Back to Zero

L.R.T.

Domino took a deep breath, gathering up all of her courage to knock on the door in front of her, cringing afterward. She hoped against hope that they weren't there and that she could talk to Mondo in private. It was unimaginable that he had to live with them simply because they were his sisters. Who knew what kind of ditzy crap her poor crush had to endure day in and day out? If they weren't underage, she was sure that she could convince the boss to let Mondo move in with her. He was such a gentleman that they likely wouldn't end up sleeping together until their wedding night...

The sound of the door opening made her heart skip a beat; the person that stood in the doorway made her wish she had skipped lunch. "Annie," she grumbled as a greeting.

Her long blonde hair was down, reaching just past her rear. A few feet away, inside the apartment, Oakley sat on the couch peering over the back of it, a devilish grin appearing on her face upon seeing who it was.

Before Domino could say anything, the two sisters called out in a sing-song tone to their little brother, "Mooondo! Your girlfriend's here!"

"I'm not his girlfriend," she mumbled in annoyance, adjusting her beret to try to hide the fierce blush creeping up into her cheeks. Mondo and his developmentally challenged sisters were the only Rockets that ever saw 009 in such a state. Maybe if this mission went well she could talk the boss into shipping those two off to the ends of the Earth somewhere. Then it could be just her and Mondo, uninterrupted...

He stopped at the end of the hallway, his own blush tinting his tanned face pink. "Hi - hi, Domino," he said nervously, ducking his head as he walked past his laughing blue-haired sister and to the door. Not looking up, he said quietly, "I got it, Annie. Thanks."

She joined her little sister on the couch, laughing as well, the sound echoing through the corridor of the fifth floor until Mondo slammed the door shut behind him, silencing the cackling.

"So...um...this is unexpected," he said, laughing slightly. "I - I mean, not that it's a bad kind -"

Domino put her hand over his mouth and smiled, shaking her head. "You need to learn to quit while you're ahead." Dropping her hand, she bit her lower lip and darted her eyes away from him and down the hall. "I, um. I just wanted to tell you that I'm going on this big, important mission for the boss."

Mondo blinked and then smiled, replying enthusiastically, "Hey, that's great! Congratulations!"

He was so sweet...not that fake kind, either; genuinely sweet and he seemed to genuinely care about her. Maybe not in the same way she did him but that was okay! Well...it was tolerable, at least.

Shifting her weight awkwardly, she continued, "Thanks...but I really wanted to see you before I went just in case something happened."

Frowning, he took a step closer to her. "What? What could happen?"

She shrugged slightly, poking at the floor with the toe of her boot. "Anything, I guess. If I could tell you about it I would but you know how the boss is."

He nodded, still frowning. "Well, I'm really glad you came to see me, then. Even though I'm sure there's nothing to be worried about..."

"Oh, yeah," she said, waving her hand in the air, "you know. I'm great and everything so I'm not too worried. I just wanted to...um."

"...Say 'see you later'?" Mondo offered.

"Sorta," Domino replied and before the object of her affection knew what had hit him, her lips were pressed against his. It wasn't the sexiest or most romantic kiss in the world but it was with Mondo and that was all that mattered to her.

After she pulled away just as quickly as their lips had met, Mondo stared at her wide-eyed, the hint of a glittery gloss on his lips from her. He didn't know what to do and there she stood, seemingly just as embarrassed as he was, probably waiting for him to tell her that everything was okay...and it was okay. It was very okay.

Much to her shock and delight, Domino got a taste of her own medicine and lip gloss when Mondo brushed his lips against hers, the tingly feeling that it sent through her body leaving much too quickly after he pulled back. They both stood wordless and motionless, looking at each other and slowly smiling.

Hearing a fit of giggles from inside the door, both Mondo and Domino looked to the noise and scowled. Without thinking, Domino stated, "Your sisters are a pain in the ass."

Mondo laughed a little and nodded, turning his attention back to 009. "At least you don't have to live with them."

The smiles returned to their faces and they took up their gazing at each other where they had left off, only having it broken by a beeping noise - Domino's wristwatch. She sighed and bit her lip again. "I gotta go."

"Yeah, sure. Right," he said, sticking his hands into his back pockets. "Be careful, Domino."

She shrugged a little, winking at him as she turned to leave. "Always am!"

Inhaling sharply, Mondo spoke almost too fast for her to understand - almost, "When you get back, you don't have to correct my sisters when they call you my girlfriend."

"Why is it that every time we try to do the right thing we end up the same way we would if we were being bad in the first place!" Jessie huffed, pulling her legs up to her chest and hugging them there, resting her chin on her knees.

