“You know,” Sly said, good naturedly as he belched loudly then wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, “I didn’t know that that many flavours of ice-cream existed.” He held his stomach indulgently, smiling.

“Disgusting,” grumbled Becca as she cringed away from Sly. She wiped her own mouth clean with a paper napkin, which she then fed to a nearby trubbish. It rumbled appreciatively as it scarfed the papery ‘treat’ down.

Ed also burped loudly, then patted his stomach similarly. “Yep, they make the good stuff here. You must have spent a lot of time away not to know about Butch and Cassidy’s Iceworks.”

“It’s been a while since I’ve been in Mauville,” Sly agreed, smiling wistfully.

“Ugh, boys.” Becca rolled her eyes. “Come on, let’s try to find… our…” Becca paused, then made an almost inarticulate scream of fear. “Ed?”

“Hmm?” Ed turned to Becca from where he’d been peering at a touchscreen map of the mall they were in with Sly.

“You know how Lux is usually the one causing the trouble?”

“Yeah?”

“Well, you now have a gengar on your team.” Becca pointed a shaking finger at a group of pokemon advancing towards them.

“What?” Ed looked up to see a smirking, happy ghost-pokemon floating along behind four of his other pokemon. It had to be Guy.

“Yeah, that little ball of gas you picked up — Guy, I mean, not Lux — has apparently evolved again. On his own. Somehow. Is anything on fire? No alarms?”

“N-n-no?” Ed hedged, as he bent down to pick up his precocious little eevee as she led the totodile, electrike and sandshrew to them. Lux took up her usual spot on his shoulder.

"Uh, how then? How? Somehow, I just know, Lux has to be responsible for this. Did she steal your pokeball and trade Guy twice? Who for? Where? When?"

Ed immediately dropped his hand down to Guy’s pokeball. It was still there. He didn’t know if that was relief or what that he was feeling at that, as the impossibility approached. So he gave up trying to understand, and found a serene island of calm in the midst of madness. Ed gently patted Becca on the shoulder. "There there, it'll be okay. Just embrace it, don't think about it. It's... it's probably best if you don't think about it, that way whatever she did can't hurt us, right?"

"R-right... yeah..." Becca sat down on a bench, trying to control her breathing. “Maybe we should go though, you know? Just in case?” The 'please' was omitted, but it was still there.

Ed sighed. “I guess you’re right. Come on guys, let’s call it a night for now. Let’s go find Ziggy, Barb, Tully and the others.”

Morning brought a soreness in my body I wasn’t expecting, so I stretched until my bones popped before hopping down from the bed and padding over to the door. I couldn’t really do the move, but maybe it would work enough? I bunched up my muscles and jumped, before my irontail arced down and neatly clicked open the door.

“Yessss!” I crooned to myself happily, before slipping out into the pokecenter proper. I wanted to go for a bit of a wander, to properly finish digesting the previous night’s happenings, as if anything could have prepared me for that. A few minutes later I was outside in the brilliant sunshine. I smacked my lips thirstily and looked around for a vending machine. It wasn’t until after I’d found one that I realised my mistake. Number one, I didn’t carry any cash on me. Number two, I was a pokemon and couldn’t reach the coin slot anyway if I had.

“Dratini,” I swore.

“Want me to take care of that?” Shadow asked, smirking as I jumped in shock.

“Heeey!” I replied, whirling to see my team-mate striding up to me. “What’re you doing out here?”

“You know I could ask you that?” he sidled up to the machine and inspected it carefully, putting a paw on the side and closing his eyes.

“I just felt like a wander,” I replied noncommittally.

“Same.”

There was a sudden burst of electricity and the machine’s lights dimmed and flickered for a moment before it spat out two bottles of soda.

“Razz-Pecha okay for you?” the electrike asked.

“Now that is a neat trick. Think you can teach me?”

