The car ride from Rocket Pewter HQ to Mount Moon had been deathly silent. For Tracer, the return trip back was significantly louder, thanks to the constant ringing in his ears. Furthermore, his radio was picking up chatter of investigators and law enforcement specialists rushing to the scene of conflict at Mt. Moon. He and his fellow Rocket agents had, for all intents and purposes, come away from the mission relatively unscathed. The Snags, by contrast, lay all over the place, and would likely be taken into custody if they weren't among those lucky enough to be dragged away by their remaining comrades. Ein would not be among these. Tracer glanced at his boss in the seat beside him, Petrel, still in his own Ein disguise as he flipped distractedly through his phone messages. The real Ein lay unconscious in the trunk, and woe to any officer who attempted to pull them over for an inspection. He drove at exactly the speed limit, and advised his colleagues to keep their red "R" symbols covered until the heat died down.
It wasn't until they were about ten minutes from HQ that Tracer finally spoke.
"Well," he breathed, "I think it's safe to say we made it at this point."
"Almost," corrected Petrel. "And I am very eager to see just what we made."
"Intel, at the least," Tracer offered. "We know that Cipher and Snagem are back together, and they've decided to risk a step on our turf. But obviously, they were ill-informed about the Kanto Champ's true power level, even though they managed to capture his Pikachu somehow." Tracer shook his head. "I'd sure like to know how they pulled off that magic trick."
"Ein should prove informative there," Petrel said, holding out his hand. "And if not, he'll most certainly know all about that wonderful Shadow formula."
Taking the hint, Tracer passed the syringe of liquid off to him: the one Haunter had stolen from Gonzap's case. He was glad to be rid of it. If the thing had broken in his pouch, and somehow managed to puncture all the way through to his skin, well, who the hell knew what effects that might bring?
"It's too bad about the Snag Machine," he said, making a left at the traffic light. "I was hoping they would have it present, to catch Red's other pokemon. But I guess they thought they were going to overwhelm him and take 'em the old-fashioned way. Well, we can expect more caution from them in the future."