Chapter Thirty-Five: Help! Police!



Gladion's POV



Of course the police show up, take us to the 'safety' of their police station, and ask us questions. Ilima spends most of this time impersonating a Skitty, due to his lack of pants, so he's not the subject of the questions.



We tell them everything. Almost. Of course we don't tell them that Ilima is a Mew or that Celebi encouraged us to storm Team Rocket's proverbial castle, let alone about the time travel or the glitch cultists or the Burst Heart or any of the really weird shit. But we tell them what we know about Hitoshi. Stupid kid, trains a Charmeleon, wants to be the best of the worst or whatever he calls Team Rocket. It's idiocy, really.



They tell us the same thing the police in Holiwood told us: don't get involved. Stay safe. Keep our heads down. Leave saving the world to the professionals.



And I have two words for them:



"Frek off."



The pair of cops stare at me as if I'm some rude little boy who doesn't respect his elders, but I go on. "Pallet Town's deserted -- all its citizens have been kidnapped. Saffron City is under an impenetrable dome to keep Team Rocket in and the police out. What the hell are you police doing about that?"



I start pacing in anger, my hand shaking with every step. "We put in a call a couple of days ago for the local police to pick up a Rocket we found in Sida Forest. Now that same Rocket has set a library on fire and stolen all our Pokemon, and frek if I know how he escaped, or if he was ever picked up to begin with. Likely he rattled off some sob story to you guys and you thought, hey, he's just a kid, what can he do?"



I pause for emphasis.



"He can burn down a frekkin' library, that's what he can do!"



My foot taps on the linoleum. "I don't know who the hell trains you or what you've signed up for. I could care less where you come from, what oaths you've taken, and just what it is you're fighting for. But the Rockets are destroying entire towns, probably kidnapped a bunch of your buddies in Saffron and Pallet. Are you that incompetent, or do you just not care?"



The police look at me, and suddenly I realize I've seen them before. I'm not sure where, but I've definitely seen...



The doors slam shut.



And I remember.



It's those two Rockets. The ones that piloted the mecha that tried to rob the Meowth. They're the cops.



They're the police.



The woman grins. "Now, normally we'd say our motto here..."



"...but you outnumber us five to two," the man says, "so let's just cut to the chase. Lights out!"



And everything goes black.



---



At first, it's so dark that I wonder if I'm literally unconscious. But then I hear a scream and a thud, and pretty quickly realize both of them belong to Gary, who just tried to get the jump on the Rockets that kidnapped his family. I don't blame him.



"Who turned off the lights?" Shu asks.



Then the lights turn back on, and instead of a pair of Rockets dressed as cops, we see a pair of Mewtwo wielding giant spoons.



What the frek?!



It's the ones from the mecha in the alleyway, too. They move in on us, making a sound somewhat reminiscent of psychic purring. "You are all humans, most of you," one of them says telepathically. "Humans without Pokemon. How pathetic. Are you really worth our trouble?"



"There's one among them that isn't," the second Mewtwo purrs. "And it isn't a Skitty, either, is it?"



"The thing you humans call a Mew..." The first Mewtwo licks its lips. "A truly powerful foe. But not as powerful as us. Go on, try to stop us, I dare you."



Ilima-Skitty looks up at the towering genetic behemoth that just challenged him. "Why should I?"



The first Mewtwo growls. "We have been given orders to defeat you. If you pose no resistance, then there's not much point to us being here, is there?"



"I can see why the humans didn't want you destroyed completely," the second one purrs. "There's really not much there to destroy."



My hand starts shaking with rage, and I grab my wrist to try to stop it. "So you really think we're not worth your trouble? If we had our Pokemon with us, we'd destroy you! You know we were winning in the fight before!"



"Um, Glad?" Wes whispers. "Not th' time..."



The first Mewtwo narrows its eyes. "That is true. Blast it all, what victory is there in rounding up a weakened foe? You're making us look like poseurs."



Great. Fantastic. These aren't just sadists, they're sadists with a sense of pride in their sadism. Maybe we can use this against them. "Yeah, well, if you gave us back our Pokemon, then maybe we could fight you guys somewhere officially, and everyone can see how tough you are."



The first Mewtwo is about to speak, when the second Mewtwo interjects. "There are five humans and a Mew. Our orders are to take them to the labs, not battle them! Our superiors will not approve!"



"Well, if they don't approve, they can always complain," the first Mewtwo says gleefully. "I'd like to see them stop me."



"If by 'stop you' you mean put a tranq bullet in your arrogant head, then I'd rather they didn't. Do you want to wind up back in reprogramming?"



The first Mewtwo whirls around. "I am NOT going back in reprogramming!" it snaps. "I'm going to--"



I doubt I'll ever know what that Mewtwo was going to do, because it's at this point that Ilima gets his crap together and teleports us all out.



---



We land somewhere a good bit from the outskirts of Mintale Town, somewhere sandy and rocky, but with a distinct lack of Mewtwo. Somewhere around the edge where Colbalt Coast and Terra Caverns meet, most likely. There's a solid wall of mountain blocking our progress in one direction, an entire ocean blocking another, and the paths that are left look rather uninteresting and are mostly covered in the kind of tall grass that the local wildlife jumps out and bites you over.



"Welp... that happened," Wes says, examining his goggles. "What we gonna do now?"



"We've got to save our Pokemon!" Terra shouts. "I'm not losing my best friend to whatever their evil experiments are!"



"I second that!" Shu exclaims.



"But how?" Gary asks. "We have one Pokemon for five humans, and it's not even a very good Pokemon. Not for battling, anyway," he says, noting Ilima's glare. "If we get a horde of Bug-types thrown at us, we're toast."



This is true. Ilima doesn't want to admit it. None of us want to. But it's true. So we all just sort of stand there, and I wonder if there's anything I can say to Ilima to comfort him that won't make me look gay, because I mean, come on, he's a cat and I'm human. That's not really an option here. But when you're a guy and your best friend is a guy with pink hair, people are gonna assume things about you. It's a fact of life, and it's why I bought him that damn hat that he's clutching.



"We don't have just one Pokemon," I finally say, holding out my hand.



Everyone looks at me. With vary degrees of trepidation.



"I still have my Burst Heart," I say. "I can still transform if I need to. Bug-types can't do jack against a Rock-type. We've survived everything else. We're going to survive this. Somehow."



I don't know what I expect to get from that. Certainly not cheers. Everyone looks at me as if I'm an idiot.



"Hoopa hasn't come back, dumbbell," Gary says. "It hasn't brought our stolen Pokemon back. Who wants to bet that those lavender-furred spoon-wielders come back for us before Hoopa does? Or that Hoopa just Alley-Hooparings our Pokemon back to a charred ruin?"



"Her name is Ali," Terra says. "And she's going to be fine! She has to be!"



"And what if she isn't?" Gary shoots back. "What if we never see our Pokemon again? I'm sick and tired of losing! We can't just keep letting life kick us in the crotch like this all the time!"



He paces angrily across the sand. "Team Rocket's taken over the friggin' police! There's no one, literally no one that can help us! And what sort of help will you be, Gaydion?" he snaps. "You and your dumb rock that makes you even dumber AND MORE DANGEROUS!"



Now, I'm not gay and I will never be gay and even if I was gay I don't see what point Gary hopes to make by claiming so, but just as I'm about to give him an earful for it, the stone wall behind him shatters outward in an explosion of sharp stones and dust.