“Uhh… maybe? It’s all in the paws. Put your beans here, Lux… yep, like that. Now, uh… I’m gonna shock you, slowly, so try to do that thing you do and shock the machine right back, but kind of feel around with it when you do.”

“I know where the mechanism in these things are, used to reach in and… well my arms were longer then. For starters I had arms, but I get your… oh, there we are and… ow! Okay, got it… easy… a-a-a-and!”

Ka-chunk.

The machine spat out a soda pop.

“Neat!”

Ka-chunk.

Uh oh.

Ka-chunk, ka-chunk, ka-chunk…

“Run!”

We grabbed our bottles and ran, as the vending machine vended itself all over the street. We didn’t stop running until we were several blocks away, which was further than it sounded with legs as little as mine, and safely ensconced in a bush. I irontailed my bottle open, slicing neatly through the glass — when had I learned that trick, I wondered? — and lapped carefully at the soda before rolling on my back, holding it up with all four legs and chugging it down, half of it spilling out over my muzzle and matting my fur with sticky syrup.

“Ahhh, brings back memories,” I said, looking over as Shadow was doing the same. Then I blinked. It really had. That was odd. What kind of pokemon ranger stole sodapop? I shook my head. Must have been during my wild phase before I settled down.

“Let’s wash off, human sodas are tasty but Ed’s gonna go spare if we go back looking like this,” Shadow said.

“Good idea, gotta get rid of the evidence.”

“That too.”

Luckily there were plenty of nearby pools for pokemon to swim in, so a quick dip to rid ourselves of sodapop wouldn’t make too many watery denizens too upset with us. It was as we surfaced from the flat dive that I caught sight of a familiar face. Or at least muzzle. I glanced around cautiously; a beak too. Oh, this was not good.

“Oh come on.” I cursed under my breath. “Now I know you’re meddling.”

“What?” Shadow asked, confused. I passed my tail across his muzzle, then jerked my head at another berry bush — this one low down, unlike the taller trees — and headed behind it.

“This way, try to stay out of sight. You can’t control the air, can you?”

“Nuh uh, why?”

“Over there,” I said, pointing a paw. “See the houndoom?”

“Yeah? …Oh.”

“That’s Bluey. Tried to snack on me and Bart. Up that spire?” I pointed again at a tall metal tree-like structure designed for the larger aerial pokemon to perch on. The corviknight? That’s Kazoo, taxi to his trainer. Why are those two degenerates here?”

“What do you want to do? Follow them?”

“You know what? That’s a good idea!”

Bluey padded through the park-like area until he reached a smallish building that looked kind of like a substation. He ducked through a low hole in the metal fence and sniffed around the edges of the area carefully before heading to the building in the middle. He scratched at the door three times then sat and waited. He didn’t have to wait long, as there was the sound of locks being undone and the door creaked open. A chewtoy was dropped out, which the houndoom picked up in his mouth. He carefully extricated himself from the walled off area, spared a brief glance up to Kazoo, then headed away. Kazoo took a baleful look around, shuffled his feet a few times, then swooped off after him.

I breathed out a sigh of relief. As far as I could tell, we’d not been seen, or smelled.

“You want to tell me what that was about?” Shadow asked. “Where are we, anyway?”

“I wish I could,” I replied. “All I know is, those two are trouble. And worse, they’ve got help on the inside. Human help. That’s big.”

“Inside what?”

I carefully checked for any more familiar pokemon, then idly circled around to the far side of the building before nonchalantly padding up along by the front, where the heavily padlocked gate was. I relieved myself up against it — if Bluey still remembered my scent then we were now in trouble if he came back, but it was a chance I’d have to take — before trotting onwards up the road. I heard the rustling of leaves and branches as Shadow joined me. He might get my scent, but I definitely now had his, and whoever had been helping him. Whoever the human was, he didn’t wash as much as most humans.

“So,” he asked, “what did you find out?”

