Chapter 176: Another Fine Addition to Team Rocket!
Suicune had been slapped in the face again.
Mammon watched the scene with a look of mild bewilderment. Suicune was practically bristling now, hackles raised, staring down the Weavile with all the cold fury of a legendary Pokémon whose dignity had been personally offended.
He couldn't entirely explain it, but every single time he used Suicune in a battle, the probability of it catching a Fake Out to the face was statistically inexplicable.
He understood the reason, technically — Annihilape had Ghost typing, so Normal-type Fake Out passed through it entirely, leaving Suicune as the only viable target. But still.
It was funny.
"Brick Break."
Suicune, still flinching from the Fake Out, couldn't immediately retaliate. On the other side, Annihilape's palm came down in a savage arc, and the Brick Break split the incoming Flamethrower clean in half. The two curtains of flame billowed past Annihilape on either side, hot wind sending its grey-white fur whipping in all directions.
It looked absolutely unhinged. Appropriately so.
"That power—"
Rika's eyes flickered. Across from her, Ito had gone visibly still with shock.
A Brick Break that cleaved a Flamethrower apart?
Rika's Weavile was her ace. Its Special Attack stat in particular was something genuinely exceptional. And yet a single Brick Break had split its Flamethrower down the middle.
"LORD MAMMON, THAT'S THE STUFF!!"
Chakra punched the air from the sideline, whole face transformed. That's the young master he knew.
Having bisected the Flamethrower, Annihilape didn't spare the Weavile so much as a glance. It charged directly toward the opposing Weavile — the Weavile that had started all of this.
"Extreme Speed."
Suicune pulled itself out of the Fake Out flinch. A white radiance bloomed at its back. It launched itself like a missile straight into the Weavile's chest.
CRACK.
The priority move landed before any counter was possible. The Weavile let out a sharp cry and was thrown backward — but Suicune didn't stop. It shot past, curved, and came hammering back in a second pass.
Extreme Speed. Again.
"Quick Attack counter! — Blast Burn!"
Rika's reaction was razor-fast. Both commands came in the same breath.
The Weavile's claws lit up white — Quick Attack, a Fighting-type's answer to priority moves. It snapped forward to intercept.
But Suicune wasn't there.
It hadn't attacked at all — it had blurred past the Weavile at full speed, Extreme Speed carrying it around rather than through. The Weavile swung at empty air.
Rika's pupils contracted.
CRACK.
Suicune's feet touched ground for half a second — then it reversed and slammed into the Weavile's back with its full weight behind it.
The Weavile cried out, this time louder. The second Extreme Speed hit substantially harder than the first, and its whole body went tumbling.
"Air Slash."
Suicune leapt. High, then higher — and from that apex, a blade of concentrated air came screaming downward, tearing into the Weavile below.
BOOM.
The Flying-type move detonated on impact, sending a dense cloud of dust billowing outward.
Then — in a small gesture of apparent consideration — Suicune exhaled a careful gust to clear the air.
It walked forward through the dissipating smoke.
The Weavile was still on its feet, barely, but in extremely poor shape. Two Extreme Speeds and an Air Slash had done significant work.
Suicune came to a halt directly in front of it. Its gaze was utterly blank.
And cold.
Extraordinarily cold.
The Weavile looked back at that expression and felt something deeply uncomfortable creeping up its spine. What is this dog planning?
On the other side of the battlefield, Annihilape bore down on Rika's second Weavile like a force of nature. The Weavile fell back, gathering flame in its maw as it retreated — the blazing 「大」 character of Blast Burn began to take shape, scorching the surrounding air red.
Annihilape dissolved.
Shadow Sneak.
When it reappeared, it was behind the Weavile.
Rika had called a warning, and the Weavile had tried to prepare — but Annihilape was simply too fast. It grabbed the Weavile by the tail.
That was that. Once caught, there was no escape — Annihilape proceeded to demolish the Weavile in close quarters at its leisure. By the end of it, Rika's ace looked like it was about to start seeing spinning circles.
"That's enough, little bro. I concede."
Rika spoke clearly and without hesitation, cutting in before Annihilape could continue.
"You don't want to keep going? You can switch — there's no rush." Mammon smiled, the offer genuine enough.
"There's no point." Rika shook her head. She looked at Mammon for a long moment, something settling into her expression.
"You're genuinely strong."
Since passing the Masked Man's trials, she had never once encountered an opponent she couldn't beat.
Today, she hadn't just lost. She'd lost with almost no ambiguity about it — the kind of defeat that didn't leave much room for "if only." Which meant only one thing: Mammon's strength was in an entirely different bracket from hers.
"You flatter me," Mammon said, with modest insincerity.
"Per our agreement, I'll join Team Rocket and take the executive position." Rika smiled — and it was genuinely a lovely smile. She held Mammon's gaze and pointed past him toward where Suicune and the Weavile were still standing.
"Little bro — could you get your Suicune to maybe stop hitting my Weavile? It keeps going and my poor Weavile's face is going to puff up like a balloon!!"
Mammon turned.
Suicune — having apparently decided that the battle wasn't entirely over — was delivering measured, unhurried slaps to the Weavile's face, one after another.
Smack. Smack. Smack.
It had a rhythm to it, honestly.
No moves. No techniques. Just bare paw, applied repeatedly to face, with the steady patience of someone settling a personal score.
Caitlin blinked, the recognition taking a moment to surface. ...I feel like I've seen this exact scene before.
