Despite being designed by some sort of mad scientist – since obviously no sane human being would make their Pokéballs look like they had eyes – the two round capsules felt perfectly normal in Hoshi’s hands.
Heavier than one would expect, though still light enough to hold comfortably, and with a slight wobble to their centre of gravity – like there was a second, smaller ball inside, rolling around with each movement. Hoshi shrunk his new ‘mon’s homes down and placed them in his pocket, where they sat a touch awkwardly. Need a belt or something… I guess I’ll get one with the uniform, since it looks like everyone has the same kind.
…I have two Pokémon. I’m a trainer.
“-And double-click the button to put it into storage mode,” the counter guy finished as Hoshi tuned back into reality. “They don’t need to eat while the balls are small, but they- you know what? This isn’t my job; ask one of the instructors.”
The room was silent for a moment, before the smooth voice of the blond, Ryan, sounded out. “So? Are we done here?”
The man – Hoshi would have used some facet of his appearance to describe him, but his face was so plain it was almost hard to look at – gave the collected grunts a flat look. “That’s it. Get to your class – which you’re probably late to, since Puke refused to show up on time.”
The muscular woman shuffled. “Not my fault they built a maze and called it a school…”
After a second’s hesitation people started to move, turning back to grab their bags or just making for the door. Just like when the asshole of a Rocket had called them up, Moony managed to leave first, while the younger girl took up the rear. Hoshi watched them go, before returning his attention to the aforementioned asshole. “I don’t have any classes. Do I just… go home?” Arcus fuck, this situation is painful. Did Casca get instructions for me and just forget to pass them along, or something?
The man held his gaze for a long moment, before sighing. “No, you should be getting Poké-orientation with the others. And after that…” He reached under the counter, the sound of shuffling papers rustling softly until he came back up with a pamphlet. “Go down to Elec three-oh-three. It’s all labeled on here.”
Hoshi took the folded paper. A map? Yeah, looks like it. “So where’s this ‘Poké-orientation’?”
“Just follow the others, Kudzu.” Hoshi’s growing annoyance must have shown on his face, because the man raised a single perfectly average brow. “You waiting on something? Better hurry, they’re getting away.”
With an under-the-breath “Fuck you, ass,” Hoshi turned and threw open the door, the springy doorstop making its cartoonish sproing as his anger-powered motion sent it slamming maybe half as hard as Puce’s entrance.
He exited the room, looked left, looked right, and caught sight of a flash of purple-green fabric disappearing around a corner. He rushed after the group, catching up to the still-unnamed girl trailing behind the others, all but dragging herself under the weight of an overstuffed, poison-Pokémon-themed backpack.
She turned at the sound of his footsteps. “Oh. Hey.” Face-to-face for the first time, Hoshi saw her eyes were a startling green, covered by a pair of nearly invisible eyeglasses, their body either clear plastic or glass. “Mutsu, right?”
“Yeah.” He stepped up beside her. “Didn’t catch your name.” That tinge of blue-green on her bottom eyelid… Sleep Powder? Some people took the stuff recreationally, but mostly it was used as medicine – as a sleep aid, obviously.
“Nerine,” she introduced herself. “Though according to our handler, it’s ‘Nerd.’”
Hoshi winced. “He’s our handler? Like, permanently?” Fuck. I’m probably going to deck the guy in the face if I spend much more time around him – not that it won’t feel good, but I won’t be looking forward to the consequences.
“Eh,” she replied. “I’ve only been here like, a week and change. I assume we’ll be able to get away from the guy once we’re actual Rockets.” Her hand went down to the Pokéball on her belt, the thing seemingly attached via magnet. “Which is after today, I guess.”
He had been calling her Gamer Girl in his head, but now that he was taking in her blue hair – a metallic shade, obviously dyed rather than natural – and the grunge aesthetic of her backpack, he thought a better label probably would have been Punk Girl. “Hopefully.”
