Chapter 7- Dark Night

"Evening, Senator Langley."

I watched in amusement when the man in his sixties with greying hair spun around in shock when I spoke to him in his house the moment he returned from work. I am currently sitting in a dark corner of his mansion on a luxurious and spacious couch, sipping on some of his fine wine with my houndoom and umbreon lazing around by my feet.

The rest of the smaller members of my team are hidden and spread out around the mansion, keeping a watch for any suspicious individuals that might be nearby, but Senator Langley did not need to know that.

Did I also mention that his adorable ten year old granddaughter is now asleep, her head resting in my lap? It is basic protocol for me to use my target's loved ones against them because it made my work so much easier. Children are always the most effective ones to use against my targets when I want to make my message known. It works every time.

The little girl won't be waking up for the next few hours. Gengar had made very sure of that with Hypnosis. Everyone else in this building is now asleep and they won't remember anything when they wake up thanks to my pokemon expertise in Hypnosis.

"Y-You are…"

I slowly pointed to the 'R' printed on the left side of my uniform. I saw his eyes widening in realisation.

"Our Leader needs a little… help." I chose my words carefully as I tenderly stroked the little girl's head as if she is my little sister. The Senator looked like he might have a heart attack when he saw me doing that. "It's time for you to be of use to us, Senator. Surely you don't think that all the money we had been remitting to you all these years are for nothing?"

"N-No, but-"

"But?" I pressed on, daring him to say further. "Do you really think that you could climb to where you are now without our support? Who eliminated your opposition in the election seven years ago? We can easily bring you up just as easily as we can bring you down. Choose your next words wisely, Senator."

There was a moment of silence.

"What do I need to do?"

I have to give this old man some credit. He is surprisingly calm about everything, even going so far as to head for the kitchen to pour a drink for himself.

"The ban on the import of rare stones and minerals from Kanto to Johto? We want you to lift it."

"T-That's impossible!" Senator Langley exclaimed on reflex. "No one would agree to it! If we do it, Johto's economy will take a huge hit and it will be overall detrimental to Indigo! The President will not agree to such an arrangement!"

"It's not our job to question." I reminded the Senator. Houndoom aided me in my threat by giving a low growl in warning. Umbreon jumped up and curled himself up in my lap, nestling himself close to the Senator's granddaughter.

More specifically, umbreon's jaws are now a lot closer to the girl's unprotected throat.

"All we need is for you to make it a reality. We don't care how you make it happen. If there's anyone standing in your way that you cannot remove, give us a call and we will handle it for you."

I tossed a phone to the Senator.

"Use this to contact us. We are expecting great things from you, Senator. Do not keep us waiting."

I stood up and walked out of the mansion unhindered. To the Senator, it would look like I just vanished from view, thanks to the illusion my zoroark casted over the entire mansion. I walk along the vacant and dimly lit street with my dark types beside me, enjoying the comfort the darkness provides.

Weavile jumped and landed on my shoulders the moment he regrouped with us. I can see a faint outline of honchkrow circling above us in the dark night sky. Ninetales had rejoined me and is walking by my side, similar to houndoom and umbreon. Gengar is in my shadow as per usual. Bisharp, shiftry, and zoroark are walking behind me, their footsteps loud and clear in the silent night. Exeggutor pulls up the rear, its leaves rustling as it moves. Hydreigon and drapion are in their pokeballs because they are too big and noisy. Nosy is silent as it hid itself within my phone, I had asked Petrel if I could have him permanently and he had agreed since Nosy made my work so much easier and efficient. It helps that my track record in Team Rocket thus far had been stellar. They trust me enough to let me own such a pokemon on my team.

Most of my pokemon are dark types. I always did have an affinity with dark types. Dark types are naturally drawn towards me and I always could understand them on an instinctive level. I don't even have that kind of connection with ninetales, and she's my starter.

My special affinity with dark types is what allows me to tame the most vicious of pokemon with this typing. They are more willing to trust me as compared to any other trainer. It's not uncommon to see wild dark types spying and following after me when I am on my nightly strolls, curious about who I am. That's just how unnatural the attraction dark types have towards me. I am a magnet to them.

This unexplained ability of mine is what made me a good Dark Specialist. I can understand them and they can understand me. It's how I bonded with the members of my team that has the dark typing as we shared our history.

Almost every single one of my pokemon have their own history. It's just a matter of how sad their lives were before we met. The most fortunate ones led normal lives before ending up on my team.

You want an example? Let's start from the ones with a sadder story.

Hydreigon was deemed a failure after an experiment gone wrong. The experiment done on my hydreigon allows him to take a lot more hits and had artificially allowed him to surpass his natural limits, but at the cost of his sanity. I don't know what the scientists injected into him, but no one could tame him and the dragon just keeps going about on a blind rampage. It's like he is constantly in mental anguish and lashing out is the only response he knows. Only I managed to get him to listen and it was for this reason hydreigon was given to me, because the other alternative would be to terminate it and it would be a loss for Team Rocket to put down such a powerful pokemon after so much money was invested in it to make it stronger.

