Petal: And here we are with chapter 4!
Copper: The big boss bad guy is introduced in this chapter!
Petal: We're putting up a poll concerning him, so please go and vote! We, pikaree1, do not own Pokemon, Yoduh, Pinkari, Natalie, Tiki, Mithril, Genevieve, Kara, 700 (also known to some (one) as Sparky Sparky Boom Man), and Leon. Mucho gracias to everyone who reviewed, and I hope we wrote your characters to your satisfaction!
"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!"
A scream ripped through the air. It was shrill. High-pitched. Girlish, even.
And it was coming from Orange. The reason? Well... He had just finished Yoduh's first trial-an extra-sticky band-aid being ripped off his skin.
"Shut up, you big baby," Lustrous said irritably. "It can't be that bad."
"Yes, it can," Orange whimpered. "Chu, you should be glad you're not going through this. You have fur."
Chu shuddered and screamed as Alakazam plucked out another hair, very precisely, plucked in a way to cause maximum pain.
Orange sweatdropped. "Never mind..."
"Humph! Big baby you are! Want to quit, do you?" Yoduh demanded, bopping the swordsman on the head with his staff.
Alakazam flipped a switch, and the Elexecutor, the rusty sword (Orange had at last decided to name it. The name candidates had been Fulminata, Deathbringer, Windscorcher, Steelsinger, Planetcrusher, Voidwaker, Starshaker, and Rusty. After many months of deliberation, he decided on the best name: Rusty), and Jo slid the slightest bit closer to the pit of doom, filled with Snorlax stomach acids.
"NO! We don't! We don't!" Orange sobbed, desperate to save his trusty comrades from their terrible fate. To prove his sincerity, he went on to the next training exercise: balancing on one arm while mixing yogurt with a spoon. Lustrous rolled her eyes. It was just a dumb sword and a banjo; he could always get new ones...
This time it was she who received a bop on the head.
"Ordinary sword, that is not!" Yoduh reprimanded. "Work of great swordmaster it is!"
Orange blinked and fell over, getting yogurt all over his face in the meantime. "It is?"
Yoduh nodded wisely. "It is."
Adamant walked in from the kitchen bearing a large pot of onion yogurt. "Firestar, the lost magnum opus of Swordsmith Ken Nobegane," he recited. "The sword was originally made for a warmongering scullery maid of Konton no Tochi. With it, she had great plans to destroy all onions in existence. Unfortunately, the poor swordsmith tripped and fell as he was delivering it. He got a concussion and passed out. When he woke up, it was gone. The scullery maid beat him up and got back twice the money she had paid him. Legend has it that the sword was imbued with the powers of flame and, even if thrust into the hottest of flames, would never melt. Of course, it would never stand a chance against Snorlax stomach acids."
As Adamant said all this, Orange and Lustrous's jaws dropped lower and lower until they finally hit the floor. Yoduh pushed them shut with his staff. "Catch flies, you will," he said wisely.
Orange redoubled his efforts to save Rusty while Lustrous went and shook Adamant by the collar. "How do you know all this?!" she shrieked. "This kind of stuff is important, you know! And that sword is so rusty!"
"I read a lot of encyclopedias at home," Adamant explained, unperturbed. Indeed, the mansion passed down the Berlitz family for generations also had an extensive library filled with literature on all kinds of topics, each generation inputting their favorite topics from warfare to using plates as frisbees. The most recent addition was Lady Berlitz-Adamant's mother-'s fascination with penguins.
"THAT DOESN'T EXPLAIN HOW A RUSTY OLD SWORD LIKE THAT IS THE LEGENDARY SWORD SUNG OF IN LEGENDS!" she screamed. "How'd Orange get that sword, anyway?!"
"Bought it off some guy on the street when I started my journey," the seventeen-year-old called.
Yoduh stroked his beard in contemplation. "Finish this training, you must. Make yourself strong. Perhaps visit Pinkari, you should..."
"Pinkari?" Orange asked, his voice wavering with effort. "Who's that?"
"Apprentice of Ken, he was. Know best about Firestar, he would. Hmm, perhaps, perhaps..." the old man mused. "Now! Time for dinner, it is! Stirred the yogurt well, have you?"
Orange paled. He had not stirred the yogurt well, as a matter of fact. He had faceplanted in it.
"Yes, yes, eat up, you must. Gives you energy, yogurt does!" Yoduh said. He motioned for Orange and the others to join him.
Lustrous looked disdainfully at the yogurt Orange had been stirring. She had seen him faceplant in it. And she didn't like yogurt to begin with. "No, thanks," she declined. "I'm going to make my own meal out of onions." She stood up primly and went to the kitchen.
Adamant sighed. "Sorry, I need to go and-"
"Sit," Yoduh interrupted. "Your energy, replenish."