They continued through the twisting halls, eventually going down a set of stairs back to the ground floor, and Hoshi took the time to examine his map. Somehow, this place is even bigger than it looks from outside. Four stories and two basement levels… I wonder how many people actually work here. They had been passing people as they went; mostly janitor-adjacent working types, but occasionally Hoshi would look up from his map to see someone in a lab coat, expensive suit, or Rocket uniform.
I guess they do teach actual rich people… Or maybe those suits are high-level Rockets in their day clothes. Casca said I was fine to keep working at M & S, so I assume a bunch of people must have kept their normal jobs too. The variety made him feel a bit less awkward about wearing his own suit, though the thing was ratty in comparison.
Another flash of passing white made him raise his head, and Hoshi’s eyes-
Drew over something that made his brain shut down completely. He stopped dead still. That… No, it couldn’t be, right? He almost turned his head to follow the passer-by, but thought better of it as a voice cried out from ahead.
“Yo, Suit!” came Moony’s growling tones. “Don’t fall behind! I’ve already waited like half the day ’cause’a Puke; if you get lost I’m kicking your ass with my new Pokémon!”
…I must have been seeing things. Hoshi grunted back, widening his stride to catch up. A few more twisting ultra-rich corridors, and they went through a set of wide double doors into a room his map labelled Auditorium 2, but that Hoshi’s brain gave the much more appropriate name of holy fuck that’s entire Arcus damned theatre!
Seats, multiple hundreds of them, filled a wide semi-circle around a raised stage, the interior of which was hidden by a red curtain. The roof was partially glass, letting in more than enough light to see even with the lights turned off.
Ahead of him, Moony whistled. “Fancy shit. Knew I made the right choice comin’ here.”
The seats were mostly empty, but not entirely; a few were filled by a cadre of business suits, another section was grunts in black uniform and caps, and a third, larger area was taken up by what were obviously scientists or lab technicians in white coats.
“Oi,” came a raised voice from the grunt section. “Over here, new guys! What took you so long?”
----------------------------------------
When Hoshi had been really little, he had been a big fan of the TV show Wiggly Theatre. It had been a puppet show starring a talking wigglytuff that broke down into a bunch of smaller segments, with each half-hour doing three or four different sketches or stories.
He had grown out of it when he started going to school, its place as his favourite being taken by a rotating slideshow of different cartoons – but looking at the stage with its ceiling-mounted spotlights and giant red curtain was bringing those old memories to the fore.
It all felt just a little unreal. He kept reaching a hand down into his pocket, feeling at the pair of Pokéballs, wondering if any minute now he would jolt awake, the whole thing turning into a fading dream in the pre-dawn light.
“And then the guy says, ‘That’s a stupid name,’ and goes back to reading the list like he didn’t just insult me to my face!”
The group rumbled with laughter. “Yeah,” said the Rocket who had called them over, a man who had introduced himself as Black. “Nak’s always been a real piece of shit. He kind of grows on you, though – like mold.”
“He’s getting his fortieth soon,” continued another, this one a woman with long, dirty blonde hair. “We’re planning on taking him to the bay for a party, and then tossing him in at the end. You want in on it?”
Hoshi listened to the banter with one ear. “A party? Count me in!” yelled Moony.
Ryan added his own comment. “I’d certainly enjoy watching that waste of a uniform take a dip in the sea. Perhaps a passing tentacool will decide to put him out of our collective misery.” He adjusted his cap. “When is this event happening?”
“Second week of August,” Black replied. “Though we might have to call it if the typhoon’s as bad as people say it is. Don’t let it slip though; man’s got ears like a noctowl.”
Wait. Something about what they had just said passed through Hoshi’s half-present brain. “That guy’s fourty?” No way. I’d have thought he was my age, late twenties at most.
Black grinned. He had kind of a generic face himself, though unlike the topic of their conversation he at least had the decency to have some memorable facial features. Beneath his cap lay sharp grey eyes and a mildly hooked nose, both set into a squarish face with light blue sideburns framing the edges like bookends. “Ha, everyone’s surprised the first time they hear it. Nak’s an original Rocket, even fought in the war – though he won’t say a damn word about it, so don’t even try.”
