Chapter 215: Team Rocket Is Led by ME, Mammon, Now!
Kyurem going after Zekrom — Mammon had seen that coming from the start.
His original plan had been to find N himself, use the situation as leverage. He hadn't expected N to walk through the door.
Even better. Cleaner.
"What do you want?" N held Mammon's gaze steadily.
"Well."
Mammon made a show of thinking it over, then looked at N with a pleasant smile.
"Join Team Rocket. That's my price for getting Zekrom back."
Silence.
N had worked so hard to get free of Ghetsis — to stand somewhere that was actually his own. Team Rocket was not where he wanted to end up.
"Didn't you just say you'd do anything for Zekrom?"
Mammon tilted his head, not particularly surprised by the hesitation. N wasn't the type to agree to something like this without the weight of it landing first.
N was a genuinely good person. He cared about the world. He wanted things to be better for Pokémon and people alike. Team Rocket was a criminal organization. Of course he was hesitating.
N's expression worked through several things at once. Yes, he'd said anything. And yes, he meant it. But—
The image of Zekrom dissolving into that sphere of light came back without invitation.
He set his jaw.
"If you can rescue Zekrom — I'll join Team Rocket."
He knew what he was agreeing to. Once he was in, he'd be in properly. And this wasn't like Plasma, where he had been the King in name and in practice — where his own will had final authority, where he could refuse anything he found unconscionable. In Team Rocket, Mammon's word was the word. N's own wishes would come second.
But Zekrom had stayed with him even when his ideals were crumbling. Had been there for every step, every doubt, every failure. Had told him: I'll be there, wherever you go.
Zekrom had not abandoned him.
N was not going to abandon Zekrom.
Anthea and Concordia's expressions were complicated in matching ways. They'd agreed to this arrangement themselves, for N's sake — and now here he was, walking into it voluntarily.
But.
Mammon was not Ghetsis. Whatever else he was, he was not Ghetsis.
"You really do care about Zekrom that much." Mammon clicked his tongue with genuine interest. "I thought I'd have to talk you around a lot more than this."
"Zekrom is my partner."
"Fair enough. And now I suppose we're partners too, in a sense."
Mammon smiled — openly, genuinely pleased with how this had gone — and produced a badge, holding it out. Gold, an R in the center.
"Welcome to Team Rocket, N."
"You haven't rescued Zekrom yet."
N looked at the badge without reaching for it, brow slightly creased. That wasn't the arrangement they'd agreed to.
"Relax. You're not officially filed yet — consider yourself a contractor for now." Mammon's tone was light. "And you don't need to worry about me going back on my word. You already know the logic: Kyurem went after Zekrom, which means it's going after Reshiram next, which means conflict with me is inevitable. I'm going to fight it regardless. What you needed was my guarantee that Zekrom specifically comes out intact — and now you have it."
N was quiet.
He did know. That was exactly the calculation he'd made at three in the morning, staring at the ceiling.
"All right."
He reached out and took the badge.
"Excellent. Executive number six."
Mammon was in a genuinely good mood. N — former leader of Team Plasma, Hero of Ideals — was a significant addition, and he knew it. Six top executives now: himself, Kagura, Caitlin, Rika, Colress, N.
Giovanni was quietly omitted from that mental list. The old man could play his League games in peace. The Boss title was something Mammon was already planning to claim formally — loudly, if possible. When he was next in Kanto, he intended to find a radio tower and make an announcement.
"…"
N looked at the badge in his hand. His expression was not the expression of someone who had gotten what they wanted.
"You don't have to look like that. Team Rocket isn't some kind of cartoonish evil operation." Mammon noticed and pulled a face. "At least not anymore. We don't go around stealing innocent trainers' Pokémon — I have standards. We're a business organization."
He offered this as genuine reassurance.
"And you don't need to worry about Pokémon being mistreated. I happen to like Pokémon and respect them. It's explicitly prohibited. Non-negotiable."
"Everything I've heard about Team Rocket says the opposite."
N's brow creased slightly.
What he'd heard — the history, the reputation — was significantly worse than what Plasma had ever been. By a considerable margin.
"That was then. This is now." Mammon made a dismissive sound. "N, you're thinking exactly like the League people. Pure stereotype."
He sat up slightly, and something in his posture shifted — not larger, exactly, but more deliberate.
"Team Rocket today is led by me, Mammon. A completely evolved organization. Times change, and organizations that don't change die. Pure villainy isn't a sustainable business model."
