Chapter Sixty-Three
Seven surveyed the broken city-scape from atop a tall office building. In the shadows of the streets, battles against ghosts and waves of Rattata raged on. From time to time, the spot light to her right gave off a crackling hum, and a blinding violet beam cleaved a ghost in two. Corpses cluttered the streets. Blood ran down streets and sidewalks in frothy waves, pooling around choked sewer grates.
Mewtwo stood to her left. She felt its eyes on her, but she ignored it. When it cleared its throat and spoke, she flinched.
"So you're Giovanni's new toy?" it asked.
She glanced back at the Grunt operating the spotlight, but he could hear nothing through his protective earmuffs.
"I'm no one's toy," she answered without looking at it. "I am an Admin, and you will treat me with respect or suffer the consequences."
It chuckled. "I can kill you, you know. If I knocked out two support beams in this building, you'd be crushed by the rubble."
"And then Giovanni would kill you."
"He intends to kill me anyways, but he won't while he still needs me." It stooped over and whispered in Seven's ear. "He will kill you as well, once this is over."
Seven stiffened. "He only kills those that are a threat to him, or betray him."
"Your presence is a threat. After Giovanni's victory, people will come to despise Pokémon. Keeping one around, even if it can be disguised, invites a scandal." Seven turned to speak, but Mewtwo said, "Sure, he could claim ignorance, but that would undermine society's confidence in him. He will kill you. Make no mistake of that."
Seven looked down at the battle, at waves of Rattata mown down by machine gun fire, choked with toxic gas, blown apart by mines and grenades. One group fell before the swarm, men ripped apart as the purple tide rushed over them, but in other areas, flamethrowers set the Pokémon bodies ablaze and organized squadrons sprinted to the front line.
"Where else would I go?" she asked. "What else would I do? I had those same thoughts before, that Team Rocket would treat me just like Ghetsis if they ever found out. Instead, they gave me a chance to prove myself useful, gave me a place and the power to improve my life. I could snap my fingers and have a medium-rare steak on my table within ten minutes. I could sleep on a new mattress every night. If I don't like someone in my unit, I can have them demoted or purged from the Team. Where else could I have anything like that?"
Mewtwo glowered at the mention of Ghetsis, but its anger died out as it considered Seven's words. "You're not really free, though, are you? You have to do as Giovanni says."
"I obey his commands because I want to."
"And if you decide you don't want to do as he asks? What if he orders you to go back in the cage and submit yourself to whatever experiments he wishes?"
"He wouldn't," Seven snapped.
"How do you know? How long have you known him? Two years? One year? Can't have been that long."
Seven thought back. It seemed forever ago that she was trapped in Atheros Labs, but after she tallied up work as a Pawn, then the raids as a Grunt, and a few months as an Admin, it hadn't even been a year.
Her silence was answer enough for Mewtwo. "I've known him for thirty years, ever since he made me. Do you think he's any different than Ghetsis? He's only less dangerous, less intelligent, and maybe a bit less ruthless. He wouldn't hesitate to put you through unimaginable agony if it suited his purpose, never mind how much use you've been to him before."
"But he hasn't." Seven looked up at the creature Giovanni and Ghetsis had made together. She found herself thinking of it as an older sibling, or maybe a prototype to herself, and crushed the thought.
"You suffered the same way I did, didn't you?"
"Cut open on an operating table, injected with a chemical cocktail, stitched and restitched with amalgamations of other cells? Oh yes."
"Then you know why I can't leave Giovanni."
Mewtwo sighed and put a hand on its head. "No, I know why you have to. You can leave, you know. Once the battle's over, you will be able to use your Pokémon again. Make a break for it while everyone is distracted."
"And go where?"
"Anywhere but here."
Seven looked over the horizon. Plumes of smoke stained the sky gray, and skyscrapers circled her with black bars. "There's nowhere else for me."
"How do you know? Have you ever left this city?"
"I haven't," Seven admitted. "But I can if I wish."
"You just have to ask Giovanni for his permission."
Seven shook her head. "I wouldn't want to anyways. There's nothing out there for me."
"You'd never know until you look."
An explosion rocked the building. The concrete roof swayed beneath Seven's feet, but the building stayed upright. Ten blocks over, another high-rise that housed a UV spotlight had been smashed to rubble.
"Why are you trying to get me to leave?" Seven asked. "Trying to make me turn against Giovanni? Are you planning on betraying him? Is that it? You just want me to help you destroy him, don't you?"
"Maybe you should be more worried about the Skarmory coming to disable the spotlight on this roof and kill us while it's at it."
Seven looked up. Even with her eyes, the metal bird was a glowing speck dimmed by a smoky haze.
"Deal with it yourself. It would be easy for you."
"It would sap my strength and reveal where I am. We would lose the initiative in the most important moment of the battle."
The Grunt at the spotlight hadn't heard. His attention was fixed on a cluster of ghosts lurking around the corner below them, spewing mouthfuls of Zigzagoon into the street. Every few seconds, the light would hum to life and swipe at a ghost that had leaned out too far.