Huh. He must bathe in rosewater or some shit to have skin that good at his age…
The light conversation continued for a bit. Hoshi learned that Moony’s actual name was Menard, though he preferred to go by Kenny, and he had joined Rocket after his plans to become a professional wrestler failed to go through.
Ryan was Ryan Sampo, a name he said with obvious pride, and his family had some sort of prior connection to Rocket – he didn’t get to the details before the discussion moved on, a fact that made the young braggart pull a sour face.
Puce had dreams of becoming a real, professional Pokémon trainer, and Nerine answered the question of why she had joined Rocket with a bored shrug.
“All the other gangs were shit. Weepinbell Riders?” A scoff. “That sounds like a sex thing, and not a fun one.” She had her backpack resting on her knees, and every few dozen seconds would fiddle with the zipper. Hoshi would have found it supremely annoying, if the conversation hadn’t mostly been drowning it out. “Is it fine if I smoke in here?”
Black waved her down. “Better not, the bosses can get really into the school thing sometimes – actually, they should have started by now…” He glanced at the stage, a few of the other grunts following his lead. “Whatever. So,” he said, turning Hoshi’s way. “What about you? Why’d you join Rocket?” A quirk of the lips. “Salaried life not offering enough excitement?”
Hoshi looked down at his plain blue-grey suit, opened to reveal a white shirt and black tie. Stupid fucking idea to wear this thing. “It started with a woman.”
“Oh?” He quirked a brow – or at least Hoshi thought he did; the man was wearing his cap low enough that only his eyes were visible. “Anyone I’d know?”
Hoshi grunted. “Maybe. But I think the real reason I joined was…” Chances are I’m about to get laughed at, but who gives a fuck what any of these low-level jackasses think? “I want to do something about Johto. About the League picking shit apart – I mean, look at Puce, here.”
The woman winced, seeming to expect an incoming insult.
“She wants to be a trainer – and a few years ago, she could have been, even while working a different job on the side. But now people like her, like me, have no choice but to go behind the League's back, ‘cause that’s the only way to do it.”
Fucking exams. Fucking ‘too many unqualified’ blah blah excuses. Just thinking about it threatened to set his blood boiling.
Black clapped, along with a few others, and maybe Hoshi was deluded, but he thought it might have been only half sarcastic. “Heh. Got an ideologue, here. Don’t make that face; I’m not gonna bite your head off about it, just-”
He was interrupted by the light dimming, and Hoshi looked up to see that a rolling cover was being drawn across the glass ceiling.
“Ah, there we go. Let’s watch the show.” The senior grunts turned towards the stage as the room progressed towards pitch black.
“Huh?” questioned Moony – Should I call him Kenny..? Maybe if he stops calling me Suit – who was immediately shushed.
“Quiet. The bosses can be touchy – we only get this once a month, I don’t want anyone ruining it with their big mouth.”
A moment later the cover finally succeeded in blotting out the sun, and Hoshi couldn’t see a thing. Are we actually getting a show? I really did join a gang of weirdos. Then, a single spotlight illuminated a section of curtain.
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“Ladies and gentlemen!” came a practiced voice, high but masculine, echoing from above – most likely from a series of speakers, given how far it carried.
“Sorry for the delay!” followed a slightly deeper, but much more feminine voice. “We had a bit of a wardrobe malfunction at the last minute…”
“But it’s all resolved now, so!”
“Without further ado!”
Bombastic trumpets sounded out, the sound washing over Hoshi’s ears as the curtain pulled back to reveal..!
An empty stage. The new trainer blinked, but the pair continued undeterred.
“To protect the world from devastation!”
“To unite all peoples within our nation!”
“To denounce the evils of truth and love!”
“To extend our reach to the stars above!”
And then, as the music swelled, something dropped from above, a blur of different colours – which resolved into the figure of a woman, posing, clad in black and white, her vivid, dark pink hair trailing behind her like an exclamation mark. “Team Rocket Senior Executive, Jessie Oakley!”
