"Oh no...Misty, your face!" CJ cried as Misty entered the room with Erika, Starmie, and Vileplume.
"It's fine, I just got belted a few times," she told her, waving her off.
"You should have seen what she did to the administrator afterwards," Erika giggled. "There's no way he enjoyed it. And the best part was all his grunts were paralysed and forced to watch."
"I wish I'd seen that," Sabrina smiled wryly. "But you should probably do something about that swelling, babe."
"I'll get her some frozen peas," Brock said as he left the room.
"Tell us everything," Oak frowned with seriousness, clearly expecting bad news.
"Not much to tell," Misty shrugged. "We broke in, we installed whatever was on Ritchie's flash disk, we beat up some Rockets, we got out."
"Does anyone suspect anything?" he pressed her.
"I doubt it," she answered as she was handed the bag of frozen peas by Brock. "Thanks," she smiled at him, then placed the bag against her swollen cheek.
"We destroyed all the cameras in the building, they couldn't have seen us doing it," Erika elaborated. "And we left the computer in the same state we found it."
"What a relief," Oak sighed.
"Data already coming in," Ritchie shouted from an adjacent room. "Great job, guys."
"How long until we can use it?" CJ asked him.
"The download speed is the killer," Ritchie answered. "I can grab whatever I want now without them being any the wiser, but anything big like audio and video files are gonna take some time."
"What about emails?" Brock surmised.
"Already doing it," Ritchie grinned. "I'm just going through them now as I loot their hard drives. It'll take me a little while to get through it all, but I'll print stuff off as I find it. If it's interesting."
Misty grunted in irritation, then sighed in acceptance.
"I was kinda hoping we'd be able to move on this right away," she told him.
"Why don't you and Erika come with me and Sabrina first," Brock offered. "We'll fix you both up a little bit, then you can get some much needed rest. You guys must be exhausted."
"But what about Ritchie?" Misty frowned. "I wanna see what he finds out."
"Ritchie can handle himself," Oak told her. "Brock's right. You two need to tend to your injuries, then get some rest. CJ, Ritchie, and I can sift through the information, then we can all go through it together once you're ready."
Misty reluctantly followed Erika, Brock, and Sabrina out of the room, leaving Oak, CJ, and Ritchie alone with James and Meowth's data. Ritchie scrolled through pages and pages of emails, as well as folders full of video and audio files, occasionally nodding or muttering a 'hmm' to himself as he worked.
"How's it look?" CJ asked.
"Well, it'll take quite a bit of time to go through it all. We might not even have it done before Misty and Erika wake up," he admitted. "But it doesn't look like James and Meowth were exactly security freaks. They're making my job a lot easier."
"We weren't exactly counting on someone being able to break in to the actual station to hack our PCs," CJ laughed.
"That's why this is gonna work," he turned and smiled at her. "Tell me, what's the file name format for these audio files? I'm guessing they're logged phone calls."
"That's right," she nodded. "It's 'day:month:commencement time:year:duration'."
"Thanks," he replied as he continued reading and clicking away, then opened a strange-looking program.
"What's that?" CJ asked. "Looks like some sort of search bot."
"It is, in a way," he answered. "This will play all the audio at four-times speed in the background while I work. It's listening for keywords."
"Is there anything we can do to help?" Oak asked.
"A coffee would be pretty good," he chuckled. "I'll have a bunch of emails printed out soon though. I need you to read through them and see if they have anything interesting in them. I'm just gonna skim through interesting-sounding subject lines."
"I should have recruited you, instead of James and Meowth," CJ laughed. "You really know what you're doing."
"Thanks, CJ," he smiled. "I've always been good at this sort of stuff, I just took more of an interest in it after I stopped training Pokémon full-time. Right now, I'm just glad to be able to help you guys out."
"Well, we'll leave you to it then, Ritchie," Oak said wearily. "It's been a big day, and this old man needs to sit down. I'll get you that coffee."
Misty woke up after a full twelve hours of sleep to find Sabrina sitting on the bed next to her. She smiled up at her, then rolled over to face her.
"Morning beautiful," Sabrina winked. "How do you feel?"
"Pretty good, actually," she answered, stretching out a little. "My face feels a lot better."
"You look fine," Sabrina agreed. "The swelling's gone down a lot. But that's not what I meant."
"Oh?"
"We're gonna have some pretty heavy stuff to deal with soon," Sabrina explained sombrely. "I just wanna make sure you're okay."