Adamant sat, but he cast a worried look at the kitchen.
Five seconds later, dark smoke and the smell of burnt onions billowed out of the room. Lustrous ran out coughing, her face covered in soot. "No wonder you like yogurt! Your stove is defective, old man!" she screeched.
"Own faults, you cannot accept?" Yoduh asked mildly. "Truly strong, you never will be."
Lustrous glared at him and decided to go without dinner. She turned out all the lights, plunging the group into total darkness, and then set her sleeping bag down and crawled inside of it.
Orange and Adamant shrugged and lay down. However, Orange was quickly woken up by Yoduh. "Navigate my house, you must. Touch my furniture, you shall not!" he ordered.
Orange gulped and prayed that he could pull it off. His first few steps, he accidentally pressed a button. His and Chu's weapons were raised back out of the pit of doom and delivered at his feet. He blinked. Cogs turned in his brain. He had an idea. It was a brilliant idea. It was the idea of the century. Lustrous and Adamant must have been lending him brainwaves while they slept; his honest and hardworking personality would never have allowed him to think of it on his own.
They would escape under the cover of darkness! He quickly walked around, carefully feeling around for his next step with his shoe. After all, his mentor had never said that his clothing couldn't touch the furniture. He accidentally stepped on Chu's tail and thought he was busted.
Luckily, the angry electric mouse released an enormous Thundershock, lighting up the room and showing Orange where Lustrous and Adamant were. Equally luckily, Lustrous had all of their travel supplies attached to Arler on a makeshift saddle and was as a matter of fact dozing with the fire-type curled around her.
"Touch Pichu, you shall not," Yoduh interrupted before going back to sleep.
Orange whispered an apology to his partner (the little pokemon was very obstinate and stubborn, seeing as how it had resolved to become stronger than a Raichu without evolving. It took much begging and bribing to achieve forgiveness), and then continued to inch through the house to where Adamant was, Chu on his shoulder. When he finally got there, he shook the boy awake. Using a complex series of pokes, he explained the situation. Adamant poked back that he understood, and together they inched to Lustrous. She let out a loud snore and rolled over, scratching her stomach and mumbling something about stupid failing stoves. The boys carefully lifted her onto Arler's back, communicated the plan with more Hoarse Code taps, and then all three of them ran like an angry housewife was after them. An amateur housewife, mind you. The proper reaction to experienced angry housewives was to sit, cower in fear, beg for one's life, and hope the punishment was light.
"Let them go this time, I will," Yoduh said with one swampy eye open. It was the best course of action, after all...
"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!" Lustrous screamed suddenly, sitting up and hitting the head of Adamant, who was sitting behind her.
Orange sweatdropped. "You're awake, I see..." he sighed.
"What's going on?!" she demanded as Adamant held an ice pack to his head. "Where are we?!"
"We escaped Yoduh," Orange explained. "And we remembered to go down the opposite side of the mountain than we came!"
"At least you did something right," the girl grumbled. "But now what are we going to do?! All our onions are still in his kitchen! We haven't a goal anymore; there's no need to traverse the mountain!"
Orange drooped. "Oh, right..."
"We can visit Swordsmith Pinkari," Adamant suggested. "He lives on this side of the mountain."
Orange grinned. "Yeah, let's do that!" he exclaimed. "That's a great idea!"
So the three travelers headed in the direction of Pinkari's shack. At least, a direction they hoped led to Pinkari's shack.
Natalie sighed and ate another flapjack, Tiki nibbling on one as well. "I just don't get it," she said glumly, adjusting her hat and petting the Joltik. "I was nice to her. I was being fun with the entrance. So why the heck did she throw that knife at me? I don't get it. It's not fair." She sighed again.
And then all of a sudden, the door slammed open. "NAT! HI!" yelled a fifteen-year-old girl, her straight, knee-length white hair flying behind her as she leaped in and rolled like ninja before standing up. "BOOM! THE WALL EXPLODED! THAT WAS FUN! ALSO, PENGUINS!"
Natalie sighed. "Hey, Mithril," she said, smiling wanly. "Haven't seen you since winter." As it was the start of spring, it was clearly a variation of the "Haven't seen you since last year" New Year joke.
Mithril frowned concernedly, her eggplant-colored eyes searching her friend's dark brown ones. "What's wrong? You seem down. Also, seals."
Natalie glared at the door behind her-not the one Mithril nearly destroyed with the force of her slam. "It's the prisoner, Lyra. She threw a knife at me! I didn't even do anything wrong! All I did was crack a few jokes!"
Mithril patted her older friend's shoulder sympathetically. "Don't you worry about a thing! I'll whip up some more flapjacks to cheer you up! Also, tulips!"
