“I’m going to have all of you beat, hands down!” Davis proudly held up his two offerings: a plate of chocolate-chip cookies and a dish of fudge pudding. “My mom makes the best deserts!”

“Says who?” Yolei scowled at him, setting her offerings down on the table. She had a three-layer chocolate cake and a tray of cupcakes. “You’ve never even tried my mother’s cooking! When you do, you’ll be begging my forgiveness for even thinking that anyone could possibly have done better!”

“Oh yeah?” Davis set his precious food down and faced her.

“Yeah!”

“How in the world did we get talked into this?” TK put his lemon-meringue pie and cinnamon bread down beside the other treats. “It’s got to be the stupidest contest I’ve ever been roped into in my life!”

“Tell me about it.” With a weary sigh, Kari sank into a chair, waving at her offering of a strange-looking brown cake and lumpy cookies. “My mom’s never cooked anything worth mentioning in her life! I’ve got tofu-cake and lima-bean cookies!”

“Who decided that Ken got to be the judge, anyway?” Cody carefully set down his one item – a tray of double-fudge brownies with chocolate icing. “The rest of us had to talk our parents into making deserts for a stupid contest – why doesn’t he?”

“Because Ken knows everything, so he makes the perfect judge!” Davis stopped arguing with Yolei long enough to answer. “And if he was entering something, it wouldn’t be fair, would it?”

“I still don’t understand why we’re doing this,” TK cut in. “I mean, having a contest to see whose parents make the best desert? That’s kind of stupid, don’t you think?”

“No way!” Davis and Yolei said, at exactly the same time. They glared at each other.

“Besides,” Yolei added. “When the contest is over, we’ll have all of these really great deserts to eat! And then whatever’s left over, we can leave here with Kari since her mother never cooks anything without somehow involving health food!”

“Not my pudding!” Davis snatched up the bowl and cradled it to his chest protectively. “This stuff is my absolute favorite, and it’s mine! The only person who can eat any of it besides me is Ken, because he’s judging!”

“Oh brother.” Kari rolled her eyes, but she was still smiling. “Well, Ken’s not here yet, so what did you guys want to do while we’re waiting?” Before they could answer, she got up and unlocked the door a little. “I’ll leave this open so he can just come in when he gets here.”

“Great! Then he can come in and tell all of you guys just who gets the best deserts every night!” Davis grinned. “I don’t even know why the rest of you bother trying! I mean, it’s obvious that I’m gonna win…”

“Hah!” Yolei bent to glare him in the face. “The only thing you could win is a ‘who has the largest head’ contest! Besides, my mother makes better deserts than your parents could ever even dream of!”

“You wish! My mom makes the best chocolate pudding ever! She’s got her own special recipe, and no one can ever get enough!” Davis grinned at the pudding in his arms. “It’s my favorite dinner treat ever!”

“Yeah? Well the only reason you can say that now is because you haven’t tried my mom’s cupcakes!” Yolei’s fingers were twitching dangerously, and her eyes narrowed. “They’re out of this world!”

“Yeah, because that’s probably where the people with good taste threw ’em,” Davis shot back, smirking. “After you eat my mom’s stuff…”

“Are you insulting my mom’s cooking?” Yolei demanded. She looked furious.

“Well… no offense, but compared to my pudding…” Davis grinned in a superior way. “It’s just not the same. This is the best thing anyone could ever eat! Not like yours…”

“You’re so full of yourself, it’s unbelievable!” Yolei’s voice had risen to a shriek. She picked up a cupcake. “Eat this, you jerk!” And then, without warning, she shoved it right into his face, hard.

“Yolei!” Kari sprang to her feet. TK was moving toward the two of them already, ready to try and separate them. Cody shrank down behind the coach. He knew Yolei.

“Oh yeah?” Davis was in no mood to be placated, even as he licked off the squished cupcake. “Well, why don’t you try a little of this!” He grabbed a handful of Yolei’s gooey chocolate cake, and threw it at her.

Having been warned, Yolei ducked – and the cake struck TK right in the face. “Hey!” he yelped, reaching up to wipe chocolate frosting out of his eyes.

“Sorry TE…” Davis picked up another cupcake and threw it at Yolei, who was skipping out of his range. He missed and got Kari this time, right in the chest. “Ack! Sorry Kari!”

He didn’t have time to be contrite, because Yolei retaliated by grabbing a goopy handful of TK’s lemon-meringue pie and hurled it at him. “Who-oa-AH!”