"I'm fine," Misty assured her. "I mean, honestly? I'm obviously still pretty upset. I don't think that's gonna change any time soon. I'm gonna make Team Rocket suffer for everything they've done. But if you're asking whether I'm clear-headed about all this? I'm not sure. I'm capable of going through with it though."
"That's all I wanted to know," she smiled warmly back at her, then grabbed her hand and stroked it gently. "I've grown quite fond of you, Misty. I've never really been big on friends, you know that. But I really love and admire you, and I'll always be here for you no matter what."
Misty almost started crying. She sat up and hugged Sabrina, then gave her a peck on the cheek.
"Thanks, babe," she said softly. "You have no idea how much that means to me."
She then felt her hands reach up involuntarily and firmly grab Sabrina's boobs, and quickly withdrew them in shock.
"Hey!"
"I never said I'd stop being naughty," Sabrina giggled, then she got up off the bed and headed for the doorway. "Once you've cleaned up, Ritchie's found some things. I left you some clothes, too. You'll need them. Where we're going, it'll be really really cold."
Sabrina left the room, and Misty got out of bed to check out the clothes she'd left her. Knowing Sabrina, she was expecting a full body shiny catsuit, but was surprised to find some of her own clothes instead.
She must have gone to the Cerulean Gym while I was asleep.
She headed for the shower, freshening up before what she could tell was going to be another long, tiring day.
Misty entered the Elite Four meeting room where everyone was already gathered, going through various bits of intelligence that Ritchie had uncovered. Ritchie himself was fast asleep on a couch nearby, still sitting upright.
"So where are we going that I'm gonna need this?" she asked, holding up her old pink parka that Sabrina had left her.
"Have a seat," CJ told her, and Misty obligingly sat down at the conference table.
"Ritchie found out by going through James and Meowth's phone records that Jessie's taken all our friends to a facility hidden in the Seafoam Islands cave system," Oak explained.
"It's a good thing they were too dense to cover their tracks well enough," Brock noted.
"They were clever enough to hide its exact location," Oak scolded him, "and to capture so many of us in the first place. Don't underestimate them. They could very well be there with Jessie as well."
"We need to follow up on this immediately," Misty said fervently. "The longer we wait, the more danger they're all in."
"I agree," CJ nodded. "We need to send all four of you, as soon as possible. It may take two of the Pallet Pidgeots to carry Golem all that way –"
"No way," Misty disagreed with an adamant shake of her head. "Brock and I will go. Sabrina and Erika should stay here. We're entering their home turf, and we can't go in there all guns blazing. If we lose all four of us to one of their tricks, then we're all screwed."
"She's right," Erika said. "Misty and Brock have the most experience out of all of us dealing with those three. I think they should go."
"Seconded," Sabrina added. "Too many of us going along just gives them more of us to potentially capture. Remember, Ash has dealt with them more than any of us, and he was captured."
"Works for me," Brock nodded. "I can't wait to get stuck into those three assholes, and bring back our friends."
"Then it's settled," Misty announced as she stood up. "Just remember, Jessie told me that she's not the one in charge of all this. Someone else is running the show, and we need to find them. Otherwise all this work will be for nothing. And I doubt Jessie, James, and Meowth will tell me anything."
Misty left the room with Brock in tow, and the pair of them headed outside where several of the Pallet Pidgeots as well as Golem and Starmie were waiting.
"Thanks for taking care of Starmie for me," Misty said to him.
"Don't mention it, Mist," he smiled at her. "It's the least I could do. Hey, are you sure you're gonna be warm enough? I know the Seafoam Islands are still pretty warm this time of year, but those caves are literally ice cold."
She had the pink parka Sabrina had gotten her, which was quite long, reaching to her knees, but she still wore a pair of her favourite denim shorts and a white crop top underneath, and only a pair of black leather knee-high boots to protect her legs. She simply shrugged at him.
"Do you remember me changing into warmer clothes when you, Ash and I travelled through snow and wind and rain?"
Brock paused, stroking his chin as he tried to remember. "I guess not," he laughed. "I just figured Sabrina would take something a little more substantial when she said she'd collect some of your clothes for this mission."
"You're sweet to be worried about me, Brock," she smiled, "but I've been dressing like this most of my life, no matter the weather. I'll be fine. Besides, it's not like this is my first trip to the Seafoam Islands. I know what I'm in for."
"I just hope Jessie, James, and Meowth don't," Brock added. "Come on, we should get going. Now, how am I gonna convince the Pidgeots to carry Golem again?"
