at the tabs, which indicated how many storage boxes there were. Out of instinct, I turned and counted out the number of server banks in the room.

There were easily fifty and the number of boxes was much higher than that.

The woman started flicking through them. “Damn, this is a lot of pokemon,” she said as each box held pokemon from across the Indigo region.

She kept flicking, and I was surprised when rarer pokemon were shown with Ivysaur and Golduck, along with what had to be Feraligatr in one box only for another box to house what appeared to be an entire cluster of Voltorb and Electrode.

“If these are all people’s pokemon… we’re going to return so many of them,” said the woman, continuing to flick through the boxes with quicker and quicker speed.

“Hey wait! Go back!” said the man just as I was about to leave them to their business. “What was that?” he asked.

The woman stopped clicking the mouse and instead moved back in the boxes only for a box full of water type pokemon to reveal itself. I frowned as one pokemon stood out.

“Who’s that pokemon?” said the man, tapping on the small, pixelated form of a small shark-like pokemon. I inhaled sharply as I recognised exactly what pokemon that was and what its appearance in the storage boxes meant.

Team Rocket had to have very strong links with Sinnoh to have access to a Gible.

A window of information appeared with a much more detailed picture of the pokemon. “Don’t do that! The screen is touch!” snapped the woman but she leaned in to read what had been revealed. “Gible? I’ve never heard of that pokemon before…” she muttered.

I sighed. “It’s a pokemon from a different region… I’ve encountered texts about it before… It’s from a place called Sinnoh, which we lost contact with.”

The woman looked interested in what I was saying, but the man was eying the Gible. “Look at this! They’ve even got information on who they stole it from? This one was a wild capture from a nest? Damn Team Rocket that’s cold! This is a baby pokemon” he said, tapping on another pokemon next to Gible and a Tentacruel was revealed.

“Stolen from Mark Jnr… two years ago?” he murmured.

“Hey! Go back to the other pokemon!” snapped the woman, tapping on the screen.

“I wasn’t done reading that!” said the man, tapping back, only for his hand to be slapped away.

Because of this, his hand hit another button to the side as Gible’s information was brought up. Another prompt came up.

Withdrawing pokemon.

A noise whirred as, behind us, one of the server banks whirred to life.

“Shit!” what did you do?” wailed the woman, tapping on the screen to stop it only for the man to get in her way.

“Stop!” I barked, making them freeze. “Just let it play out, and we can see what happens. Smashing our faces on the keyboard won’t help,” I said firmly.

The pair nodded contritely.

I ignored the woman as she jammed an elbow into the man’s ribs. Next to the computer, a chute appeared with a raised receptacle. A noise like a ball rolling came from the chute, and a moment later, an ultra ball appeared.

“Huh, it deposits the pokem—” was all I got to say before the ball popped open and a small pokemon appeared. It tottered from side to side as though dizzy before sneezing, causing itself to fall onto its back where it tottered on its back before rolling around.

“Daaaaw!” It’s ador—” was as far as the woman got before the Gible smiled at her, revealing its sharklike teeth.

“Gib?” said the little pokemon with a tilt of its body.

The woman froze, while the man screamed in surprise. Gible stiffened at the sudden noise and then turned and sprinted away.

Gible wove its way through the server banks, dodging as people sprinted to find out what was going on, causing more noise and further frightening the tiny pokemon. It made for the door only to be denied by a Machoke.

It turned and threw itself into a small space at the bottom of one of the servers where it made tiny growling noises.

I stood, listening to people shout orders and suggestions. I clapped my hands together once and silenced everyone. “Alright, let’s calm down. Gible is a rare pokemon from another region but it’s just come to, in less than ideal circumstances. Give it some room!” I said moving towards where everyone had gathered. “Check your security points as well!”

That got everyone hurriedly striding back to where they were supposed to be.

Jenny eyed the bottom of the server where the Gible was hiding. “You got this?” she asked.

