"I thought… we were going to go to Birth Island today," Cynthia spoke softly, as the two trainers cleaned their makeshift kitchen in the aftermath of Austin's self-created disaster.

"Yeah, well I thought I'd just make something for you,"- Austin observed the sudden stiffness in her posture as he uttered the words—"you know."

"For… what? The training?" Cynthia asked a slight tinge of melancholy in her tone.

"Not… really. I just decided to make some changes today."

"I thought… as your tutor, you are supposed to run all the decisions through me." The Sinnoh girl muttered as she cleaned out a couple of plates.

"I'm allowed some lenience on my birthday."

"…"

"…"

Cynthia turned to face him. "Today's your birthday?"

"… Yeah?"

She looked at him blankly for a moment, gathering her words. "So… what exactly are these… caskets doing around here? And why exactly are you trying to burn half the island?"

Austin chuckled at her sardonic tone. "Um… because I wanted to spend the day with my friend?"

That stopped her short.

Austin sighed. "Look I'm sorry. I know what I said that day was kind 'of unfair on you, and I lost it in anger, and-"

"So this is your way of trying to patch things up?" Cynthia returned in a somewhat cold tone. "You think that I am angry at you, and for not training you properly? I assure you that I am not."

"No, No!" Austin waved his hands animatedly. "I just… look I'm sorry okay? I just… you know I never really got the time to even digest that you are you… and you are a Champion… and-"

"You could fool me." Cynthia deadpanned. "You remind me more of that fact than myself."

"Look," Austin was getting nigh uncomfortable now. He sighed. "You know what happened right? With the cruise and Raticate and Mewtwo and-"

"I fail to see the point."

"I'm coming to that." Austin nearly yelled. Gosh, this is difficult.

"My point is, with all that happening and you offering me to train my pokémon, it influenced me to think that-"

"Oh, so this is my fault," Cynthia replied, her expression choleric.

"Will you allow me to complete it?" Austin yelled uncharacteristically, shutting her up midway.

Silence.

"Well?" the Sinnoh girl demanded after a moment.

"I miss my friend," Austin confessed. "And I know that it is because of my stupidity. I didn't really care about you being the Champion, but when you offered to help train me… somewhere in that, I forgot about my friend Shirona and I just focussed on the training, and I completely ignored the fact that you chose to sacrifice your vacation for me and,"—he gulped seeing the dangerously calm expression on her face, "—and I will just shut up now."

A second passed away.

Another second passed away.

Cynthia's expressions remained inscrutable.

"…. Umm… you aren't going to kill me now, are you?"

" ….. "

" ..… "

Finally, her lips parted. "I did not sacrifice my vacation. I chose to spend it with you."

Austin swallowed. All right, at least this was better than the silent treatment. "Cynthia… I'm sorry."

"For what?" The cool, cynical reply came.

"For ignoring my friend. I… I overreacted about your treatment with Charmander, and I completely ignored that my friend chose to spend her vacation with me, and that means that I should not ignore her, just like she doesn't ignore my own need for training. I just…" he paused, "—I just feel like I've been behaving like an asshole completely and I wanted to make this vacation special for you and I even brought you some ice cream, and I—mmmmh!"

The last words remained unsaid as Cynthia pushed a finger against his lips. "Anybody ever tell you, that you talk too much? And you can mention that my actions were wrong with my treatment of Charmander, for that an apology is necessary."

" I don't think I am the right person to apologize to."

" Then do you want me to go apologies to Charmeleon?"

" Yes."

A little grin spread across the girl's rosy lips. "Alright, I will apologize to Charmeleon however You and I are going to spend this day having fun and nothing else. Is that understood?"

"Uh-hmmm."

"Good." Cynthia's lips twisted into a grin. "Now I need to go back in and change into proper clothes"—Austin just realized that she was still in her pajamas- "and then we are going to celebrate your birthday together. Is that understood?"

Austin gulped. "Crystal."

"Good." She turned away, a spring visible on her every step. She took a few steps towards her tent, before she stopped and spun back, a sublime expression on her face. "What did you mention about ice cream again?"

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"I'm not sure if this is a good idea, you know."

Cynthia rolled her eyes, as she stared at the just-turned-eleven trainer, who was only dressed in his swimming trunks, looking oddly uncomfortable about the entire situation. She had shed her nightwear and gotten into a comfortable two-piece swimsuit, one that only managed to accentuate her curves, causing the most natural reaction from the transmigrated trainer. Even with the body of a ten-year-old, Austin still was a 15-year-old in mind so he was trying not to stare and was failing miserably at it.

