Chapter 103: Lord Mammon, We Have a Problem — Wallace Is Coming!
Lavaridge Town. A villa they'd rented out entirely.
"First meeting of Team Rocket's Hoenn branch. Thoughts, everyone?"
Evening. Mammon surveyed the small gathering.
It was, in fairness, a very small gathering. He'd brought Caitlin and Gladion. New additions: Kagura and Courtney. That was it.
Courtney sat in the awareness that she didn't quite belong here. Technically she was in Team Rocket, but her heart was still somewhere in Team Magma.
Although — after listening to Mammon and Kagura's conversation this afternoon, something in her had shifted. She couldn't quite put a name to it. It was less that she'd developed affection for Team Rocket and more that Team Magma had retroactively started to feel... a little small-scale. Like a local operation that had convinced itself it was a movement.
But she still cared about Team Magma. And she genuinely wasn't sure why Mammon had included her in this meeting, given that she hadn't exactly signed on with any enthusiasm.
"Lord Mammon, I've completed the personnel count."
Gladion went first.
"We brought approximately one hundred from Kanto — nearly all of them have arrived. Absorbed thirty-three from the Magma base."
"That's not a lot." Mammon exhaled.
"Correct. Numbers are thin. And the Magma recruits are mostly unreliable — discipline is poor, individual strength is low. Only a handful are actually usable."
Gladion glanced at Courtney while saying this.
Courtney's expression didn't move. Her toes, however, were doing something involuntary inside her boots.
That look. That 'how did you produce subordinates like this' look. Extremely rude.
"It's fine. These things take training."
Mammon wasn't in any particular rush about it.
"On the company side, Lord Mammon — we can adapt a lot of our Alola frameworks, but Hoenn's environment is significantly different."
Gladion shifted into the next item.
Company side?
Kagura, who had been listening with vague interest, sat up slightly. Courtney's blank expression developed a faint trace of puzzlement.
Team Rocket was... opening businesses?
"Slateport already has a Game Corner," Caitlin said, catching Gladion's meaning.
"Buy it." Mammon was unconcerned.
"The owner probably won't sell — it's turning a decent profit. I looked at their numbers." Gladion frowned. "It's not as busy as the Alpaca Game Corner in Alola, but the prizes keep traffic consistent. TMs, rare Pokémon merchandise."
"Gladion." Mammon's tone was patient. "You need to think less conventionally."
The boy looked at him.
"If the above-board offer doesn't work, we go sideways. If a premium price still doesn't move them, and they're being stubborn about it — then we apply some pressure. This is Team Rocket. Since when do we compete fairly? Other criminal organizations would laugh at us."
"So your approach would be—?"
"Send some people in to cause problems. Ruin the reputation a bit first. Then we buy it, once the owner is motivated to sell. Keep it clean, nothing traceable — last thing we need is them running to the Hoenn League."
"Understood." Gladion filed this away with the expression of someone doing quiet moral arithmetic.
"Don't handle it personally. Clear?"
"Yes, Lord."
"Slateport is the biggest city in Hoenn — we need a real foothold there. The Game Corner goes in Slateport. Then Mauville and Mossdeep — both have potential, don't ignore them. Acquire some land, set up rental shops, that kind of thing. Standard legitimate fronts."
Gladion noted everything down.
Kagura and Courtney continued to look faintly dazed. This was not what either of them had imagined a criminal organization meeting would involve.
"The business side can be handled by the staff. The more pressing issue is numbers."
Mammon leaned back.
"Primary target going forward: take down Team Magma and Team Aqua. Absorb their people."
Hoenn Rocket was too small right now, but that was fixable — you just had to build on the wreckage of whoever you'd beaten. Alola Rocket had gotten a significant membership boost from absorbing Team Skull. Magma and Aqua would serve the same purpose.
The complication was that he didn't know where their real bases were. He remembered there was a large facility on an island somewhere northeast of Mauville, but he couldn't recall which organization controlled it in this version of events.
Didn't matter. Both organizations were getting dismantled either way.
"Courtney, Kagura — do either of you know where Magma and Aqua have their bases? Courtney, you only need to give us Aqua's locations."
He was deliberate about that. Given where Courtney was emotionally, asking her to give up Magma's positions right now would be excessive pressure — and counterproductive.
She'd come around. Nobody who thought clearly about it chose Team Magma over Team Rocket. He just needed to give her the time to arrive at that conclusion herself. And if she turned out to be irredeemably committed to the wrong side, he'd deal with that then.
Courtney let out a slow breath. The relief was visible.
"I don't have details on Aqua's core base. I know where a few of their smaller facilities are."
She'd been dreading being asked for Magma's locations. This she could actually answer.
"I joined too recently," Kagura said simply. "No access to anything central."
