Chapter 195: Mammon: Elesa, You Wouldn't Want Anything to Happen to This City, Would You?
N pressed his lips together, not at all sure how to face this call.
He answered anyway.
"Father."
"N. Did you get Colress?"
Ghetsis's voice came through immediately, direct.
When word had reached him that Colress's base was under attack, he'd sent N there instantly. In Ghetsis's mental picture, Colress was a researcher — brilliant, yes, but physically helpless, and some of his technology was admittedly strange. Against a serious trainer, he'd be easy to seize.
And he couldn't afford to let that happen right now.
Colress mattered to Ghetsis enormously — not only because of Genesect, not only because of the Colress Machine that bore his name and could control wild Pokémon. Those were significant. But they weren't the whole of it.
Very few people knew this: Unova had more than just the Dragon of Ideals and the Dragon of Truth in its founding mythology. There was a third dragon. The one a sacred swordsman once called "the strongest dragon on land" — Kyurem, the ice dragon born from the shell left behind when the original Unova dragon split.
That was Unova's actual apex legendary.
Kyurem mostly slept, sequestered in some remote place that most Unovans had no awareness of. But Ghetsis knew it existed. Which was exactly why he valued Colress so much — if the Colress Machine could be refined enough to control it, and if Ghetsis could find Kyurem's location—
He'd have the strongest dragon on land in his hands.
Kyurem, Zekrom, and the Genesect legion — who could possibly stand against that?
Colress absolutely could not be lost.
"...I'm sorry, Father."
N had heard the urgency in Ghetsis's voice, and he felt the weight of failing him.
The unease that settled over Ghetsis, back in his castle, was immediate.
"What happened?"
"Team Rocket intervened. The one you've mentioned — Mammon — took Colress."
"You said what?!"
Ghetsis's voice shot up, fury breaking through his composure.
N startled. He'd never heard his father lose control like this.
Ghetsis caught himself. He pushed down the rage — hard, deliberate — and forced his voice toward something resembling calm.
"How exactly did this happen? N. You brought Zekrom with you, didn't you?" The anger was still there, seeping through every syllable despite the effort.
He genuinely couldn't process it. How had Mammon managed to take Colress from N?
And this meant Rocket had been the ones to hit Colress's base in the first place.
Those wretched invaders—
"Zekrom was injured. Seriously. Mammon... he has Primal Kyogre."
"..."
Ghetsis's expression had gone somewhere deeply unpleasant, his eyes clouding over.
Primal Kyogre.
And N and Zekrom together — still not a match?
"Understood. Tell me where you are. I'm sending people."
Ghetsis drew a slow, heavy breath and kept his voice even as he gave N the instruction.
He hadn't completely lost his reason. And N wouldn't lie to him.
He ended the call.
Sitting on his throne, Ghetsis's face had gone darker than the stormclouds Zekrom had conjured.
"Useless. Useless!! Worthless garbage!"
He couldn't hold it back anymore. The fury poured out in a torrent of profanity directed at nothing in particular — really at the situation, at the outcome, at the infuriating, incomprehensible fact of it.
He'd given N the legendary Dragon of Ideals, a creature born from mythology and prophecy, and the result was being driven off by some Rocket brat?
Just — routed? Forced to flee?
And the one N had lost to was that specific person?
Ghetsis's chest heaved. Anger by itself accomplished nothing, he knew that — but knowing it and suppressing it were different problems entirely. Whatever else happened, he needed a plan to get Colress back.
He sat with it for a moment, then tried calling Colress's phone on a long-shot impulse.
A captured person shouldn't have their phone. But maybe Colress had hidden it. If there was any chance—
The call connected.
"...Hello? Ghetsis, is it?"
Colress's voice — calm, elegant, composed as ever.
"Colress? You're alright?" Ghetsis sat forward.
"Me? Of course. I'm quite well."
Colress had just finished dinner with Mammon's group and was on his way back to his room.
"You escaped from Rocket? That's — that's Colress, that's exactly what I'd expect from you—"
Ghetsis was already rewriting the story in his head.
"I'm afraid not."
A pause. Then Colress's voice again, light as ever.
"Actually, Ghetsis, I was just about to call you myself. I'm leaving Team Plasma."
"You said what?" Ghetsis's pupils contracted.
"I'm resigning from Team Plasma." Still perfectly level. "And going forward, please don't contact me again. I'd rather Mammon not get the wrong impression."
"Colress!!"
This time, Ghetsis's composure shattered completely. The picture came together all at once, and it was worse than he'd imagined.
Colress had turned on him. Defected to Team Rocket. Of his own choice.
"Colress — haven't I treated you well?! After everything, this is how you repay me?! Don't you remember who took you in when the League had you cornered and you had nothing?! I did! I was the one who gave you shelter!"
The volume had climbed to something that was effectively shouting.
