CHAPTER 12: A cold and quick romance

Time passed and Ash was going to his last gym badge. He went to Virbank City with that objective. They were walking to the port, but on the way, they met with Georgia, Iris's rival, who was going to a research lab for a type of moss that improves the skills of Pokémon. Ash, Iris and Cilan followed her to reach there, it sounded fun.

In the lab experimented with some Ferroseed. They, by being stuck to rocks, launched spikes that became in moss. Depending of the type of rock, also changed the qualities of the moss, like its color. They also experimented with the moss, how strong they are, how absorbed water, the strength that can exert to them, etc.

When they were in the fourth flour, Georgia asked to the tour manager if he had a moss to his newly-caught Vanilluxe. She caught it to beat Iris, the problem was the Snowstorm Pokémon became fond with Iris's Axew, and the two were afraid of ice types. The Dragon Buster took out her Pokémon to show to the lab worker. After taking out of its Poké ball, Vanilluxe turned around to see Iris's Axew, and winked two of its four eyes.

What nobody expected was that, after the taking out the ice type, Ash's Oshawott also went out from his Poké Ball. The reason? He was in love with Georgia's Vanilluxe. No one except him knew why. It could be that it was like a sale, two girls for the price of one, sounded alright. It seems that the coldness of the Snowstorm Pokémon would cool down the love heat of the otter. It would do a warm and nice combination so the love between them produces, according to his own words.

Vanilluxe came closer to Iris's Axew, and that made him so uncomfortable, so he had to escape, and the ice type Pokémon went after him, at the same time Oshawott went after her, completely in love, in turn Iris was in search of Axew. The dragon Pokémon ran with a lot of fear as fast as he could and got to the roof of the building. Vanilluxe was still pursuing the Tusk Pokémon and behind her came Oshawott in love for the ice type, saying thing lovely things like: "Vanilluxe, don't go away! I love you! Do you wanna be my girlfriend? Say yes, please!"

The Snowstorm Pokémon had enough of the otter flirting her non-stop. She wanted to be with Axew, no with Oshawott. She turned around and said in the coldest way possible: "Get out of here!" as she used Icy Wind on the aquatic Pokémon. He noticed the maneuver and tried to protect himself with his scalchop from the wind, but he froze anyways. Afterwards, he got free from the ice, he said angrily to his valued object, throwing it to the ground with force: "Useless thing!", but in second thought, it was his valued object after all. He came closer and picked it and put it in his belly. He could recover some of the pride and dignity.

'Argh, darn it!' thought Oshawott in his mind. Rejected again by another female Pokémon, but that time didn't hurt him so much for some reason, it didn't make a deep hole in his heart. He wanted to be more optimist, maybe next time he would get.

Afterwards, Iris appeared to save Axew from Georgia's Vanilluxe. The ice type Pokémon still wanted to be closer to the small dragon. After that inconvenient, the situation was calmed and everyone decided to go where their friends were; however, by opening the gate, a kind of water-green-colored moss with static electricity appeared in front of them, that covered all the walls. Everyone got surprised. The gate closed later and next to there was a video call, where showed the others that were underground to avoid danger. Cilan was talking and said that the moss of the third floor grew ran out of control and only affected electric type and ground type Pokémon, fortunately the humans wouldn't be affected.

Then, Oshawott saw the moss was spreading between the gates and coming closer to them. Everyone had to run away from there. They went to the other side of the roof. They saw with their own eyes that the moss had spread in the whole city. They were trapped. Iris took out her Excadrill and Emolga so they got rid of it, but they were affected by the spores, being ground type and electric type respectively, so Iris had to returned them back to their Poké Balls. The moss was coming closer quicker to them. What could they do now?

Oshawott used Water Gun in the moss and held it back for some seconds, nevertheless, the moss grew up even more. All of them were over to the anomaly. It was their end. Everything changed when Vanilluxe used Icy Wind in the moss and froze it, after freezing it completely, the moss disappeared totally. It just left a trail of shining particles of ice in the air. They realized that ice type moves affected effectively the moss. If they continued like that they could escape. So, Iris ordered to the Snowstorm Pokémon that used Icy Wind in the moss to make way.

Oshawott was happy to continue living thanks to Vanilluxe, despite she rejected him coldly, but the otter was still thankful for the ice type Pokémon anyways.

The objective now was to reach the third floor and stop the Ferroseed so they didn't make more moss. They got to the room where the Ferroseed were and Vanilluxe used Icy Wind, but the Thorn Seed Pokémon launched more and more moss that spread quickly. They couldn't hold it and couldn't go further. Just then, appeared Georgia with her Beartic to clean up the place, with them were Cilan and the lab's professor, with some objects in his hands. The last one activated the devices that he brought, that did that the Ferroseed could be contained bringing them to the machinery with electricity. But not everything went as expected, the grass-steel type Pokémon escaped from the devices, the energy that they had was too much.

They released more moss, Vanilluxe and Beartic used ice type moves quickly, but sadly they couldn't continue attacking because they were very exhausted. It was better not pushing them anymore. The moss was spreading everywhere, until Ash came and took Pignite out from his Poké ball, he used Flamethrower and made put still the Ferroseed. Next, the young man returned Pignite and Ash ordered his Pikachu to absorb the electricity of the Thorn Seed Pokémon. Cilan took Stunfisk out to help Pikachu and put on the Ferroseed and absorbed their electricity. Iris and company could cross the room and they could reunite with their friends.

Later, they drained completely the grass-steel Pokémon's energy. Pikachu and Stunfisk were full of electricity in their bodies, and their trainers ordered to them that freed the energy outside. The two electric Pokémon took the remaining electricity out of the building. Oshawott was close to the window seeing how the electric lighting went to the outside. He noticed that a lightning came towards him, and he quickly deflected with his scalchop, and the lightning went to the others, electrocuting them. The otter noticed what he did, misfortunately, he also was affected by the electricity. The good thing was that nobody was seriously injured and all the problem with the moss solved completely.

After saying goodbye to Georgia, Ash, Iris and Cilan went to the port and took a cruise towards Virkbank City, hoping to get the eighth gym badge for Ash.