Tauros swayed from side to side, struggling to stay balanced on four wounded hooves. A bead of sweat rolled down Giovanni's forehead. Dammit.
Touros finally fainted. "And there goes the battle! Ash Ketchum has defeated Gym leader Giovanni!" The crowd cheered. Even though it was Giovanni's gym, most people seemed to be rooting for Ash.
Jessie and James looked knowingly at one another. Jessie quietly descended the stairs to join Silver in the basement.
Two guards stood in the hallway by Giovanni's office talking about the battle.
"No kidding. He must have thrown the fight purposely. There's no way Giovanni could have lost to that little brat. He must have something planned."
"He always does. If I weren't so busy I could have totally taken that kid out myself."
The other guard laughed. "Yeah yeah keep talking buddy, that's all you do man, talk talk talk."
From the staircase Jessie saw Silver across the hall in Giovanni's office. On Silver's signal, the two redheads swiftly aimed and shot the guards while their backs were turned.
From the hallway the bodies were dragged into a back room that was being used for storage. Jessie noticed an open door that lead to another room "Are those Giovanni's pokeballs?"
Jessie and Silver peeked in and saw about a dozen pokeballs organized on a shelf. "Yep. That's them. I can't believe the old man just left them lying around." Silver closed the door.
They were lucky to have found the pokemon before any more battles took place. Jessie thought about just stealing them, but then she had a better idea. "Uh, I need to run back upstairs real quick. I think I know how I can make this all go more smoothly."
Silver glanced at his watch. "Okay, but be really quick, they could be down here any minute."
Upstairs Giovanni was buying Ash a drink. "I have to admit kid, you got some skill! I'd like to see how you handle a REAL battle though." He snickered.
Ash felt even more sick. "What do you mean a REAL battle? That was a real battle! I beat you fair and square!"
Giovanni laughed. "Yeah yeah. Back in my days there weren't so many rules. A trainer was allowed to fight however he wanted. I'll tell you what, if you want to see how we old guys do it, come downstairs tonight. I know a few old school trainers who would love to meet you." Giovanni smiled a murderous smile and Ash felt like throwing up. He hated pretending to be friendly with someone who was clearly trying to murder him. But this was a game two could play.
Jessie could see that Ash was busy talking to Giovanni, but Pikachu who was sitting on the floor beside his bar stool noticed her.
Jessie motioned for him to come over, and without Ash or Giovanni noticing, he slipped away. "Pikachu, I need you to get Bulbasaur and follow me downstairs"
Pikachu quickly and quietly grabbed Bulbasaur's ball from Ash's belt without Giovanni seeing and followed Jessie into the basement.
When they arrived in the back room, Pikachu let Bulbasaur out.
"What are you guys doing down here?" Silver asked.
"All of Giovanni's pokemon are in that room right there." Jessie pointed to the door. "I wanted to give you guys a chance to talk to them before this goes any further." Knowing how much other pokemon respected Pikachu and what a great ambassador Bulbasaur was, she was sure they could reason with them.
The two pokemon looked up at the shelf where the pokeballs were stored up high. Without even thinking of asking for help, Bulbasaur headbutted the shelf and all the balls came raining down on them. "...Saur." Moltres's ball hit him square on the head.
Pikachu scurried around the room, tapping every single pokeball he could see, summoning his fellow pokemon out. Soon enough, the room was filled with Giovanni's Pokemon.
"Pika pi- pi pika pi pi. Pika chu chu pi. Pi chu. Ka!" Pikachu tried to explain what was going on. Listen! You guys are all in danger! Team Rocket has developed new pokeballs that will brainwash any pokemon they capture. It's horrible!
The pokemon looked around at one another. "Gengaar." We know.
"Pika? Pi pi ka pi?" You do? Then why are you guys still here? You need to escape fast, before they turn you all into zombies!
"Gen." We are loyal to our master."Gengar Gen." It would be wrong of us to abandon him.
"Bulba. Saur saur." Bulbasaur and Pikachu were natural leaders, and between the two of them it was not hard to convince them to leave.
"Kanga. Kan kanga." Kangaskhan agreed with Pikachu.
From all the noise outside, the pokemon were able to deduce that the celebration was underway. This was their chance to slip away.
Bulbasaur lead them out through the bulkhead and into the forest. He was pleased that he was able to get past this hurdle without using violence. He thought about trying to enlist their help in the ensueing battle, but he could see they were ashamed of themselves and he didn't want to push his luck.
Pikachu sympathized, but he couldn't quite understand what it was like. He had never been in a situation like that before. His allegiance to Ash came from friendship. He felt lucky to have such a kind and wise trainer. He felt sorry for them. So did Bulbasaur. But they both had work to do and they couldn't linger. They said their goodbyes and Giovanni's pokemon bodyguards disapeared into the night, free to be whoever they wanted.
