14.

Corner Store Scene

My only weakness is a list of crime
My only weakness is, well never mind

He didn't have to wind back both arms and stab a screwdriver through each of the Pokémon Center's sliding glass doors. It was the middle of the day, and the front lobby was open twenty-four hours. The doors would've opened for him regardless. But if his life was lacking anything at the moment, it was consistency, and the break-ins were simple enough if he kept to the same screwdriver routine which had stolen him more Pokémon in the past few days than his teammates had collected in over a month.

So maybe Marcell was being a bit of a "plasmadonna," as they put it.

But he was getting pretty damn good at solo work.

"Your storm warning's over, normies. Get on the floor and give me your Poké Balls, or one lucky shot takes the whole street offline," Marcell threatened, gesturing toward the nearest electrical pylon outside with his plasma pistol.

The patrons cowered, younger trainers throwing themselves under the tables and hesitantly rolling their Poké Balls out onto the floor. The bolder ones summoned their partners. A Vaporeon, a Bulbasaur, and a Pidgey burst forth in blue light, angling their eyes at the engineer in full Team Rocket gear. Even the nurse's Chansey was puffed up and ready to fight, while Nurse Joy herself had pressed the emergency button under the front desk — Rocket red, of course.

A deep, practiced snickering broke from Marcell's throat. He cracked his neck and angled his chin so the lights glinted lavender off his safety glasses.

"Too clueless. So I guess none of you have taken a physics course. Do you really think I'd shoot a pylon with a plasma pistol? And have the current travel back along the stream to fry me alive? I've got a pretty high pain tolerance, but you're crazy to think I'd wanna be bacon. This is basic stuff, guys. Your ignorance bores me to tears."

"Bulbasaur! Use Vine Whip!"

A flash of green, and the gun was knocked right out of his left hand, landing with a clack and spiraling across the polished floor.

"Perfect. She gets my point," Marcell said, giving a flat hand to the brave young trainer who'd called for it. "Anyway, here's how I'd actually cut your power. Raichu, Protocol Vermilion-26! Extra V-power! No holding back!"

"Rai-rai!"

No one had even seen him jam one of the screwdrivers into the pocket of his breeches to pop open the Poké Ball. Raichu surged forth in its own blue mist. Its cheeks sparkled. Its fur bristled with static. Its tail lit up with charged cables of yellow and white. One Thunderbolt was enough to knock out the swollen Chansey at the back. Then with a great leap, Raichu plunged the thunderbolt-shaped tip into the nearest outlet and let loose, electricity bursting from every cell in its body.

The lights flickered, then exploded, sending more shards of glass raining down into the lobby and forcing the remaining Pokémon and trainers into a frenzied panic to duck and cover. It didn't leave much of a lighting difference when the sun still streamed down pleasantly outside, but it was eerie enough for Marcell to rush over and leap atop the front desk, now equipping himself with his net gun.

SKIK! SKIK! SKIK!

Three pellets shot out of the barrel, quickly expanding into weighted nets that tangled up in Pidgey's wings and trapped Bulbasaur and Vaporeon under a sticky mesh. Raichu, meanwhile, waddled outside, where it leapt up parallel with the pylon and sliced straight through the electrical wires with its perfected Iron Tail. The high-voltage current arced through its pudgy body and left its fur absolutely shimmering with power. With a happy squeak it somersaulted and landed perfectly on its paws outside the PokéCenter doors again.

The street was out. More than the street was out. And if the whole street wasn't out, there was also a small mechanical Dedenne furiously skittering up and down pylons and chewing the wires until they snapped.

BEEP! BEEP! BEEP!

In the little storage room just behind the front desk and a curtain, Marcell slapped his Rocket ID card against every Poké Ball on the shelves, scrambling the metadata and severing the encrypted connection between Pokémon and their trainers. With an eager grin, he scooped them all into a sack and slung it over his shoulder. More than yesterday, for sure! And a heck of a lot more stylish in his approach! Electrifying, even!

When he ripped the curtain from its rings, he wasn't surprised to find one Officer Jenny and a handful of deputies blocking his way to the exit. They brandished batons and summoned a triad of Growlithe with their teeth bared. One look at the sack in his gloved hands, and the woman in uniform had her jaw clenched tight.

"I recognize that undercut and eyeliner. You're the same criminal who set fire to the Vermilion Gym. You must be a real Team Rocket-brand dunderhead to try stealing Pokémon in broad daylight like this."