Seven concentrated. As the Skarmory dove towards them, like a guillotine's blade, she wreathed the building in illusory fire, then the air around the bird. She gave it one avenue of escape and removed the building in its way. The Skarmory, startled into banking through the path Seven gave it, slammed head-first into the steel corner of the adjacent building. It plummeted to the ground with a sizable, bleeding dent in its beak. Two Grunts with flamethrowers reduced it to a bubbling puddle. Its dying screams made Seven clap her hands over her ears.
"It would be easy for you to escape," Mewtwo said. "With that Ditto and Gengar, you could leave a doppelganger while you made a run for it. By the time Giovanni knew what you had done, you could be anywhere in the world."
"Go where? Do what?" She scanned the skies. Birds and dragons swooped down on other buildings, but they left their building alone. On the street, the ghosts had been routed with a portable UV laser, and only ashes remained of their Rattata cannon fodder. "I'm done talking to you. Let's redeploy closer to the front lines."
"That one over there." Mewtwo pointed at a skyscraper twice as high as their building. It pitched to the right, and a large crack ran through the middle. "It's sturdier than it appears, and we will be less exposed inside of it."
Seven relayed orders to the men downstairs. Four came up to dismantle the spotlight with twenty more took positions at the building's exit. Seven stayed in the rear, watching over the spotlight and Mewtwo. Halfway down the building, she received a radio message from Giovanni.
"We're going North," Seven said.
"To deal with the surprise attack from the flanks, correct?" Mewtwo chuckled. "If you didn't have me around, you'd be in quite a bind."
"He wants you to deal with this group, then finish the South pincer. Fisher and Colson will hold them off until they arrive."
Mewtwo frowned and stretched its arms. "I don't think I can. These aren't ordinary Pokémon. I could take out one and Bruno, but two… it's too much."
"What do you mean?"
"There's more like Bruno. Each group has one, a Pokémon manipulating the power of the soul. They're weaker than him, but it will take considerable effort to defeat them."
"Then we better get moving."
Seven left one of her lieutenants in charge and split off towards the north. Mewtwo guided them past groups of ghosts, underneath the protection of the remaining spotlights. Pockets of Rattata resistance remained, but the Rockets had organized into smaller platoons and pinned them in alleyways. A few Sentret and a Zangoose jumped at her from ash piles as they went, but she slashed open their bellies with her knife.
Signs of violence faded away as they ran further north. Weather had cracked the buildings and streets, and time smoothed the jagged edges. Weeds sprouted in the sidewalk, and frail ivy vines clambered up rusted dumpsters. But up ahead, gunfire and cries shattered the silence.
The battle was a rout. The northern division of Rockets gave ground foot by bloody foot, losing two men for every Ursaring, or Scizor, or Heliolisk they brought down. The hastily dug trenches now served the Pokémon. They lobbed balls of fire and flurries of icy daggers while bullets glanced off the earthen bulwarks. From the rear, an Eelektross hissed orders and called bolts of lightning from the smoky sky. The air shimmered blue around its body. From half a mile away, the heat of it made Seven's skin prickle.
Seven slipped into the trenches and donned a Charmeleon's appearance. She picked them off one by one, slaying each Pokémon as they saw her kill another. By the time they had realized what was happening, she had cut Mewtwo a path to their commander. It followed close behind, darting around Pokémon as they swiped and bit at it.
Mewtwo leapt from the trench, hands glowing purple, and struck at the Eelektross. The air hardened around it, and a shockwave forced them apart. Lightning shot at Mewtwo from twenty directions, but the bolts twisted around it, splintering the concrete. Mewtwo answered with an invisible force that rippled the air. The Eelektross buckled beneath the blow, but blue light flared up and pushed back the attack.
A Stoutland charged up a hyper beam from further down the trench, aiming at Mewtwo. Seven ran forward and drew her pistol. Dropping to one knee, she aimed for its chest and fired. The gun bucked, and the gun flew from her clumsy grip. She thought she had missed, but the Stoutland stumbled back, blood gushing from a bullet wound in its hind foot. The beam shot into the sky, clipping the wing of a Swellow.
When she turned back to the battle, Mewtwo had the Eelektross pinned beneath a purple, translucent barrier. Electricity crackled from the eel, but it bounced off the psychic energy. Inch by inch, the Eelektross was crushed into the ground until, with a choked gurgle and snapping bones, it shuddered and died.
Terror rippled through the ranks of Pokémon. They ran from the ragged band of Rockets clawing their way over one another as they scrambled up and over the trenches. The humans rushed in pursuit, gunning down the stragglers, and took up defensive positions. Seven had almost forgotten to replace her disguise when they slid into her section of trenches, but by the time anyone got close enough to see details, she had her Admin uniform around her.
"Thank you for the support Admin Sun," an officer said. "We have enough manpower to hold this position unless another one of those… things shows up."
Seven nodded and went to Mewtwo. Its thigh had circular burn marks where sparks scorched it, and it was breathing heavily.
"We have to go," she said. "If it was this bad here, the southern front won't hold much longer."
"There isn't any time." It looked to the south-east, towards the front line. "The Lucario are dying."
Changelog
12/28/18 – minor edits