A Gym-class Trainer's ability lies chiefly in his Pokémon, and once the Pokémon are gone he has no Gym-class fighting strength left for the moment.
A Gym-class Psychic's ability lies in his Pokémon and in himself both. Even with the Pokémon gone he is Gym-class fighting strength in his own person. Some Psychics may be a little weaker in a fight than a Pokémon of the same tier, but that had nothing to do with Vance: if he really set about it he could hammer a Gym-class Pokémon flat in front of you — though Dark, Bug, Ghost and Psychic-type Pokémon were rather more troublesome, of course.
Leaving those four types out of it, Vance would even chance a few exchanges with an Elite-Four-class Pokémon.
One Teleport brought Vance in front of him, and under Merrow's horrified stare he hauled him up.
"You... you can't kill me. I'm... a Team Rocket Branch Chief. If I... die, the organisation will certainly investigate."
Merrow said it in pieces as he hung there.
"A Branch Chief? What a great weight of office you carry, Chief Merrow. And what if the organisation does investigate? Don't forget what sort of organisation Team Rocket is. Killing you here breaks no rule, and you struck first besides. And when the people above learn that I was able to kill you, doesn't that prove I'm worth more than you?" Vance said it with a cold laugh. What a joke. He meant to hold that over him? What sort of mind worked that way?
"Hoo—"
The Xatu on the ground stirred, bearing the savage pain, and struck back, trying to get its Trainer free.
"Not bad. Very loyal."
Before it could act Vance's power reached it, flung it away in an instant and slammed it into the ground, its brilliant feathers scattering all over the sand.
"It doesn't know its own measure."
Vance snorted coldly. Saying a thing like that, in a scene like this, from a bystander's point of view he must look like the villain — swaggering and unbending.
The thought made him laugh in spite of himself. A villain, then. There was nothing so bad about that.
The Nidoqueen, the Persian and the rest had all been brought down under the Gyarados and the others, and lay on the ground, alive or dead nobody could say.
Merrow had given up hope. All his Pokémon were gone. There was no escaping now.
"Which raises a question. There's no grievance and no feud between us. Why attack me here?"
Vance held him fast in front of him and asked.
At that Merrow's eyes lit up, and he felt there was hope of living yet.
"If I tell you, will you let me go?"
"Heh. It seems you don't know what a Psychic can do. Never mind. It's safer if I do it myself."
Vance wasted no more words. He set his psychic power going, took the man under control and made him tell the whole business of the ambush.
"So it was Grady. I hadn't gone after him yet, and he comes after me first. Very well — I'll send you down to be reunited with that nephew of yours, Wilder."
Vance said it coldly, killing intent flashing in his eyes. From Merrow's own mouth he had got word of Grady.
He had not gone after the man yet, and the man had come after him first; so he would send him to heaven while he was about it.
"As for you, go in peace."
Vance twisted with the motion, and there was a crack of bone.
"Ngh..."
With unwillingness in his eyes, Merrow's awareness sank into the dark, and his whole body went limp and slumped face down on the ground.
He had chosen the place well himself: remote enough that nobody would ever find out what happened here. And so the Branch Chief of Porta Vista died on that spot without a sound.
As for the consequences of killing a Branch Chief, Vance was not afraid of them in the least. By feeling or by reason, the man had brought it on himself.
Inside Team Rocket the strong eat the weak. Which of the people who join Team Rocket is a gentle soul?
Members killing one another happened often enough. So long as it was not inside a base, and was done in the open, it was permitted. That was Team Rocket's unwritten rule: no fighting and no killing inside a base. Everybody accepted that one, and the ones who did not are no longer to be seen.
With Merrow dead, everything he owned naturally fell into Vance's hands, another haul to add to the rest.
Most of it was Gym-tier, with some Elite-tier resources among it; there was nothing above Gym-class, nothing of the Elite-Four tier.
Which stood to reason. Seasoned Gym-class Trainer though Merrow was, his fighting strength was no more than middling, the best of it a level 56 Nidoqueen; otherwise he would not have been sent out here to Porta Vista to serve as Branch Chief.
The Pokémon together with the resources in his storage space came, by Vance's estimate, to somewhere around forty or fifty million Poké Dollars. A good hard transfusion.
"If Grady knows I'm in Porta Vista, then the fat one and his partner must be in danger too."
It occurred to Vance just then. He had few friends; he had been in contact with Ambrose and Emery only a few days ago, and those two were the only ones who knew he was resting up here in Porta Vista.
And if Grady had found out about him, then something must have happened to the pair of them.
Vance took out his phone and tried to reach them, and found he could not get through. *Just as I thought,* he said to himself.
In that case there was nothing to do but wait. Deal with Grady first; how matters stood after that he would find out when he got back to Celadon City.
Grady he would certainly not let go. It would be finished here.
By the arrangement the man had made with Merrow, Grady would arrive here towards evening, and this was the meeting place as well.
He had only to wait here for his quarry to walk in.
He had got some intelligence about Grady out of Merrow too.
This Division Commander, newly transferred back to Kanto, had stronger Pokémon in hand than before — as many as three Gym-class Pokémon now.
What Vance had known before was that Division Commander Grady had only one Gym-class Pokémon. Four or five months on, he had come a long way.
Knowing that, Vance smiled coldly. Before, he might have been a little wary of it; now it came to very little.
These last months it was not only the other man who had grown. He himself had come on by leaps and bounds.
Let him come, then, and let him not go back.
Vance cleared the ground up and shared out some food among his Pokémon.
"Rest a while. There's another round coming later. Hit hard for me this time too."
"Roar, roar—"
"Rooaar, rooaar—"
"Combusken—"
All of them came alive at that and answered together with a roar.
They could hear the killing intent in Vance's tone as well. Their Trainer very seldom spoke like that; this enemy on his way must have crossed their boss somehow.
And what they could do about it was to tear the intruder apart with the iron fists in their hands, with hard claws and with sharp fangs.
When they had eaten they went back into their Poké Balls, and Vance found himself a place to sit quietly and settle his breathing while he waited for Division Commander Grady to come.
The time went by minute by minute. The sun moved west and came down to the edge of the sky, staining it a burning red and setting the sea glittering, as though a thin red veil had been laid across it.
A shadow came flying towards the place, and as it drew nearer out of the distance it resolved into Grady.
"Here he is."
Vance opened his eyes and stood up, watching Grady come on.