A Job Taken, A Friend Made

Summary: Team Rocket Scientists aren't given much credit, time to end that! Meet Vince, a Rocket Scientist and more. How one event reawakens a dream that young trainers live for; Adventure! OC Scientst

Please note that I won't be describing the visual aspect of pokemon as I expect readers to already know at least the pokemon from Gen I to Gen IV

Disclaimer: I do not own Pokemon.

Author's Note: I wanted to try my hand at making different types of stories and see what happens. Here i am, breathing life into my ideas and presenting it to my readers. Now it's time, I'll see where my skills and faults are and go from there.

Come on out One Shot!

Let's go!

"What to do, what to do..."

The black haired man glanced over at the statuses of the supposedly incoming batches of test subjects. This man towered over many of the workers and commanded respect with just his visage, he wasn't a man per se, he just looked much older than his liking because the stress-inducing conditions. He wore strange and advanced metal gauntlets and a huge white lab coat, identifying him as a scientist. Under his coat were his black pants, black shoes, and white shirt that had a red 'R' pin on it. These newcomers would be subjected to numerous experiments that would determine the effectiveness of future defense systems of Team Rocket bases.

Not old enough to be called a man and not young enough to be called a brat by his peers stood Vince. He had dedicated years of service to Team Rocket, he had worked on upgrading a good majority of the Rocket armaments. Be it vehicles, robots, or fortresses he was able to upgrade or create altogether new armors, projectiles, and new power sources. If there was one thing that he had learned from his reports over time is that...

"If you have a strong weapon/robot/fortress/vehicle it does not take an even stronger weapon/robot/fortress/vehicle to best it, it just takes and incompetent operator to bring it to its end." His words were not without truth, he had sifted through many complaints and inspected them all to find that his creations had only failed when they were mistreated, used with incorrect methods, or subjected to stresses over their predetermined limits.

He sighed and reacquainted himself with the oh so familiar loading bay, the expanse was alive with activity, Grunts filed back and forth with the equipment, crates were being sealed for transport, and trucks were unloading supplies. He remembered back when he sent in some forms requesting a more private facility to work in. Unfortunately 'Private facility' did not mean a workplace for one person...'Private facility' to the higher ups meant a facility full of raw Rocket recruits yet to get acquainted to the 'Lifestyle of evil' as they so eloquently put it.

He stood over the bustling grunts and surveyed the entire hanger. Up ahead near the entrance to the hanger he saw the target transport truck reverse into one of the docking bays of the hanger. Nearby Rocket Grunts dragged their legs to the next truck and began dragging the metal crates with no sense of urgency at all.

"Get moving! I want them in for inspection NOW!" Vince barked out orders and to his displeasure he saw the Grunts stiffen and move at a faster rate. "I want to inspect them undamaged! Now move quickly and efficiently! No Damages!"

Unfortunately for the man, one of the Grunts who was currently offloading a caged Ursaring accidentally floored the accelerator and made the perched cage fall onto the concrete, therefore releasing said Ursaring from its confines.

"Graahh!" The Ursaring let out a roar once it was freed. The Grunts scattered immediately already understanding that their basic assortment of Poochyena, Zubat, and Carvanha weren't suited for the raging normal type. One Grunt was all it took to get the others running.

"A-Abandon the base!" The frightened Grunts proceeded to stampede and flee.

'Arceus, these idiots.' The Scientist pushed against the flow of running Rocket members and proceeded to dial in some commands into his strange gauntlets. The metal gloves began to give off a faint hum and moments later the visible circuitry pathways on the gauntlets began to glow a soft amber. He took in a deep breath before voicing out a command for the facility.

"Begin observation!" With two words the hangar's cameras shifted to the Scientist's location and began recording...with two words the stampeding Grunts were brought to a standstill as if they too were ordered to observe...and with two words the hibernation pokemon found its new target.

"Graahh!" The rampaging normal type charged forward with a basic Tackle in mind, but Vince wasn't ready to be sent home in a full body cast so he quickly dodged. Since the Ursaring wasn't expecting a dodge it crashed the wall directly behind Vince. The dodge wasn't perfect so he was clipped in the shoulder and learned that if his shoulder was sore from a barely dodged hit he wouldn't be getting up after a direct hit.

