Chương 19: Neither Side

The data drive contained eight hundred credits and enough information to kill him. Rine examined it inside an abandoned utility room rather than the base. Identify found no active transmitter, but Silph encryption protected a hidden partition. Gastly passed through the casing and reported no embedded spectral anchor. Houndour sniffed it and sneezed. The public partition held Level Four bypass codes, generator schematics, and a sequence for opening the north maintenance gate.

The hidden section contained Iron Talon contact procedures and a copy of Elias Kern's partial testimony. Lyra knew about the second cache. She did not know its location. Rine read the reconstructed map. Team Rocket's primary generator occupied Sub-Level Four and drew supplementary power from a captive Electivire. Disabling it would shut down cameras, containment systems, medical equipment, ball-transfer locks, and the Dark dampeners hiding the orphanage. It would also open hundreds of Pokémon cells.

Some contained frightened animals. Others contained things Team Rocket imprisoned because killing them proved difficult. Sabotage without preparation could turn the base into a slaughterhouse. Lyra either did not understand that or considered the risk acceptable. Rine closed the file. He returned through the maintenance tunnel at three in the morning. Gideon waited at the interior checkpoint.

"Productive walk?"

"Haruto had collection records."

"At midnight."

"He closes late." Gideon held out one hand.

"Your watch." Rine surrendered it. The executive searched location history. Lyra's psychic field had replaced twenty-three minutes with corrupted coordinates, but the gap remained obvious.

"Where were you?"

"Walking between reflection anchors." Gideon looked up. Rine had chosen a truth that implied less than it revealed.

"She contacted you."

"Through reflective surfaces."

"What did she want?"

"To test my defenses and determine whether I could be turned."

"Can you?" Rine met his eyes.

"Everyone can be turned. The price changes." Gideon smiled.

"What did she offer?"

"Protection. Legitimacy. A chance to hurt you."

"Tempting."

"Vague."

"Did she provide anything physical?" The drive rested inside Gastly's compressed core. Rine allowed Hypno to touch his Dark veil. The barrier contained doubt, fear, and the memory of Lyra's offer, but not the drive's location or Kern's locker.

"No." Gideon studied him for a long time.

"Continue contact. Convince her you are uncertain." That required no acting. Rine retrieved his watch.

"What happens when the Gym attacks?"

"Saffron remembers why Team Rocket survived longer than every administration that promised to remove us." Gideon walked away. Rine returned to his cell and released the drive from Gastly. The Ghost spun proudly, pleased with the concealment trick.

"You understand that carrying it could get you dissected." Gastly grinned. Houndour did not. She stared at Rine with growing agitation. His aura shifted between competing plans too quickly for her to interpret. Rine sat on the floor.

"Team Rocket is going to attack the Gym. The Gym will attack here. Neither cares what the middle looks like." Houndour came closer.

"Mira is in the middle." Rine opened the orphanage camera feed. Mira slept in the girls' dormitory with one hand beneath her pillow. Weedle's cocoon—now a Kakuna—rested inside a laundry basket near the heater. She would be twelve soon. Four years from the arena. The thought of waiting until then was impossible. Rine began planning a third operation. Not Gideon's ambush. Not Lyra's sabotage. His own. First, the children needed an evacuation path disconnected from both combat zones.

Old medical tunnels ran beneath the orphanage but had been sealed. Elara might know where they emerged. Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere. Second, dangerous Pokémon cells had to remain locked while ordinary holding areas opened. The Level Four map divided containment systems into six circuits. Rine could sabotage selectively if he reached the control station. Third, the Electivire could not simply be abandoned inside a failing harness.

Cutting generator load incorrectly might kill it. Fourth, he needed proof capable of surviving Team Rocket's destruction protocol. Kern's locker could contain it. Fifth, he needed allies. Iona was the first risk. Rine found her in the flight-training room with Zubat. The Pokémon had reached Level 12 and restored current potential from Green to Blue through careful conditioning. Iona had accomplished the work quietly.