"I consider it practice for blasting off," James replied, resting his head back against the steel bars of their cave confines. "Maybe we would've drowned a long time ago if we didn't have that experience with Lugia to go off of!"

"You mean falling into the ocean and by some miracle washing up on shore? Oh, yeah," she said sarcastically, rolling her eyes, "we're regular fucking Dewgong, we are."

"Well, look on the bright side: this time we're well out of the way of all the danger through no cowardice of our own!"

"Instead we got captured by a bunch of renegade Pokemon. I don't see how that's much better."

"To be fair, they were clones," James argued, blowing the same single strand of hair from his eyes.

"What does that even mean, anyway? Like there aren't enough Pokemon in the world to go around or something? And what was that..." She made a face and gestured with her hand, searching for the right word but deciding on, "thing with the telepathy and child-bearing hips?"

"Maybe it's a cloning experiment gone wrong." James bit his lip and glanced down at his lap, saying softly, "None of those Pokemon would be in trouble and feel so awful about the world and humans if it weren't for Team Rocket, you know."

"You don't know that," she retorted, turning her head away from him.

"What are you talking about? You know that the boss has a whole staff of scientists and laboratories all over the world...it can't be just a coincidence that he comes after a bunch of cloned Pokemon. He probably did it himself."

"Or he found out about it and just wants them for himself. It doesn't mean he created them."

Wrinkling his nose, James stood and wiped the dirt off his pants before looking down at her. "Why are you defending him?"

"I'm not," she said, glancing up at him. "We shouldn't jump to conclusions. That's all. And besides, why would he enlist Domino of all people for a mission like that? Going and capturing rare Pokemon is one thing but trying to capture one you created that probably doesn't like you very much is something else all together." Sitting back and crossing her arms, she scowled. "And Domino is so not that good."

"She seemed pretty...uh..."

"She seemed like a fucking troll. I mean really, this is Jessie, James, and Meowth back in the killing-people-in-alleys days stuff! No kid her age is capable of handling the big, meaty stuff." She snorted to herself, resting her head back against the bars and shutting her eyes. "I could barely handle the big, meaty stuff."

"Domino's nuts, though," James said, going over to the bars and peering out, looking for any sign of Meowth - even Pikachu at this point. "And I think she's practically grown up in Team Rocket."

"What?" Jessie said, opening her eyes and looking up at him. "Where'd you hear that?"

James shrugged and looked back down at her. "Mondo. I guess Domino helped train him to be an assistant. He said that she said she was an exception to the 'little kid' rule that the boss has...or...had, I guess...and that she was the youngest agent in the history of Team Rocket. Mondo won't be eligible for that for another year or two and the only reason the boss even let him into Team Rocket at all was because he wanted Mondo's sisters - they're some super-spies or something like that."

Jessie blinked up at him. "Where the hell was I when Mondo talked about this?"

"Jessie," James said with a small smile, "he can barely move around without walking into a wall or tripping over his own feet when you're around. He'd be way too shy to tell you any of this!"

She scowled again and stood up, poking him in the chest. "All right, so then why didn't you tell me?"

"I...I guess I never thought it would come up?" he offered, laughing nervously.

"Well, what do we have here?" The two Rockets jumped as the cell door was flung open, clanking against the bars, the sound echoing throughout the cave. "Some rare and valuable Pokemon?"

Jessie narrowed her eyes, clenching her fists. "You know very well we're not Pokemon!"

"Oh, that's right," Domino said, tapping her finger against her chin. "I was mistaken. Team Rocket agents are as useless as you are rare; but they certainly are not very valuable!"

James narrowed his eyes as well. "Are you going to help your fellow team members and let us out or are you going to make snarky remarks all day?"

Domino snorted. "Fellow team members? I wouldn't insult the Zubat by saying that you were its fellow team members, let alone myself!" She turned on her heel just in time to miss James grabbing Jessie to keep her from lunging at the younger agent. "I happen to have a very special job for the both of you - a job where your talents will be put to their best use yet."

Jessie and James exchanged looks with each other, gesturing with their heads and hands to the other to speak up. Non-violence not getting the desired results, Jessie smacked James in the back of the head resulting in a cry of, "Ow! Jessie!"

She smiled and crossed her arms in triumph, nodding her head in Meowth's direction. James sighed and took a step toward their friend, hands in his pockets. Biting his lip and ducking his head, James asked, "Are you okay, Meowth?"

Letting out a heavy sigh of his own, Meowth remained seated on the ground, looking up at the bright moon above them. "Been betta."

"Do you want to...um...talk about it?"

