"Shun, hurry—see if there are any more uniforms like this."
Once Reiji realized the psychic youth had been a Team Rocket plant, he figured there might be others—more Rocket informants working the casino.
They tore through all the clothes and junk but found no more uniforms. It looked like, among the four men, only the psychic guy was a mole.
Most likely each small enforcer team lead at the casino could be a Team Rocket recruit, roping in more fringe members; when Team Rocket moved to take the black market, they'd have ready-made tools to use.
Judging from the youth's strength, he was probably a squad-leader type. And since he had psychic talent, Team Rocket would have treated him as elite. This was big trouble.
Reiji drew a long breath. They would probably have to run—but before that, one more push. He needed to find the old man and lay it out, get him to blow the whistle on any other Rocket plants in the casino.
If the old man refused, they'd bolt. If they reported it and Officer Jenny did nothing, they'd bolt. If the whole city didn't move at all, that would mean Team Rocket moles had killed the report—and there were more of them inside the city.
The darker thought Reiji didn't even want to voice: that Team Rocket had riddled the city like a sieve—just like in the shows about Kanto and Johto, where half the Gyms and even parts of the Elite were secretly Rocket. If that were true, what was the League even worth?
"Don't panic. Bag the uniform. We're going to your grandpa right now. Hand him the uniform; dump the rest of the clothes and junk."
Only four hours had passed since they did the job. Team Rocket wouldn't trace it back that fast. There was still a window. Whether they abandoned the foothold they'd built here would depend on the old man's stance—and on whether the city's police actually acted. It would be a shame to throw all of Shun's progress away.
Shun had scared himself reading up on Team Rocket after first hearing the name. The guy they ambushed and killed had only been a small squad leader—and that strong already. What would a captain look like? A Rocket executive?
He knew it was serious, and he knew why Reiji wanted his grandfather. Finding that uniform had blindsided them. If Grandpa wouldn't handle it, Shun could already foresee the rest: this morning was all the time he and Reiji had left together. Not just Reiji—he and Grandpa would have to lie low too.
They packed up, recalled all their Pokémon, locked the villa, shouldered their bags, and grabbed a cab to the Sailors' Bar.
—
They pushed into the upstairs room without knocking, startling the old man awake.
"So early?" He sat up, blinking at their anxious faces. Something had clearly happened.
"Price these first," Reiji said, having Shun set out the ten Poké Balls. If they led with Team Rocket, the sale might collapse. Better to turn stock into cash before anything spooked it.
"Ten? Don't tell me—" The old man had already guessed they'd gone after the men in the photos.
"Mm? Starmie?" He frowned at one ball. That hadn't been in his intel.
"Yeah. Almost got me last night," Reiji said. "It was waiting in the pool."
"My mistake. You're not hurt?" He owned the miss; bad intel can kill. Thankfully, Reiji was fine—everything else was fixable.
"And the guy was a psychic. You didn't dig that up?" Reiji's suspicion flared again, then cooled—no way the old man would set up his own grandson.
"A psychic?" The old man looked to Shun. Shun nodded. Missing the psychic angle, missing the Starmie, missing the west-coast safehouse… the old man suddenly doubted his crew.
"Where did you do it?"
"Seaside villa, west side," Shun said.
"A villa?" His face tightened. Starmie, a psychic user, a hidden safehouse—none of it had surfaced. How had these two come out alive?
"It's the one on the news," Reiji said, flicking on the TV. The morning broadcast covered Officer Jenny rescuing a group of captives from a basement. The four dead got a perfunctory line; no mention of a spider bandit, of course.
"That was you?" the old man asked—at Shun.
"I called it in when we left," Shun said.
"Fine. Prices."
He scanned the line. "Starmie, ₱4,500,000. Grumpig, ₱7,000,000—happens to be a buyer for that. Exeggutor, ₱4,500,000." He kept going. "Noctowl, ₱2,000,000. Breloom, ₱2,500,000. Mankey, ₱1,500,000. Good?"
Reiji thought Grumpig might push higher—Psychic-types sell—but ₱7M was fair; last time his Gyarados and Golbat had each gone for ₱7M. Starmie and Exeggutor lined up with what he'd paid for that gravity user Staryu; adults were always cheaper than moldable babies. Once a trainer's imprint was on a Pokémon, resale took a hit; they were mostly breeding stock after that.
He still said, "Add one million?"
"I'll add two, to make up for the intel miss." The old man didn't haggle. "Ten in total—₱24,000,000. The four junk ones are mine."
He lifted a cushion, pulled out bricks of cash, counted ₱24M onto the table, and took the ten balls. Reiji didn't argue about the four cheapies—common beach/forest catches almost no one bought.
Reiji split the money; Shun took ₱12M.
His own haul for the run was over fifteen million. He stuffed it into his pack with the rest: ₱34,127,000 on hand now. With the bank, he'd crossed fifty million. Risky work paid fast.
He exhaled, then had Shun lay the black uniform on the table.
"We killed a Team Rocket plant in the casino. How do we handle this?"
"What?" The old man's brief glow at the tidy profit vanished. The uniform was real. Shun wouldn't fake this.
"My plan: report the Team Rocket plants in the casino and let Officer Jenny handle it. If the police hit the place hard,Team Rocket's attention goes there, and the psychic's death lands on the department, not on us."
"No." The answer was instant—too risky. But he could also see that Reiji was already half out the door.
"Think about it," Reiji said evenly. "Team Rocket will investigate his death. They will find the trail. You don't want your grandson and me living on the run, do you? If the casino's crawling with them, then have Jenny sweep it now, draw the heat, and we walk."
"Let me think." He looked at Shun's frightened face. Now he understood Reiji's urgency.
"And don't forget the black market," Reiji added. "If Team Rocket really took it last night, once they regroup, there won't be time to report anything."
He was bluffing on parts of it—he didn't know how deep Team Rocket ran, and the market's status was a black box even to the old man—but fear moves people faster than facts.
And he wasn't guessing blind about the casino: if it had been a full-on Team Rocket base, that psychic would never have bargained with him earlier—he'd have tried to erase Reiji outright. More likely, the casino was infiltrated, not owned. As for the black market, it was sealed tight; even the old man didn't know what shape it was in now.
(End of chapter)
[100 Power Stones = Extra Chapter]
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