“Well I still can’t read,” I said, “but I am good with pictures. I know what a lightning bolt means, and so I think I know what’s down there.”

“Go on?”

“Some sort of power station. That’s New Mauville, which is weird. I thought that place was out over yonder.” I pointed towards the sea. Granted, we were close, but I’d thought the complex didn’t penetrate inland quite this far.

“I think Ed’s mentioned that. They make power for Mauville. It was going to be bigger, and it is big, but there’s all pokemon living down there and the humans don’t want to cause trouble. I think they made it bigger a few years back, or had to rebuild it and took the opportunity to expand. I guess they still use it, most humans don’t go down there.”

“Obviously somebody does,” I grumbled. “We have stolen machine plans, stolen parts and something to do with power generation. What in the world is that woman doing?”

“Meddling?” suggested Shadow.

“Hmm?” That hadn’t been the suggestion I’d expected, rhetorical or not.

“You said somebody was meddling, earlier. What did you mean? This?”

I snorted, shaking my head. “Oh, no, no. I just mean Celebi. She’s—”

“Celebi!?” hissed Shadow.

“Yeah, I kind of—”

“Does this have anything to do with Arceus patching the universe?” Shadow was at once doubtful and petrified.

“Naa, I don’t think so. At least I hope not.” I swallowed. “Arceus, I hope not. No, but I’m sure Celebi has been meddling. It’s what happens when you get booped by Ho-oh, like it or not.”

“Oh, that expla—WHAT!?” Sparks flew from Shadow’s muzzle as he yelped in astonishment.

“Uh, yeah, didn’t I explain that yet? I guess not. Uh, Lord Ho-oh was… you know how Giratina evolved Guy?”

“You got evolved? But you’re still… you?”

“Yeah, not so sure about that. Anyway, don’t worry about it. Long story short, Celebi’ll be around every now and again, because I guess when a pokemon ranger gets turned into a pokemon — don’t laugh! — then I guess there’s never a celebi far behind.”

“You think she, what, sabotaged that drinks machine? So that we’d have to wash off in the pool and then see—” Shadow blinked. It was a long shot, but it made weird sense.

“Maybe? I dunno, the way I was told it was kind of a toss-up between being noticed and this sort of thing happening, or this sort of thing happening and then getting noticed. But either way, that Zyrna woman, the Draconid? She’s… building something? Or trying to, I think. And she’ll need to power it.”

“So she needs something from down there,” agreed Shadow. “And might now have it?” He looked up at me. “And you think you can stop her?”

“Heck no, I’m just an eevee.” I shook myself. “Doesn’t mean I won’t try if I get the chance, though. You with me?”

“You’re nuts. But sure, why not.” Shadow grinned. “We’re all in this together, a team.” I grinned with him.

“Come on, we’d better get back. If I’m not wrong, Ed’s gunning for whatever badge you can get here, which means more fights, more training and more moves. End of the world or not, we’ll have to get those badges some time.”

“Shadow! Thunder Fang!”

“Charry! Flamethrower!”

The pignite leaped backwards, took a deep breath and roared as it spat a huge tongue of flame from its jaws. Shadow’s thunder fang snapped short as a powerful burst of electricity lit up the field just before Charry’s gout of flame slammed into him, throwing the spiky electric pokemon backwards to smash into a nearby concrete wall. He slumped to the ground. Becca swiftly retrieved him, pressing the ball to her forehead as it closed.

“Thanks Shadow, you did good,” Becca murmured. She shrank it down, affixed it to her bandolier belt once more, then plucked her second pokeball of the match — the pair of trainers had agreed on two — and enlarged it. “Time for your new party trick Bart! Rollout!”

Becca threw her pokeball with a fastball backspin applied, her sandshrew exploding onto the field before the full move had even been called out.

“Shrewwwww!” Bart yelled, tucking himself into a ball, rolling in place and speeding up as great gouts of yellow lightning flickered around him. Great plumes of dust and rocks shooting up around him, the sandshrew barrelled up the field towards Charry, the streaks of lightning earthing themselves as he went.