"Hey! Hey! The eyeliner wasn't my choice!" argued Marcell. But he collected himself just as quickly. "What's obvious is obvious. Now don't waste my time. I'm on a schedule, and I'm hungry."

"I think you're the one wasting our time!"

The smirk turned to a full-on sneer. "Oho, am I that much of a hassle for you? What a pleasure it is. Go ahead and whine. I don't have to accommodate your feelings."

While he said this, he shot the remaining three pellets. Two nets ensnared their targets, but the third Growlithe dodged at Jenny's command, then charged and lunged upward to clamp its teeth around Marcell's pant leg. He struggled with his toolbelt, both hands madly jerking around in each pouch to find more pellets to reload. Meanwhile, the deputies surrounded him, seizing the sack of stolen Poké Balls he'd dropped on the counter and swiping the batons at his limbs.

Jenny forced him off and onto the floor, where she fought to pry his wrists behind his back. His boots slipped on the polished tiles, and he was forced to sit on his knees, fighting hard to see past the legs of the deputies to the shattered windows. A whole crowd was gathering beyond the new police line. Raichu sneakily hid itself within, and the mechanical Dedenne skittered up its back.

"Don't get distracted. You're under arrest, Team Rocket dunderhead. Keep your mouth shut and listen to your rights."

"This dunderhead goes by Marcell, Master of Blackouts."

Officer Jenny clamped the handcuffs around his wrists. With her breath hot in his right ear, she whispered, "Aww, but I don't have to accommodate your feelings, Marcell, Destroyer of Public Property."

"I never asked you to, Jenny."

"Good dunderhead."

"And no hard feelings, Jenny."

"Why don't you shut up now."

"In a minute."

"No, you'll cooperate with me," she said, raising him to his feet and giving him a kick in the back of the knee so he'd start moving toward the doors.

"What a shame you had to run into me today, huh?"

"You're as charismatic as the rest of them, I'm sure."

"Of course. I'm always the most interesting person in the room. Sometimes in the whole city," Marcell said very seriously.

Then his smirk returned, and he glanced wistfully around at the four Luxrobots stalking in toward them. Two pounced through the skeletons of door frames, one burst in from the men's room, and the last clawed its way through the ceiling tiles and dropped down with a clang and a hiss behind Jenny.

Their metal muscles moved with smooth hydraulic sighs, and their yellow eyes now glowed with concealed LEDs behind painted discs of plexiglass. Copper claws swelled out of vulcanized rubber pads. Iron jaws and aluminum fangs were painted with sealant and lubricated with vinegar injectors hidden in the throat. The filaments of their black manes pulsed with cold white light.

"Luxrobot voice command. Begin AET Program 1. Authorization code Marcell-6-2-1."

Fast as lightning, the four Luxrobots positioned themselves in the four corners of a perfect square, surrounding Marcell and the officers, who were the only people still in the lobby. Their jaws creaked open. Their manes flashed in standard patterns. Then, between each of them, a bolt of static sprang to life. A current rushed around the square, strongest at the edges and slowly spiraling toward the center until all the space within the square was hazed with an ambient atmosphere of sticky yellow static.

Marcell felt his wrists burn within the handcuffs. His heart was pounding, and his veins were running hot with that familiar untamable energy. With almost no effort, he broke away from the startled officer, now stunned into paralysis by the miniature artificial electric terrain. The charged particles only made his muscles stronger and his drive sharper.

His spark brighter.

"Mechadenne, help me out," he muttered, shaking his wrists.

The squeaking little robot zipped in and up his pant legs, chewing him out of the cuffs in an instant. All too simple, just like the day before. Breathing in the metal-smelling air, Marcell picked up the Poké Balls that had spilled out of the dropped sack, as well as those which had rolled out onto the floor among the glass shards, and exited the Pokémon Center in a triumphant lope. His Luxrobot bodyguards accompanied him, parting and intimidating the crowd with their programmed Charge Beams.

"Gah! It's you again!"

"Marcell!"

"Piiika!"

Dulled blue eyes only looked for a second at an angered Ash and Goh, who sprinted after him from the next street over.

"No ya don't," Marcell droned, lifting a leg and slouching onto the back of the biggest Luxrobot. Raichu and the sack of Pokéballs were safely tucked under his arms. Mechadenne nestled itself nicely into his hair. Squeezing his legs tight around the pressure plates beneath its forelegs, he grunted as the ride took off, bounding between the dregs of the gawkers and carrying him from car hood to awning as he made his escape.

