Why does exeryone want to steal Pokémon so badly?
Well... Michael supposed he was pot calling kettle black, here. He tells everyone the Snag Machine on his arm is a prosthetic, which is only true in the most generous definition of the term, if at all. The fancy cables are just for show, he appreciated a science fiction aesthetic, nothing more.
In Orre, the focus on theft made sense- there were no spare Pokémon to go around, and their power in your pocket could make or break even the average businessman. Even there, though, stolen Pokémon had to be dealt with carefully, painstaking and incredibly illegal re-coding of Pokéballs necessary to prevent the storage system from recognizing the unregistered transfer- or hosting one's own storage server, and avoiding the Pokémon Centers outright.
Until Cipher created the first Snag Machine, of course.
Still, there were only two known functional snag machines in existence- and no one knew where Wes went. Some had claimed he pulled a Red and waited at the peak of Mount Battle, higher than the hundredth arena; some claimed he lived in the abandoned Under. Regardless, no trace was found.
Which left Michael with the only Snag Machine, which had even been legal, once. Oh, using it now for anything but Aura Detecting was incredibly illegal, and given Cipher's fall he hadn't seen any Shadow Pokémon for over ten years, now. But given its nature, the automatic severing of the link between Pokémon and its former ball, it's not like anyone but an eye-witness could very well prove anything.
So it seemed incredibly silly that these punks in front of him, these practical children, were just demanding Michael to give up his Pokémon. They each only had one ball visible on their belts, but hadn't even reached for them. Did they really expect to not have to battle?
Michael sniffed a laugh. Given their folly, why not humor them? He'd caught a Yungoos, a Pokémon that wasn't native to the region but that he hadn't seen elsewhere, curious about it; but he hardly cared for the thing, so gambling his ownership of it was hardly a risk at all.
When he handed the ball to the feminine grunt, he started to walk away - but she called after him. "Uh, hey! The rest of them too, loser!"
Michael turned around to look at the pair again, and raised an eyebrow. Umbreon was his oldest and strongest companion, but did lack the intimidation factor. Which was fine, being intimidating wasn't usually his style, anyway.
A devilish thought entered his mind... unfortunately, given most competitive battling stages banned the use of legendary Pokémon to put the occasional Region Savior and/or Chosen One on equal footing to average but skilled persons, he didn't tend to keep the Birds with him anymore, or even train them much. Damn.
Still, Salamence would do perfectly well, and the young thieves got the hint.
What kind of a criminal outfit was this Team Skull they claimed to be part of? How could they operate with such low standards?