"So, the bait has been cast."
In the dark and silent conference room, Matthias put his hands on his back, gazing at the starry sky outside the window.
"Hiss..."
A sound of snake hissing appeared in the meeting room. Two purple silhouettes were slithering on the floor, heading toward Matthias. After a while, two four meters long, ferocious-looking Arbok appeared behind Matthias.
Although his aunt, Agatha, was known as the Ghost Mistress, she also specialized in Poison-type Pokemon with horrifying appearances. And as Agatha's favorite nephew, Matthias was naturally best at using Ghost-type and Poison-type Pokemon.
S.S. Anne, Upper Deck,
"Okay, the patrol is over," Dwayne looked at his watch and then turned to look at the four sailors behind him with a strange smile.
A middle-aged sailor standing in the front looked at him with a puzzled expression, "Mr. Dwayne, there is still more than an hour left before dawn. How is it already over?"
"Don't ask too many questions," Mendo said with a ferocious grin and immediately rushed forward, punching the middle-aged sailor in the gut.
The huge force made the middle-aged sailor roll his eyes in pain. He held his hands on his stomach and fell to his knees, foaming in his mouth.
"Mr. Dwayne, why are you doing this?"
Seeing that their colleague was attacked, the three remaining deckhands shouted in unison. Their eyes fixed on Dwayne while raising the electric baton in their hands.
Dwayne pricked his ear, not deigning to answer their question.
Ah!
Ah!
A few minutes later, the three deckhands also suffered the same fate as the middle-aged sailor. Dwayne easily knocked out the three men, who were equipped with electric batons using only his bare fists.
The four sailors were then tied up inside the cargo room, and their mouths were all stuffed with cloth. Then, Dwayne took out a small backpack hidden inside one of the crates. The bag was full of explosives with an activation device.
It took him several minutes to install these time bombs in the main areas of the bottom deck according to the plan. They were all timed and remote-controlled bombs. If things went south, he just needed to press the button to set the bombs off.
After the bomb was placed, Dwayne quickly ran to the ship's upper deck. He then took out a flare launcher from his bag and pressed the launch button on the handle. With a swoosh, the flare quickly rushed into the sky and exploded, forming a huge red R logo in the night sky.
The mission went very smoothly. A hint of joy appeared on Dwayne's face when the flares exploded in the night sky. If this task was successful, he would be able to increase his rank from mid-rank to upper mid-rank member of Team Rocket.
Clap!
Clap!
A round of applause suddenly appeared behind his back. Dwayne furrowed his brows, and then a series of footsteps on the floor let him know that he was being surrounded without even turning his head.
"Well done, Mr. Dwayne," Matthias clapped his hands while walking out from the shadow with a smile.
"Do you feel like everything is going well for you tonight? Isn't it weird that you didn't meet any staff along the way?" he teased.
"It's you, the sponsor of that Pokemon tournament," Dwayne gritted his teeth, his face turning red.
"I forgot to introduce myself. My name is Matthias, the Chief Officer of the Eastern Region of the Kanto League."
"Do you think you will win?" Dwayne laughed in contempt.
"Idiot, if you had prevented me from launching that flare before, there might have been a chance for you to defeat them. But now that the support has arrived, do you really think you can defeat us with just these sailors?"
As soon as these words came out of Dwayne's mouth, the surrounding sailors showed angry expressions one after another, clamoring to teach the arrogant Team Rocket member a good lesson.
A chill went down Matthias's spine, and he suddenly felt a bad omen. Without hesitation, Matthias immediately shouted, "Dodge!"
After saying that, Matthias immediately rushed to the left.
Most of the sailors were confused by Matthias's order. However, a few smart ones noticed his movement, and they too quickly jumped to the side, keeping their heads on the ground.
Just as Matthias jumped to the left, a fierce Fearow suddenly flashed by where he was standing before. Its pointed beak left a deep hole on the wooden deck.
If it wasn't for Matthias's quick reaction and timely dodging, the youngest Chief Officer might have been killed today.
