~ Meteor Mashed! ~

...

After a while of back-and-forth cake-hurling, there was no longer a surface in Cofagrigus' room that wasn't covered with sticky icing. Lombre had made a fort of ruined cakes behind Cofagrigus' table, stocking up on countless ammunition and armed with her trusty rolling pin. Rem, meanwhile, had taken shelter behind Cofagrigus' throne, making more of his innovative bombs.

You'd wonder how they were going to clean up the whole room before Cofagrigus came back, but at that moment, the thought hadn't crossed their minds yet. The only thing they had in mind was that they needed to defeat the other, and that none of them was about to cease fire. In fact, they were now about to begin attacking again since Lombre had a dripping slice of cake in her hand and Rem had one of his bombs in his. They both threw their weapons at the same time...

And suddenly, the door opened.

A face poked into the room, unfortunately at exactly the wrong time.

Since Cofagrigus' throne and Rem's shelter were directly opposite the door, it was no surprise that his bomb might stray to ridiculous destinations, such as the unlucky visitor's face. The visitor, however, got taken completely by surprise.

Darwynette de la Verde let out a high-pitched scream when Rem's highly effective bomb collided with her face, instantly coating her face and the white petals on her head with sticky goo. Her hands flew to her face, attempting to wipe it off.

Once she had succeeded in more or less clearing up her face, she glared at Rem. (Lombre was invisible and amazingly hadn't heard a thing due to being buried in a mound of ruined cake that was her fort.)

"You!" Darwin howled. "The rowdy pairing, I should have known! Look what you've done, it'll take hours to clear my petals of this disgusting, sticky stuff!"

"Sorry," said Rem breezily, readying another bomb.

Darwin wasn't quite finished yet. "I knew you two would come up with barbaric ideas like this. Only Pokémon like you could come up with a food fight to spend a special, romantic day!" She stamped her feet when lemon yellow icing dripped onto her forehead. "You two are obnoxious, immature, out of your right minds, and disgusting! That's right - totally, utterly, absolutely disgusting!"

Then she disappeared outside again, slamming the door behind her.

Finally, Lombre poked her head out of her mound of ruined cake. "Who was that? It wasn't Cofagrigus, was it?"

"No." Rem rolled his eyes. "It was some Roserade with a bad temper."

"Darwin." Lombre knew exactly who it was. "What'd she say?"

"Oh, stuff like how obnoxious and immature and out of our right minds and disgusting we are. Emphasis on disgusting."

"Oh, that." Lombre shrugged lightly. "That's expected of her. Although I have to wonder why she isn't with Tepig... But whatever. Carry on."

Rem grinned and threw the bomb he was holding.

SPLAT.

Oops. Lopunny is grimacing. Darwin wouldn't have liked that at all. (And neither would she if she had been in Darwin's place. She would have High Jump Kicked Rem for sure, that disgusting Whimsicott.

Well, at least two certain Pokémon are having fun, however abnormal the activity is...

Meanwhile, back at the cafe, Treecko and Amelia had been joking around about the possibility of Rem and Lombre having a food fight. They pictured the two of them building forts out of ruined cake and making sticky secret weapons. They pictured Cofagrigus' room looking as if a bomb filled with cake had hit it. It was an imaginatively funny picture, indeed.

Amelia chuckled, and then shook her head. "Uh... what were we talking about before they came?"

"You were telling me that you used to get teased for evolving into an Umbreon."

"Oh yeah." Amelia rolled her eyes. "Well, why don't we talk about more enlightening topics, huh? What were we doing before we talked about that?"

"We were singing."

"Oh yeah!" Amelia's eyes lit up. Treecko noticed that she had considerably become more talkative. That's because she opens up to people she quite likes, he thought. He couldn't help but blush again.

"Speaking of singing, I'm actually writing a new song," Amelia said, taking out a few papers from who-knows-where. "Would you like to listen to it? I also need your feedback, Treecko. It's not often that I meet someone who's as passionate about these stuff as me and doesn't think I'm weird."

