Chapter 93: The Bird That Kidnapped Mammon's Little Brother!
Mammon turned the possibility over seriously in his mind, and arrived at the same conclusion: something was wrong with this particular Rainbow Wing.
"Qi qi~"
Shell Lady came floating back with a small armful of Rainbow Wings, presenting them to Mammon with both eyes blinking up at him in obvious pride.
"Good work. You're getting a bag of mini cakes tonight."
Mammon took the feathers and gave her an approving nod.
"Qi~!" Shell Lady beamed.
He fanned the feathers out and counted roughly a dozen — some were damaged and not much to look at, but that was fine.
"What are you going to do with all of those, Mammon?"
Erika was watching with undisguised curiosity. They were pretty, she supposed — but beyond that? Some of them were even torn. They had sentimental value as Ho-Oh feathers, sure, but at the end of the day they were still just feathers.
"Ah, you just don't see it yet." Mammon grinned, holding one of the more intact Rainbow Wings up to the light and watching its faint iridescent shimmer. "Whether you're talking about monetary value or symbolic value, these are priceless."
What did a Rainbow Wing actually represent? By conventional understanding, it was a treasure given only to those Ho-Oh had recognized — a kind of preliminary candidate status for the Rainbow Hero.
According to the old myths, if you brought a Rainbow Wing to the Rainbow Rock at the end of a rainbow, the legendary Ho-Oh would descend.
Not that this was useful to Mammon personally. Getting Ho-Oh to recognize him would be an uphill battle — his character didn't exactly match what Ho-Oh was looking for in a partner.
"Ho-Oh is Kanto's mythological Pokémon," Mammon continued. "In this region, Ho-Oh is sacred to a lot of people. Over in Johto, Ecruteak City still has plenty of devoted believers."
He let that sit for a moment.
"So what do you think would happen if I sold these Rainbow Wings to them? Or, better yet — if I walked into Ecruteak with a Rainbow Wing in hand and told them I was Ho-Oh's chosen?"
The smile he wore was spectacularly unhinged.
And he wasn't wrong. Ho-Oh's standing in Kanto and Johto was extraordinary — especially in Ecruteak, the city where Ho-Oh had once come to roost. The Tin Tower monks still maintained their faith there. And then there were the Kimono Girls — five sisters, Eevee specialists, famous throughout Johto.
The Kimono Girls' background was genuinely remarkable. Players who'd run HeartGold and SoulSilver would know: they were among the rare inheritors of ancient traditions in the modern era, like the Meteor Falls people in Hoenn who could call Rayquaza down through prayer at the Sky Pillar.
The Kimono Girls could do the same — through their inherited dance, at the right location, they could summon Ho-Oh and Lugia.
Mammon's theory was that their ancestors had been shrine maidens or ritual priests who served Ho-Oh and Lugia directly, and had preserved that connection across generations.
Since the fire a hundred and fifty years ago, both Ho-Oh and Lugia had withdrawn from humanity in disappointment. The Kimono Girls' inheritance was intact, but they'd need a genuine trigger — a real sign — to make contact again.
"That— "
Erika was alarmed. If they were true believers, and they saw Mammon standing there with an actual Rainbow Wing in his hands...
They'd think he was Ho-Oh's chosen messenger, wouldn't they?
But— that wasn't right—
"Isn't that just fraud?!" Erika said flatly.
"I'm Team Rocket," Mammon said, completely matter-of-fact. "Isn't this basically entry-level stuff for me?"
Erika: "..."
"And wealthy collectors exist everywhere in this world," Mammon continued pleasantly, turning a feather over in his fingers. "Take these Rainbow Wings, have them mounted and framed properly — turn them into proper art pieces — and you've got luxury goods that'll sell to someone with more money than sense for eight figures easy. At minimum."
Erika's eyes had started to spiral.
"And — here's the real play — Ho-Oh can resurrect the dead. That kind of vitality has to extend to its feathers somehow. A pharmaceutical compound derived from Rainbow Wing feathers? The recovery properties could be extraordinary."
Mammon was confident about this one.