“Don’t let him… ember!” Marc called out, but it was no good. Bart rolled straight through the blast of flame and slammed into Charry, who was sent flying in turn.

Unrolling from his ball, Bart straightened up as Charry slumped. “Saaaannnd—!” he cried, as his form was enveloped in light, before he continued. “Slash!”

Bart stretched upright, and kept stretching. And stretching. His countenance grew more serious, more proud, as the previously smooth scaley plates on his back flared up and out, darkening in colour from light beige to a more russet tan. His stance widened as the light left him, revealing meatier claws on both his feet and forepaws. He was easily twice as tall as he’d been before, and as he felt everyone watching him, suddenly bashful about it.

Becca’s and Ed’s own cries of joy were joined by Shadow’s, as the electrike popped himself out of his ball and staggered over to the now-sandslash, leaping to pounce upon his friend as the second evolution-glow of the day started.

Shadow — previously relatively small, green and unassuming — lengthened and grew, his fur thickening and darkening, the hue changing from green to blue as wild, unkempt spikey tufts of fur sprouted from his head and neck, paws and hind quarters. Previously he’d been bigger than Bart, and though now he was a good deal larger, his previously smaller friend now towered above him.

It didn’t matter. As the light faded, it revealed a healthy, happy manectric wagging his tail furiously from on top of his friend. He was swiftly thrown off as a loud tussle began between the two, rapidly joined by the somewhat-recovered Charry. The turtwig Shadow had initially defeated trundled up inquisitively, and was boisterously taken into the impromptu wrestling match the other three combatants were having.

Marc ruefully rubbed the back of his head and Becca laughed, offering her hand to shake. The older trainer took the younger’s hand, grinning.

“Good match, Rebecca. You’re a smart kid, you could go all the way, you both could. My Charry and Tortuga were beaten fair and square.”

“Thanks Marc. Let’s have a rematch some time… but after me and Ed have both got the Dynamo Badge.”

“Good luck with that. Got mine a while ago, yeah? I guess I’m out of practice now, eh? Maybe I’ll get down the gym some, get my two monsters a bit of a workout now and again, whaddaya think?”

“Pretty sure I was just lucky.”

“Keep telling that to yourself when you’re on Victory Road.”

“Augh, stop being so nice about it!” complained Becca good naturedly, as she moved towards her two pokemon, drawing them into a hug. “Hey! Lay off licking my face, Shadow! Bleurgh! Or you’ll be grounded!”

“Good thing he’s already grounded,” snarked Sly, pointing at where Bart was pulling on his friend’s tail.

“Oh har-har,” huffed Becca. Marc just chuckled.

“I’m just a local, not gunning for the league any more, those years are behind me, but I do keep my hand in. If you can beat me, you’re on track for getting your badges though. Having two of your pokemon evolve in a fight — with those two pokemon fighting, no less! — bodes well.” He hugged his own pokemon, Tortuga nuzzling him apologetically whilst Charry just seemed to have enjoyed the challenge. Marc comforted the turtwig, murmuring softly to it until it cheered up.

Ed grinned. “Tell me about it! Pretty sure Shadow was just waiting for Bart to evolve, the two of them stick together, Becca’s a good trainer.”

“Friendship’s a powerful thing, kids.” Marc grinned back as he looked at the two younger trainers, just starting their journeys together. He nodded at Ed and Becca, “When are you two going for the Dynamo Badge? Today?”

Becca shook her head, grinning and pointing to the flashing lights of the Game Corner behind them. “Naa, I think we’re going for a bit more training first, but before then we’re gonna try our luck at the Game Corner.”

“Then you really do need some good luck. Watch yourselves there, the house always wins, yeah?”

“We’ll be responsible,” said Sly, as he looked up from scrolling through the picture’s he’d taken of the match to also shake hands with Marc. “I promise to keep an eye on ‘em.”