Natalie's smile immediately grew. "Thanks, Mith. Your cooking's awesome."
Mithril winked at her conspiratorially. "No problem, as long as you promise to help me when I make my evil empire and conquer the world!" She giggled crazily and turned to the refrigerator, gathering ingredients.
"I thought I heard the chattering of useless insects," came a sarcastic voice.
Natalie turned to the door once more and saw a woman her age with long, straight silver hair and jaded, midnight blue eyes. "Genevieve," she hissed dramatically, itching to plant her fist in the other woman's face. Unfortunately, she was grounded. The boss had said no more punching people for the rest of the month.
"MY LONG LOST OLDER SISTER!" Mithril gasped, referring to the physical similarity between herself and Genevieve (as well as her well-known protectiveness of children and Genevieve's little-known soft spot for them).
"Actually, that's impossible," Kara said calmly, walking into the room. "I have data on every member of the organization, and your DNA doesn't match at all."
"Kara!" Mithril exclaimed brightly. You see, ever since she was a little girl, Mithril knew what she wanted to do with her life. She would use her evil genius to create an evil empire filled with evil people all working evilly under the evil her. And as everyone knows, an evil empire needs an evil mad scientist. And while Kara wasn't a nutter like her co-workers, she was a scientist, and she was evil. As a result, Mithril always attempted to recruit her. "Would you like some flapjacks?!"
Kara shook her head, icy blue curls flying around (she made a mental note to learn how to tie up a bun-her long hair got in the way of her work efficiency, and there was no way she was going to cut it short). "No, thank you. It is unlikely to provide me much nutritional value, and I already ate." She glanced at the black-haired boy behind her. "What about you, 700?"
"No," the boy said in a monotonous tone, his green eyes blank and unemotional. "I merely require nutrition pills. Also... Everyone, I ask you to stop staring at me."
"Wimp," Genevieve muttered under her breath.
"Come on, Sparkers!" Mithril hollered. She had met him while he was on a mission under the alias of Sparky Sparky Boom Man, and he had been Sparkers to her ever since. "You'll never make friends if you don't like them looking at you!"
700 lifted up the collar of his impressive brown trench coat and shifted behind Kara, who he was most comfortable around-they were unemotional buddies. Being a science-based person, Kara disliked silly things like feelings, and 700 was pretty much unemotional, period. Thus, they got along well. If you can call that being friends... Though they did indulge in a game of chess now and then. Due to their impressive intellect, 700 and Kara's chess matches were legendary within the group, and even the cold and uncaring Genevieve and Leon went to watch.
And speaking of Leon, the man himself walked in with a bag in his hand, scooting past Kara and 700. "Hey," he said quietly.
"LEON!" Natalie and Mithril exclaimed, rushing to their comrade. "Did you bring back a souvenir?! Did you, did you, did you?!" Their eyes were fastened not on the dirty-blonde-haired man's face, but on the package in his hand.
Leon sighed and handed over the bag. "Grapes from Olivine City," he explained.
"Cool!" Mithril exclaimed happily. "I can cook these into the flapjacks!"
"The flapjacks... OH MY ARCEUS MITH THE FLAPJACKS!" Natalie screaming, bolting to the stove and flipping them. Unfortunately, she was too late-they were already burned.
"Ack!" Mithril panicked. "Uh... Leon, just sit tight and wait while I cook the next batch! I know how much you like grapes!" Natalie as the right-hand woman, Kara as the mad scientist-Mithril knew she would also need a strongarm to start her evil empire. As Leon was a skilled swordfighter and tolerated her, and Genevieve pretty much hated her, Mithril abandoned all attempts to convince the silver-haired party pooper and was trying her best to butter up the dark-green-eyed blonde before popping the question. Then she'd be able to threaten Kara with him if the oldest of their group didn't want to join her.
Leon closed his eyes and said four words: "The boss is coming."
Everyone froze in their activities, then moved into action again. Mithril started praying to some sports god, Natalie adjusted her hat over and over again, Tiki climbed in and hid, Genevieve started pacing, Kara quickly made sure the files in her spacious lab coat pockets were in order, and 700 decided to sit down.
A dark, shrouded figure in a dark, shrouding cloak strode into the room.
"Greetings, my minions!" he announced grandly. "I can tell you are all delighted to see me by the pale, terrified looks on your faces!"
They all bowed, even the crazy Mithril. "Sir."
Suddenly heat radiated off of him. "Why are you not doing the awesome secret handshake I made up?!" he demanded.
"Sir, we-" Kara started, her voice only trembling slightly.
The boss cut them off. "Never mind, it looked ugly anyway."
They all did their best and managed to refrain from sweatdropping. Well, except for 700. 700 never sweatdropped.