"You wanted to have fun, so this is my idea of having fun." The Sinnoh Champion grinned.

After the awkward end of their conversation, Austin had treated Cynthia to his entire stash of ice cream. He had gotten all thirteen flavors, unsure of her favorites, though it had hardly helped matters. For one, he certainly didn't anticipate an ice-cream lover like her to just stare in wonder (and extreme focus?) at the different flavors for over half an hour, unable to decide which one to take. He had asked her to try all the flavors and knock herself out, but in reality, her answer was the one that knocked him out.

"Well, every one of them looks great… but where would I put them all?"

After fifteen more minutes, she had settled with a triple cone of chocolate, strawberry, cookies, and cream, much to his eternal gratitude, to whichever deity had listened to his prayers, and taken pity on him.

And now, she had the bright idea to go surfing on Milotic into the sea, and not just that, she wanted Austin to join him.

The Sinnoh Champion was an adrenaline junkie.

Go figure.

"Come now, Austin. It will be fun." She emphasized, before pulling Austin's arm with her towards Milotic who was already on the water, ready for surfing.

"Hold tight. It's going to get messy in a while."

An extremely self-conscious Austin held her waist tightly, as she held on to Milotic's red hair, which protruded from the temples all the way down to the ground, having a length closer to two feet.

"All set, Milo… let's go!" Cynthia pulled the hairs backward almost as if pulling a Ponyta's rein, as Milotic let out an enthusiastic warble, before shooting into the waters at night unbelievable speeds, literally parting the sea on two sides as it shot, with water spraying upwards all over, drenching Cynthia and Austin- the former laughing uncontrollably while the later shrieking like a little girl.

"Are you having fun?" Cynthia yelled aloud, knowing very well that it would be otherwise difficult to converse, what with the sound of the waters parting on both sides.

Austin just held on to her waist for dear life. He had nearly slipped off Milotic's body several times and had almost fallen. At her words, he simply held on tighter, wondering why on earth he had subjected himself to this torment.

Cynthia laughed. "We can stop by for a moment, and then continue if you want."

"Don't stop," Austin yelled back. "Once I am getting down, there's no way I'm getting back up on this."

Milotic let out another warble, almost as if in answer, and shot ahead, if possible at increased speeds.

Another hour later, an overwhelmed Austin and an excited Cynthia got themselves off Milotic, who let out another warble before leaping into the depths of the sea, vanishing from sight.

"She loves doing it." Cynthia chirped. "Did you have fun?"

Austin muttered something incomprehensible under his breath.

Cynthia laughed. "It's an acquired taste, Austin. Just try it and you'll love it." She paused. "On second thought, maybe we should try that out."

" How ?!"

" With Squirtle of course ."

Austin looked at her, horrified. "Uh… Cynthia. You know I'm sorry, right? Please don't punish me anymore."

Cynthia's grin only turned wider.

He took a step back. "You are not going to go for that now, are you?"

The Sinnoh Champion smirked. "It would be fun, but… some other time, I suppose."

Austin sighed, elated.

"-after lunch, that is."

His eyes shot up in horror.

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[ Omake Paragraph: Tales of the Ketchup Addiction ]

As trainers go on their journey, they learn many new things about their partners which makes them into who they are but for some reason, all Pikachu trainers' have noted that a strange addiction falls upon their furry little friends.

This has caused a few trainers to make a few thinly defined rules but there was one rule that stood above all else. Stay away from Pikachu's ketchup otherwise, your body will be torn apart and you will be sentenced to eternal torment.

Every meal that a Pikachu had would be drowned in ketchup. To put it simply, Pikachu was a ketchup addict and what the trainers had seen so far was a Pikachu will never try to fight its addiction.

A trainer from the Johto region once tried to cure his Pikachu's addiction by using twelve easy steps.

Step # 1: Proving Ketchup's power over Pikachu, which had resulted in the poor Pikachu being held by a psychic type while he was tormented as the spoon full of the nectar of the Gods was brought closer, ever so close to his mouth and then the devil ( trainer ) would take it away.

The night after the trainer was found by a couple of his friends who were horrified by what they had seen.

The unspeakable things that Pikachu had done to the young man with a spoon, a handkerchief, and a ketchup bottle had sparked an international debate on the issue with some input from Professor Oak about it since Ketchup contained a chemical that caused the Pikachu line to experience a sense of euphoria.

The international debate had resulted in absolutely nothing like all international debates actually but one thing is for sure, ketchup and a Pikachu had resulted in the traumatizing of multiple young men and women on that fateful night.