Treecko scooted a tiny bit closer to her and looked at the papers. Some of them contained song lyrics, but he also found that she also liked writing stories. In short, she was the really artsy kind of Umbreon.

He looked down and started to read the lyrics of Amelia's new song.

"Hmm, let me see..."

...

Some time later, Amelia's new song was finished. She tried singing it in that beautiful, musical voice of hers, and Treecko, typically, joined in not long after. This time he dared sing a little louder. His voice was not bad at all for someone who hardly ever practiced the art.

When they were finished, Amelia was ecstatic.

"Oh, that was marvelous!" she exclaimed happily. "Your ideas were awesome, Treecko! You're really good with words." She beamed at him.

Treecko's face went even redder. Like he had been with giving compliments, he also rarely got them from girls in Amelia's group. He wasn't used to it at all.

"Uh... th-thanks?"

Amelia laughed. "You're stammering again!"

And again, Treecko found himself being saved by the arrival of yet another Pokémon.

"Bravo, bravo, très bien."

They looked up with surprise and saw Darwin emerge from behind a cotton candy machine.

"I have to admit that was really cool," said the Roserade when she came to their table. "You two have nice voices. Yup, you make a really cute couple; almost as cute as Hypno and I."

Treecko's face went red again, this time because of annoyance.

"Were you eavesdropping on us?" he asked coldly.

Darwin glared. "Eavesdropping? Oh, so I compliment you and that's what I get in return?" She sniffed and stuck her nose in the air. "Huh, I shouldn't have expected more from young ones like you."

Amelia, however, had been staring at the white petals on Darwin's head. She squinted.

"Wait... is that lemon meringue on your petals...?"

"What?!" Darwin looked alarmed and quickly grabbed a sheet of tissue from the table, furiously trying to wipe her petals clean. "Oh, no. Non non non non non! I already told them getting this sticky stuff off my petals would be the death of me. I thought I'd cleaned everything up, but... argh! Now my roses are all sticky too!"

Amelia got another tissue and attempted to help her. "What just happened?"

"They had a food fight, of course!" Darwin snapped furiously. "They had to be in the middle of a stupid food fight the exact second I went in."

She finally threw her arms up and gave up.

"Whatever," she said, grabbing the tissue out of Amelia's paw. "I'm going. I can't stand this awful muckiness." With that, she began to walk away, lemon meringue still dripping onto her forehead. Treecko and Amelia could still hear her complaining as she got farther and farther.

What was more unfortunate for our poor Darwin was that she'd been so frustrated that she'd forgotten to ask Treecko and Amelia whether or not they'd seen Hypno.

Back at the cafe, Treecko turned to Amelia in disbelief.

"You were right," he said. "They had a food fight."

Amelia laughed.

Lopunny shakes her head, still feeling bad for Darwin. Karma certainly came and bit her. Hard.

However, she is thrilled with the progress Pairing 2: Treecko x Amelia is making. At first, they were as cold as the inside of Blizzard Cave, but now they're singing and making up songs together. How adorable!

Meanwhile, Storm and Roselio were far from doing anything adorable. In fact, they – or rather, Roselio – had gotten themselves into a hard-to-get-out-of tangle with the FANGS. Storm saw that type-wise, the thugs had advantage over them, and they were helplessly surrounded.

For the first time in a long while, she began to doubt her own battling abilities. She doubted if they could get out of this fix that smoothly. She became even surer of that when she remembered that she and Roselio were still injured after their battle earlier.

As the FANGS closed in, Roselio gulped. "Uhh, Storm, I honestly think we're in dire need of a plan right now."

Now Storm felt like strangling him for real! He was the one who got us into this mess, she thought, and now he's pestering me for plans. Hopeless. He's just hopeless when it comes to stuff like this.

Krokorok sneered as the FANGS reduced Storm's and Roselio's ground slowly but surely...

Wait.

Ground.

That's it!

Suddenly Storm remembered about her fourth move. It might just be their ticket out of there! She suddenly grabbed Roselio by his arm and shouted, "Hang on!"