'Begin charging right gauntlet Focus Punch' With the mental command sent Vince prepared for a counterattack needed to be resolved quickly and he didn't want to let his subordinates get hurt even if they were incompetent.

'Left gauntlet type change normal' The amber glowing circuitry on the left gauntlet shifted to a soft white glow. What he was going to do was fairly similar to a situation in his past, just substitute the sparring partner with an angry Ursaring and substitute normal human punches with Poke-powered punches.

The Ursaring recovered quickly and Vince was already putting some distance between them for his plan to work.

'Fake Out Combo' The left gauntlet glowed and white light washed over Vince and after the light had subsided there was now two Vinces, one that looked exactly like the original and another that also looked the same but was slightly transparent. The two scientists ran forward to the right and left sides of Ursaring and cocked their right gauntlets back.

"Graahh!" The Ursaring immediately disregarded the faded copy and went for the clear-cut one. With a well placed slash at Vince's torso the Ursaring's claws met, air? The clear-cut copy of Vince faded away and the Ursaring understood the mistake it made and soon heard the real Vince behind it.

"Haaah! Focus Punch!" Vince's right gauntlet met the normal type's face when it turned to meet the real threat and was immediately sent to the ground from the fighting type move.

'That was a pretty good first run.' Vince brought his gauntlets to face level and gave a quick inspection of the gauntlets, 'This packed quite a strong punch, but then again the testing was premature and i wasn't able to get any of that Ursaring's statistics.' He tapped several sections of the gloves and the humming faded along with the glowing amber/white circuitry, matching the gunmetal gray scheme of the gauntlets.

The loading bay was silent as the onlookers saw the battle before them until the cheering began.

"Did you see that punch he threw?"

"That was awesome!"

"I knew i made the right choice at the bridge!"

"That scientist is no pushover that's for sure!"

"How'd he move like that?"

Vince just ignored the cheers and headed for one of the storage rooms, but not before remembering that the observation was still recording. He turned around and looked at one of the recording cameras.

"End observation, file 1, label: Normal and Fighting." With that over and done with Vince headed for that storage room and turned around yet again to send a final message lest the Grunts become even more incompetent.

"Get back to work!" The grunts shushed themselves up and gave crisp salutes before heading back to their workstations with quickness unseen before, obviously because of how he handled the rampaging Ursaring.

"Yes Sir!"

The man left the hanger and began to walk through the metal halls of the facility, and as soon as his presence faded two grunts failed to keep quiet.

"Psst, hey that was Vince?"

"Yeah, he leads the development team here in the facility."

"Whoa that guys was a scientist?"

"He is a scientist. Just remember to look professional whenever he passes, he does horrible things to us when we look incompetent."

"Now i feel sorry for those guys who were supposed to gather the new testing materials."

Both of the recruits shivered at the thought.

As he strode through the halls he removed his pin delicately with his metal gloves and stared at it as he walked on, 'What the heck happened to me?' Vince remembered back to when he was, 'A budding prodigy in both fighting and science', so said by his mentor in the martial arts field. He was no prodigy when he compared himself to his teacher so he had decided to focus on something he knew he could beat her in, science.

Was it the right choice? Was choosing science over the fighting arts really worth joining Team Rocket? Sure he was given free access to the Rocket research labs and given respect in the form of fear and power, but was it really worth denying himself the life of a trainer? His teacher was always talking about her other student's accomplishments such as winning badges and catching pokemon, she wasn't allowed to tell her students about Vince's accomplishments due to his affiliation with a certain hated group of poke-thieves.

Vince sighed, at least his teacher accepted his choice with no fanfare...well there was some fanfare but not on noticeable levels. A parting battle was all his teacher needed to show his determination and although he lost and was left bruised he was able to leave on a good note with some words.

'I'll get better but not in the way you would expect! I might be able to fight on par with your pokemon!'

He stopped at the thought with a unnoticeable smile until a Grunt bumped into his back. Vince quickly eliminated any trace of happiness from his face and turned to meet this rude interrupter.