Jessie was glad her idea worked. One thing she learned from getting to know Ash and Pikachu was that pokemon were not violent by nature. They were loyal and wise. They weren't like people. Especially not the people in her life.
Pikachu remembered how Jessie's Ekans said that pokemon aren't bad. They do bad things because their masters are bad. That always stuck with him. A pokemon had every right to abandon their masters if they were wrong. Trainers abandon their pokemon every day. Sometimes Pikachu thought he was the only one with enough guts to stick up for himself. But he could see things were changing. No thanks to Giovanni.
Inside, James and Ash were wondering where the heck Pikachu went. With all of Giovanni's pokemon gone, the wheels were in motion and there was no way to stop them.
"They did it!" Jessie tried to keep her voice down as she came out of nowhere, grabbing Ash's arm and pulling him behind the cover of a large potted plant.
"What? What are you talking about?" Ash was a little surprised. She was beaming.
"Pikachu and Bulbasaur convinced all of Giovanni's pokemon to leave! You won't have to battle him again. Now the only pokemon we have to worry about are a few guards. Probably machamp."
Ash was proud, although not surprised. "That's great. So what do you need me to do now?"
"You don't have to do anything. We would never want you or your pokemon to risk your lives for something like this."
"Well we might be able to help. If you need anything don't hesitate to ask." Ash was genuinely concerned for her safety.
Jessie smiled, touched, and a little confused. "You've done so much good, I don't think you realize. You've got some serious good karma kid. So do your pokemon."
Ash smiled. "So do you. I owe you guys a lot you know."
"Alright ladies, are we gonna get this thing going or what?" Neither Ash or Jessie liked being called a lady. Silver didn't seem to have the slightest trepidation about this. He was cool as a cucumber. As always.
"Yeah I'm sick of standing around talking. Ash, you heard about what happened. Are you in or out?" James was anxious to hear what he would do.
Ash looked to Pikachu. "Chuu..." He was ready to fight.
"Pikachu, do you really want to? I mean..."
"Why don't we take this outside?" Looking around the room, Silver was thinking clearly enough to know that four people whispering behind a ficus was a little odd.
The group traveled to the back next to the bulkhead in the clearing where Giovanni's pokemon left. Only this time it wasn't empty.
The forest was filled with punks, thugs, theives, hustlers, junkies, cutpurses, freaks, dirt bags, crackheads, bagmen, decoys, con artists, henchmen, muggers, trailer trash, gangsters, and skid marks. They were all scum. Which is a kind of integrity, if you look at every exit as an entrance somewhere else. They were the kind of scum that knew they were scum. Most of them were born into it. It was no coincidence that Giovanni was in charge for thirty years, and hardly anyone in Team Rocket was over the age of thirty.
As James looked around at his peers, he felt he finally had somewhere he belonged. He was a god among junkies. Looking at where he was, and how far he had come, he felt proud. Silver managed to find every low life in the state. Affiliated with Team Rocket or not, hatred for this disease of a man was almost universal on the streets. It wasn't as difficult as one might think. These were men and women who came from the same streets as Jessie and James. Men and Women who may have done something with their lives, before they were infected by Giovanni's scourge of moral pestilence.
Some of these people were really just boys and girls Ash's age. Unlike Ash, they had nothing to lose. Ash took out all his pokeballs and released them.
He looked at all of them, more seriously than he ever had. "Listen guys. We won't be battling again. Not like normal anyway. I need to know right now if any of you are willing to fight with the others." He motioned behind him to the knife and gun wielding criminals in the woods. "I want to protect you, but it's not my descision to make... If you feel too weak, return to your pokeballs now." Silver was shocked. This was unprecedented. Never in the history of pokemon battles had a trainer given their poekmon such freedom. Unsurprisingly, some of his pokemon did return. They just got out of a pretty rough battle. Unlike his Bulbasaur, Ash's other pokemon were not too proud.
Some of the criminals had pokemon alongside them. Some of the criminals, namely Meowth, were pokemon. "Pissah! It looks like we've got plently of man power! Now can we get goin?" Meowth was bloodthirsty. A fault of his his friends could easily forgive here.
James was beginning to think Meowth never took anything seriously. "I appreciate your enthusiasm Meowth." He sighed and grabbed the scruff of his neck. "But just be careful, okay buddy?" He said as he pulled him close into a hug.
"Okay okay jeeze. What is it with you humans always thinkin you gotta protect us? Don't you know it's the other way around?" Meowth winked at Pikachu who completely agreed with Meowth for the first time in his life.