"NOW! Stand to attention and slap the minion to your right!" Boss commanded.
"Sir!" They all slapped the minion to their right, except for Mithril, who was at the right end of the line. Mithril slapped the burnt flapjacks.
"Now they're SLAPjacks!" she exclaimed, unable to help herself at the perfect oppurtunity for a joke. Natalie gave her a thumbs up behind her back.
The boss glowered at her. "No unauthorized jokes! 50 wall-head-bashes! NOW!"
Just as Mithril was about to bash her head into the wall, the boss stopped her.
"Just kidding! That was a good joke, kid. Have a cookie." He gestured to one of the slapjacks, which he apparently thought were cookies.
Mithril wanted to tell him that they weren't cookies, but then, she wanted to tell him a great many things. Like how her paycheck was minimum wage, and he left his dirty laundry (cloaks) everywhere, and his plan was a stupid one. After all, she would someday overthrow him and take over The Organization! ...Just not now. She was still, er, gathering strength. So she ate a slapjack.
"Now, my little minions, gather around," he ordered. "Group huddle!"
They stood in awkward circle and listened.
"Alright, so here's the next stage in the plan..."
Up in the tower, Lyra was wondering what happened to her screen time. After all, she was supposed to be really popular, right? The authoress's favorite and all. So why did she sit in the tower doing nothing important to the plot the whole chapter? Maybe the author hated her. She'd better sacrifice another voodoo doll in the visage of Orange to the gods... Or perhaps go on a rampage destroying a bunch of creepy Victorian dolls...
Lapis paid a visit to a shrine. Five stone statues stood within: Arceus, the creator. Giratina, the warden. Dialga, the time-keeper. Palkia, the space-controller. And Mew, the bringer of life. Also known as... Arceus, the one with a '90s television memory (though there was no such thing as television in this world). Giratina, the not-eater of Shaymin. Dialga, the cheater who used Roar of Time twice in a row with no cooldown period. Palkia, the pink dragon dude. And Mew, the cute pink thing that does cool stuff.
Lapis brought the charred remains of all the onions he had bought in town as an offering. He loaded it into the offerings catapult and shot it towards Arceus's mouth. "Please help me find 'em..." the brunette muttered.
However, Palkia apparently liked onions, because a pink vortex opened up before the burnt root veggies reached the statue's mouth. Two people tumbled out, both younger and shorter than him. The slightly taller of the two, a girl, stood up. "Before anything else happens, I just wanna say: this is all my fault!" she announced, adjusting her glasses.
The boy stood up. "Before anything else happens, I just wanna say: this is all her fault!" he announced, pointing at the girl to his side.
She glared daggers at him. "I already said that," she hissed. Then she turned back to Lapis, who was gaping. "Sorry to startle you. We came here to help you with your quests. The onions are in the care of an old man who hates bratty kids climbing up his mountain, and they are going to be turned into yogurt."
Lapis stared at her oddly. "Um... Are you sane, kid?"
She glared at him. "I'm only a year or two younger than you, thank you very much, so DON'T comment on my height." She nudged the shorter boy forward. "Come on, your turn."
"So, you'll find Orange near a smokstack, in a pink shack, with a pink whack!"
The girl smiled. "There, was that so hard?" She waved goodbye to Lapis, and the two shorties vanished with a POOF!, leaving behind a thoroughly confuzzled ninja.
Silver walked into the werewolf camp. Unfortunately, all the werewolves had passed out the second the silver-eyed man walked into camp with his laser glare. He stalked up to the werewolf king and glared viciously.
"Reveal Lyra's location, or you will DIE. And I will make you SUFFER before you die," Silver snarled.
"I KNOW A LOT OF LYRAS! PLEASE DON'T KILL ME!" the werewolf king shrieked. "MY SISTER-IN-LAW LYRA IS OVER THERE!" He pointed at one of the passed out wolves. "THERE ARE TWO PEASANT GIRLS NAMED LYRA IN THE NEARBY VILLAGE, ONE WITH FRECKLES AND THE OTHER WITH A LYRE!"
"I am looking for a girl who looks much like me," Silver said coldly. "She was kidnapped a few nights ago."
"I DON'T KNOW ANY LYRAS WITH SILVER EYES! GO ASK THE MERMAID QUEEN!" the werewolf king wailed, practically sobbing by now.
Silver sighed. He heard from the previous captain that the mermaid queen was a seasoned bargainer who always demanded expensive jewelry in return for information. This was going to be a pain... Ah, well. It was time to call on his elder sister for help and fight a bargainer with a bargainer...
Petal: We finished in a day, and it's our longest chapter! Whoo!
Copper: Hey, look what I found in the mail! A voodoo doll in the visage of Orange!
Petal: O.O Uh, that's nice... Please review!