Honchkrow could sense mischief for miles. Its tatty red tail feathers always twitched when the mischief was mean-spirited, and it always puffed out its chest and chortled darkly in its throat when it knew the mischief was coming its way.

It was twitching and chortling now, even flapping its wings and nipping its trainer on the ears and nose. He was a short yet stocky old man, his back stooped and his shoulders off balance from letting the heavy bird sit on the right one for so many years. His windburned and sun-damaged face curled up into a crude smile as he felt the feathers beating against his worn old tricorn hat.

"Are we about to see something interesting, Honchkrow?" he croaked, hands fiddling to open a parchment paper bag so he could scoop in two glazed donuts from the pastry case. Just a little sweetness to balance out the twenty-seven green smoothie bottles he'd already piled into a basket. (It was best to take all of them in case they weren't in stock at the corner store tomorrow.)

Honchkrow continued to chortle and flap, digging its claws into his shoulder. It dipped its head down and snatched one of the donuts right out of its trainer's hand, tipping up and gobbling it down in one snap of its beak.

"Oh, Honchkrow. That's very naughty when I haven't yet paid for the donut. But you were wont to enjoy it anyway. Now, what kind of Pokémon snacks would you like? And dare we purchase a new air freshener to hang off the gunwales so the fish know we're friendly?"

Honchkrow chirped indignantly.

"Right, right. I didn't forget about you. You can have the new car scent in your cabin and I'll take the spruce needle in mine. Probably cinnamon and mildew for the grandchildren if they ever find us. I'm surprised they haven't yet. Do you think they're even looking for us, Honchkrow? We're certainly not looking for them."

He said this as he slid the entire stock of fragrance trees off the hooks and into his basket.

"Did you find everything you wanted, sir?" the teenage boy behind the counter asked as he packed everything into the old man's fabric grocery bag.

"Oh no, unfortunately I haven't. I've always wanted a non-pretentious yarn box subscription and to eat a corn chip off the floor of a Unovan subway train, but in eighty-six years I've never found those things, so they must still be out there somewhere."

"I meant… did you find everything here at the store all right."

"At the corner store, yes, of course. Unless you've got one of those little caffeinated sparkling waters that purport to taste like citrus and razz berry but instead perfectly emulate a chemical cotton candy."

"Did you mean those?"

"Aye! I have been looking everywhere for these! I've been sailing around the world for some time now, and I've never found anything so delicious!" the old man cried, stepping right past the boxed multipacks and taking fifteen individual pink cans out of the cooler to add to his purchase. Honchkrow flapped and chortled in pure excitement at such a rare find. Its trainer raked a loving hand through its feathers.

Right outside, a young blond undercutted man in purple safety glasses and white breeches and a gray hi-vis vest with a big red R on the left breast came to a halt. His face was completely pink like he'd sprinted a mile, and as he bent over to catch his breath, a long string of snot poured from both nostrils and splattered on the sidewalk between his boots. A heavy duffel bag hung off one of his shoulders. He strained to lift it. His face twisted up in a wince.

He turned his head to look through the sliding glass doors of the corner store. Shrugging, he reached into one of his breeches pockets and withdrew a screwdriver. He swung it menacingly toward the glass before the doors slid open for him and he replaced it in apparent defeat. The man trod in and immediately slunk behind the nearest row of shelves toward the back of the store, lugging the duffel bag with him. His voice came out in a low huffing growl. The old man with Honchkrow heard a few choice words slipping out from beyond the produce.

"Would your Pokémon like a free sample of a new snack we're selling? It's kind of like a nutritious trail mix."

"Honchkrow? No, Honchkrow can't have that. He's been naughty. He ate one of your donuts, and he looked about to eat my donut too."

"Can you pay for that, then?"

"Certainly. Take my card."

"You can slide that in here. It's a chip reader."

Suddenly the young man in his Team Rocket gear came slinking up the aisle again. He approached the counter and locked eyes with Honchkrow's trainer for a few seconds before placing two clenched fists on the counter.

"Could I have the key to the bathroom, please?"

"The bathroom is for customers," said the kid behind the counter.

"Yeah, yeah, I am a customer. I just need to, um…"

"Take a little smoke break?" the old man suggested. "Villains need to take the edge off often, don't they. You're free to take a swig of my flask if you need it."