In the games, wild Ho-Oh always carried a specific held item — the Sacred Ash. Its effect: fully restore the HP and PP of every Pokémon in your party, and cure all status conditions, including fainting. For every Pokémon simultaneously.
Completely broken. Absolutely essential for any serious healer's kit.
And since every wild Ho-Oh carried Sacred Ash, that meant Ho-Oh produced Sacred Ash somehow.
Sacred Ash. Sacred Ash. The name implied burning — what if it literally meant ash made from Ho-Oh's feathers?
The alternative was that Ho-Oh was carrying its own droppings around, which seemed undignified even for a turkey.
So: feathers burned to ash = Sacred Ash. Which meant the feathers themselves had to contain whatever made the ash work. Even if you couldn't synthesize the full Sacred Ash effect, a compound with even a fraction of that recovery potency would blow every existing healing item on the market completely out of the water.
"If a compound with those recovery properties could actually be developed..." Caitlin's eyes gleamed. "That would be enough to launch an entirely new pharmaceutical company."
"Mm. Though we'll probably need more feathers than this."
Mammon glanced upward. The battle was approaching its conclusion — but that was secondary right now.
He watched Rainbow Wings drift down from the sky like falling leaves and waved Shell Lady over again.
"Shell Lady, one more trip — collect those."
Shell Lady was highly motivated. In her mind, each feather was a mini cake waiting to happen.
Ten more minutes passed.
A dark shape dropped from the sky and landed heavily in front of the three of them.
Dark Mewtwo.
Its body was marked with burn damage from Ho-Oh's fire — quite a lot of it. But the aura radiating off it was still formidable, even as its energy clearly ran low.
"Looks like you got your fill."
Mammon raised a hand and let green light drift toward Dark Mewtwo — the Power of Viridian working quietly, knitting closed the worst of the burns.
"I'm sorry, Mammon." Dark Mewtwo's hoarse telepathy was steady, with no trace of wounded pride. "I'm not its match. Not yet."
It accepted this without argument. It had only just awakened.
"That's entirely expected." Mammon smiled and clapped it once on the shoulder. "You're a newly recognized legendary — but Ho-Oh has existed since ancient times. Even a fraction of its lifespan is longer than you've been alive."
A pause.
"But I believe it won't be long before you surpass it. You're Mewtwo."
"...Mm." The violet flame in Dark Mewtwo's eyes flickered. It nodded once and said nothing more.
It could feel the absolute, unguarded trust Mammon had for it. That was enough.
Dark Mewtwo swore to itself, with complete certainty: it would never disappoint him.
Ho-Oh descended slowly on wide wings. It hadn't come through unscathed either — Mewtwo had landed solid hits throughout the battle. But its constitution was in a different category entirely, and its injuries were far lighter than Dark Mewtwo's.
"Human." Ho-Oh's neutral telepathy returned. "Will you release Suicune and the others now?"
It had a fairly good idea of what had happened. Mammon had probably forced the capture specifically to provoke this confrontation — a live test to gauge Dark Mewtwo's ceiling against a genuine high-tier legendary.
"I don't recall agreeing to that," Mammon said, raising an eyebrow.
"Human. Do not test my patience."
Ho-Oh's voice carried a distinct edge now — a weight it hadn't used before. It didn't enjoy using force against humans, but that didn't mean it never would.
"I'll return Raikou and Entei. But Suicune stays with me."
"Absolutely not."
Ho-Oh refused without a moment's hesitation. Rainbow fire began to kindle around its wings again, and the oppressive pressure returned in force.
"Human — I have told you. Suicune will never accept you. Even if you keep it, it will not fight for you."
Its voice dropped lower.
"Pokémon are not puppets on strings. They are living, thinking beings. Legendary Pokémon especially — each one has its own will and its own convictions."
"So your position is that the righteous Suicune could never accept someone with an impure heart like mine?"
"Precisely."
"Is that so." Mammon's tone shifted — sardonic now, tilted sideways. "Then why did you kidnap my little brother?"
Silence.
The air went completely still.