"Good luck with that," Misty shouted back at him as she and Starmie mounted one of the Pallet Pidgeots and prepared for takeoff.
"Hey! You can't leave me to tell them by myself! Misty!"
"I just did!" she waved down at him as her Pidgeot took off.
"Why oh why didn't I release Crobat instead…" he chastised himself as he watched Misty fly off into the distance. "Hey, I'm Brock, former Pewter City Gym Leader, and world-class, award winning Pokémon breeder, and I released a six-hundred-pound Pokémon that needs to be airlifted 'cause our pokéballs are all busted, instead of one that can fly on its own. Idiot! So hey, Pidgeots, my dear old pals, I need to ask a teensy, tiny favour of you…"
By the time they reached the Seafoam Islands, the poor Pidgeots were completely exhausted. It took four of them to carry Golem, and they were still so tired that they had to collapse and roost for a little while before they could even fly back again. Brock felt terrible about it, but there wasn't much he could do. Going in to the Seafoam Caves without a Pokémon, with Team Rocket's most dangerous personnel against them would be suicide. He was already questioning whether bringing Golem was such a good idea, given its type disadvantage to pretty much everything they'd find in the cave.
"Let's go," Misty said as he and Golem finished dismounting.
"C'mon, Mist," Brock whinged. "I literally just got here. Gimme a break."
"You didn't have to fly all the way here. The poor Pidgeots did all the work. Besides, we're not here to sight-see. In case you forgot, Ash, Surge, Bella and Gary are all inside. We have work to do, Brock. Let's go!"
"Right," Brock frowned, blushing slightly as he realised she did indeed have a point. "Sorry."
The cold hit Brock immediately upon entering the cave. He was about to complain, but noticed that Misty wasn't, and decided he'd better not. Suddenly she stopped, and Brock nearly walked right into her.
"What's up?" he asked.
"Golem's gonna make a lot of noise," she observed. "There are slight drops throughout this cave that we might be able to get down without too much trouble, but Golem's gonna have to jump."
"That's true," Brock nodded, clearly missing the point.
"So we should split up, to give ourselves the best chance of finding the others."
Brock frowned again. "Not sure that's so smart," he disagreed. "We have a better chance of fighting off whatever or whoever's in here together. If we split up and I draw attention, I'm gonna have a much crappier chance of defending myself without you. Similarly, if I get caught or you arrive first and get into trouble, I won't be there to help you."
"Good point," she sighed.
Suddenly they heard talking coming from deeper in the cave, and they gestured at each other to stay quiet. Misty led the way, tiptoeing her way towards the voices as carefully and quietly as she could. Surprisingly, Golem was whisper-quiet, allaying their fears that he'd be impossibly loud and give them all away. They travelled for what seemed like half an hour, going deeper and deeper into the cave network until they heard the voices only a short distance away from them. In the distance they could see light refracting around a corner, and knew they were close to something interesting.
"This is ridiculous," came a very gravelly voice that Misty recognised, but couldn't put a face to. "It was bad enough taking orders from Jessie, now we have to take orders from those two idiots as well?"
"Just relax, would you?" replied a woman's voice, also very familiar to Misty. "We have to play this smart. We mess this up now, and we won't even be in the picture anymore. You know what Jessie's like these days. She'll just kill us, she won't even dob us in."
"I'm tired of smiling and nodding to those morons!" the gravelly-voiced man said in clear frustration. "We should be the ones running this show, not them!"
"Butch, you need to calm down," the woman told him. "Our time will come. Just be patient."
Butch? Why does that name sound so familiar to me?
Misty edged a little closer to them, trying to see if she could get a peek at what they looked like, but stepped in a puddle of icy water. It made a lot more noise than she was expecting.
"What was that?" Butch asked as soon as he heard it.
Shit!
"Quickly, make a run for it! We have to get back to the hostages!" the woman said.
"Golem, Rollout!"
Golem edged past Misty, then charged forward before diving into a roll that sped up quickly, and disappeared around the corner. Before long they heard a couple of shouts of surprise and pain, followed by a roar from Golem.
"Now I'm glad I brought Golem along," Brock grinned as he chased after them.
It wasn't long before they stumbled on a larger area of the cave that was well lit by the lights they'd seen in the distance before. They could hear running water coming from somewhere, but couldn't see it. What they did see was the two Team Rocket grunts they'd heard talking earlier.
"I remember you guys!" Brock shouted. "You're Butch and Cassidy!"