It still doesn't change the fact that hydreigon is still prone to violent bouts of madness whenever it goes into battle, but I worked around it.

The only thing I could train hydreigon in is to let it learn how to not fight like a mindless idiot whenever it goes into battle. Fighting like a berserker is alright, but fighting like an idiot is not. There is a fine difference between the two.

Zoroark was a similar case.

Zoroark was experimented on to see if his illusion casting abilities could be further enhanced. Unlike the average zoroark, whatever was done to mine allows him to cast an illusion that can easily affect a small town if he bothered to make an effort, and he can go even further than that when pushed.

However, that experiment was still deemed a failure because now that zoroark possess such a power, it no longer wants to take orders from Team Rocket or remain with us, the humans who forcefully stole him from his previous trainer by killing her. It has the ability to constantly escape Team Rocket's grasp with such a power but I was the one sent to retrieve him with instructions to terminate the dark type if he proves to be uncontrollable when it escaped for the ninth time. My affinity with dark type goes both ways. I would instinctively know the location of any dark type around me, it's like having a sixth sense. I am a walking dark type radar.

I don't know how I got this gift, but I am not going to question it.

After knowing zoroark's history from the scientists when I asked before I embarked on that mission, I gave him a choice. Either die by my hands (because I have a job to do as an Exterminator and failure isn't an option), or work with me to bring Team Rocket down. The both of us have a common goal of revenge. Zoroark wants revenge for his previous trainer, I want revenge for Jane. There's no reason to not work together.

Zoroark made his choice. I was given custody over the illusion pokemon after it was proven that zoroark will not take orders from anybody else.

Umbreon was discarded after the scientists failed yet again to produce an eevee that can change and transform into its many evolutionary forms at will. I just happen to be there to pick him up when we first met. The experiments done on umbreon when he was still an eevee included many different forms of dissection and painful forced exposure to numerous evolutionary stones at the same time. Even after umbreon evolved from an eevee, he still has the scars on his body that documented each and every of his suffering, hidden underneath his black fur. Sometimes umbreon will still have nightmares about what he went through and wake up all of a sudden, screaming himself hoarse. Sometimes I would wake up in the morning to find him snuggling close to me on my bed for comfort after experiencing a bad dream.

The rest of my team met me through more normal means. I got ninetales as an egg that I stole when I was still a child during one of Team Rocket's many raids. I got exeggutor as an exeggcute that was left to die when Team Rocket judged it to be too weak to be of any use to them. I met weavile as a sneasel when I was posted to Mahogany Town as a grunt and I caught him for the fun of it back then, wanting to experience what a normal pokemon trainer did on their journey. I got honchkrow as a murkrow when I joined a raid that was tasked to capture a flock of its brethren when we razed its home down to the ground. Drapion was poached from somewhere and given to me by Executive Petrel after I was promoted to Elite Officer. The only abnormal thing about her is that she is constantly looking for foes to compete with in a deathmatch, which is a result of whatever unspeakable things had been done to her by the Rockets. Bisharp and shiftry was given to me by Executive Ariana for a job well done. Nosy joined me because he was being nosy.

Houndoom and gengar, I got them when Jane died. She can no longer take care of them, so I will do so in her stead.

I sent the President a quick message on what to expect come tomorrow morning with Nosy making sure that no one can intercept and hack into my phone, even remotely. He will have to play along with it for at least a short while to ensure that my cover would not be blown.

At least I told him long ago that Senator Langley was involved with Team Rocket. The President only kept Langley around because while you keep your friends close, it is wiser to keep your enemies closer.

I continue on my late night stroll, hands in my pockets and still no destination in my mind. Where am I now anyway?

A quick check of the signpost nearby told me that I am now at a corner of Azalea. This is Jane's hometown, from what little memories she had of her childhood before she got abducted and ended up getting forced to become a secret operative for the Government.

Yes, forced. We were never given a choice. What we were given was the illusion of choice. What we thought we remembered was actually an illusion, the illusion that we voluntarily chose to become a secret operative and to sacrifice our all for it.

My hunch turned out to be right. It took a lot of careful experimentation and psychic digging in my mind. Psychic, ghost, dark. I have members of the Mind Arts Trio on my team. Exeggutor, gengar, and umbreon had been very careful to not let me slip into a comatose when they were dangerously exploring my mind in unison, looking for that unknown thing I suspect to be housing in my own head.

The anger I felt after knowing what we found in my mind made me nearly blow my cover.

Hypnosis. That one move that is my specialty had been used on me without me knowing it. I should have known. I should have been able to tell the signs. I don't know when a mental suggestion of 'Absolute loyalty to the Indigo President, Kain Briggs. Bring down Team Rocket at all costs.' had been implanted into my brain, but if I had to hazard a guess, it was when we were still children and training in the Government's secret facility which they used to train child spies. Our memories were probably altered at some point during our time there. That program has since been terminated, but its legacy lived on.

Me. I'm now the only one left.