The group made their way down the stairs into the back room. Through the door they could hear Giovanni yelling at Miles. His voice echoed in the huge two story warehouse-like underground lair. "What do you mean they aren't there? Pokeballs don't just disappear! Find them!"
"Y-yes sir. Right away!" Miles bowed and ran into the back room where he was greeted by a baseball bat to the face.
"God, I've always wanted to do that!" said Silver as he dragged his unconscious body into the closet. "One down." He smiled as he shut the door.
Leading the gang, Silver quietly opened the door and made his way down the hallway, followed by Jessie, James, Meowth, Ash and then the rest of the group pooled into the backroom and hallway. The group was so large the hallway and room were filled, and some people were sill outside the bulkhead waiting to charge.
Silver stepped into what would soon be a battlefield. "Silver. You're back." Giovanni fought back the sudden fear that gripped him and tried to hide it with a smile. "I'm so happy you're safe." What a coward. "Have you had some time to think things over?" Giovanni tried to sound confident, but Silver was the one person in the whole world who could tell when he was hiding something. To him, it was obvious.
"Yes, I have. I thought long and hard Dad, and the sad truth is, you must die now." Both Silver and Giovanni reached for their guns, but Giovanni was faster, and shot his son in the shoulder.
As soon as he was hit Jessise came running in. The rest followed. "I'm fine, I'm fine" Silver said through excruciating pain. "Believe it or not, I've been shot before." He smiled as a terrified Jessie saw to his safety.
The army poured into the room like a tide. Giovanni's men along with four Machamp rushed in to protect him. A Weezing used smoke screen and Giovanni stole off up a flight of stairs on to a balcony overlooking a gloomy lab. Being a Weezing owner himself, James saw right through the smoke and ran up the stairs after him.
Knowing he had been followed, Giovanni turned and fired. Shoots like a drunken retard. James, completely forgetting the fact he was even carrying a gun himself, wrestled the gun from Giovanni and threw it over the railing. Then it was hand to hand combat. The truest form of antipathy.
Giovanni swung, James ducked, and for some strange reason, the next thing James saw was Giovanni's fancy Italian shoes flying through the air.
Charizard had grabbed him by his Armani suit jacket and dropped him right over the ledge into the lab, which was some fifteen feet below. He landed with an ear shattering crash and James ran down to see where he landed. What he was was almost too violent even for him. Some kind of pipe was sticking straight out of his chest. He was fully impaled.
"Heh. Looks like you beat me kid." Giovanni said in between coughs of blood. "Now be a good boy and put an old man out of his misery. Don't let me suffer."
James looked at him and moved forward slowly. "I just need to know one thing." He crouched down next to him to hear his reply. "Did you ever love Miyamoto?"
Giovanni closed his eyes and smiled a wistful smile. "I did. And Jessie too..."
James looked down at him in amazement and disgust.
He gave a weak laugh. "I wouldn't expect you to understand. You have a strong sense of justice Gervais. She deserves a man like you." For the first time since his early twenties, Giovanni Rossi was a human being. "Take care of her."
An aghast James said nothing else. He backed up, slowly aimed and shot him between the eyes. He then stood there for a minute, still holding the gun up, completely empty inside.
He then put the gun back in his holster and turned to face the throng. It was a massacre. Giovanni's men didn't stand a chance. He arrived just before the last throat was slit.
"Please, please, don't kill me, I'll join you, I'll do whatever you say, just let me live, I have a daughter!" The cowardly Grayson was on his knees at the mercy of Claudio.
"Let him go Claud, Giovanni's dead." James said like he was reading off a grocery list.
The crowed cheered. "Really? Well shit, that was quick!" Meowth seemed disappointed.
"How did he die? ...Was it quick?" Silver looked concerned for the first time since James knew him.
He decided to lie. "Yeah, he was in hell for thirty seconds before he even knew he was dead."
James looked at Ash. He was covered in blood. Someone else's blood. He was impressed. "Wow. So Silver, this means you've in charge now, right?"
Silver laughed a little uncertainly. "Well partly. I mean, Jessie has just as much claim to it as I do."
Jessie tried to look like she didn't know what he was talking about. "Silver, don't be silly, we don't even know-"
"Yes we do Jess!" Silver walked over to her and took her hand. "I know the whole story... You and dad always acted like you were ashamed of each other! Jessica, you are my sister, and I could never be ashamed of you!" The twins hugged tearfully with the mangled body of their father only yards away.
"Well isn't this a nice little family reunion." Meowth mumbled sarcastically before he was elbowed by Pikachu who was enjoying their happy moment.