"Watch where you're going you Scientist!" The Grunt rubbed his face and was immediately greeted with a pain in his back, courtesy of Vince.

"Shut the hell up you Grunt," The man had grabbed the Grunt by his uniform and pinned him up against the wall. The Grunt realized his mistake at yelling at someone stronger than himself when he remembered the battle with the Ursaring that took place not so long ago.

"I'm sorry! I d-didn't know it… was you, …Scientist…V-Vince!" The scientist Vince unceremoniously let go and let the Rocket Grunt drop to the floor with a thud. Vince gave a glare to the observing men and watched them scurry away in fear. Honestly was there any scientist with a fighter's body? How could they not notice him? They probably just look at the uniforms and not the person.

The scientist made his way into one of the inspection rooms and was greeted by two saluting Grunts and another scientist with an average build and glasses.

"So what do we have for today?" Vince looked at the scientist he remembered that the bespectacled man once worked with him on a joint project on creating new metal plating.

"It's better for you to see it. Follow me," Vince was guided toward a single cage and was angry before he got a look inside. It definitely wasn't better for him to see it.

"What is this!? ONE!? What the heck happened?" Vince knew that these Grunts were raw recruits, but this? He had thought that a squad of Grunts would be able to procure a suitable amount of subjects with each recruit armed with a set of Poochyena, Zubat, and Carvanha, but he had thought wrong.

"Well this little Mawile gave us a fight, she took out most of our Grunts and their pokemon. There was also that Ursaring that broke free but seeing as you already did some premature testing we hauled it to another section." The bespectacled scientist gestured to the cage. He quickly identified this Mawile as a female, his familiarity with pokemon gender was a necessity among other things, when he thought back to the battle he now realized that he fought a female Ursaring, if the length of its fur was anything to go by.

"What the?" When Vince looked inside of the cage he was angry at the state of the Mawile; she had various cuts, bruises, burns, and scratches among her body, she was tied at the ankles, wrists, and at her larger maw behind her. He saw her sleeping and guessed that the grunts had put her to sleep. This was not a prime subject for testing! She was not up to testing standards.

Vince ripped off a chunk of metal from the wall in anger, he wanted to vent badly and making the wall cry was a good option "I want it brought to my lab for my evaluation!" Vince then turned the to the weak scientist who was hiding behind a clipboard he had found, "Get to work! You aren't getting paid to oversee just one Pokemon!" Within seconds the room was emptied of the two Grunts and smaller scientist.

Vince walked over to the Mawile's cage and his angered expression shifted to a saddened one, "Why did you fight?" The large scientist reluctantly left the holding room, leaving a battered and sleeping Mawile in her cage. Sure he would've gladly carried her to his section, but there were regulations to follow before he could do anything.

At his private sector Vince processed the paperwork for using the Mawile for 'research purposes' but he was interrupted by a call from one of his close friends. He grabbed the lab phone on his desk.

"Howdy Vince! How's life as a Rocket?" The voice was feminine and cheery it was a definite plus to hear some happiness after all his time spent working for the rockets.

"Shut up…how many times do I have to tell you to shut up?" Vince tapped his fingers impatiently, any other day he wouldn't be like this and would play catch up for an hour.

"Aww you're so mean!" She teased through the phone,typical, mean words didn't even put a dent in this girl's mood.

"Keeps me alive and keeps my pay high." Vince shrugged, well it was true, it pays for the food and more.

"So how's my former student faring? You know I can hire you," She's been going on and on about that every single time she calls and every time he would turn down the offer since being her student meant less research time for him.

Vince chuckled, "I'm doing fine…I just hate the, you know…" his mood dropped a bit after he remembered Mawile's condition.

"I understand…" His sadness must have reached her, "Well I'll call in a few days ok?" She knew what he had meant. There were some times where he would have to keep himself from voice out his apparent dislike of how Team Rocket treats pokemon. In Mawile's case the Grunts didn't even do a small once-over with a potion.

"Wait! Uh, you called me up just for that?" He was confused at his former mentor's call but paid it no heed.

"Yep! Bye-bye!" And with that the cheery voice clicked off. She knew when he needed alone time to rearrange his thoughts.

