Chapter 27

"Questioning the Co-Leaders"

In the days that followed, the cross examination of Giovanni still resonated shock and awe throughout the judicial system. Of course, we still had the other defendants to cross examine as well and we decided to question members of the executives and scientists of the five Pokemon organizations. Because I had spent most of my time cross examining Giovanni, I had the rest of my team have their moments and the people I had assigned to them in the pretrial moments were the ones that they would be cross examining. But, I also the British prosecution question some of the defendants just as to give the trial a fair run.

For his first run, Harry was cross examining the leader of Team Plasma, Gheteis Harmonia over his involvement with brainwashing Pokemon into joining their cause.

"Mr. Harmonia," he said from the podium on his side of the court. "Would you agree that as leader of Team Plasma, you force Iraq in its war with the U.S. to surrender all of its Pokemon, by the most intolerable threats of aggression?"

"I do not agree," he replied. "The purpose and goal of Team Plasma is to separate humanity from Pokemon by any means necessary, but not including aggression."

"Well, you threatened to send your people into the country," replied Harry. "In overwhelming strength and also bomb Baghdad. What further pressure could you have possibly put upon them?"

"War, for instance," he replied.

"War?" remarked Harry. "What is there but war when there were already two wars that we were fighting?"

This was somewhat amusing for Giovanni and the other defendants as they were snickering over Ghestis' botched testimony.

"Harmonia should be hanged," whispered Giovanni to his fellow defendants. "For his stupidity, that is the greatest crime of all."

The other defendants laughed silently as Harmonia looked on with betrayal and disgust. Meanwhile, Harry moved on to the next defendant, who was Archie Aogro, the head of Team Aqua.

"In your tenor as head of Team Aqua, Admiral Aogro," said Harry, holding up a paper that had a list of plans related to Team Aqua's conquest against Merchant Ships. "You ordered the capture of numerous merchant ships for the purpose of restarting the world of piracy. In addition, as we have heard from Captain Paul Peterson of the St. Anne, you were also believed to have been one of those people who had orchestrated the hijacking of the Maersk Alabama in April of 2009, is that true?"

"We were only planning on ransoming the ship and the crew," he said. "The plan to take Captain Phillips hostage aboard a lifeboat was not caused by me, it was caused by the Somali pirates who raided the ship and I wash my hands of their involvement."

"If you are believed to have not only orchestrated the hijacking of those ships for not just their cargo but for their Pokemon," remarked Harry. "Then you have red hands in this matter."

Next, I came back up to the Podium to interview the leader of Team Magma, Maxie Matsubasa, whom was accused of orchestrating several natural disasters including the tampering of the Levees that caused New Orleans to flood after Hurricane Katrina.

"Mr. Matsuabasa," I began. "During your time as leader of Team Magma, you ordered your organization to take part in causing external damages to cities affected by natural disasters is that right?"

"That is correct, yes," he said. "Our objective was to evacuate the Pokemon from the areas affected and that they were to be brought to safety at an unknown location."

Much like I had with Giovanni, I had my suspicions about Maxie's organization and wanted to go into this matter a little further.

"This unknown location," I said. "We have reports that you claimed to be working for the American Red Cross after several notable disasters including the Asian Tsunami of 2004 and why you are here on the stand today: for your possible involvement of tampering with the levees that flooded New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina in 2005."

Maxie looked mortified at hearing those words and tried to clear his name of any wrongdoing in the levee breaches of New Orleans.

"I assure you, Mr. Schneider," he said. "We were only in New Orleans to evacuate the Pokemon from the storm and then we were going to return them to their trainers in a few days."

"Mr. Matsuabasa," I said. "I lived my entire life in the U.S. and I saw the devastation that befell New Orleans after the storm. New Orleans did not get back on its feet in a few days, I assure you on that."

I then opened my evidence against Maxie and his associates and brought them forward to him. Inside were pictures of dead Pokemon floating in the waters of New Orleans. Some of them had tags and licenses around their necks meaning that they were already in the custody of trainers that lived in the city.

"You see these pictures?" I asked. "These pictures were taken of the Pokemon that had drowned in the breaching of the levees that you and your people caused."

But, Maxie did not respond to what I showed him and at that point, I decided another tactic to make him squeal before the court.

"Perhaps," I continued. "Maybe I can convince you to talk when I talk to you about how you used Pokemon to use Earthquake and Fissure attacks to kill thousands of people in Haiti in January of 2010."

Now, this made Maxie wake up and answer my questions to him.

"It was a test gone wrong," he said, trying to defend himself. "We were testing Earthquake and Fissure to create an earthquake on an American base in Afghanistan. We had no intention of killing the people of Haiti, we swear on our lives."

I didn't believe what he said and I had him excused before bringing in Cyrus, the leader of Team Galactic who was accused of sabatoging the space shuttle Columbia when it was destroyed in 2003.

"Cyrus," I said. "In February of 2003, we have evidence according to an independent investigation by the Pokemon branch of the FBI that you and your organization, Team Galactic, may have had something to do with sabotaging the Space Shuttle Columbia, resulting in its destruction on reentry. How do you answer to that?"

"Our intentions were to take grasp of a galactic Pokemon that the astronauts were bringing back to Earth from the International Space Station," replied Cyrus. "Our intentions were to destroy the shuttle and recover the Pokemon from it to study its anatomy and learn about our growth in space."

"And that includes killing seven astronauts who had absolutely nothing to do with you or your people," I said. "We have evidence that you were planning to attack the International Space Station and take possession of the Pokemon that resided in the International Space Station and bring them back to Giovanni."

"That is a lie!" shouted Cyrus. "How dare you accuse me of such a crime?"

All I did was smile as he swallowed nervously at the accusation I made against him. As he got down from the witness stand, I smiled yet again, knowing that we were starting to get the upper hand…