He paused, genuinely distracted by his own thought.
"If the conditions were right, I'd honestly consider setting up Team Rocket as a League-recognized trainer group and having our people compete in the World Championship circuit."
He filed that away. Something to think about once they were fully established across all regions.
"..."
N had no response to this.
"N left."
Alder frowned, looking at the empty room.
He'd deliberately not confiscated N's Poké Balls — partly as a gesture of good faith, and partly because the conversation had given him enough to be fairly confident about where N's head was.
"He's not pursuing the extreme version of his ideals anymore. That's what matters."
Alder shook his head. The exchange yesterday and the quiet observations since had settled it for him. N's worldview had genuinely shifted. He hadn't done anything truly wrong in the first place — he'd been a weapon pointed by someone who knew how to aim.
Ghetsis was handled separately. Maximum-security holding, location classified.
"Have Looker's people keep an eye out for N. I want to know where he goes."
He directed this at Looker's second in command, who nodded.
Because Alder hadn't given up on the idea entirely. N's capabilities, his relationship with Pokémon, his raw strength — if he ever came around to the League's side—
Unova would stand up.
Not in Kanto's league, no. But ahead of the pack. Champion-tier, Hero of Ideals — that combination carried real weight.
If N became Unova's Champion—
Alder could retire peacefully.
"Yes, sir."
Having reached his agreement with N, Mammon left the castle.
He wasn't misleading him — Black Kyurem was genuinely difficult. It had been challenging enough before it absorbed Zekrom; now, with Zekrom's power integrated, its Black Kyurem form was essentially at full capacity. A complete form.
Mammon turned the problem over as he walked.
Primal Kyogre was pure Water-type. Kyurem was Ice/Dragon — Water was resisted. The Larousse approach, where Dark Mewtwo and Reshiram had stalled for time while Kyogre stacked Calm Minds, wouldn't translate cleanly here. Dark Mewtwo and young Rayquaza couldn't hold Black Kyurem long enough. The math didn't work.
He needed a different angle.
Lacunosa.
Lacunosa.
Eiscue.
The town was a small one — in Unova's eastern territory, sitting in the shadow of something ancient. As Mammon walked down the main street with Caitlin and Elesa, he found himself looking at the mountain above the town and the structure on top of it.
"What's that?" Caitlin had noticed it too — a massive construction on the hillside, old and imposing.
"The Sword of the Vale."
"The Sword of the Vale?"
Neither Caitlin nor Elesa had more than a vague sense of the term. Lacunosa was not famous, and neither was whatever historical role this town had played.
"This town was once the power center of the People of the Vale — a kingdom, back in the era before Pokémon Leagues existed." Mammon glanced up at it. "That castle up there is what remains. Local landmark."
He shrugged. The historical architecture wasn't what he'd come for.
The three of them kept moving through the market streets, and Mammon kept an eye out for what he'd actually come to find — though the target hadn't appeared yet.
He didn't mind taking his time. He could give the two of them a proper afternoon out.
"HELP!! THE MONSTER'S BACK!!"
"EVERYONE — GET YOUR THINGS INSIDE!!"
"Three times this week already — WHY—"
The street went from calm to chaos in about four seconds.
Mammon watched with interest as the market vendors around them demonstrated a level of drill-team efficiency usually associated with emergency response training — carts folded, goods stowed, shutters down, doors locked. The entire marketplace vanished into itself like a theater set being struck after a performance.
What.
A sound arrived with the wind — a rushing, building pressure from somewhere above. Then the storm front hit: clouds rolling in heavy and dark, rain coming sideways, wind that went from zero to unpleasant before Mammon had finished registering what was happening.
A shopkeeper nearby — a woman in her forties with the expression of someone who had weathered approximately seventeen of these — waved them toward her door.
They ducked inside.
"What is this?" Mammon asked, watching the street empty outside the window. The sky had gone the color of a bruise.
"Honestly, we don't know." The woman shook her head, and the worry on her face was clearly not new. "About a month ago, these storms just started appearing. No warning. No pattern anyone can figure out."
She settled her hands on her counter.
"Every day or two. Sometimes three times in one day, during the bad weeks. Our crops are nearly gone — that kind of wind doesn't leave much standing. Half a month ago, an old building on the edge of town got picked up and moved. Just — gone. Landed somewhere else. Nobody was hurt, but people were terrified."
(End of Chapter)
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