The lights and sounds of the Game Corner were too much for my sensitive ears, which was part of why I had the brilliant idea after too many hours of slot machines, loud cheers, cigarette smoke and flashing lights. The other part of why I didn’t just ball myself was because I couldn’t bloody well think straight with all that light and sound. Why I’d thought I’d enjoy this in the first place was beyond me. Most of the rest of us pokemon had quit long ago, but I’d been there too long. I’d tried jumping in Ed’s lap, batting at the machines, tripping him up and nothing had worked.

“Alright, alright, I’ve had enough… we’re gonna get out of here one way or the other,” I grumbled, wincing at the thump-thump-thump of a growing headache.

“What are you gonna do?” asked Shadow, also suffering from all the light and sound, just not quite as much and for some reason somewhat enjoyed it. Maybe it was the electricity everywhere that balanced it out for him, it wasn’t an element I was fully familiar with, despite the morning’s lesson.

“Remember the drinks machine?” I offered, flicking my ears.

“...Yes? …No-o-o!”

“Oh yes.”

“Lux, we’ll get in trouble! Lux! Lux, no!”

“Lux yes!” I said triumphantly. I tried to hide the little smirk on my muzzle, but unfortunately I hid it with another, larger smirk so didn’t really succeed there. I lifted a paw to the machine where Ed was sitting, closing my eyes and feeling around. luckily the one at the end of the row so I was sure we’d not be seen, and concentrated. Just a little push was all it would take.

I hopped up onto Ed’s lap, then from there turned and hopped up almost standing — hind paws on Ed, forepaws on the one-armed bandit’s glass facade — and started batting at the buttons and the screen.

“[Oof! Lux! What are you doing! Get off out of it!]” Ed complained, “[We’ll be going soon enough!]” but I was right where I wanted to be.

He’d pulled the arm just after I’d hit the multi-bet buttons and cleared the hold, so the reels were spinning merrily and ordinarily he’d be set to lose most of his in-play poke, but not this time. All I’d need to do was to give them a little nudge just at the right time and… I pushed electricity through my paws into the machine and stopped the reels on all pokeballs.

Whirr… thunk-thunk-thunk… awooga awooga awooga! Kachunk kachunk kachunk kachunk…

A big red light spun and a siren sang as the jackpot was hit. Coins started veritably flooding out of the dispenser as Ed and Becca sat there, gaping, before fetching their buckets and scooping up the winnings. By unspoken agreement between them, they decided that that had been quite enough gambling for one night, which suited me down to the ground.

If only it had suited the owner of the casino.

Ed and Becca strode out of the casino into the cool night air as two large gentlemen and a third scrawnier but far more worrying looking chap surrounded them from out of the shadows.

“Uh, evening,” said Sly, fingers reaching down for his phone. He gripped it tightly in case he needed it.

“Boss wants to see you kids, congratulate you on your winnings,” said Scrawny.

“What i-if we don’t want to see your—” Becca tried, screwing up her free hand into a fist and scowling.

“That would be rude, very rude,” said Large One, cracking his knuckles.

“My mum always said don’t be rude,” said Large Two, thoughtfully, garnering him a stare from everyone present.

“W-well, uh, if all that’s wanted is a quick chat, th-that’d be fine, I guess. I mean we do have to get all our pokemon into bed.” Ed visibly fingered his full bandolier of pokeballs. “You know, before they get overtired and decide to stay up all night causing trouble.” His voice shook, but he didn’t look away.

“Oh, no, no, we know how much trouble pokemon can be, don’t we, boys?” asked Scrawny, flipping his suit jacket so his own pokeballs were visible.

“Yeah, one time my salazzle bit me when I was trying to feed her and… uh… yeah.” Large Two’s explanation petered off into awkward silence.