At that exact moment, the FANGS lunged forward at them, but were surprised when they only struck thin air – Storm and Roselio had simply vanished. The only thing left of them was a hole in the ground.

"Poison Jab!"

The weird occurence of Bellsprout suddenly slamming onto the ground out cold next to Krokorok made him turn around, just in time to see the Pikachu and the Roselia land on the ground perfectly, the latter executing a perfect somersault and drawing his thorny vines back into his roses.

"What the-?!" Krokorok gasped.

Electricity was leaping out of Storm's cheeks as she smugly replied, "Oh, that? That was only a speedy escape with Dig that allowed us to emerge aboveground behind you, followed by a swift Poison Jab. Quite nifty, wouldn't you say?"

Storm had by now recovered some of her confidence. Thank Arceus I'm so used to battling that I can make split-second strategies like that, she thought. One down, three to go. Hey, they might actually win this thing after all.

Krokorok gritted his teeth. "You two! Attack!" he shouted at Magmar and Glalie. At Krokorok's command, Magmar and Glalie advanced on Roselio and Storm. Magmar was firing up a Flamethrower. Storm, meanwhile, was thinking hard. It was going to be difficult to defeat these two. She only had Dig to defeat Magmar, and Roselio was weak to their Fire- and Ice-type attacks.

Surprisingly, it was Roselio who came up with a plan.

"Go and stand in the sidelines!" he hissed to Storm. "I've got a plan."

Storm stared at him incredulously. Go and stand in the sidelines? What kind of order was that? Besides, she was the powerhouse, not him. What plan could he have to defeat these thugs?

"Go and stand in the sidelines and when Magmar fires his Flamethrower, use Dig on him," Roselio went on, nudging her urgently.

Storm didn't budge. By this time, Glalie had gone over to their other side so he was opposite Magmar with Storm and Roselio in the middle. They were flanked by the thugs on each side.

Roselio turned to Storm. "This'll work. Trust me," he said.

Storm finally had no choice but to comply. After taking a moment to glare at him, she fled and stood behind Magmar, leaving Roselio still surrounded.

Despite that, Magmar and Glalie didn't move. She wasn't the one they were after, anyway – the little Roselia was right there, and he was easy picking.

"I hope your plan doesn't involve yourself getting killed," Storm called. "I'll never know what to tell your sister if that's the case."

Roselio only smiled.

And then Magmar opened fire.

The flames got nearer and nearer, but Roselio didn't seem to have any intention to move.

Storm wondered what his plan was, but it was already time for her to go underground to get ready to use Dig. The last things she saw were the flames getting nearer yet, and that behind Roselio, Glalie was also preparing an attack. To her surprise, she felt worried about him. It was understandable – she was used to being the leader, used to knowing what will happen. Now she could only follow his orders, hoping that he knew what he was doing.

Meanwhile, up there in the line of fire, Roselio could see the flames up close. He could even feel the heat. There was a moment when the thought dear Arceus I'm not sure I know what I'm doing crossed his mind, as the flames got closer and closer and closer still. Even worse, he could see from the corner of his eye that Glalie was coming closer for an Ice Fang. Closer and closer and...

And at the last minute, he moved.

Missing the flames by that much, Roselio landed on the ground neatly and looked back just in time to see Glalie get enveloped in Magmar's fire, shouting and cursing and telling Magmar to stop. Finally, Magmar did stop, noting with amazement what he'd just done, but by that time, the damage had been done, and it was a lot of damage, too.

And that was before Storm joined in the party.

Suddenly, she burst out of the ground right from under Magmar, knocking him forward and flailing. Roselio saw his chance and hit Glalie with Poison Jab, knocking him forward in Magmar's direction. Magmar and Glalie crashed into each other in the middle and promptly fell down in a messy, stunned heap. All that happened in less than a minute.

Roselio went over to the Pikachu. "Hey, that Dig was really well-timed!" he said brightly. "Nice one!"