I nodded, reaching into my pouch to pull out some pokemon food and a collapsible pokemon bowl which I filled with water.

I put both into the server cubbyhole, ignoring as Gible flinched and nipped at me. I made sure to strengthen myself with rock aura to allow me to ignore the tiny bite.

“Hey little one,” I said, recalling what I’d seen of the Gible’s information. “You’re scared and confused. I would be too. You’re a long way from home, aren’t you? How about you have some food and water and calm down?”

Gible didn’t say anything and I sat down, content to let things deescalate. A few moments later, the sound of food being devoured could be heard and I smiled. When Gible was done the bowl was pushed around a bit causing scraping noises to fill the room as Gible tried to get every morsel of food it could.

“Want some more?” I asked.

Gible paused at that and stepped closer to the edge to look me over.

I raised an eyebrow at it. “Brave little one, aren’t you?” I said calmly.

Gible continued out and glanced around. When it noticed all the eyes on it it backed up and I chuckled drawing its attention back to me. ‘You’re alright, we’re the good guys. We just beat up the people that took you away from your home, and found you. Sorry for pulling you out like that but we’d never seen a pokemon like you before.”

“Gib?” it said.

I shrugged. “Well, you’re pretty rare around here. You’re in a different region. This is Kanto, specifically the northeast part, not that it will mean much.” I put a hand on my chest. “My name is Brock.” I waved a hand, and Selene floated down. “This is Selene, she’s part of my pokemon team and is very strong and nice. Could you let her talk with you?”

Gible ventured a little more out and began speaking with Selene.

My pokemon nodded along with whatever was said. I hummed and pulled out some more food, causing Gible to turn away from its conversation. It shifted from foot to foot and looked me over.

It apparently liked what it saw as it strode up to me, hopped in my lap and began to quickly devour the offering of food I had. I snorted. This was just like a baby pokemon… or a little kid.

When Gible was done it yawned, its giant mouth stretching wide before it turned in a circle a few times before settling down in my lap. It reached out with a tiny hand and grabbed my shirt. I looked into the single eye visible as it watched me. “Gible?” it asked quietly.

I raised a hand and gently ran my hand over its fin. “You’re safe,” I said gently.

Gible’s eye closed shut, and it began to slumber.

I sighed. Well, that pulled on the heartstrings a bit.

I remained seated and endured a wave of G-men patrolling past me and smiling at the sight of me sitting quietly with the tiny pokemon in my lap with Selene resting at my side.

Jenny inched up and smiled. “He’s certainly different from the local pokemon, isn’t he?” She leaned a little in and took a picture of him and I together. “He alright?” she asked.

I shrugged. “He might be a she. I have no idea of its gender…” I tilted my head. “Unless it says so on the information about Gible?” I asked.

Jenny shrugged, and I hummed. Something to work out later. “Well, Gible was pretty stressed out. I think sleep is just its way of dealing with the stress of finding itself in another region away from its family. I don’t think the rest he got in the storage system was quite right for him.” I accepted the Ultra ball and settled in to wait for Gible to wake up.

Jenny went over to the storage device and brought up the past information to learn what she could after twenty minutes she reported her findings. Gible was a male. Jenny stared at her notepad. “He had been caught in a cave system so he’s probably rock-type,” she said with a nod.

I almost spoke up and corrected her, before realising I would have no way of justifying said knowledge. So I stayed quiet.

In the end, Gible remained asleep for another thirty minutes when Lance and Sabrina walked in and found me sitting on the floor still.

I waved. “Hey, we had a little incident,” I said.

Lance tilted his head while Sabrina merely raised her transceiver and took a picture.

Lance sighed. “So, this is where you’ve been. I was wondering if you’d chased after Bruno.” I raised an eyebrow, and he waved the statement off. Instead, he directed his gaze to the pokemon slumbering in my lap. “Is that a trainer’s pokemon?”