"If the base lost power," Rine said, "where would you go?" She stopped the exercise.

"Why?"

"Answer."

"Ventilation shaft fourteen. Opens near the station." Good. She already had an escape route.

"Could Zubat guide children through darkness?" Iona's expression changed.

"How many?"

"Possibly all of them."

"When?"

"Nine days or fewer." She looked toward the camera.

"This room has audio."

"Gastly?" Red eyes appeared inside the wall. Violet vapor entered the microphone and repeated the last ten seconds of training noise on a loop. Iona stared.

"Show-off," Rine said. Gastly's grin widened. Rine explained only what she needed: the Gym raid, Gideon's ambush, children above the base. He did not mention Lyra, the data drive, or Kern.

"My brother is eleven," Iona said when he finished. Rine had not known.

"At this orphanage?"

"Another facility near Vermilion." Two confirmed in practice.

"Help me here," Rine said, "and I'll help you find him." It was a promise he might not possess the power to keep. Iona understood.

"If you're lying, Zubat feeds on you first."

"Fair." The next ally was Haruto. He knew the Rust District's tunnels and could shelter a small number of children temporarily. He agreed before Rine finished asking.

"Mei needs to leave the district first," Haruto said. Rine transferred two hundred of Lyra's credits for a train ticket and forged travel identification. The remaining six hundred purchased medical supplies, filters, insulated cutters, and three smoke capsules. Rine kept none. The final ally had no reason to help. Mara Vey answered the Iron Talon contact signal from a public terminal. Her face appeared without uniform.

"Rine Frostfang." So much for surnames.

"I need an evacuation team not controlled by the Saffron Gym."

"That is an ambitious opening."

"Children. At least forty. Possibly more." Mara's expression hardened.

"Location?"

"Not until you agree."

"That isn't how warrants work."

"Then don't bring one."

"You're asking licensed hunters to enter a Rocket base illegally."

"I'm asking whether your rules matter more than children in an arena." Silence.

"What arena?" Mara asked. Rine looked at his hands.

"The one where I killed Tomas Vale." Saying the name and act together hurt. Good. Pain meant the door inside him had not closed completely. Mara agreed to listen. The hunter met him through a voice-only channel routed across public terminals.

"Start from the beginning," she said. Rine almost disconnected. The beginning contained another world, another death, and sixteen years of a lie. Mara did not need all of it.

"Municipal Children's Residence Twelve sits above a Team Rocket recruitment facility. Children are paired years before induction. At sixteen, each pair enters an arena. One leaves." The line remained silent.

"You have evidence?"

"My testimony."

"You know what I mean."

"Elias Kern's second cache may contain nutritional orders, suppression drugs, and transfer lists. Station locker twenty-six."

"Code?" Rine did not answer.

"Trust goes both ways," Mara said.

"No. Risk goes both ways. Trust comes later." She exhaled.

"What do you want from Iron Talon?"

"Unmarked medical teams at the old bathhouse east of the orphanage. No League uniforms where children can see them. Transport without destination records until Gideon's municipal contacts are identified."

"That last request violates custody law."

"So does forcing children to murder each other."

"I am trying to keep the rescue from collapsing in court."

"I'm trying to keep it from collapsing in blood." Mara's voice softened.

"Both matter." Rine thought of Lyra saying the same kind of impossible truth. He supplied the locker code. Mara dispatched a civilian retrieval agent rather than approaching herself. Twenty minutes later, she confirmed the cache existed.

"This is enough for emergency authority," she said.

"Do not act before the raid."

"Forty-seven children are in that building."

"If Gideon sees a warrant, there will be zero when you arrive." Mara hated the delay. Rine heard it in her breathing.

"Eight days," she said.

"Possibly fewer."

"If contact is lost, we move."