"Ain't nothin' to talk about." He lowered his golden eyes from the sky to the dirt in front of him. "I knew humans was capable of some real crummy stuff - dat's pretty much all Team Rocket does is crummy stuff, after all - but I neva tought dat dey'd tink so little of Pokemon to use dem for experiments and like a weapon made for takin' ova da world. And I dunno why but," he looked up at the moon again, wondering where his friend Meowtwo was at that moment and if it was looking up at the same moon in the same sky, "I neva tought da boss was like dat neither. I always figured dat bein' a rare Pokemon was like a compliment and dat bein' brought to da boss was a privilege...and I didn't undastand why I wasn't rare enough or good enough to be top cat." Furrowing his brow and frowning, whiskers drooping, he said, "I get it now, dough...ain't no Pokemon good enough for da boss. He's gotta mess wit' nature and make his own - and even den he's gotta use all dat power for himself." Sighing again, he stood, tail flicking back and forth. "If it weren't for youse twos, I'd wish dat I neva joined Team Rocket at all."

Jessie and James looked at each other sadly, Jessie stepping forward to stand with James closer to Meowth. "But you stood up to him and to all of those grunts...and because of that, all of those Pokemon are safer and happier and maybe even feel a little more accepted in the world," Jessie said, smiling at James as he took her hand and squeezed it.

"Yeah...maybe..." Meowth shook his head and turned to face his teammates. "Don't worry about Meowth! I'll be fine. Just stinks when yer whole purpose is called inta question, dat's all."

"You should never question that," James said. "Your purpose is to just be Meowth."

"Whatever that means," Jessie said playfully.

Looking up at his friends, Meowth smiled, his teary eyes glistening in the moonlight until he rubbed them away with the back of his paw. "Youse twos ain't like nobody else in Team Rocket."

"Yeah, we're failures," she retorted.

"I don't mean dat!...Dough, yeah, we are. I mean ya don't act like dat awful girl Domino or even da grunts, not carin' 'bout anyting but da bottom line. And maybe dat's why we ain't so good at what we do but I'd rather have a heart and be a loser den be like da boss!"

"Well, the boss is a loser today, too," James said with a grin.

"In a pretty spectacular way, too," Jessie added.

Jumping up on James's shoulders, he tugged lightly at his hair and pointed out over the horizon. "Den let's get dis show on da road! I tink I gotta have a real long chat wit' Mondo 'bout his choice in ladies."

"So, how did your mission go?" Miyamoto asked, leaning against the bed frame.

Giovanni laid sprawled out on his monstrous satin-covered bed, attempting to nurse a migraine the likes of which he'd never experienced before - and hoped never to experience again. "I have no idea," he said to her shortly.

Raising an eyebrow as he closed his eyes and clenched his jaw, she sat down on the edge of the bed near his feet. "How's that now?"

Letting out a long, annoyed sigh, he responded, "The last thing I remember is screwing you and then getting ready to leave -" Opening one eye, he glanced down at her and smirked slightly. "And you made that very difficult, as I recall, strutting around here in my shirt and nothing else."

She shrugged. "What can I say? It gives me a kick." Scooting up closer to him, she placed her hand on his chest and frowned down at him. "If you can't remember what was such an important, secretive mission then maybe you should see a doctor. Did you ever think of that?"

He shook his head slightly and made a face at the increase in pain the movement caused. "It couldn't have been that important if I don't remember anything about it. Besides," he said, placing his hand over hers, "I wasn't the only one that it happened to, which leads me to believe it was an attack that was either misused or went rogue."

"Oh, yeah. Of course. It was an attack that was executed improperly so obviously everything's completely fine with that scenario."

"Well, it did give me an idea for a new project..."

Miyamoto rolled her eyes and pulled her hand away from his, crossing her arms. "Why doesn't that surprise me?"

Giovanni smirked once again, lifting his hand to brush stray strands of her purple hair out of her eyes. "Not to worry - unlike my other plans, I don't have to be so..."

"Obsessed?" she offered.

"Fine. Yes. Obsessed. I'm leaving it in the hands of our scientists and Dr. Namba, foolish though that may be."

"And I'm guessing that, as per usual, I'm going to be left in the dark about this one as well?"

He raised an eyebrow, wincing at the pain that once again shot through his head like an arrow. "Would you really want to know what goes on in the laboratories? Knowing that there was nothing you would be able to do to stop anything that you found horrendous?"

She sighed softly and shook her head, looking away from him. "Just promise me something."

"I'll try."

Glancing back over at him, a small smile appeared across her lips. "Don't become a super-villain and try to take over the world with your crazy inventions, yeah?"

He couldn't help but smile back, dark and pained eyes softening to look into hers. "We both know that it's much too late to make that promise, Miyamoto."