"You were at the Jessie League draw announcements," Misty recalled, addressing Cassidy. "You weren't pleased about it either. What the hell are you two doing here?"
"We could ask you the same question," Butch frowned, preparing a pokéball.
"We're here for the hostages," Brock told them. "And you're going to give them to us."
"Or what?" Cassidy laughed. "You have no idea what you're up against."
"You wanna try that line again?" Misty smirked. "I've beaten much tougher grunts than you guys, with much more powerful Pokémon. You don't wanna mess with me."
"That's where you're wrong, kid," Butch laughed. "I think we do wanna mess with you. Go, Lapras!"
"Take them out, Cloyster!"
To Misty and Brock's astonishment, both Cassidy and Butch threw a pokéball each. They were black all over, with a letter 'R' emblazoned on the top. Both balls opened as per normal, but with an orange flash instead of the usual red. Misty and Brock stared at each other dumbfounded.
"That shouldn't be possible," Brock shook his head in disbelief. "Even in this cave, the signal should still be strong enough to block those pokéballs."
"I won't bother trying to make this simple enough for your tiny mind," Cassidy dismissed him, "but one thing you missed when you went to Silph were these black pokéballs. You really should have taken a few."
"Unfortunately for us, you destroyed a lot of the existing ones, and now there's only a handful left," Butch elaborated. "But that's more than enough."
"In any case, these are GE Pokémon," Cassidy grinned. "You can't beat them."
"Prepare to be surprised," Brock snorted. "Golem, Rock Slide that Lapras!"
Golem didn't have any rocks around, so he just hefted huge ice boulders at the Lapras that he literally wrenched free from the icy floor of the cave. Lapras wasn't able to dodge while on the ice, but it didn't seem to care. It just charged straight at Golem without so much as ducking. Golem hit with every single throw, and it did stagger the Lapras a little, but it wasn't enough to discourage it from charging.
"Starmie! Psychic!"
"Cloyster, Withdraw!"
Cloyster's shell shut tight, and Starmie's Psychic attack seemed to have little effect on it. Misty grit her teeth, trying to think of what to do about it.
"Golem! No!" Brock yelled as the Lapras headbutted Golem without even being given an order.
The attack stunned Golem, hitting harder than either of them were expecting, but not enough to do much real damage.
"Lapras, Hydro Pump!"
"Golem, Rollout!"
The Lapras reared its head back before spitting a giant stream of water at Golem. Golem was able to roll around fast enough to avoid it most of the time, but was still struck twice. It slowed the rolling speed down a little the first time, smashing Golem into the cave's ice walls. The second time was a clean hit, and it pulverised Golem, proving once again just how dangerous Team Rocket's GE Pokémon were.
"Okay Starmie, no more messing around," Misty shouted. "Thunder!"
"What?!" Cassidy yelled angrily. "No matter, there's no way that starfish's pretend Thunder attack will penetrate that shell."
"Shows what you know," Misty fired back at her. "That only works for physical attacks."
Starmie started to spin, and an electric charge began forming around its centre jewel, then it suddenly blast out in an overhead arc that struck both the Cloyster and the Lapras. Lapras started sliding backwards, unable to keep its grip on the slippery surface, but the Cloyster didn't appear to be taking any damage at all. Its shell remained closed.
"Okay, Golem, time for some more Rock Slide!" Brock ordered. "Give Starmie a hand!"
Golem resumed hurling the ice boulders at Lapras, occasionally flinging one at Cloyster as well, and before too long the Lapras looked like it had had enough.
"Lapras, Ice Beam!"
"Cloyster, Blizzard!"
Without hesitation, the Lapras once again reared its head back, this time spitting out a bright blue-white beam of light that struck Golem even as it was still taking damage from the Rock Slide attack. This time Golem went down, and didn't get back up.
Not good, Misty thought to herself. One I could beat. Two though?
Cloyster's shell opened, releasing a powerful Blizzard attack that forced Starmie and Misty to ground. Brock fought his way through the maelstrom to Golem's defence, trying his best to block as much of the attack from hitting the unconscious Golem as he could.
"Starmie, Thunder one more time!"
As Starmie started to gather electrical energy again, the Cloyster suddenly stopped attacking. Misty quickly noticed that the Cloyster was almost totally spent. It tried to keep attacking, but it could only manage short bursts of Blizzard that did almost nothing to stop Starmie. In typical GE Pokémon style though, it kept trying to attack even though it was completely exhausted. Misty seized on the opportunity.
"Hit 'em both again!" she yelled confidently.