"Agreed." They established signals. Green meant the tunnel was open. Amber meant casualties but continued extraction. Red meant Team Rocket had discovered the evacuation. After disconnecting, Rine remained in the empty flight room with Iona.

"You trusted her," Iona said.

"No."

"You gave her the cache."

"I gave her a reason to commit resources." Iona looked unimpressed.

"That is trust with extra steps." Rine considered arguing. Houndour entered carrying her empty bowl. Gastly made the bowl appear full. Houndour attempted to eat illusionary meat, discovered the deception, and chased him through the wall. Iona laughed—a quick sound she covered immediately. Rine watched Houndour wait at the wall for Gastly to reappear.

"Maybe," he admitted. The planning continued through the night. Iona mapped ventilation routes. Zubat tested air currents and identified two collapsed shafts. Gastly carried a thread through sealed sections so Rine could estimate distance. Houndour practiced controlled Ember against concrete samples matching the infirmary wall. Small abilities assembled into an escape. No one involved was powerful enough to challenge Gideon directly. Together, they might make his fortress irrelevant.

Rine's next conversation was with Wallace Drenn. The generator technician ate alone in a service cafeteria at four each morning. Identify showed chronic anxiety, stimulant dependence, and a gambling-debt lien held by a Rocket front company. Rine sat opposite him.

"Your daughter is at Lavender Technical College." Wallace's spoon stopped. Rine hated the fear that appeared.

"I'm not threatening her."

"Then don't say her name."

"I didn't." That distinction offered little comfort. Rine placed a chip containing four hundred credits on the table.

"In six days, the base loses power. I need the Electivire disconnected alive." Wallace stared at him.

"You're insane."

"Probably."

"The harness has three live feeds. Break sequence and everyone in the hub cooks."

"Teach me the sequence."

"Gideon will kill us."

"Gideon intends to use the generator as a trap. If the Gym overloads it, your name will be listed among acceptable losses." Wallace knew enough to believe him.

"Why should I trust you?"

"You shouldn't. Take the credits. Send them to your daughter through a clean account. If I betray you, report that I coerced you."

"Did you?"

"I mentioned your daughter first. Close enough." Rine did not excuse the tactic. He recorded it among the compromises he would answer for if they survived. Wallace pocketed the chip. He spent twenty minutes drawing the shutdown sequence on a napkin: reduce external load, reverse the tail feeds, disengage magnetic clamps, sedate only if Electivire consented, then isolate the core.

"It hates us," Wallace said.

"Reasonably."

"It may kill whoever opens the harness."

"Also reasonably." Wallace gave a tired, broken laugh. Another ally joined—not through loyalty, but because Team Rocket had left too many people searching for a different exit. Iona supplied the final complication.

"Cassian offered me five hundred credits to report your meetings."

"What did you tell him?"

"Eight hundred." They constructed a false plan suggesting Rine intended to steal Rocket credits during the raid and escape through the southern freight tunnel. Gastly planted account codes, a freight schedule, and a marked map in Rine's locker.

"If Cassian reports it?" Iona asked.

"Gideon sees a selfish crime instead of an evacuation."

"If Cassian waits there?"

"He is far from the children." Illusions and manipulated expectations—their escape increasingly used Team Rocket's methods. Rine established limits before pressure erased them: no threats against families, no disposable allies, and no killing merely because it simplified the plan. He encrypted those rules beside the map. The false evidence passed its first test the next morning.

Cassian accessed Rine's locker while Gastly watched through the wall, photographed the southern-tunnel map, and replaced everything carefully. He believed the bait because selfish escape made sense within Team Rocket. Rine felt no triumph. Cassian's predictability came from the same conditioning that shaped all of them. The difference was that Cassian embraced the lesson and called it freedom. When he left, Gastly altered one number on the counterfeit account sheet.

If Cassian attempted to steal the imaginary credits early, the transaction would flag his own watch.

"Petty," Rine said. Gastly grinned.

"Keep it."