Night blanketed the entire sea. When sailing after dark, the S.S. Anne cruise liner had to slow its speed and proceed cautiously. Even though this route was one the iron-willed captain sailed once every year, he still didn't dare relax his vigilance. After all, it was always better to be careful.
Roughly two nautical miles south of the S.S. Anne, a speedboat was tearing across the waves at full throttle. Around it followed more than a dozen jet skis, each carrying personnel dressed in tight black combat suits. On their chests was a massive R emblem.
The mark of Team Rocket—the letter R.
On the speedboat, a Team Rocket member at the helm stared at the distant lights just barely visible on the horizon and shouted,
"Boss Tyson, we've spotted the S.S. Anne!"
"Good."
Standing behind him was a rugged man clad in a blue-gray high-collared uniform. He had short black hair, and his bulging muscles stretched the fabric taut. He was even more powerfully built than Mondo.
He was one of Team Rocket's senior executives—Tyson—and an A-rank wanted criminal of the Kanto League. The League had placed a 200 million bounty on his head.
"Notify all units. Push the engines harder," Tyson ordered. "We need to catch up to the S.S. Anne as soon as possible. Mondo is still waiting for us."
After issuing the command, Tyson pulled two Poké Balls from his coat and hurled them into the air. With two sharp puffs, a pair of massive avian Pokémon appeared above the speedboat.
Their wingspans exceeded three meters. As they beat their wings, the surrounding air churned violently, creating gale-like currents. Brown feathers covered their bodies, their necks long and slender—but what drew the eye most was their razor-sharp beaks, over twenty centimeters long. Their pale eyes brimmed with the killing intent unique to birds of prey, as though they were perpetually poised to strike.
They were Fearow, the final evolution of Spearow—one of Kanto's most common avian Pokémon. Ill-tempered and highly aggressive, they excelled at aerial moves like Drill Peck and other Flying-type attacks, making full use of their long, piercing beaks.
The League's wanted notices placed special emphasis on these two Fearow. They were Tyson's undisputed trump cards, Pokémon he deployed without fail whenever he carried out missions. Larger than others of their kind and ferociously aggressive, they were especially adept at aerial combat. When the two appeared together, their combined strength was far greater than the sum of its parts.
Arms crossed, Tyson stood atop the speeding boat and commanded the Fearow overhead:
"Sakon. Ukon. You two fly ahead and rendezvous with Mondo aboard the S.S. Anne. If he runs into any trouble, deal with it first."
"Gah! Gah!"
The two Fearow nodded, let out piercing cries, and with a powerful flap of their wings, shot into the sky, streaking toward the S.S. Anne at high speed.
...
The operation to attack the S.S. Anne had been assigned to Tyson by Ariana, one of Team Rocket's Four Generals.
In recent years, Team Rocket's rapid expansion had drawn joint suppression efforts from both the Kanto League and the Johto League. Numerous large corporations secretly controlled by Team Rocket had been shut down overnight, and assets across multiple cities in both regions were seized and confiscated. The blow to Team Rocket's finances was devastating.
Yet at Rocket Headquarters, a major experimental project—one that Giovanni had poured years of effort into—had reached a critical stage. At a time like this, ensuring the experiment's absolute success required an astronomical investment. Just the project's daily maintenance costs alone were enough to make an ordinary person dizzy.
This was what it meant to truly burn money. Ever since Tyson had seen the project with his own eyes, he understood that sometimes money was no better than scrap paper. Over five years, the experiment had already consumed nearly 100 billion in Team Rocket funds—and how much more it would devour remained unknown.
Among the Four Generals, Ariana—the only woman—was Giovanni's most trusted subordinate and the one in charge of Team Rocket's finances. Naturally, the burden of easing Giovanni's worries fell on her shoulders. Raising such a massive sum in a short time through legitimate business expansion was impossible. That left only the crudest of methods: terror attacks and kidnapping the wealthy.
The S.S. Anne carried more than 900 passengers from affluent families, including over a hundred VIP tycoons. Kidnap them all, extort ransoms from their families, and if the plan succeeded, the payoff would be nothing short of astronomical.
...
"…What's your name?"
"Lisa."
"Why did you come here to find me?"
"To kill you and collect the five-million bounty."
"How were you planning to do it?"
"Seduce you. Then, when you're with me, kill you with a poisoned needle."
Lisa lay slack against the sofa, her eyes empty, murmuring these answers mechanically. Behind her stood a pale, shiny Gengar, its ghostly hand pressed against the top of her head. A red gleam flickered within its sinister purple eyes. Lisa's current state was clearly the result of the Gengar's handiwork.
Kael wanted to see where she had hidden the poison needle. Lisa mechanically parted her lips, and beneath her tongue, a transparent, hair-thin needle could be faintly seen.
"This is a blood toxin," Cole said as he stood up to explain. "A true instant-kill poison. I'd guess this venomous spider planned to finish things after sleeping with you—strike when you were most relaxed."
"She hid something like that under her tongue and wasn't afraid of pricking herself?" Kael asked curiously. "You said it's lethal on contact with blood. That takes guts."
Cole rolled his eyes and sneered.
"That just shows how confident this woman is in her… technique. Want to try it now, kid? Miss this chance and there won't be another."
Kael couldn't be bothered to respond. This guy was all mouth—sharp-tongued and shameless.
"Enough. Tell me—why did you really come after me?"
Cole snapped his fingers. The white Gengar withdrew its ghostly hand from Lisa's head. The next second, her vacant eyes fluttered shut, and she fell into a deep sleep.
The Gengar had used hypnosis to control Lisa's mind—an advanced application of the move. It was commonly used in police interrogations, but methods like this could easily cause irreversible damage to the subject's brain afterward.
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