After missing its target, the Fearow didn't continue its attack. Instead, it immediately spread its wings and flew into the sky.
Those few sailors who didn't manage to dodge in time fell to the ground after being attacked by another Fearow. Most of them were severely cut caused by the sharp air blades of the bird Pokemon, dying the wooden floor red.
The painful screams of the injured men pierced through the night.
Seeing this scene, Matthias's expression turned cold.
"Haha, it's Tyson's Pokemon," Dwayne smiled in joy after seeing the two Fearow in the sky.
"Chief Officer? Pfft!" he mocked.
"I'm here, boss!" Ryoichi was panting while running up the stairs.
Before Matthias could say anything, Ryoichi suddenly called out, "Mismagius! Shadow Ball!"
With a cheeky smile, a purple ghost with a witch's hat appeared in front of Matthias. It then put its hands together, forming two purple and black energy balls. With a push of its hand, the Shadow Balls were fired at the two Fearow in the sky.
The Shadow Ball's flight trajectory was very fast. One of the characteristics of the Ghost-type move is that it is silent when activated.
By the time the two Fearow noticed the two energy balls, they were already less than one meter away from them.
Woosh!
Woosh!
The two Fearow were always alert to their surroundings. As the trump cards of Tyson, a high-ranking member of Team Rocket, they had outstanding combat experience.
Even if there was no Tyson to command them, they could still make effective responses in times of crisis. They stuck their wings close to their stomachs and plunged toward the deck, avoiding the Shadow Ball aiming for them.
The energy balls went past them and did no other effective damage besides ruffling their feathers.
...
"Boss, are you alright!" Ryoichi held his hand out to help Matthias get up, but Matthias slapped his hand away.
"Are you an idiot? Don't you know that the Ghost-type move is ineffective to the Normal-type Fearow?" Matthias patted the dust on his clothes without any expression on his face.
'Well, this is quite embarrassing,' thought Ryoichi with flushed cheeks.
He then quickly explained, "I'm not worried about your safety, boss! I'm just afraid that they will hurt you."
"It's fine," Matthias could only smile wryly in reply.
Taking care of his subordinates can also be regarded as a kind of test for himself by the League.
If the Fearow trainer was here, he would already order the Fearow to ignore the Shadow Ball and continue attacking. The only reason they dodged the attack just now was due to their instinctive reactions.
"Come out, Arbok!" Matthias then threw out two Pokeballs on the deck.
Two giant Arbok appeared in a flash of red light. They stood in front of Matthias, flickering their forked tongues out to intimidate the two bird Pokemon.
Seemingly aware of the presence of their natural enemies, the two Arbok immediately stood at attention. They raised their heads, revealing the frightening pattern on their large hood and making a threatening hissing sound.
The two large Fearow flew over toward Dwayne's side, letting out shrill cries and glaring at the two Arbok.
Snakes and birds are natural enemies, but as birds of prey, Fearow has the flying advantage. However, in the face of Arbok's deadly venom, even they didn't dare to act rashly.
"Yo! Recognize this?" Ryoichi shouted, taking out a series of bombs from his bag and waving them in his hands.
Dwayne's face turned pale after seeing the familiar explosives in Ryoichi's hands. Then he quickly shoved his hand into his pocket and took out a device with a red button in the middle.
"Do you really think it's over? Look here! This is a remote-control device. I only need to push this red button to activate the bomb!" he yelled back.
"Try it then," Ryoichi said indifferently.
"Let's see if this thing will blow us up."
"Alright, fine!" Dwayne smiled grimly.
"Let's all die together!"
He shouted while pressing the red button on the device, but the expected explosion never came. After that, his face flushed red, sweating as he repeatedly pressed the red button. Still, the bombs in Ryoichi's hands didn't give any response whatsoever.
"Haha!" Ryoichi laughed after seeing the constipated expression on Dwayne's face.
"Do you know how to defuse a bomb?" Matthias asked curiously.