Then to her left dropped a second person, soft blue hair, a rose held to his lips as he made an equally vivid pose. “And of course, Team Rocket Senior Executive, James Kidd!”
Then, to Hoshi’s continued astonishment, a persian dropped down between them – wearing what could only be a specially made pinstripe suit, complete with persian-sized trilby. “Meow,” it said, in a voice that he would have assumed was a man’s if he hadn’t heard it issuing directly from the Pokémon.
“Team Rocket blast off at the speed of light!”
“Surrender now, or prepare to fight, fight, fight!”
“That’s right!” concluded the pair together – or rather trio, since the large cat joined in with a roar – and the trumpets followed them with the music’s own dramatic finish.
Polite applause from the assembled… faculty, and Hoshi joined in, slightly dazed.
It wasn’t just the performance, or the fact that someone had tailored a full suit for a three-foot-tall, four-foot-plus-tail-long predator – though that was a good chunk of it – it was also the fact that both the people in front of him could have been supermodels.
Holy shit, that’s a beautiful woman – and a fucking pretty dude, for that matter. The woman had a round face, lips painted to mimic her hair below shapely blue eyes and slightly old-fashioned pearl earrings. Her figure was stunning, shown off by a white… half-cape… coat… thing that probably would have looked ridiculous if she hadn’t been posing like a runway model, over a latex tube top. A skirt and leggings rounded off the ensemble in white fabric and black latex, respectively.
The outfit left her stomach and thighs exposed, revealing creamy skin with exactly the right mixture of toned muscle and smooth fat to make a blush rise to his cheeks.
…And though he’d never admit it, the man was doing as much work in that department as the woman. His face was sharp where her’s was rounded, but he held himself with the same vive, eyes sparkling like green jades. The male version of what Hoshi refused to call a uniform failed to show as much skin, but it was obvious from the way he had caught himself during the landing that the man was fit.
He looks like a Kanto-pop idol. It was extra impressive, because judging from their voices and builds, they must have been half again Hoshi’s age.
Fuck, even the cat looks good. He wasn’t as familiar with the Pokémon as its pre-evolved form, which roamed in packs north of the power plant, but it had a distinguished, aged look that together with the white suit gave it a mob-boss sort of aesthetic. Looking at it conjured pictures in Hoshi’s imagination, of the thing sitting in an antique armchair, puffing on a cigar as some poor schmuck begged it to call off the hit on his wife.
…Holy shit, I need to lay off the gangster movies, they must be rotting my brain.
The duo ended their extended pose with synchronised bows, and he wondered if they had been actors before joining Rocket, or if being an Executive gave them enough time and cash to pursue it as a side hobby.
“Thank you, thank you!” projected the woman, Jessie.
Then the man, James, followed up. “You’re too kind!”
“But the show wasn’t just for entertainment, oh no!”
“This is an educational program!”
“Meow.”
“That’s right!”
“A little pidgey told us our darling new recruits just got their very own Pokémon – the first one’s they’ve ever owned!”
“So we’re going to give you a little lecture… Followed by the real lesson!”
“Our very own tournament! But we can’t have a tournament with just the five of you – any volunteers from the audience?”
The entire group erupted in cheers, from the richest business type to the scrawniest scientist, and Hoshi felt a complicated emotion.
Exhilaration and anticipation, from the fact he would shortly be having his first ever battle as a real trainer, with his Pokémon – as well as a certain trepidation from the realisation that ah, here it is, this is the initiation. He was probably about to watch his rat and bat be beaten a dozen times over by battle-starved senior Rockets.
“Magnificent!” started Jessie.
“We’ll just have our lovely assistants hand out the merchandise, while we set the stage!” continued James.
“Meow.”
And with the persian providing the conclusion, the curtains dropped, the sun-shade beginning to peel back with the faintest whirr of a distant motor.
