operation: melt

Chapter 1: attempts(?)

(A/N: this is absolute brainrot you can skip this)

— some time after the prolougue —

Parasol gave Confetti a thumbs-up, amiling in encouragement as she pushed Confetti nearby Grenade, specifically a few metres away. "You can do it, Confetti!" Para had exclaimed, who gave her a thumbs-up and a smile of encouragement hiding in a nearby bush. Confetti, anxiety filling her whole body, walked over to Grenade and awkwardly tapped him on the shoulder with trembling hands.

"H-hey," she stammered, smiling at him despite the cold aura radiating from him, "I'm Confetti. You know, the new phighter.. you're Grenade, right? If it's okay with you, do.. you want to get to know each other?" Grenade, listening to her, let out a snarky scoff before responding, "I'm not interested in knowing someone from Theives' Den, lest a lady like you."

Confetti nodded, turning to walk back to Para. "So.. actually he doesn't want to talk to me," Confetti said softly, before adding, "He doesn't want to kno–"

"So what?" Para replied. "He's got to open up anyway! He's like a teenager not getting past his emo phase!" Confetti, on hearing that, sighed. This wasn't going to be easy. "But at least he didn't throw a grenade at me!"

As she walked with Para, she could have sworn she heard a safety pin drop onto the ground and something landing in the grass.

That was attempt #1.

———

(Attempt #2 was still a failure, but also an accident.)

Confetti was walking out of Slingshot's Cat Cafe, caramel latte in hand as she walked out of the establishment. Making a beeline to the nearest rubbish bin after finishing it, she accidentally collided with someone larger than her.

Looking up, she looked up to see Grenade talking to Para. In contrast to Parasol's excited and cheerful expression Grenade's face showed a mix of irritation and annoyance. "What are you doing here?" Grenade asked Confetti, his patience wearing down by the minute. Confetti gulped, pushing away all thoughts of anxiety before stammering out, "J-just going to throw.. uh, this cup." She looked away from the both of them, embarassment clouding her features. Noticing the aura of negativity radiating from Grenade, she said, "I'll go throw this now, I guess I'll see you two around!" With that, she skittled away, leaving behind a very annoyed Grenade and a confused Parasol.

Confetti heaved a sigh of relief, feeling like she had dodged a bullet.

———

Confetti felt like she wanted to give up, but after Para had bribed Subspace with giving him some of the crystals she possessed, she changed her mind.

By midnight, the trio was tinkering with Grenade's gear, making it so as it would be harmless. Confetti, thinking it would be nice put some confetti in it while Parasol added a squeaky rubber duck sound to it. Subspace did most of the testing, making sure it was harmless before giving it back to Parasol. "I'm not doing this again, you two commonners are too low to have some time from the greatest scientist of Blackrock!" Subspace had said, adding, "You two lowerlifes are just lucky I was free and running out of crystals to experiment on!" Parasol on hearing that just scoffed, retorting, "Yeah, says the one who was so easily bribed by just being offered crystals–"

"Shut up, young child!"

 Confetti giggled softly as she saw the scientist and the umbrella holder bicker. The result of this thing would be amusing. As they finished in the wee hours of the morning, Para sneakily placed it where it was before, while Confetti retreated back to Theives' Den to get her beauty sleep.

In the afternoon, when Confetti was eating her egg mayo sandwich on a bench, she felt a grenade land beside her.

(We all knew who threw it.)

Instead of moving away, she placed it on the ground below her.

Meanwhile, Grenade had thrown the bomb a few feet away from where it landed, hiding in a bush watching for the result of his actions. Noticing Confetti didn't move away, his curiosity was piqued, so he stayed there to watch.

As the grenade detonated with a 'squeak', it left behind a flurry of confetti and glitter, some landing on the ground while some landed on Confetti's hair. Seeing this, Grenade felt a mix of emotions well up in him; amusement and confusion. Amusement at how it detonated, confusion for how it turned out. He stood there for a few minutes, pondering what had happened.

That's until it hit him: his gear was tinkered with.

By who? Grenade didn't think it was Confetti, but it could surely be Parasol or Subspace. He suspected the two, not knowing it was all three who had a part in this entertaining attempt of communication. He still didn't come out from his hiding play, instead going in the other direction as he walked away from the scene. But well..

It had made his day, as it was somehow entertaining, even better than destroying biografts or watching his mentor Hyperlaser feed his cat Princess.

It was cute how it resulted.

———

After a few more days of attempting every way of communication: notes, emails, snail mail, even food, nothing else seemed to work. It seemed like Grenade had stood firm on not having communication with Confetti. The pastel pink-blue angel was sitting beside Para, munching on her homemade custard puff.

"You know, he doesn't want to talk to me," Confetti said, taking a bite of her homemade pastry, before adding, "It doesn't seem to work." Para sighed, replying, "It's fine. He's just like that, it's usually quite hard to talk to him, alright?" Confetti nodded, taking another bite of her pastry as she pondered on the past few days' events.

Of course, there would be another chance. But she didn't expect it to be so soon.

Not that soon.

(A/N hmm what's gonna happen 'soon'? What's going to happen? i actually scrapped a part from the original script in my notebook, and that part was attempt 2. it was supposed to tell yall why grenaynay disliked confetti, but i edited it so the prolougue would already tell why he hated her and not put a loophole in the story. we don't always want to rely on pure gut feeling, hm?)