Storm had to smile. "And that was a daring but good plan," she said. "Not bad. Not bad at all."

Their little party was rudely interrupted by Krokorok.

"Don't be too happy yet!" he snarled, flexing his fingers and showing off his claws. "You haven't gotten past me yet!"

Storm and Roselio exchanged meaningful glances and grinned. "If you're that badly looking for a fight, we'll gladly give you one," Storm said.

With that, Krokorok growled and ran at them, trying to attack with Foul Play. His attack was too easy and Storm and Roselio could already see him coming. They both darted out of the way. Krokorok had to screech to a stop and looked back and forth between the Pikachu and the Roselia, wondering who he'd attack.

Naturally, he decided to go after Storm. Before she could do anything, he had scored a Scary Face, slowing her down. He was off the next second, charging with a Bulldoze. It hit hard, knocking her back onto the grass. She tried to use Agility to get some speed back up, but Krokorok had already beaten her to it with another Scary Face.

"Shoot," Storm thought, knowing that her speed was now severely low. If Krokorok attacked again, she wouldn't be able to dodge it. Krokorok was this time running towards her with a Foul Play (luckily he wasn't smart enough to choose Bulldoze again).

That was when Roselio simply burst out of nowhere, shooting a shower of petals from his roses. They hit the Ground-type and blocked his view for a moment. The next moment, he had drawn his vines from inside his roses and hit Krokorok with Poison Jabs.

Growling with frustration, Krokorok swiped at the pesky petals with his claws, clearing his view for a moment...

...to see Roselio's thorny vines about to hit his face.

Although Krokorok pretty much wasn't a genius, he was a fast thinker unlike Magmar and Glalie. He quickly used Swagger on the Roselia, making his next attacks miss.

Now Krokorok could concentrate on Storm. He used Foul Play again and again (see, I did say he wasn't a genius), whittling at her health. Storm gasped when she fell to the ground again, the breath knocked out of her.

Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Roselio snap out of his confusion and stand up, dazed. She also saw Krokorok coming in with another Foul Play. She knew she couldn't take much more of this. She braced herself for the knockout blow...

Aaah! Lopunny covers her eyes with her fluffy ears. She can't bear to watch...

Dear reader, tell Lopunny when it's over, yeah?

...

Axew looked pleased when Braixen told him that she and Breloom were going to sign up for the Power Bash.

"Ah, finally, a Meteor Mash-up pairing who decides to play Power Bash," he said happily. "You see, every fourteenth of February, we have a special kind of Power Bash because of the Meteor Mash-up. Instead of going up there alone, you get to go in a pair. So that means you're going together, and the other non-Meteor Mash-up participants are supposed to find a teammate to play with. Haxorus and Lopunny were the ones who thought of this idea to make the Meteor Mash-up even more fun—"

"Yeah yeah, we get it," Braixen interrupted impatiently. "Please, can't we just sign up now? And if it's possible, I'd like to participate in the same game Hariyama is participating in."

"Oh, Hariyama, is it? Yes, I'm sure I can arrange that. But why would you want to go up against Hariyama? He's one of our best Power Bashers so far."

"So if we win against this Hariyama guy, we'd be beating the reigning champion," Braixen said in satisfaction. "That's even better, then."

Axew shrugged. "Well, OK, if that's what you wish. Here you go, Miss, two passes into the 5.00 PM Power Bash, the same one in which Hariyama is participating."

"Great!" Braixen laughed, accepting the passes from Axew.

... Reigning champion, huh? Well then, Hariyama must be really tough.

Lopunny hopes that Pairing 1: Breloom x Braixen really is as good as how Braixen implied. Please. Lopunny doesn't need any more pairings to go wrong at this point, thank you very much. Or is that too much to ask?

It's been a chapter filled with fights (except for Pairing 2: Treecko x Amelia, who are sitting close to each other making songs), from food fights to fights with thugs to fights picked with intimidatingly tough reigning champions. Stay in your seats and stay tuned on Wish Park FM, people. This had better have a good ending.