Ryoichi turned to look at his chief with a smile and said, "It's all thanks to that Hisoka's Pokemon, Kirlia. I didn't expect that his Pokemon would know how to defuse a bomb. It also gave us a lot of help when we were searching for the bombs at the bottom deck."
While Matthias and Ryoichi were confronting the Team Rocket member on the upper deck, the other Team Rocket member who had sneaked into S.S. Anne two days prior began to start their operation after seeing the 'R' flare in the sky.
First of all, they dealt with the people inside the VIP room. They used the copied room card to open the front door and sneaked into the room quietly. While these wealthy people were still sleeping, they quickly stole their Pokeballs. When these people suddenly realized the intruders in their room, they were then knocked out and tied up by the Team Rocket.
"Faster! Move your fucking asses!"
The speedboats finally caught up with the S.S. Anne. Under Tyson's roar, the Team Rocket members used hook launchers to quickly climb up the cruise ship that was more than four stories high.
Each member of the Rockets who boarded the ship was carrying a specially designed space-folding backpack. They were two hole-shaped vacuums on their shoulders. They used that to suck the Pokeball directly into the device the moment the trainer took out their Pokeball.
This attack and kidnapping operation was done quickly and efficiently, so the League forces on the ship didn't have ample time to react. Initially, the plan was to hijack the S.S. Anne, but after thinking about its huge size and slow sailing speed, they quickly changed their original plan. It will also be easier for them to be intercepted by the police force sent by the League.
With more support arriving, Team Rocket's actions on the ship became faster. More than a hundred or so wealthy people were already robbed and kidnapped. The only remaining goal was to target the ordinary passengers below. Team Rocket certainly would not let go of their money and Pokemon.
"What do you want to do?"
A passenger who got up and wanted to go to the toilet was startled by the dark shadow that suddenly appeared in his room, but before he could make a move, he was immediately stunned by the other party's electric shock baton. After that, the jewelry and purse lying on the table were all sucked into the vacuum together with the person's Pokeball.
Meanwhile, Ash and Pikachu were so hungry that they couldn't sleep in the middle of the night. So they decided to sneak into the kitchen to get something to eat before resuming their sleep.
But just as he was about to head into the kitchen, a scream was suddenly heard coming from Misty's room.
Then, Ash immediately rushed into Misty's room and saw Misty sitting on the bed, waving her pillow and desperately trying to get the masked figure out of her room.
He didn't have time to think about the strange masked figure and quickly shouted, "Pikachu! Use Thundershock!"
A bright yellow electric current surged out from Pikachu's small body, heading toward the clearly hostile person. The masked figure was shocked by the jolt of electricity. Finally, a puff of black smoke came from the masked figure's mouth before falling to the ground unconscious.
"Misty, are you alright!"
Seeing the uninvited guest being stunned by Pikachu, Misty couldn't help but breathe a sigh of relief. However, when she saw the attacker's clothing, she screamed again in shock, "It is Team Rocket! How did they get into S.S Anne?"
Ash also saw the iconic R logo on the fainted man's chest. It was indeed a member of Team Rocket.
"Misty! Ash! What happened? Are you guys okay?"
At this moment, another person rushed into the room. It was Brock who was startled by Misty's scream.
Misty shook her head and said, "I'm fine. Ash saved me just now."
Brock dropped to one knee and began to check the unconscious Team Rocket member on the ground. He then turned toward them with a worried look and said, "When I was rushing into the room, I also heard several screams coming from other places. It is obvious that Team Rocket is attacking S.S. Anne right now. And it looks like there is more than one of them!"
"Haha! You are correct, Brock!"
Suddenly, two familiar voices appeared behind them.
"Team Rocket is attacking S.S Anne right now!"
"So prepare for trouble!"
"And make it double!"
"To protect the world from devastation!"
"To unite all peoples within our nation!"
"To denounce the evils of truth and love!"
"To extend our reach to the stars above!"
...