From either side of the stage emerged a grunt in uniform, carrying identical bags – black with an emblazoned R, of course. Hoshi was becoming increasingly convinced that the entire aesthetic sense of the ‘school’ had been carefully stapled together by the pair of Senior Executives, from the uniforms to the wallpaper. It’s certainly dramatic enough.
The grunts closed in on him and the other rookies, one handing out a small electronic dongle while the other did the same with plastic cards. Are those..? Hoshi thought, his eyebrows raising as a different flavour of anticipation joined the mix in his belly.
They reached him at nearly the same time, emptying their bags and retreating as Hoshi held up the small card to catch the returning light. “No,” he said aloud. “This can’t be real.”
“It ain’t,” answered Black. “Well, it’s a little real. I’ll let the instructors explain, they’ll be back any second now.”
Hoshi could only stare at the card. It had his name, a mug shot – where the fuck did they get that? – a few other details like his height and weight, and most importantly, a title in large block letters running across the top: OFFICIAL POKÉMON TRAINER LICENCE, a string of numbers and letters in a much smaller size sitting just below.
“This can’t be real,” he repeated. For all his smarm and bluster, Danny is actually pretty fucking good at hacking shit, and he laughed for a minute straight when I asked if he could spoof a licence.
In the seats ahead of him the other recruits were taking things with various levels of stoicism. Ryan and Moony were mildly satisfied, as if they had seen this coming, while Puce was dabbing tears from her cheeks. The girl – what was her name again? Ner-something? Nerine! – Nerine was looking at her card wide-eyed, emoting for the first time since he had met her.
As the cover completed its journey with a dull clunk and the room reached maximum brightness, the curtains began to roll away a second time. Hoshi tore his eyes away from the fake, don’t get your hopes up, it’s obviously fake licence to look at the stage.
While the curtains had been down a screen had been set up, large and flat and wheeled like a whiteboard. Jessie and James stood on either side, with the persian lounging on top like- well, like a cat, he supposed.
“We see you’ve all gotten your handouts!” started James, this time.
“I’m sure you want to know how our wonderful scientists managed to replicate our dear League’s proprietary technology…”
“Or at least, what you can do with it!”
“…But first, direct your attention to the board – and the other piece of equipment you’ve received.”
Hoshi looked down at the dongle he had neglected, then back up to see that a diagram of the thing had appeared on-screen.
It was shaped a bit like one of those adapters you’d put into a car’s lighter socket to turn it into an electrical outlet; thinner than it was long, with a flat bit near the end of the otherwise cylindrical body. The flat part had a tiny screen and two buttons, up-arrow and down-arrow, about the size of those on a digital watch.
“This is the Mini-Dex, or as I like to call it, the Rocket Dex!”
“Meow.”
“That’s right! Though it isn’t quite as powerful as the full-sized, League-database-powered official machine, our Mini-Dex is more than capable of telling you your Pokémon’s moves and condition!”
James sighed dramatically. “No one calls it the Rocket Dex… Look, it even looks like a spaceship!” A cough from the side. “Oh, right. Just plug this thing into your Rocket-manufactured Rocket Ball, and click the buttons to navigate!”
“Don’t worry, you won’t break anything! Just insert Tab A into Slot B,” the redhead said with a wink, “And let the magic happen!”
Hoshi looked back down at the dongle – no, at the Mini-Dex. His body thrummed with energy as he drew a ball out of his pocket.
The glass lens-slash-button on the front of the ball depressed as he slid the adapter-looking bit in, continuing to depress until the two machines fused with a click. They really did look like they fit together, black plastic complementing the two-tone purple whatever-it-was they made the Pokéballs out of.
The screen turned on. ZUBAT, it displayed in small text. He pressed a button, and the text changed to HEALTH: PERFECT.
He cycled through the screen’s settings.
STAT CON: NONE
HUNGER: MILD
And then, the word MOVES. Hoshi pressed the down button again, and it changed to LEECH LIFE, then SUPERSONIC, before rolling back over to ZUBAT.