Vince let out a massive sigh, "Man…way too blunt…at least sugarcoat it so I don't feel like I wasted my time." He went back to his paperwork and a few raps on his door interrupted him.

"What in Arceus' name do you want!" He wanted to finish up the paperwork and these Grunts weren't helping him, not one bit.

The door slid open revealing two grunts flanking a metal cage, "Sir Vince! We brought you the specimen!" One of them handed Vince a clipboard with the forms for the subject.

"Good, just bring it in and I'll manage the rest." He took out a pen and filled out the necessary portions of the sheet and returned it back with the clipboard to the Grunt.

"B-But sir won't you need some assistance detaining the specimen if a problem emerges?" The young Grunt was clearly intimidated by the build of this so-called 'scientist' he was always led to believe that all scientists were stringy and weak.

Vince was irritated. "Are you new here?" the young Grunt looked around and pointed to himself, "Yeah YOU!"

"Y-Yes sir, I was transferred here a while back." Sometimes he should just label every grunt as a recruit in his mind since he has yet to see a competent grunt.

Vince sighed, he noticed he was sighing quite a bit today. "Though I may not have any pokemon…" Vince held out his glove, "…I have these gloves to help me. Now leave, I'm busy with this pile of forsaken forms!" The two Grunts made a hasty retreat after they shoved the cage inside.

"It never feels natural…" He muttered to himself. The muscled scientist made sure to properly lock his doors before he went to check up on the Mawile.

"This also never feels natural either…" He said as he saw Mawile sleep. "Why did I ever choose this job?" His gaze fell onto the Mawile's wounds, "Oh, yeah, research..." He sighed yet again. 'There's always a trade-off...Always. A. Trade. Off!' ()

"Hmm…" Vince looked around his personal lab; it was a moderate size, had precision machines for delicate repairs, glass cabinets filled with vials of chemicals, his work desk, his phone, and a second door which led to his lodging area. He went up to his lodging area and checked its condition; it was clean and organized, the kitchen was bare, the fridge was filled with coffee, his bed was plain, and his personal desk was stationed in front of a window which looked out to the sea.

He went back to the Mawile's cage and took off the lock. Normally one would expect Vince to fumble with the lock because of his metal gauntlets, but it wasn't normal gloves, his were a one of a kind prototype he had developed. The higher ups had high hopes for his multipurpose glove; it had high precision, flawless dexterity, strength, tools for first aid, and the ability to match the punch strength of a pokemon.

"Damn…they did a number on her…" Vince gently lifted the Mawile and cradled her in his arms. He placed her on his bed and began to work at the bindings. A small blade emerged from his index finger and he used it to cut away the bindings on her legs, wrists, and deadlier jaw.

"Should've studied pokemon anatomy…" He nearly abandoned the idea of doing the healing personally since he was no Nurse Joy. "I think I have those lying around." Vince crawled down pulled out an old cardboard box from under his bed and opened it.

"Been years…" He rummaged through his old gear; a rusty pokedex, dusty poke ball, aged region maps, and more. He stopped when he had found his old potions; he had originally wanted to do some experiments on it, but it had a more important duty to fulfill…something it was originally designed to do.

When Vince popped up, he was startled to see Mawile awake and two ruby-red eyes looking right at his face about this close apart.

"WAHH!" He stumbled backwards and knocked his head against the hard floor. He heard something he hadn't heard personally in years…laughter. It was so nice hearing genuine laughter and it brought a smile to his yellow and black Mawile giggled at Vince's misfortune and Vince shifted back into his 'angry' mode.

"What. Was. That?" Vince stood at his full height and glared down at the once laughing Mawile. He did that out of habit whenever anyone laughed at him, but now wasn't the best time to intimidate and he soon regretted that.

Vince had intended to quiet the Mawile down but to his embarrassment the giggling fit evolved into full-blown laughter. She had thrown her head back and laughed as hard as she could while rolling side to side with her arms cradling her gut.

He scratched the back of his head sheepishly as he took in the sight before him. Alas, one can't deceive a pokemon labeled as a 'Deceiver Pokemon' as they already know the In's and outs of the art of deceiving.

