Days later another video call took place. Unlike the call that had sparked Misty's rage, this call was between several terminals. As the call started the display split into seven sections, with three gray and blank. The other sections were filled by four Kanto gym leaders, Erika, Surge, Daisy, and Flint. The last had deep bags under their eyes and their hair was unkempt and greasy.
There was silence as everyone fiddled with the terminal on their end, followed by more silence as everyone waited, with mute icons displayed on their windows, for the rest to arrive.
Eventually Erika broke the silence.
"So, Surge, I heard that you decided to put some shrubs outside your gym," she said, leaning forward on her elbows, the mute icon disappearing from her section of the display.
Surge's mouth moved but no noise came out. Frustrated, he looked down at the bottom of his own terminal and the mute symbol in his section of the screen went away.
"Of course, you'd be the one to hear about that," he said, rolling his eyes.
"Well, you've got me there, but I'm not the only one who's been telling you that your gym needs sprucing up," Erika replied. "The industrial look may work with your type specialization, but it is just so depressingly drab when there's not a battle happening."
"The shrubs are on the outside," Surge said, rolling his eyes once again.
"Yes, that needed livening up too."
"It's just some bushes," Surge sighed, leaning back in his chair. "They'll stop out of control vehicles from crashing into the gym and provide a habitat to some of the urban pokémon. That's all."
"What specific pokémon do you think will live in those bushes?"
Daisy laid her arms on the desk and let her head slump on them as Erika continued to interrogate Surge on the greenery being added to his gym. The water-type gym leader began tapping her fingers on her desk and glanced up at her screen, watching the three grey, blank sections.
Eventually they started to fill in, one by one. First Blaine joined, leaning back in his chair, causing Daisy to sit back up. After that Daisy had to stop her eyes from narrowing as Giovanni joined, hands folded in a professional manner on the desk before him. Finally, Koga joined and the screen was full.
"Alright, let's get down to business," Blaine said, cutting through the chatter. "I-"
"Everyone should have a copy of the agenda," Giovanni said, quickly cutting off Blaine. "The first item-"
"Hey-" Blaine protested, but Giovanni kept talking.
"-the first item on the agenda, other than preventing any atrocious attempts at wordplay of course, is to go over the distribution of the regional budget grants," the gym leader from Viridian City went on to absolutely no objection from the rest of the gym leaders. "Now, in the absence of Sabrina I do believe it was Koga who ran the numbers for us this time?"
The meeting commenced and Daisy muted herself so that the other leaders couldn't hear her sigh. She would much rather be working on their next show or even doing paperwork. She found it harder to care about the regional level tasks; it could be hard to see their impact on day-to-day life in the gym and in Cerulean City.
Budgets were discussed, event planning was delegated, proposals were debated, upcoming acts of legislation were examined, and news from the Elite Four was distributed. Updates on the status of League units operating under the temporary command or supervision of the gym leaders were compiled and news of upcoming operations was given out.
Finally, after several hours of work, the meeting was wrapping up.
"And finally, does anyone else have anything they want to bring up?" Surge asked.
"I do," Daisy announced, scanning the faces on the screen. "After receiving a tip from a CI, my sisters and I investigated the remains of a site on Clefairy Ridge, suspecting possible criminal activity. We found leftover traces of heavy equipment in a wilderness area-"
"Obviously smugglers," Giovanni said, in the tone of someone who was politely not rolling their eyes.
Daisy resisted the urge to scowl. She had expected this from him.
"It's the wrong season for smugglers in those mountains," she replied. "The meltwater makes things too difficult to move any products in bulk. Anything that isn't smuggling small goods is too risky. And before you say anything, both our gym and the Cerulean police department have the numbers to back this up-"
Intellectually Daisy knew that bringing that up was a mistake, it made her seem too combative. She kept the wince off of her face and pushed on ahead.
"- and there aren't any reasons for smugglers to bring heavy equipment to that particular spot either. It's too exposed, like, both to the elements and to observation."
Once more, Daisy fought off the urge to wince. She was better at following scripts written by other people, when trying to follow her own scripts she tended to slip up and revert to her usual speech patterns.
"So, who do you think it was?" Flint asked, looking pensive.
Daisy took a deep breath.
"There's no direct evidence, but given their recent activity, both the base near Viridian City and their attack on Saffron City, there's a strong possibility that it is Team Rocket."
Her statement was met with a mix of skepticism and blank looks.
"And you're basing that assumption on what exactly?" Koga asked, steepling his hands together.
"On the fact that it's unlikely to be smugglers and that Team Rocket has been unusually active lately," Daisy replied, keeping her expression serious, but not angry or irritated. "They've been spotted multiple times around Viridian City, there was an attack on Pewter City, the assassination squad in the wilds, and of course, the attack on Saffron City."
"That's still not proof that these signs were left by Team Rocket," Koga started, but then Giovanni spoke up.
"I understand that these are trying times Ms. Daisy," Giovanni said, hands folded, voice calm, eyes steady. Daisy made sure not to react. She had been expecting something from him.
"The security of the entire region has come under question as multiple acts of violence and terrorism have shaken us all to the core," Giovanni continued. "People close to us have been lost or put in harm's way. Team Rocket has proven to be a greater danger than we've previously thought. They managed to quite frankly embarrass me by not only launching several operations under my nose, but they were maintaining a base in my forests.
"However," Giovanni went on, "that is no reason to start jumping at shadows. I understand that you may be apprehensive about having to defend Cerulean City from an assault like Saffron, but that is no reason to start suspecting every lowlife skulking around to be an agent of Team Rocket."
"With all due respect," Daisy said, her voice and face portraying a calmness that she was not feeling, "given what has been happening, all of us should be jumping at shadows. It is quite clear that we no longer have accurate intelligence on Team Rocket, while I'm starting to suspect that we're as translucent as a solosis to their eyes. Until we've rectified the intelligence gap, we all should be embracing paranoia. Our cities deserve no less."
The other gym leaders had put themselves on mute during the exchange, but Daisy could see that her words were having an effect on them, as some nodded and others leaned closer to their screens and speakers.
"That's not a bad suggestion," Koga said, unmuting himself. "Though I admit, my gym's own philosophy does tend along those lines."
"You want us to run around like a student the night before their exams who forgot to review their textbook?" Blaine said before letting out a sigh sighed. "But we did miss something, so I suppose we should start chugging the coffee."
"We don't want to go off too half-cocked here," Erika said. "We're liable to start a panic if we do so. The media wasn't too interested in anything outside of Saffron city, but that's not going to last. It's fine if we jump at every shadow, but we don't want the public doing the same."
"Indeed," Giovanni agreed, his strong voice stopping anyone else from speaking up. "We should reconvene soon to discuss how we should go about increasing security. But for the matter at hand, I'd like another chance to deal with Team Rocket. I owe them that much at least. I'll go to Cerulean City to help Ms. Daisy and her sisters investigate."
Once again Daisy stopped herself from visibly reacting, but fury and frustration roiled around inside of her. She should have expected this.
"We'll either smoke out Team Rocket or I'll enjoy a trip out of Viridian for a little bit," Giovanni said, a small smile on his face.
Daisy couldn't stop her gaze from narrowing at that.
AN: I'd like to thank Amationary for beta reading.
I had a busy January and February. I'm hoping to have a less busy March.
The next chapter will be released on April 12th 2023
Don't forget to review! Concrit is welcome!