Ho-Oh froze mid-motion. It stared at Mammon.
Caitlin and Erika both turned to stare at Mammon too.
Ho-Oh kidnapped Mammon's little brother?
"You—"
Ho-Oh came back to itself slowly. Something shifted in its expression — shame, and frustration, and a dim, heavy recognition.
It didn't deny it.
It didn't deny it.
Erika was floored. That's— that's actually true?
"He was my little brother. He was five years old that year." Mammon's voice was light, but his eyes weren't. "I imagine you haven't forgotten, Ho-Oh."
...
Ho-Oh had no answer.
This was the single stain on its existence. Ten years ago, both it and Lugia had been caught by a trainer — someone whose power was staggering, beyond anything Ho-Oh had encountered. That was why it had agreed to serve him.
But what followed — the things that were done — had ultimately driven both Ho-Oh and Lugia to break with that trainer. The betrayal was done. But the wrongs already committed couldn't be undone.
And this was precisely why Ho-Oh had reinforced its conviction: strength alone wasn't sufficient. A pure heart — that was what it was waiting for.
This was also why it had wanted the three beasts back. It genuinely believed Suicune and Mammon were incompatible. That keeping them would lead nowhere good.
"That was my failing," Ho-Oh said at last, after a long silence. "Even if it wasn't entirely by my will."
The guilt was strong enough that it didn't even ask for details about the child — what he looked like, where he was now. Because at the time, both it and Lugia had been searching across Kanto for exceptional children. The boy might have been taken by Lugia rather than Ho-Oh directly.
But that distinction meant nothing. They had acted together. The sin was shared.
"I can offer you compensation. But human — keeping Suicune by force won't make for a happy partnership."
Ho-Oh's manner had softened considerably.
"Can you bring Silver back to me?"
"I... cannot."
Ho-Oh genuinely wished it could return every child that had been taken. But going back to face that — did it dare?
"Then three promises, Ho-Oh." Mammon held up three fingers. "When I'm in genuine trouble, you come and help me. Three times."
He continued before Ho-Oh could respond.
"I'll hold onto Suicune for now. I'll work at building something with it. If it turns out you're right — if we're truly incompatible — I'll release it. But if we work well together, you can't come back demanding it."
Ho-Oh considered.
The arrangement regarding Suicune was... tolerable. Three promises was harder. But after a moment's hesitation, it agreed.
It owed him that much.
"Naturally." Mammon's response was immediate. Obviously he wasn't going to ask Ho-Oh to help him do anything that violated its values — Ho-Oh wouldn't help him regardless, and would probably actively interfere. The promises only held any value if they stayed within Ho-Oh's acceptable range.
Even so: with Ho-Oh as a guaranteed backup, any number of future situations just became considerably more manageable.
Terms settled, Mammon kept his word immediately. He took out two Poké Balls — Entei and Raikou — and pressed the release button on both.
Two flashes of white light materialized into form ahead of them.
The two beasts looked momentarily disoriented. Then they felt Ho-Oh's presence, turned, and bowed their heads in respectful acknowledgment.
"One more thing, Ho-Oh — when I need to call on you, how do I reach you?"
A single feather drifted down from Ho-Oh's wing and came to rest in front of Mammon. Distinctly brighter than the others.
"Through that feather, you can contact me from anywhere in the world. And I can locate you through it in return."
"Oh—" Mammon examined it. Even set against the dozen feathers Shell Lady had collected, the difference was obvious — color, luminosity, condition. This was a genuinely pristine Rainbow Wing. The others were scraps by comparison.
"Actually, Ho-Oh — one personal request, separate from the three promises. You're free to refuse."
"Speak."
Ho-Oh's patience was, in fairness, remarkable. It was still willing to hear him out.
"When's your molting season? Do you shed heavily? I'm looking at your plumage right now and it seems like the quality could use some refreshing — why don't you swap out your feathers right here, and leave me the old ones."
"???"
Ho-Oh's eye began to twitch.
It looked at Mammon, and the look it gave him was no longer merely complicated.
It was dangerous.
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