"Villain…" the kid behind the counter noticed the R on his chest, and his face loosened in fear. "Are you the guy who was on TV stealing the Gym Leader's Pokémon? I think there's a warrant for you!"

"Yes, I'm sure there is, but for the next five minutes, I'm a law-abiding citizen and I need the goddamn bathroom key, all right?"

"Are you going to smoke in there?"

"No I'm not gonna smoke in there. Do I look like a Lay School dropout?"

"I think Honchkrow will try the trail mix, actually. He is very excited by all this mischief. Perhaps it would distract him for a bit."

The young Rocket agent recoiled at Honchkrow's rowdy display. With a grunt, he hoisted himself onto the counter and stood up, leaning to where he could reach the keyring slung over a nail between the cases of cigarettes. Leaping down, he stole to the back of the store again. An angry bout of door lock grinding commenced.

Cautiously, the kid behind the counter unzipped a bag of nuts, seeds, and dried berries. He poured a bit into a plastic ketchup cup and then offered it to the greedy bird. Honchkrow, far too excited for this, only took the cup in its beak and chucked it across the room, splaying out all its tatty red feathers and chortling out a throaty "CAW-CAW-CAAAW!"

"Maybe you should recall your Honchkrow into its Poké Ball before it gets too crazy."

The old man petted the bird's fluffy white chest. "Honchkrow couldn't get too crazy. He's old like me. I trust him to steer my ship and light my cigars. Do you sell cigars at this establishment?"

"Nope. Just the cigarettes you see behind me."

"Pity. I'll have to sail down to Cinnabar for those."

The young man came skulking back up the aisle. Apparently the same man, anyway. He'd discarded the Team Rocket uniform, which now bulged in sweaty folds from the caught zipper on his duffel bag. Now he wore a plain gray t-shirt and bootcut jeans and a teal knitted beanie. The eyeliner was rubbed off, (smeared around his face, more like,) and his eyes, now revealed to be an electric shade of blue, were squared behind a thick-rimmed pair of reading glasses.

He dumped his own basket of items on the counter for checkout — eight boxes of prepackaged meat and cheese slices with crackers, three bottles of orange juice, one small bottle of milk, two potions, the whole stock of nine-volt batteries, a drum of coffee grounds, and a lightbulb. Not even a packaged lightbulb. Just a singular lightbulb, still hot to the touch when the young man swiftly snatched it out of the pile and slipped it into the duffel bag with his uniform and whatever else.

"You need to replace the toilet paper roll back there," he told the kid behind the counter.

"Oh. Which stall?"

"You can go back there and see which stall."

"There are only two stalls."

"Yeah. Makes it easy for you."

"Could I buy a whole bag of the Pokémon nutritional trail mix?" the old man asked.

"It's in aisle 3. Take as much as you want."

"I assure you I only want one bag to try it. Honchkrow may prefer donuts, and then I'll have to come back here and clear you out of those."

"You have donuts here?" asked the young man previously in the Team Rocket uniform.

"Oh, they're splendid! At least Honchkrow thinks so. They're in the back. I'll show you."

"Any éclairs back there?"

"No éclairs," said the kid behind the counter. "That's gonna be $137.86. Cash or card today?"

"Cash, actually. I got… I only got $120. Here. That was my food allowance."

"Who in your family is hungry for forty nine-volt batteries?" asked the old man.

"The baby," the young man yawned.

"The baby?"

The young man tightened his grip on the counter. "Yeah. The baby."

"Still need that $17.86."

"Damn. Uh… old man."

"Call me Darius, the North and South Navigator. And this is my faithful partner Honchkrow. We're a pair of vagabonds from the Sinnoh region."

"Darius, I will give you… um…"

"What is your name, young man?"

"Call me Marcell."

"It is good to meet you, Marcell."

Marcell knelt down and dug through his duffel bag. Both of the others could see he was rummaging through at least fifty Poké Balls and bits of destroyed machinery and assorted batteries and screws that slipped through his fingers like candy.

"Buzznuts. Darius, I don't have anything in here you'd like. Not that I'd know what you like. I just met you. Could I exchange eighteen bucks for a battle with you? Do you even still battle?"

Darius chortled in his throat alongside his Honchkrow. "Oh, Honchkrow and I are long retired. We only battle when it's necessary to protect ourselves, and my dear Marcell, you do have something in that bag which I would happily part with eighteen dollars for."

Marcell held up the lightbulb he'd unscrewed from the corner store bathroom.