He couldn't accept this. He had given Colress every resource, every opportunity — and this was what it bought him.
And the final insult: calling that despicable Rocket brat "Lord." Colress had never once added that honorific to Ghetsis's own name. Not once, in all the years they'd worked together.
"Please don't phrase it so dramatically. I never told you I was loyal to you."
Colress's voice had gone a shade colder.
"Our arrangement was always transactional, Ghetsis. I provided you my research, you provided me materials and subjects. It was a mutual exchange."
Still perfectly level. Undeniably, infuriatingly accurate.
"The three Genesect I've already transferred to you cover the full value of your investment in me. Consider us even. I'd prefer we part on civil terms."
"You ungrateful—"
Ghetsis finally lost the last of his control and descended into profanity — but before he'd even finished the sentence, the call ended.
He redialed immediately.
One ring. Disconnected.
He tried again.
The number was blocked.
"Colress!"
The thread holding his composure together snapped entirely. Something fundamental in his mental state caved, the rage breaking outward with nowhere to contain it.
His phone hit the floor hard enough to shatter the screen. His voice tore through the castle in a howl directed at a man who could no longer hear it.
"COLRESS!!"
The name echoed through the stone chambers, over and over, unanswered.
Nimbasa City.
The city had just come through a heavy downpour, though it had cleared faster than anyone expected. Now, sun back out and air washed clean, the streets had a fresh, pleasant quality — the kind of weather that made a person genuinely glad to be out in it.
At least Mammon was in excellent spirits. He was wandering the streets alone for once — Caitlin was back at the hotel pool with the baby Lugia, and Kagura had gone off to train.
Though "alone" wasn't quite accurate.
"Mammon, Mammon~! Shell Lady wants that one!"
"Me too! Me too!"
Tapu Fini, still small enough to tug on the hem of his long coat, pointed with great enthusiasm toward an ice cream cart a short distance away. Jirachi, perched on his shoulder, voiced her own very sincere demands.
"Alright, alright."
Helpless against two tiny and utterly persuasive presences, Mammon walked over.
"Three vanilla, please."
"Right away, sir!" The cart owner was immediately enthusiastic.
While the order was being filled, Mammon let his gaze drift idly — and snagged on a figure standing not far away.
The corner of his mouth lifted.
Striking black hair, antenna-style headphones, tall and elegant with a model's bearing — dressed in something summery and minimal enough to showcase a very memorable silhouette.
Elesa. Nimbasa's Gym Leader. He'd seen her barely an hour ago, on the outskirts of the city.
She'd spotted him too. She'd been about to head back toward the gym when she stopped dead, staring at the ice cream cart with undisguised shock.
Dark, slightly messy hair. A notable face. Black clothes. Distinctive enough overall — but the clincher was the star-shaped Pokémon sitting on his shoulder.
That's Jirachi. A mythical Pokémon. A Mythical Pokémon he has on his shoulder like a pet.
So this person was — unmistakably — the Team Rocket executive who'd just been casually murdering Zekrom in a parking lot.
Elesa stood very still.
She couldn't process why an "evil criminal" was just walking around the city in broad daylight eating ice cream. Was this some kind of plan? Was she supposed to alert Looker? Try to stop him?
With what, part of her pointed out. My Zebstrika, which went down to his Pokémon embarrassingly fast?
If she provoked him and he turned it on the city—
Elesa chewed on her lip, thoroughly uncertain.
Then the Rocket executive looked directly at her.
And waved.
Elesa hesitated for a moment, then walked over.
"Ice cream?" he said, when she got close enough to hear.
As a professional model, Elesa didn't generally make a habit of ice cream — the caloric math wasn't worth it in most situations.
But—
"...Sure." She nodded.
"One more vanilla," Mammon told the cart owner.
"Coming right up! Oh — is that the Gym Leader Elesa?!" The vendor looked up mid-scoop and immediately turned a full shade more animated.
For anyone from Nimbasa, Elesa was essentially a civic institution. There wasn't a resident who didn't know her face.
"Hello." Elesa offered a single nod — not warm, not cold, simply there.
Her social aptitude was actually quite strong, but she wasn't the type who liked to talk much in her private time. The vendor's visible enthusiasm was something she registered and did nothing with, partly because most of her attention was occupied by the extremely unnerving person standing beside her.
Ice cream in hand, both of them moved away from the cart. The city went on around them. Mammon strolled with the air of someone with nowhere to be.
Elesa did not feel this way.
"Mammon — that's right, isn't it?" She finally couldn't hold it. "What exactly are you here for?"
Mammon raised an eyebrow at her. Then the smile returned — and something in it shifted, sharpening slightly at the edges.
"That depends entirely on how cooperative Miss Elesa is willing to be."
He let that settle for one beat.
"You wouldn't want anything to happen to this city, would you?"
Elesa's pupils contracted to points.
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