He carried himself over to his bed and plopped down on his back and waited until the laughter died down. Vince had a deficit of laughter so he didn't mind one bit, he closed his eyes and brought his hands behind his head.

After a minute or so of laughter Vince felt a weight rest itself atop his body. He cracked an eye open to see ruby eyes scan his face with curiosity.

"nngh" Vince willed himself against the urge to jerk back at the lack of distance between both their faces. Thinking of a solution he broke the eye contact by bringing over one of his hands to rub Mawile's head, she closed her eyes at the approaching hand and a second later Vince felt her leaning into his moving palm.

Bringing his other hand over to keep the Mawile attached to his chest he sat up and then placed the Mawile onto the bed. She whined a bit when Vince's hand left but the disappointment was overtaken by curiosity as she watched him walk over to one of the nearby bookshelves. He turned around as if to sate her curiosity,

"Just sit still there. I'll heal you up and you'll end up as good as new." With that said he turned to continue to search the shelves, occasionally picking up cover-less books and riffling through the pages.

"...Healing 101, doesn't seem too bad..." Vince retrieved a book on healing techniques he had picked up a year ago.

Not even onto the second page a familiar reverberation echoed in the private quarters, "...What. Is. THIS?!"

...Well, it wasn't like professors didn't get to where they are by doing nothing...

"Arceus...how did i get into this mess?" He dragged one hand across his face in annoyance as he scribbled more notes with his remaining hand.

"At least it couldn't get any harder than this."

...Oh the irony...

"Time to put this into practice."

...Not a moment later...

"Hey! Stop laughing! And don't move! Wait! Don't bite that! "

"Ahhh! It burns! The potion! It burrnnnsss!"

"Mawile?"

"Oh don't you 'Mawile?' Me! That was all your doing!"

"Mawile!"

"H-Hey! stay in one spot will you?!"

"Gyahhh! The potion! It Still burrnnnsss!"

...His respect for a certain family of pinkettes rose considerably that day.

Those Grunts did a number on her, and indirectly did a number on Vince, if the bandages on his hands were anything to go by. Vince promised himself to punish them under the guise of 'failure to deliver specimen in good condition' he truly meant that, those guys were now in his sights.

Cotton balls, empty potion bottles, gauze strips and a stack of medical books were piled atop Vince's desk. It had took him over a few hours, but he had unexpectedly gotten it done, he had treated and healed Mawile back up to normal, now she just required a few more hours of rest. Apparently one can get exhausted from excessive laughter...and excessive yelling.

"Took me so much work to fix you up myself, you know?" Vince said as he softly rubbed the sleeping Mawile's head.

"I had to learn an entire medical guide on how to treat Mawiles…" He looked out at the window for a good view out to sea, "How exactly do those Nurse Joys do it? It would take a normal person a few weeks to learn how to treat just one species, not including their evolutions…" His respect for those pink nurses rose again at the thought of them having enough medical knowledge to fill the Rocket data stores. He pressed some buttons on his gloves and he removed his hands from the prototype glove.

Vince yawned; he was obviously tired from cramming his brain full of knowledge and treating a pokemon to the best of his abilities. He gently lifted the Mawile up and leaned down on his bed before resting Mawile's head on one of his outstretched arms. "Eh? Hey, that tickles!" He turned his head and saw Mawile hugging his forearm like a pillow while her large maw nibbled on Vince's hair.

Vince smiled at the sleeping figure, "Maybe I should quit and take up Greta's offer…"

He turned and saw his gloves and then smiled, "Looks like I can fight her pokemon myself…"

He reached out with his free hand and petted Mawile on her head, "I wonder if she'll want to come with me…"

"Maw Ma wile…" The Mawile tightened her grip on Vince, and he pulled a blanket over the two of them. He could've sworn that he had heard 'Yes i will...' but his mind was already tired with all that happened today.

Seconds later Vince fell asleep for the first time in years with a smile on his face. It was a start, a fairly good start towards his re-entry to the Pokemon battle circuit.

Nice job One Shot!

One Shot Return!

Thank you for reading!

I just appreciate anyone who reads my works!

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