"This?"

"Those Poké Balls, boy. The ones you appear to have stolen from the Pokémon Center across town. You can give me those so I can return them to their rightful trainers, and I'll pay for your batteries and processed cheese food and I won't tell anyone I saw you here today taking off your costume and revealing those very singular injuries on your arms. It would be a shame if the police learned of such an easy indicator for Vermilion City's most handsome hooligan."

"I'm telling," said the kid behind the counter.

"Now, play along, you. We must be fair with Marcell. I believe he is a reasonable merchant. What say you? Will you give me those Poké Balls for your purchase and privacy?"

Marcell narrowed his eyes. He zipped up his duffel bag and slung it back over his shoulder, then grabbed the bagged-up batteries and charcuterie boxes.

"Is that under a hundred n' twenty?"

"That would be…"

The kid did some calculations on the sale terminal while Marcell and Darius awkwardly stared at one another. The old man smiled. The young man steeled his gaze. The big boss bird croaked, threatening, challenging.

"Yeah, that's under."

"Perfect. So I'll take these bags, leave those ones, and we don't have an issue."

"You don't want your orange juice, Marcell? But what about scurvy?" Darius quipped.

"The orange juice isn't for me. I only drink coffee."

"That coffee?"

The drum of coffee grounds was still among the unpurchased items. With its dark powers, Honchkrow could see the frustration radiating from the man's body like a perfume.

"How much for the coffee?"

"That's $8.40."

"Darius, will you take the lightbulb for $8.40?"

"Well, you'd need… another six to get the coffee," said the kid behind the counter.

"Six?"

Darius shook his head. "All those Poké Balls. I've made my offer."

"You're not getting the Poké Balls."

"Aye-aye. You choose your own risks."

"Right… so I can take the Poké Balls and my cheese food and batteries… and you'll pretend like this never happened."

"I suppose that is only logical, Marcell. But you cannot take back the memories I've sustained of all your mischief and eccentricity these past few minutes."

"Yeah, that doesn't bother me much. Team Rocket requires me to act weird. It's like a dress code."

"I understand. Back in Sinnoh I used to be a Gym Leader. We're very much the same."

"Yeah no. We're not."

Marcell slowly backed up until the sliding glass doors opened again. Taking only what he paid for, he disappeared beyond the wall of the corner store, and Darius and Honchkrow shared a twinkling glance and a chortle in the throat.

"Do you still want that trail mix?"

"I think we'll be all right, thank you. But I will buy the rest of this mess. We could use some orange juice on our ship, and some haphazard contraption is likely to come by and steal it otherwise."

Right on cue, the mechanical Dedenne skittered into the corner store, scrambling up to the countertop and heading right for where the drum of coffee sat untouched.

"Dark Pulse, Honchkrow."

"Sir, no, please no Pokémon moves inside the store—"

Honchkrow opened its beak and screeched. A beam formed out of black and purple rings burst from its throat and slammed into the tiny robot, quickly tearing it to pieces. The odors of burnt coffee and corroded metal emanated from the remnants of the sale counter.

"It's true we Sunyshore Leaders don't lose our destructive streak even after giving up the mantle," said Darius.

Honchkrow squawked in agreement.

"I'm gonna go replace the toilet paper," said the kid behind the counter.

"You mean take a smoke break."

"Yep."

"Then you'd better replace the lightbulb first. That little genius stole it right in front of you."

~N~

621 can be read in Gorowase as "ruthless."

Weird thinking that when Volk and Flint were kids they won their badges from a whole different Sinnoh League. Aaron in Eterna City? Byron in Oreburgh? Bertha or Lucian in Canalave? An actual cold, serious Leader in Snowpoint? Their own Sunyshore Leader was Darius, who retired and left the gym in the care of his semi-adopted-grandson Flint so he could travel the world looking for a subway floor corn chip. (Yes, I just combined APH Prussia and Old Fritz into one character.)

And of course I am absolutely heartbroken that Flint got booted from the Masters 8 OFFSCREEN, (admittedly to the regional Champions, who are the obvious end result. ^^') There will likely be no Flint vs Volkner in Ultra Class when the focus is on the 8 now. Big big ach there. Whatever. I shall create all the Mr. Ōba-hito content the official release won't give us. Expect a one-shot series soon! :D

Published on FanFiction . Net May 9th, 2022. Reviews are a stack of air freshener trees! Reposts are a lack of toilet paper.