The review was soon done, and both sides were well pleased with it.
Lt. Surge's Gym inspection was a simple affair this time, and not at all ceremonious; there were only the few of them present.
After the inspection Vance took Nolan up on his invitation and stayed the night at the Gym.
They had bought tickets for the S.S. Anne too, ready to board the next day and take another cruise, to see once more what this enormous liner, the S.S. Anne, had to offer.
"Two honoured guests — this way, please."
The attendant showed them on, with a properly judged smile on his face.
The two of them went by a special passage into the S.S. Anne, and sat down at a table.
A briny sea wind blew over them and left their hair somewhat disordered.
"Now *this* is living."
Nolan took a drink of his drink, sunglasses on, stretched out on a deck chair.
"Haven't you always lived like this? What's there to sigh over?"
Beside him Vance was in much the same state, stretched out on another deck chair on the deck.
"I haven't had that much of it, you know. I'm usually very busy. I don't want to just eat and wait to die either."
"Mm. I can see that."
Nolan did work fairly hard. He had a Gym Leader for an uncle, and yet he was not like other sons of privilege, eating and waiting to die every day of his life.
At present he was already a Gym-class Trainer, and though he had only one or two Gym-class Pokémon, among people his own age that was a level near the very top.
Naturally, he could not compare with a man like Vance — there was simply no comparing.
"Whereas you — I've no idea how you got to be this formidable. Is this what it is to be a freak of nature and me not?"
Nolan said it with a hint of bewilderment. Vance grew more impressive every time, as though he had been swapped for someone else.
They had come out of Team Rocket's recruit intake together, and by now the gap between the two of them was the distance between heaven and earth.
"Ha ha, there's no explaining it. All I can say is that getting as far as I have today has been down to my own hard work, all of it."
Vance answered with a laugh, and answered in the vaguest possible terms.
Hard work did do something, certainly; but there were times when it did not seem to have all that much effect.
"Is that so. Maybe it is. Looks like all I can do is work at it too. If I don't work harder, all I've got to look forward to is going home, taking a wife, having children and inheriting a little family business. My uncle is a nuisance about it as well — he's never taken a wife himself, and he still wants me to settle down. He says if I get a Pokémon to break through to Elite-Four-class he'll leave off and let me decide for myself."
Nolan chose, helplessly, to pour out what the elders of his family had arranged for him.
"Ha ha ha, that sounds fine to me."
"Does it? I don't think so. But breaking through to Elite-Four-class — I'm stuck on that too."
Nolan waved a hand and turned his face up to the sky, with the look of a man for whom life held nothing.
"You've got the better of it — no ties, free as you like, and all this to show for it besides. You've even worked your way up to running the Inspection Department in the League."
Then Nolan made his envy plain.
"Each has its own advantages, I suppose."
Vance answered. Free he was; but with nobody behind him, if he ever failed then everything was finished.
Fortunately he had grown up entirely now, and everything was moving in the right direction.
What the two of them talked about covered a great deal of ground — careers, families, raising Pokémon, and more.
"Will there be a pseudo-legendary auction this time as well?"
Vance thought of it.
"There ought to be. This is also the first voyage since Locke came in as the new director, so the show of it won't be modest, whatever else."
Nolan answered.
"It's him. So he has the S.S. Anne in hand."
Vance nodded. Locke's file had been among the list Giovanni had sent him a few days ago; his details were in there too.
If Vance needed it, he could have the man co-operate in an operation.
Where pseudo-legendaries were concerned, with Vance's standing now one was not hard to obtain; naturally, it was not like the last time, when learning of it on boarding the S.S. Anne had left him staggered.
"I have this S.S. Anne to thank, at that. Otherwise I'd never have come across Zweilous."
...............
In the S.S. Anne's meeting room, Locke sat at the head of the table in high spirits. After no small struggle the S.S. Anne was his after all!
When he reported to the Boss, Giovanni had even commended him.
With the S.S. Anne in hand, moving Team Rocket's supplies became a great deal more convenient — especially moving supplies between Kanto and Johto.
"This is my first voyage. I trust every one of you, colleagues, will take your duties seriously, and that together we shall do the work well."
Locke delivered his remarks.
When he had finished, he had an eager response from all those below him.
After another stirring speech he sent them all off to keep the work in good order.
Once they had gone, Locke's expression turned respectful and he looked toward a corner.
A dark figure, his face entirely hidden by a pitch-black robe, had appeared there.
"Be careful. Let nothing go wrong. What is being escorted this time is very precious, and it bears on the Boss's great plan."
"Yes. Set your mind at rest, Lord Shadow. The S.S. Anne is already in our hands; we hold eighty per cent of the personnel. You may rest easy."
Locke answered confidently.
"Mm. The League may have noticed something out of the ordinary. Otherwise there would have been no need to come to you."
"Lord Shadow, you have only to give the order. To serve the organisation, and to serve the Boss's great plan, is an honour to me."
Locke did not know the details of the plan. He knew only that headquarters' demand for treasures had grown larger, and that precious, rare, high-grade treasures in particular — and treasures connected with Legendary Pokémon above all — took higher priority.
Giovanni had made the requirement plain to him as well, and he had taken it to heart.
And this time, what this Lord Shadow carried under escort was a thing of great importance.
What exactly it was he did not know, but he did know it mattered a great deal.
"See to the arrangements."
"Yes."
Aboard the S.S. Anne it grew livelier and livelier.
Hard as the S.S. Anne's tickets were to come by, that did nothing to hold back people's longing for her; they bought their tickets and came aboard in droves to see what the famous S.S. Anne was like.
Men and women in formal dress, glasses in hand, cups passing back and forth, all smiles, gathered in threes and fives to discuss this and that.
Some of it for business, some of it for the sake of company.
There were boys and girls with the look of childhood still on them threading through it all as well.
The S.S. Anne's marketing was well done too, and met the needs of a great many different sorts of people.
Wanting to widen your circle? Wanting the experience of a luxury liner? Wanting the experience of a grand auction? Wanting Pokémon competition............
All of it could be satisfied aboard the S.S. Anne.
"Excuse me, coming through."
"Hey, handsome, want to get to know each other?"
A sweet-faced girl blocked Vance's way, a pair of large eyes fixed on him.
"It's not convenient. Move aside, please."
Vance was as cold as ever, and sent the beauty who had come to make her approach away disappointed.
That made a dozen or more refusals already.
That is what comes of being too outstanding. It was absolutely not down to the Zweilous at his side that so many beauties came over to talk to him.
Naturally, Pokémon could be let out aboard the S.S. Anne, and there were few restrictions.
And Zweilous, perhaps moved by the sight of the place and full of its own feelings, wanting to revisit old haunts, had asked to go out and walk about and have a look.
Vance was not about to refuse.
So he let Zweilous out, and the two of them took in the view together on the deck.
Zweilous's appearance brought still more beauties over to make their approaches.
Which seemed only natural.
Reckoned in the terms of his previous life, Zweilous was no less than a luxury sports car making a racket down the street — the effect maxed out.
And Zweilous was a living thing, and the embodiment of power besides, so the effect went far beyond any sports car.
"Whoooo—"
The ship's horn drew out, long and deep and heavy.
The deck under his feet gave a shudder, and the S.S. Anne pulled slowly away from the quay and set out toward the open sea.