“Just as long as we understand each other. This way, lady, gentlemen.” Scrawny sauntered his way back towards the casino, and the rest followed. Scrawny led them back into the casino through the front doors, to a side elevator which he called with a special card. The walls were glass, the lighting recessed and warm, classy, with plenty of soft curves. Scrawny looked up at a camera and nodded, and the doors closed again. Moments later, the glass elevator emerged into the night, rising up the outside of the skyscraper as the lights of Mauville City spread out below them. Despite their predicament, the three youngsters found the view mesmerising, it was almost a shame that the doors whooshed open behind them and they were ushered into an opulent penthouse suite.

The lighting in the suite was also tastefully hidden. The windows were huge, perfectly made and placed for looming behind as one stared out over the city, brooding or planning. Which probably explained why there was a sharply dressed, well-toned older man doing exactly that. He held a whiskey glass in one hand, his other was tucked into his expensive, charcoal-coloured suit jacket. A large — very large — persian lounged nearby. It was bordering on ‘enormous’ and looked to be well fed. Not in the ‘roly poly bundle of pudge’ way, but in the ‘shiny, sleek, sharp and deadly’ way. She watched them, unerringly, tail-tip flicking as she cleaned her claws noisily and pointedly. She flexed them occasionally, they gleamed in the light.

“Gi-gi-gi…” stammered Ed, eyes going wide as he realised who they were looking at. The man was a legend in his own lifetime, a powerful figure that moved in the shadows, not one to cross lightly.

“Good evening,” said the sharply dressed man, eyeing them through the room’s reflection in the floor to ceiling windows, taking a sip of his whiskey as a small smile played across his face. His hair was jet black, despite the faint age lines on his face. His suit was immaculate, charcoal grey, and very expensive. “My name is Giovanni, you may have heard of me.” He turned, smoothing his suit with his free hand. “I must say, I’m surprised. Whilst I am but a humble philanthropist these days, I have to say that plans to rob me are usually a lot more…” he waved a hand playfully, but his eyes were sharp. “Well thought-out? Meaningful?”

“Rob you?” retorted Becca, brow furrowing. She’d expected to be strong-armed for the cash back, not accused of thievery. “We didn’t rob you! We just won the jackpot and decided enough was enough. Look, what is this about? Your heavies dragged us up here—”

“Oh? That’s interesting to hear.” Giovanni sipped his whiskey again. “So you’re saying you didn’t deliberately have an eevee with Mimic — so we wouldn’t immediately realise what you were up to — manipulate the slot machine?”

The scared, confused and curious looks on the three children’s faces turned to a united one of anger as they all turned to the eevee who had been trying to hide behind Ed’s legs.

“LUX!” Ed shouted, balling his fists up around the bucket of coins. “Did you mess around with the slot machine!? Is that what you were doing, you little…!”

“Ee… eevee? Ve… eeeveee?”

Ed’s face became suffused with red, though it wasn’t clear if this was from anger or embarrassment. He turned back to Giovanni and held out his bucket of poke.

“I am very, very sorry, sir. I had no idea. I will be having words with—”

Giovanni blinked, looked between the two trainers, their red-haired companion and then the eevee in question, and burst out laughing.

“Will you please, uh, forgive…” Ed started, but trailed off, clearly embarrassed and confused. He rocked back and forth on his feet, fidgeting.

Giovanni ignored the boy for a moment, just holding up one finger as he attempted to regain his composure. Finally he took a deep breath and straightened up. “Ah, well this is somewhat awkward, though given your reaction to it all, perhaps more useful.”

“If you’re just going to try and threaten us,” huffed Sly, “then you can forget it.”

“Come, come. We’re all friends here,” Giovanni replied, chuckling at the scowl on Sly’s face that said, louder than words, no we’re not.

The ex-gym leader was silent for a moment, meeting the gazes of all three youngsters, one after another. Finally he focused back on Sly, raising an eyebrow. “I was surprised that a man of your many talents, Sly, would take up with common thieves.” Ed and Becca turned to the third member of their impromptu team, who shrugged, mouth a hard line.