Zuki and Tamao wore matching expressions of mild existential crisis. They were having some difficulty reconciling the Suicune before them — messenger of Ho-Oh, legendary guardian of the waters — with the Pokémon currently dispensing rhythmic face-slaps to a Weavile.
...Is this really what it's like?
"That's enough, Suicune," Mammon said, with the mild tone of a man who had learned not to be surprised by this. "Keep going and you're going to knock it into a spin."
Smack.
One final slap — a solid one, the kind that set the Weavile rotating gently on its axis. Having achieved this, Suicune finally lowered its paw. It let out a cold, imperious sniff, then turned and strolled back to Mammon's side with its head held at maximum height.
Some two-bit punk. You dare slap me in the face?
Don't you know who my people are? Mammon and Ho-Oh? Do you have any idea—
"..."
Rika's eye twitched several times. She recalled her poor Weavile into its Poké Ball.
"Welcome to Team Rocket." Mammon stepped forward and extended his hand, smiling. "Looking forward to working with you."
"The pleasure's mine." Rika's smile bloomed bright. She took his hand and held it.
Team Rocket, she suspected, was going to be interesting.
And with Rocket's resources behind her, her current assignments would become considerably more manageable. All things considered, she was more than satisfied with how this had gone.
Honestly, she thought, if I'd had a decent avenue in, I'd have tried to join ages ago.
"Oh, one more thing, little bro." Rika turned the gold badge over between her fingers, letting her gaze drift — with great deliberateness — toward Chakra, who was standing to one side looking thoroughly unenthusiastic. She smiled.
She remembered very clearly what Mammon had told her: that her top-rank executive badge placed her above senior executive. Which meant she had, in the space of approximately one afternoon, become Chakra's superior.
She decided not to make a point of it. Yet.
"I have a friend with me. Any chance he can join as well?"
She nodded toward Ito, who had been standing quietly this entire time — so quietly that Mammon genuinely almost forgot he was there.
"Of course." Mammon looked Ito over. Psychic specialist. Elite-Four-tier. In the original material, the first of the Johto Elite Four.
"Ito's abilities are genuinely excellent," Rika added on his behalf. "Elite-Four-tier. Psychic-type specialist."
"You're very welcome." Mammon produced a silver Rocket badge and held it out to Ito.
His mood was good. Both Rika and Ito were solid acquisitions — talented, and each with specific expertise that filled real gaps. He harbored no illusions about their current loyalty to the organization, but that was fine. Loyalty could be cultivated.
Given their personalities, they certainly weren't going to defect to the League anytime soon.
He exchanged a few more words with Rika and Ito, then turned to Chakra.
"Chakra. Where are the Lugia?"
"Based on the subordinates' report, they were spotted along the southern shore of Whirl Island One." Chakra's tone was clipped. He was still not having a great afternoon.
"Then we wait." Mammon nodded to himself.
His memory of the anime plot was a bit vague, but he was fairly certain the Lugia pair — mother and child — had their territory somewhere in these waters. He'd know more once he saw them.
"It's still early. Why don't we rest first?"
He glanced back at Caitlin and the two Ecruteak sisters.
"Of course." Caitlin had no objection. Zuki and Tamao even less so.
"Mm~" Rika propped one hand on her hip, clicking her tongue with exaggerated appreciation. "I have to say, little bro — traveling around with three gorgeous women in tow. Someone's living well."
"A man only gets to enjoy that kind of life if he's earned it." Mammon was completely unashamed. "Which, if you think about it, is really just further proof of my outstanding qualities."
"...You know what, I can't even argue with that." Rika actually nodded.
"Oh — speaking of the journey over." Rika tilted her head, something surfacing in her expression. "We heard something interesting from a sailor on the way. Want to hear it?"
"Go on."
"There's an old legend around the Whirl Islands — that the islands used to be one continuous landmass. But during some ancient war, the guardian deity Lugia descended in fury and struck the land apart with bolts of lightning, splitting it into four."
Mammon took a sip of his juice. He knew this one.
"Later, someone wanted to seek Lugia's forgiveness for whatever role their ancestors had played. So they ventured deep into the caverns behind the great waterfall at the heart of the Whirl Islands, trying to reach Lugia."
Rika paused for effect.
"They came back raving."
"Why?" Mammon's interest, despite himself, ticked upward.
"Apparently, at the very end of the waterfall path — they saw something." Rika's fingers moved idly, elegant. "A colossal Pokémon. Something that looked, to their eyes, like a demon. The terror of it was bad enough that it broke their mind."
"A Pokémon that looks like a demon." Mammon's brow arched. "In the Whirl Islands."
He ran through what he knew. Was there anything on record that made its home here? Anything that would inspire that kind of reaction?
"I could tell you were going to find that interesting." Rika smiled. "Honestly, if the interior of those caverns weren't such a nightmare to navigate, I'd have wanted to take a look myself."
The deep Whirl Islands remained largely unexplored — because of the persistent legend that Lugia, the old guardian of what had once been Whirl Island, had ultimately vanished into the depths beyond that waterfall. No one had actually managed to confirm it. Getting to the waterfall itself was apparently already no small feat.
"Intriguing." Mammon turned the thought over. "Though whether the story's true is another question entirely."
If it was true — whatever this Pokémon was — it was lurking in the same caverns where Lugia was supposed to have gone.
But then where did that leave Lugia?
☆☆☆
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