Chapter 18 Prisoners
Officer Jenny woke up, slowly at first. But then she noticed she wasn't in bed and recalled everything. Phantom the pirate using his Parasect's spore attack to put them all asleep! She'd had the type advantage, double! Her Growlithe was a Fire type and its attacks would do 4x the damage to a pokemon that was both Bug and Grass type! It should have been an easy win!
"Man I'm so pathetic!" Jenny cursed as she pushed herself back up.
She got up and was shocked to see the house that had been standing when she'd last been up now be reduced to a pile of rubble.
"Oh my gosh!" Jenny exclaimed.
She looked around, saw that her deputies and Growlithe were all still down.
"Wake up!"
With a bit of nudging she got them all awake.
"Oh man! What happened!"
"It seems a lot happened well we were out. I feel like a complete failure," Jenny said. "I couldn't' take down a pokemon who I had a severe advantage again! Those kids have helped us in all the regions they've been in. I couldn't help them when they needed it!"
"Officer Jenny! Professor Oaks lab!" one of the deputies said.
Jenny exclaimed. She ran at full speed with the deputies to the lab. To her surprise it looked untouched. But looks could be deceiving. She made it to the door to the lab and pressed the door bell repeatedly. After a couple minutes, Professor Oak answered the door in his pajamas with the lab coat over him.
"What's happened?" the old man asked rubbing his eyes.
"Ash and his friends are all gone!" Jenny told him.
"What? Oh no!" Professor Oak said.
He ran to the ruins of the house, Tracy (who had woken up as well) Jenny, her Growlithe and deputies followed.
"They put me to sleep with a spore attack before I could do anything," Jenny said. "I'm sorry Professor!"
Oak sighed. "There is no use dwelling on the past. Right now we must keep level heads and think of a plan to save them before something bad happens.
…
The copters made their way to one of Giovanni's Kanto bases. He had a few dozen located throughout his home region. This one in particular was an abandoned jail that had been vacant for a few decades now. Now it served as a place for Giovanni to keep hostages or prisoners if he ever needed to.
The copters landed and everyone exited them. Giovanni turned to Butch and Cassidy, his faithful person trailing behind him.
"Reapply the hypnosis briefly to Ash and his friends, but release our allies, except for those three fools!" Giovanni told them.
"Right boss!" Butch said. "Hypno!"
"Hypno! Hypno! Hypno!"
The yellow pokemon swung its pendulum at the people it had hypnotized, reapplying the trick on Ash and his friends. It then released Phantom and the majority of the Team Rocket members except for Jessie, James and Meowth.
"Hey what's the idea putting me under a hypnosis!" Phantom roared.
"Apologies. But there was little to do when you are in the area of the target. You are unharmed though."
"Meh," Phantom grunted in response.
"Escort them to the cells!" Giovanni ordered.
And so they went down below and into the prison area. Hypno used its psychic powers to open the cells and send Jessie, James, and Meowth into one. Norman, Caroline, and Delia went into another. Brock, Max and Dawn, then Ash Misty and May in their own. Pikachu meanwhile was kept outside a cell, and put into an electroproof container.
"Hate to use the same method those fools usually do," Dominoe said as she held the container. "But these are effective for electric types."
"Now, release the hypnosis!" Giovanni said.
"Hypno!"
With a few more swings of the pendulum everyone was released.
Ash looked around in astonishment. He was standing in a cell with Misty and May.
"What's going on!"
"It looks like we're in a jail cell!" Misty said.
"Hey what gives!" James shouted. "Why are we in jail!"
"Mom, dad!" May exclaimed as she looked through the bars and saw her parents in the cell down from theirs.
"May! Are you alright?" Norman asked.
"I'm fine!" May said. "Aside from being trapped!"
"Boss! Why are we in here!" Jessie asked.
"You dare ask why?" Giovanni said glaring at them. "You… the most incompetent members Team Rocket has ever known? You've been chasing after this so called rare Pikachu for five… nearly six years now… and what do you have to show for it? Nothing? You are not even worth being called members of Team Rocket anymore. All you do is embarrass us!"
"But boss!" Meowth tried to object.
"Reow!"
Giovanni's Persian hissed at Meowth who flinched in fear for a moment. But that fear quickly turned to anger
"You stuck up Persian! Get in here and fight me!"
"Reow!" It stuck its tongue out.
"Enough!" Giovanni shouted, causing his pokemon to look away from its prevolved form. "You all better get some rest. Cause your work for Team Rocket starts in the morning!"
"I told you I'm not interested!" Ash shouted.
"And I told you you don't have a choice boy," Giovanni said.
"Now wait a minute! I was promised the chance to pound him for taking the Sea Crown from me!" Phantom suddenly shouted.
"If you wish to do so go ahead, but try not to break anything, I need him functioning," Giovanni said.
"Fine," Phantom agreed.
Hypno used its psychic powers to open the door to Ash's cell as the raven haired boy glared at Phantom while May and Misty both looked scared at the giant coming at them. Everyone else was likewise looking scared.
"Ash no!" Delia shouted in concern for her son.
As soon as Phantom stepped into the cell, Ash charged at him. He punched at the old pirate, who despite his old age was still remarkably strong. He caught Ash's punch and then punched him in return, hard. Ash grunted as a bruise appeared on his eye.
"Ash!" Misty screamed as she charged.
"Pika pi!" Pikachu cried from in its container.
Misty jumped, getting a kick in Phantom's stomach. He grunted then glared at the red head and giving her a back fist that knocked her off her feet. He then glared at May.
"You wanna go bandana girl?" he roared at her.
May backed up. Her pokeballs had been taken. Blaziken might have been able to take Phantom but she couldn't call on him. Phantom grinned at her, before kicking Ash who was still on the ground. May felt tears in her eyes but knew she would only get hurt too if interfered.
"Please stop!" she begged.
Fortunately, he did. But not for May.
"Well that's enough to satisfy me. I wonder, maybe I could use you to get Manapy back?" Phantom asked. "You seemed awful close to it by how it was happy to be in your arms after you stole it?"
"You won't ever get Manapy again!" Ash shouted through the pain of his brusies.
"We'll see," Phantom said before looking at May and walking out of the cell.
May immediately ran to Ash and hugged him tearfully. She glared at Phantom before he walked out of sight, leaving Giovanni and the rest of his underlings there.
"If you behave yourselves, I won't let him hurt any of you again. If not though, your mothers will be the first to be punished. I don't need them since they aren't trainers," he said.
Delia and Caroline shivered, as Norman glared at the crime lord and grasped his wife's hands. Even Jessie, James and Meowth were shocked. Things were not going well. Giovanni left as May tried to comfort the battered Ash. Misty was alright besides a bruise which she touched.
Well Phantom beat up Ash, how are bad are things gonna get? We'll have to wait and see, I'm just making this up as I go. I don't own Pokemon of course. Good night everyone, I will probably not be posting next week as it is Christmas weekend but we'll see. I am planning a Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer fanfic to go with the holiday. Not the one from Christmas specials but the other one in 1990s I believe. Personally I prefer that one. Anyway, please review and feel free to check my profile for the new stories. After Christmas I will be switching stories around as I've had other ideas to write. I'm also submitting my original work for editing on Reedsy.