“Although,” Giovanni continued smoothly, “I was not entirely surprised to learn two seemingly otherwise innocent trainers had stooped to petty thievery — it’s technically grand larceny with the amount you ‘won’, by the way — my dear Edward and Rebecca, but then I rather had come to the conclusion that you two were involved in some other…” he trailed off, eyes narrowing thoughtfully. “Hmm. Drinks?” Giovanni looked at the three youngsters before him and raised his shot glass, shaking it questioningly, the ice within clinking loudly.

“Umm, n-no, thank you,” said Ed. Becca shook her head. Sly just remained silent.

Giovanni took another sip of whiskey before nodding, then waving off the three thugs who were skulking around at the back of the room near the only exit.

“Sir?” asked Scrawny, trying his best to loom. He didn’t really do it as well as Larges One and Two. He did do skulking with expertise though.

“I won’t be needing you three any more here. Go… walk the lobby or something.”

“Oh, it’s the part of the thing that needs no witnesses,” said Large Two, brightening.

Giovanni closed his eyes and breathed a long-suffering sigh. “Just, just go.” He paused whilst the three flunkies left, then fixed his eyes once more on the children. “It is, I assure you, so very hard to get good help these days. Still, to business. I have proof, and I stress that I can make it stick, that your eevee influenced my slot machine to give you a nice little payout of ten to fifteen, so do I have your full attention?”

“Umm, is this where I ask for my lawyer and refuse to talk?” squeaked Becca.

“Only if you’re really intent on walking out of this office in handcuffs. It would be refreshing to be on the other side of that experience for once, but I expect none of us would be that thrilled, all in all.” Giovanni shook his head. “No matter. I don’t care about your winnings. It really wasn’t that much, and your assistance will both cost me and you less than doing things the hard way, understand? You do a favour for me and I don’t ruin your careers before they start. Everybody wins.”

“And how do we know you won’t change your mind later?”

“Ordinarily that might be a bit harder to ensure but,” Giovanni leaned closer to Sly. “Is this close enough for your device to pick up? Good. I hereby give you the winnings that your eevee stole for you tonight, Sylvester, Edward, Rebecca, and absolve you of all responsibility for the crime that I have, I add, absolute proof was committed, however accidentally you maintain it was perpetrated.”

Sly blinked. Ed and Becca looked at each other, confused.

“I-i-is that it? Can we go?” Ed asked.

Giovanni brought out a small device, pushed a button on it, and the three found themselves putting fingers in their ears and wiggling them as an odd kind of pressure assaulted their hearing before the feeling faded, though it was clear that whatever the device had done, the effect remained.

“Well you could, but this is the part of our meeting where I tell you that I know enough about you three to make life very interesting for you if you do. So, how about we all sit down and continue our chat?”

Sly eventually nodded, speaking up. “You know who we are. I bet you know all about us. It doesn’t scare me. You know what we can do, so you want something from us,” said Sly, eyes narrowing. “Let’s assume we’re ready to play ball, and—”

“Oh you may not be, but these two little cherubs are,” interrupted Giovanni with another chuckle as he gestured at the two young trainers in the room. “I thought I’d caught a couple of short-sighted opportunists red handed, that I’d have to strong-arm them through their inevitable bravado, but they really hadn’t planned to rob me in the slightest. They still did though.” He smirked, knowingly. He held all the cards. It could be said he held the card making machine.

“You’ve made your threats, just get to it and tell us what you want. You won’t impress us by sicking Team Rocket on us.” Sly was nonplussed.

Giovanni sipped his drink. His persian stretched, showing off her immaculate, sharp fangs.