"That works. Courtney, mark the positions when you get a chance."
Mammon didn't show disappointment.
They wrapped up the remaining details quickly. First meeting, concluded.
The following morning.
Gladion and Courtney headed to the captured Magma base to organize personnel. Kagura was asleep — deeply, peacefully, indifferent to the time. Mammon and Caitlin wandered out to see what Lavaridge Town actually looked like.
It was, as advertised, a town of hot springs and elderly residents. Tourists drifted through, but the permanent population skewed noticeably toward the silver-haired. The volcanic air had that particular mineral warmth to it.
"Hey — it's you guys!"
A bright voice cut across the street. They'd barely gone anywhere before passing a training ground and drawing the attention of its current occupant.
"May." Mammon turned.
She was there in the training yard — trim and energetic, that red-and-white bandana doing what it was doing, waving at them with the unself-conscious enthusiasm of someone who genuinely liked running into people.
"Small world! We keep crossing paths!"
She jogged over.
Caitlin's brow made a very slight, very controlled adjustment. Of all the timing. She'd been looking forward to having Mammon to herself for once, and this cheerful stranger was now apparently very much in the picture.
She smiled politely, because she was always poised.
"I handed that Aqua admin to Officer Jenny yesterday!" May reported, with the energy of someone completing a mission. "She was so happy about it. She mentioned she wanted to send you guys a plaque or something — said she sort of recognized you?"
"Jenny's very kind, but she really doesn't need to do that."
Mammon understood — it must have been the Jenny from the day before. A commendation plaque, though. He let himself imagine, for a brief moment, what expression that particular Officer Jenny would be wearing if she ever found out that the people she'd wanted to thank were Team Rocket.
"Fighting criminal organizations is everyone's responsibility," he said warmly. "Personally, I can't stand the idea of other criminal organizations operating in the same area I'm in."
"Right?! They're the worst!" May shook her fist with full conviction. "I'd barely started traveling and I ran into those Magma guys stealing an old man's Wingull. What kind of person does that?"
"Team Magma and Team Aqua — no ambition, no standards. They're embarrassing."
Mammon shook his head with what felt like genuine commiseration.
"...Hmm." May tilted her head. Something about the way he'd phrased that nagged at her. She couldn't identify what. He sounds like he has opinions about other criminal organizations.
She decided not to think about it too hard. Thinking was effort. Battling was fun.
"Are you a new trainer this year?" Mammon asked, glancing at the Swampert and the Aggron standing behind her.
May was clearly going for power. Not what you'd necessarily expect from someone who looked this fresh-faced.
"Yep, just started! My goal for this year is to win the Lilycove Tournament — and then challenge the Elite Four!"
She pumped her fist, eyes bright.
Her actual goal wasn't just the tournament. She wanted the full title — defeat the Elite Four, take down the Champion, make Hoenn answer to May from here on out. Wallace wasn't going to know what hit him.
"Ambitious. Good luck — I mean that."
Mammon gave her a genuine round of applause.
He was honestly uncertain how May's timeline would play out. In the games she'd beaten the Champion within a year of starting — but this wasn't the games, and Steven Stone's ceiling was genuinely high. Champion-tier on the stronger end. One year of growth, even for someone with May's talent, against that — he wasn't sure.
Wallace, on the other hand? Mammon felt fairly comfortable about May's odds there. Wallace was Champion-tier, but among Champions, he was honestly not the most alarming specimen. His team was Water-heavy and several key members relied significantly on terrain and field conditions to perform at their peak.
Wailord, for instance, was twenty-something meters of Pokémon. In a standard indoor battle arena, that was going to be a problem from a mobility standpoint alone. Standard Pokémon League venues didn't come with swimming pools. Put Wallace in his ideal conditions and he was dramatically more dangerous, but the Champion's stage didn't accommodate that.
Bzzzt.
Mammon's phone went off. He excused himself with an apologetic nod and stepped away.
"What's happening, Courtney?"
"Lord Mammon." Courtney's soft voice had a thin edge of something that wasn't quite panic but was adjacent to it. "Champion Wallace has arrived with his people. Lord Gladion has gone to engage them. Kagura isn't answering her phone."
Of course she isn't.
"Don't panic. I'm on my way."
Mammon ended the call.
He thought about Wallace — the refined face, the cape, the general air of someone who had wandered out of a watercolor painting.
The corner of his mouth curved upward.
Good timing.
He turned back to Caitlin.
"Caitlin — swing by a clothing shop on your way back. Pick up a variety — nice dresses, JK uniform pieces, some Lolita stuff, a few swimsuits. Black stockings, white stockings, fishnet. Variety is good. I have a use for them."
"...???"
Caitlin stared at him with an expression that contained several questions, delivered simultaneously, at significant volume.
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