Day 18 of the journey to Kanto. Thunderstorm.
Boom. Boom.
The storm rolled in without warning that morning and jolted half the ship awake, including Amber, who was sleeping alone in her little room.
"Waaah! Mr. Thunder's angry! Mr. Thunder's angry!"
"Amber, it's okay. Don't be scared. Grandpa Blaine's here." Blaine's room connected to hers, so the moment he got out of bed and pulled back the curtain, he saw Amber sitting there crying. He hurried over at once.
The instant she saw him, Amber threw herself into his arms. Blaine carried her back into his room and sat with her by the window, watching the rain and lightning outside. They'd had good weather for so many days in a row that the sudden storm felt almost unreal.
Then something at the edge of his vision caught his eye.
There was a sheet of paper on the bedside table.
He was old, not forgetful. He remembered very clearly that nothing had been there before he went to sleep.
After checking the room and making sure nothing else was off, he reached over, picked up the paper, and unfolded it.
[Blaine, by the time you read this, I've already gotten off the ship. Don't rush to look for me. Read the whole thing first. After the party last night, that kid who's friends with the captain's son started hunting me...]
[He knows Amber exists. He wanted to grab her and use her to force me to work for them as a sailor. I had no choice. I've already dealt with everyone who knew. The only ones left are his father—the first mate of this luxury liner—and the captain...]
[Blaine, while I was handling them, I confirmed they're Team Rocket. Don't tell me you didn't know this ship belonged to Team Rocket. If they find out about Amber, she'll be in real trouble...]
[The rest is yours. You still have time to lock things down and lure the first mate into a trap...]
[One more thing. I didn't get the chance to say goodbye to Amber. Do it for me. And don't forget the Indigo Plateau Conference. I'll be waiting for you there. —Rai]
Blaine let out a long sigh after finishing the letter. "That little brat..." He had waited for Reiji all night. Once the boy never came back, he had already known something had happened.
You didn't live to Blaine's age without learning how to read a situation. Of course he knew this luxury liner was one of Team Rocket's mobile bases, and one of their money-making operations too. The League had marked it a long time ago.
The reason the League still hadn't shut it down was simple. They didn't want to alert the enemy. Once a base had been exposed and brought into the light, it stopped being a real base. It became something you could wipe out anytime, and something the League could watch around the clock.
That was why it was still standing. The League was waiting for the right moment. If they tore down every discovered base one by one, Team Rocket would just burrow deeper and become harder to find.
As for how Reiji figured out they were Team Rocket, that wasn't hard to explain. Darkrai found it, not him. But honestly, it didn't take much guessing. An underground black market in Kanto could only belong to Team Rocket.
There was no room in Kanto for any rival underworld group to grow. In both Kanto and Johto, Team Rocket was the local kingpin. Other than the League itself, every other force had to give them space.
"Magmar, burn this."
Blaine released Magmar and handed it the letter. Magmar didn't even need to breathe fire. The paper ignited the moment it touched its hand and curled into ash.
Then Blaine picked Amber up and left the room. He went straight to the maid's room, released Arcanine there, and said, "Take care of Amber. Arcanine will stay and protect both of you."
"Yes." The maid took Amber from him and nodded at once. If Blaine had come personally to make arrangements at a moment like this, then whatever he was about to do had to matter. She didn't dare treat it lightly.
After giving instructions to the maid, Blaine pinched Amber's cheek and smiled. "Be good, alright? Don't run around. Wait here until Grandpa Blaine comes back."
"Grandpa Blaine..." Amber watched him leave, worry written all over her face. Rai-nii was gone too, and that only made it worse. She missed him already and had no idea where he had gone.
Blaine shut the door behind him and headed for the captain's room with Magmar at his side. He was going there for one reason only—to clean up after Reiji.
Still, the boy hadn't been wrong.
Amber was the one thing Blaine couldn't let anyone touch. Before, it had been one thing when nobody knew about her. But now that someone had set their sights on her, every person who knew had to be dealt with.
Especially when they'd planned to use Amber as a hostage and force Reiji to work for them. Blaine would never tolerate either one.
So that was why Itsuki had said at the party that he was the one who invited Reiji. They had known each other before, and not on good terms.
Still, Reiji hadn't mentioned Itsuki in the letter. That meant he had no quarrel with him, and more importantly, that Itsuki wasn't one of the people in the know.
Thankfully, the real trouble had already been handled. Not a whisper had leaked out. That little brat had done the dirty work cleanly enough. Blaine only had to close things out.
He reached the captain's door quickly enough and knocked.
Knock. Knock. Knock.
"Leader Blaine? This early?" The captain opened the door and found Blaine standing there with Magmar, face set and eyes hard. He had no idea what this was about, but the sight alone put him on edge.
"Kenichi. Let's talk inside."
The fact that Blaine had come in person meant there was still room to negotiate. That also meant Blaine hadn't come to drive him into a corner so hard he'd fight to the death.
"Leader Blaine..." Captain Kenichi took a slow step back. He already had a Poké Ball in his hand, ready to battle at any second.
If his cover had been blown, then so be it. He was a Water-type Trainer. Against a Fire specialist like Blaine, it wasn't as if he had no chance at all.
"Kenichi, are you really going to keep this up?" Blaine's gaze slid to the Poké Ball in his hand. "Think carefully. Your son is sleeping right next door."
At that, Kenichi turned toward the next room. The fight went out of him at once. "Leader Blaine... you know?"
"Kenichi, the League found you a long time ago. The only reason no one touched you was because moving you somewhere else would've made you harder to watch. Better to keep you under the League's nose."
"Leader Blaine, please spare Itsuki. He doesn't know anything." The truth hit Kenichi all at once. Everything he had done over the years, every bit of secrecy he thought he'd maintained, had been sitting in plain view the whole time. All those careful disguises—nothing more than a joke.
He turned and tossed the Poké Ball onto the bed.
That was surrender.
That was what it meant to have something you couldn't afford to lose. No matter how hard a man was, once someone got a grip on that one weak spot, even he had to bend.
"Kenichi, you still have a chance to make up for this," Blaine said. "Come over to the League's side and help us."
[End of chapter]
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