“Quite apart from the incontrovertible fact that Team Rocket is entirely a thing of my past which I have, I assure you, entirely left behind after paying my debts to society, I can say that I would only be doing my civic duty to point out that you three have gotten yourselves thoroughly embroiled in whatever plan Team Magma’s been cooking up, not that I as an honest businessman would know anything about that sort of thing.”

“Uh huh,” said Sly. “Pull the other one, it’s got bells on.”

“Quite.” Giovanni sipped his drink again. “Let us then dispense with the trivialities. I thought whatever you three were up to was deliberate; after all, you’d covered your trail well — missing scientists and all — but now I’m just wondering…”

The mob boss broke off for a moment, taking yet another sip of his drink before moving to a decanter set and topping himself off. Sly eyed the bottle, it was a malt worth easily twice what his friends had allegedly ‘stolen’ from the casino below. Giovanni’s eyes glittered in the reflected lights from the city as he turned to gaze once more over his demesnes, and into the past.

“There was another team of youngsters I knew a few years ago who would always get themselves in my way, just like you three,” he said softly, the ghost of a smile on his lips.

“What?” Becca shared a gaze with Ed, who shrugged.

Giovanni shook his head to clear it, then nodded to the suite of sofas set around a glass coffee table. A number of photographs were on the glossy surface, picture side up. Most of them were of pokemon and people that Ed, Becca and Sly all recognized. Because it was them and their teams.

“I have been attempting to track down some merchandise of mine that went missing a few weeks ago, without much success. However, it has come to my attention that this lady has been spotted in the area, and she is much more interesting.”

Giovanni put down another picture atop the rest, slightly blurred, of a woman perched on the back of a swooping corviknight.

“Zyrna!” hissed Becca, before she could clamp her mouth shut.

“Ah, you do know of her.”

“Yeah, we, she… well our pokemon fought her in Rustboro,” Ed began.

“Then we ended up fighting her again in Rusturf Tunnel,” added Becca.

“And she was after some hardware both times, correct? Delightful. Now then, to properly pay me back, children, I’ll need you to poke around a bit. Her pokemon have been seen in the area dealing with somebody from an inland portion of the New Mauville complex. I want you three budding criminals to snoop around for me down there. I don’t know what you’re after, but somebody took something from there and gave it to Miss Zyrna via her pokemon, apparently in a chew toy of all things. I’ll have some operatives drop you a line when we’ve got something set up for you. It’s too hot for my people to get on the inside, but you three? Whatever Magma or Aqua are up to, they won’t notice you, or at least won’t think anything special of you. What do you say?”

“We don’t have to do any—” Sly began, scowling.

“Fine!” barked Ed, making a fist. “Fine, we’ll do as you say.” He was shaking — with anger or fear he wasn’t sure. Maybe both. Becca nodded too, her cheeks flushed.

“Excellent.” Giovanni pushed another button on the small device he held in his hand. The keening note just on the edge of hearing grew noticeable again, and then the pressure disappeared. “Like I said, ordinarily I’d have done this differently, but I’m a good judge of character. You two trainers have got that in spades. I know you can pull it off.” he waved a hand as he stood up and moved to the windows again, losing interest in them. “I’ll be in touch, see yourselves out.”

The door to the penthouse elevator swooshed open at some unseen signal. Ed, Becca and Sly slowly stood up, looking at one another, unsure.

“H-how do we, uh…?”

“Contact me? Don’t worry, my people will be in touch with you. There’s some gifts for you in the elevator. Chop chop, be off with you now. The night’s young and you’ve got all those ill-gotten gains to spend. And don’t be too angry with… Lux, was it? She was just trying to help. She’s a smart one. A lot of people would be proud to have an eevee that clever on their team, you know? A lot of people would do anything for an eevee like that.”

Giovanni gestured with the remaining fingers on the hand holding his drink, watching until the three had clambered into the elevator and the doors had closed. He chuckled again, taking another sip from his whiskey as his persian padded over for head-pats, purring up a storm. “This was a turn-up for the books, eh girl? And we finally have our in.”