Amazing, he thought, completely genuine. Most trainers have to suss out their Pokémon’s moves through trial and error; this is a big upgrade. Almost as good as what those official League-sponsored brats get. The condition checker was equally useful; in theory he would know the moment his Pokémon got sick, or had any sort of internal injury that would be hard to see from outside.
He dug in his pocket for Rattata’s ball, but Jessie’s resonating voice broke in. “Do you like it? Our very own Rocket Professors worked on those magic wands!”
“They’re sort of like us, but for science instead of Rocket recruiting, Pokémon poaching, and all-around amazing our allies and enemies alike!”
“Meow.”
“That’s right! It isn’t even the most impressive thing they’ve made – but the licences we handed out come close!”
James gestured to the screen, which changed to feature a pair of licences – featuring the Rocket Executive’s names and faces. “Now, these little forgeries aren’t exactly bulletproof…”
“But they can get you into the shallows of the system! They’ll fool bank kiosks and the hand scanners carried by the pretty officers in blue…”
“And that means you can also use the official League Pokécentres!”
“Meow.”
“Right,” Jessie corrected. “So long as you don’t do anything that queries the more… reactive bits of the system.”
“Which is, admittedly, a dauntingly long list! So buckle up, we have a few rules for you to follow…”
What followed was, indeed, daunting: a list of all the things that would see them instantly or not-quite-instantly marked as hackers, rendering them unlicensed once more. If we’re caught committing a crime-crime, we’re fucked. Anything with just a fine is okay, but things that would go on our non-existent record need to be avoided…
Registering a Pokémon for major surgery, draining their League account below zero when the month rolled over, trying to buy certain super-restricted items like evolution stones, all of them were off limits. Hoshi frantically wished he had brought a pen and notebook, and it must have shown on his face because Black reached back to nudge him in the shoulder.
“Don’t worry,” he whispered. “The tech guys will give you a list if you ask. Just focus on the moment.”
Hoshi nodded and turned his eyes forward, embarrassment dusting his cheeks with red.
“...And of course, if you void your licence you won’t be getting a replacement for a while,” stated Jessie.
And James followed up, “Can’t let those curmudgeonly cretins up north get wise to our tricks!”
“Meow.”
They nodded in sync, including the cat.
…Is it reacting to a cue? Is it a poké-genius like Dabi’s machoke? It can’t be a puppet, right..?
No, I’m just thinking about that because of Wiggly Theatre.
“So now that we’ve explained the gadgets…” began the blue-haired Executive. “It’s time for the show!”
His red-haired partner took out a remote, and with the press of a button the screen shut off – only to flash back on with a long list of names. “Our dear recruits will take centre-stage, of course!” she announced.
The list split in half, then each name moved to scrunch up against another. “But everyone should get a chance to participate! And for our prize…”
The senior crowd leaned forward, obviously knowing what was coming even before Jessie spoke. “Something special! A rare Pokémon! Bring it up for us, Professor!”
A diminutive figure came from stage left – and as it had earlier in the halls, Hoshi’s brain short-circuited.
No. That’s not-! Every single time Hoshi had seen Dabi Mokusen, he had placed the man in an imaginary lab coat. It was simply impossible to look at the man and not see it, that was how stereotypical he looked, even in the overalls and hardhat of a construction worker.
The man who walked confidently across the stage, not cringing even a little, was not clad in the uniform of a worker. He was also, Hoshi’s brain insisted, not Dabi Mokusen – because that was too ridiculous. More than the bright red R plastered to a uniform from out of a black-and-white movie, more than the look-how-evil-I-am Pokéballs, more than the Executives with their weird and hot show routine, and even more than the persian in a pinstripe suit, little weedle-like Dabi being a big-shot gangster was completely ridiculous.
His coworker’s evil twin turned to the audience, drew a Pokéball from his pocket, and with a casual toss and an echoing whoosh-oosh-oosh revealed the prize: standing over five feet tall, rippling with muscle, was the four-armed form of machoke’s near-legendary evolution, machamp.
Moony stood up in his seat, pointing, childlike wonder thick on his acne-riddled face. “That’s so fuckin’ cool!”