Diving to the ground, Davis narrowly avoided being hit and the pie got Cody on the side of the head. “Sorry Cody!” Yolei called out, reaching for the pie again.

Cody stood up, looking thoroughly pissed. “That does it!” he yelled, surprising everyone with the ferocity in his voice. “This is war!“

All hell broke loose at that point.

“You guys are going to wreck the house!” Kari called out, not sounding very concerned as she hurled hunks of tofu cake at the others. She was laughing as she said it, so no one took it seriously. They were already covered with sweet food products and the furniture had suffered by result of their lack of aim under fire, as well.

“Yolei started it, it’s her fault!” Davis had set down his pudding bowl and was throwing fudge brownies at, for the most part, TK and Yolei. One of them did hit Kari right on the seat of her pants by accident, though.

“Yeah, get bent!” Yolei caught TK square in the chest with the last of her cupcakes and grabbed a handful of cake to chuck in Davis’s direction. “I was just shutting that big mouth of yours!”

“We should stop!” TK hurled a handful of cinnamon bread in Cody’s direction, half catching the younger boy on the side of one arm. He started to laugh, lemon-meringue dripping from his soaked blond locks. A chocolate brownie caught him on the side of his head, and a hunk of tofu cake hit his chest. “Hey, you guys are asking for it!”

“We’re real scared, TK!” Kari laughed, and was immediately beaned with a hunk of chocolate cake. “Ack! I’ll get you for that, Yolei!”

“Just try it!” Yolei looked around for ammunition and caught sight of Davis’s abandoned bowl of pudding. “Gotcha!” she cried in triumph, snatching it up.

Davis stopped what he was doing, not even noticing when a huge hunk of cinnamon bread caught him in the back of the head. “NO!” he yelped, running forward. “Not the pudding! WAAAAAAIT!”

Too late. Yolei let the whole bowl fly, aiming for Kari’s face. The brunette ducked, the door behind her opened up, and the pudding kept flying forward…

…and hit Ken full in the face as he walked in through the door.

The room went suddenly and completely still.

And then an agonized cry broke the silence. “My pudding!” Davis wailed.

Ken slowly raised his hands, as if feeling to make sure that the bowl attached to his face was really there. He carefully, and with agonizing slowness, pulled the plastic container off of his face, which was dripping with Davis’s mother’s chocolate pudding.

No one spoke.

Then Davis stumbled forward. “No-o-o-o!” He gazed up at Ken mournfully, reaching out with one hand almost pleadingly.

Ken’s mouth opened and shut several times in an attempt to get words out. It took him several tries. “Did… I just get hit… with a flying bowl of pudding?”

Yolei made a nervous little laughing noise. “Um… sorry?” she said weakly.

“That was my favorite pudding!” Davis wailed, looking distraught. “Yolei, how could you?”

Ken looked at him as if he were insane.

“There is no way I’m letting my pudding go to waste!” Davis declared, almost desperately. “It’s still good! I can still eat it! Hold still, Ken!” He grabbed the taller boy’s shoulder, and reached out to scoop a huge handful off of his face, greedily sucking it off his fingers.

The rest of the group just blinked at them. Ken was in shock.

“No good, there’s some still on there!” Without warning, the distraught boy put both of his hands on Ken’s shoulders and started to lick the pudding right off of his face, like a dog.

The others looked at each other.

Ken just stood there stupidly.

“Pudding, pudding, pudding,” Davis was muttering, even as he cleaned off Ken’s face. “Can’t waste it, I can’t… sorry, Ken…”

“Ah… it’s okay…” Ken barely got the words out. Davis was licking his face! He felt his skin growing hot. Good god… he’s licking my face! I must be dreaming, somebody pinch me! On second thought, don’t! Just let me enjoy this for as long as possible…

Davis finished with his forehead and cheeks, moving down to work on the lower half of the face. His lips brushed over Ken’s nose, his chin, his lips…

Neither of them was really sure how, but in the middle of Davis’s feeding frenzy, they were suddenly kissing hungrily, clutching each other tightly in their arms, pudding gone and lost in the feel and taste of each other’s lips.

Ken was in heaven.

The others looked at each other again. “That’s a new one,” Yolei admitted sheepishly, shrugging helplessly. “I never thought Davis had it in him!”

“Maybe we should leave them alone,” Kari suggested, and the four remaining digi-destined made a strategic retreat to the next room.

Davis continued to kiss Ken, still not sure exactly what had happened. Well, maybe that pudding isn’t the best tasting thing in the world, after all! he conceded, finally, and threw himself back into the business of making out with his best friend.

The End