“Wild pokemon that Team Rocket got from its nest in Sinnoh from a cave,” I said. I felt an idea form. “Jenny think’s it’s rock type, which is why it likes me.” I knew otherwise. Food and treating it kindly had done me a lot of favours.

Lance clicked his teeth. “Damn, proper confirmation that they do have access to another region. We’ve found some notes in the main offices, thanks to Sabrina.”

Sabrina inclined her head and crouched down to inch her way towards me. When she reached me she crouched down and extended a hand towards Gible. Gible opened his mouth and Sabrina twitched before continuing to reach forward. “No. Biting. Me,” she said, making sure to enunciate her words.

Gible stilled and watched her hand slowly move forward to lightly brush against his skin. “He’s rather… coarse?” she said. She continued to rub his head lightly. “He’s very small,” Sabrina said.

“Baby pokemon,” I said, causing the scowl to deepen on Lance’s face as he remained standing, looking about the servers. “He got withdrawn from the pokemon storage system when some G-men unlocked it and realised how many pokemon there were. They found this guy and got curious.”

He looked to the side and saw the computer. “Good work on securing the computer!” Lance barked.

This caused Gible to stiffen in surprise and snap his mouth closed. Sabrina didn’t withdraw her hand, she must have realised Lance had merely startled the little pokemon. She shot Lance a flat stare.

Lance coughed sheepishly. “Well, seeing as that’s not a stolen pokemon and I don’t want to put it back into the servers…” Gible cowered at the mention of the server. Lance nodded. “Brock, can you take this one in?” he said with a smirk, knowing I wouldn’t reject it.

“I don’t think we should give out pokemon like that,” I said, more for appearance's sake than any true objection. Mentally I was laughing with glee. Lance had no idea!

Lance waved it off. “It needs a nurturing environment, and your Gym has a good record for taking in young pokemon.” He nodded his head to the side.

I frowned, to keep selling the act. “Well, alright. I suppose I could take him in.”

Sabrina paused in stroking Gible to eye me. She knew me well enough to know something was happening here but she wasn’t sure what.

Lance smirked like he’d gotten one over on me. Heh.

I rolled my eyes at him. “So, this is all wrapped up, and we can go home until we raid the next place?”

Lance’s smirk grew. “Oh, we’ve actually not stopped raiding sites.”

I blinked.”Huh?”

Lance chuckled. “Ranger Hank has been rallying the rest of the pokemon Rangers and some of the new Frontier Leaders have also stepped in. Team Rocket has had a number of other sites raided. All at the same time,” Lance announced with a certain level of glee.

“We’ve raided a number of other bases and discovered a lot of equipment, such as giant robots and submarines, that we’ve confiscated. We don’t yet have the true executives, it would seem, but their days are numbered. We’re going to keep tightening the noose, don’t doubt that Brock!”

“Any hint on the Rocket Brass?” I asked, hoping that Lance knew who his real enemy was.

Lance hummed. “We have some ideas, but we’re not going to say anything more here.”

He glanced around and I felt a surge of hope. “We’ll talk more back at the League,” he said carefully.

If things played out as I hoped, Giovanni was soon going to have some people knocking on his door.

Gible shifted in my lap and warbled up at me. I fed him again and glanced down at my… newest pokemon?

When Lance moved off to check something else Sabrina tapped me. “What has you so smug?” she said firmly.

I grinned and leaned in to whisper in her ear. “Gible are ground-dragon type, not rock type.”

Sabrina shot Gible a surprised look and then laughed darkly. I merely chuckled.

I certainly wasn’t going to say no to a pokemon that evolved into Garchomp, a signature pokemon of Cynthia, one of the all-time strongest Champions around.

He was also a pseudo-legendary.

While Lance was patting himself on the back for his clever ploy, I was going to take home a real prize today.

Well, this certainly wasn’t how I was expecting to finish out my weekend, but I certainly wasn’t complaining.