No wonder. No wonder my body refused to move when all I wanted was to save Jane at that fateful moment. My mind didn't allow it to, not with the mental suggestion hindering it. No wonder I never did anything that would betray the President. It's not like the idea never crossed my mind, it did many times, but in the end I would always find a reason that justifies why I shouldn't do it. And for some reason, I never once found it suspicions.

The same mental suggestion was probably implanted into everyone else. Including Jane.

The thought of it made me furious.

My pokemon had very carefully removed that mental suggestion from my mind without leaving a trace. There was even a failsafe planted in my brain, an application of Future Sight that should anyone tried to tamper with the mental suggestion in my mind to find out more about the League's secret, a burst of psychic energy will instantly fry my brain. Removal of the foreign thing in my head in its entirety is a slow and gradual process. It is extremely risky and suicidal, but we did it.

I am no longer a puppet.

I still want to take down Team Rocket. For that end, I will tolerate the President and his shenanigans until I have no more use for him. He still thinks I am within his control, which is good. Let him continue to think that way. It will make the betrayal even more sweet. The finale that will be playing when the curtains draw to a close will be epic. I guarantee it.

I also need to start thinking of what to do after I managed to take down Team Rocket and escape the Government and the Indigo League. It's a secret that I kept from the Government, but my body has been failing me. I don't have long left to live and I accepted it as karma for all the evil I had wrought upon this world.

Even then, I want a chance.

I want a chance to experience what living in a world of pokemon should be like without all the evil and darkness weighing down on me. Even if it's just a little while, I want to experience that joy or being a pokemon trainer. That is the only selfish wish that I have.

I began to cough uncontrollably and I quickly fumbled through my pockets to find my medicine. I managed to pop in a few pills with zoroark's help. After a painful minute, my coughing fit eventually stopped.

There is also some blood that I coughed out that now sits on my palm.

Surprisingly, Team Rocket do care about the welfare of their more important members. The medicine pills was created by the doctors and scientists in the organisation. Petrel even promised that they will find a way to cure whatever was ailing me.

Team Rocket may be merciless, and I can argue that the only reason why they are doing this for me is because I am invaluable to the organisation. It's hard to find a replacement with the same skills and experience as me. Also, there is a weird sort of camaraderie among us. Even in this shithole that is filled with deception, betrayal, mistrust, and evil deeds, Team Rocket is strong not only because of its size, but also because the members do look out and care for each other to a certain extent.

Weird, I know, but it is true. Giovanni really is a master at controlling his subordinates and gaining their loyalty even without him ever meeting anyone that is not an Executive. He is a true leader. He knows how to run an organisation.

And I will have to betray them, the evil people who actually cared for my well being. People who actually cared whether I live or die, unlike the President. I don't even know what is right or wrong anymore, only that I really want to not let Jane's death to be in vain. That desperate cling onto that notion is the only thing keeping me sane right now.

I really hate this job of being a spy. It sucks big time, especially when you cannot help but form an emotional connection with the people you are spying on.

"I'm fine." I said in a hoarse voice after my coughing fit had died down, my hands leaning against a wall to support my body weight. I spotted the concerned looks my pokemon are sending my way. Even honchkrow flew down and perched on a nearby tree to take a better look at me after noticing that I wasn't feeling well.

"I don't have much time left." I whispered in the dead of the night, the street still vacant and silent. "We will have to act soon. I have almost everything I need to bring Team Rocket down, I just need to see Giovanni's face and get concrete, indisputable proof that he is the true leader of this stupid cult, then we can all be free."

I need to create an opportunity for myself. I cannot afford to wait for much longer. Any longer and I might just keel over and die. Any longer and Team Rocket might grow to be too strong to be taken down. Nothing must be left behind. All the corruption, all their hideouts, businesses, army, contacts. Every single person that have or had dealings with Team Rocket needs to be weeded out and erased for Indigo to be finally purged of this cancer, for me to have my revenge.

I want Jane to have her closure, and then I can finally join her.

Ninetales nuzzled her head against my hand as a show of support. She is a creature that is said to be able to live a thousand years. She is the one who will watch the entire team die, be it in battle, sickness, or old age. This is too cruel to her.

Hopefully, gengar is really immortal like all ghosts are, as speculated by the prevalent theory about ghosts types. Maybe gengar and ninetales can keep each other company after we are long gone.

"Let's go." I said and continued walking, ignoring the concerned looks my pokemon sent my way. I have no intention of sleeping just yet.

There is no rest for the wicked.

Name: Jayce

Indigo Government Identity: Operative 2046, Code Name: Gengar

Indigo Government Rank: Special Agent

Team Rocket Identity: Elite Officer Plague

Team Rocket Rank: Elite Officer

Pokemon Team:

1. Ninetales, female

2. Exeggutor, male

3. Weavile, male

4. Honchkrow, female

5. Gengar, female

6. Houndoom, male

7. Umbreon, male

8. Hydreigon, male

9. Drapion, female

10. Zoroark, male

11. Bisharp, male

12. Shiftry, male

13. Porygon, (Nosy), genderless