Starmie let the electricity fly, the attack arcing up once again and striking down at both Lapras and Cloyster with even more power than the last Thunder attack. Lapras was once again sent sliding backwards until it hit the cave wall, and then received the full force of the attack while pinned down. Cloyster made no attempt to Withdraw this time, and like Lapras, it received the full brunt of the attack. When Starmie ceased, both Lapras and Cloyster were unconscious.
Not exactly Pikachu-level electric attacks, but pretty useful all the same, Misty smiled to herself.
"Uh, Cassidy? I think we're in very big trouble," Butch muttered.
"We must have gotten dud Pokémon," Cassidy surmised.
"Duds? Are you serious?" Brock spat. "Any normal Cloyster and Lapras would have been annihilated by our Pokémon. You two are just so hopeless you can't even cheat properly."
"Oh, I dunno about that," Butch grinned. "How about we make a deal with you."
"You have got to be joking," Misty rolled her eyes. "How dense do you think we are?"
"Think about it," Cassidy told her. "We have something you want, and some information you might like as well."
"Like what?" Brock frowned.
"We have your friends, and we know where Jessie, James, and Meowth are," Butch grinned a little wider.
"We don't need you to figure out where they are, and we can find our friends ourselves," Misty huffed. "Besides, we know they're not the ones in charge of all this. Come on, Brock. Let's go."
"Wait!" Cassidy yelled as Misty and Brock turned to leave. "Okay, we'll tell you where the boss is as well. But you have to do something for us."
Brock and Misty slowly turned back around, and folded their arms across their chests as if it were choreographed.
"We want you to take us with you," Cassidy sighed. "We want full immunity from prosecution, and protection from Team Rocket. We want out."
Misty and Brock looked at each other, frowning with skepticism. Brock turned back around first.
"How do we know we can trust you?"
"We'll lead you to your friends first," Butch answered. "Then we'll tell you where James, Jessie, and Meowth are. You can verify that with your base of operations if you don't believe us. Then once we're all safely away, we'll help you with the boss. We'll tell you where to go, what you're up against, everything. We'll even let you keep those two pokéballs!"
"Our gift to you!" Cassidy added.
"Fine," Misty agreed, stepping towards them. "Take us to them. Now. Before I change my mind and throw you both in the drink."
"You got it," Butch nodded, tossing the pokéballs to Brock and Misty. "But first, hold down the activation button for five seconds. That'll wipe them clean, and you can use them to carry your own Pokémon in."
"Just remember this though: they won't be able to be transferred, and they're absolutely not legal," Cassidy warned them.
"The Pidgeots are gonna love this," Brock mumbled as he did what Butch instructed them to do.
The activation button glowed orange on both balls as they were cleared, then the unusual orange flash reappeared when they recaptured Starmie and Golem. It lit up the cave in orange as the activation buttons glowed green, signifying that both Pokémon were caught successfully.
"Take us to our friends," Misty demanded as she shrunk the ball and placed it on her belt.
"Right this way," Cassidy gestured with a manicured finger.
They were led through the cave network a short way before coming to an ice boulder that was blocking their path.
"It's through here," Butch told them. "Our Pokémon moved this thing outta the way last time, but since you've ensured that they can't do that now, you'll need to help us instead."
"I don't trust you," Brock said flatly.
"Neither do I," Misty agreed. "Let's just throw them in the drink and be done with it."
"Look, kid," Cassidy frowned, "we're not stupid. We know when we're beaten, and we don't wanna be martyrs for those three bastards. If we're going down, then we're taking them all with us."
"Yeah," Butch added. "We've always hated them. You know that."
"They have a point," Brock admitted.
All three of them looked at Misty, eagerly awaiting her response. After a few seconds, she threw her hands up in defeat.
"Fine. Let's just get this over with."
"Great!" Cassidy said enthusiastically. "We'll need to be on both sides of this boulder, and push it away from the entrance. So you," she pointed at Brock, "Squinty. You're with me. Red, you're with Butch. That'll make our combined strength roughly even."
They got to work, both teams of two trying with all their might to push the boulder away from the entrance. After about thirty seconds of both Cassidy and Butch insisting that it was budging, Misty stopped pushing.
"It's clearly not moving," she panted. "There's no way we're getting inside."
"We know."
Suddenly Misty felt an arm wrap around her neck as she saw Cassidy doing the same to Brock. She spluttered and coughed as Butch roughly and crudely choked her, panicking wildly for a few very long seconds before she passed out.