Fears 2
Ichigo didn't used to be afraid of fire; in fact she used to love it. Now that she was half-cat, however, she hated and feared fire with a passion.
This brings us to the present time, when she and her teammates were fighting Kisshu, Pai, and Taruto again. Ichigo was helping fight the Chimera Anima they had sent out, when Pai sent a lightning attack at her. She dodged, but the lightning had obviously hit something, because it started a fire. Soon the whole area was covered in flames, and Ichigo was shaking.
The Cyniclons noticed this, as Lettuce tried to put out the fire with her attack. "Oi, what's wrong with the old hag?" Taruto asked his brothers.
"I don't know," Pai said.
Kisshu was silent, watching Ichigo. It looked like she was frozen, and though her teammates were trying to put out the fire, she remained in one place, even when Mint yelled at her.
Suddenly Kisshu noticed part of the blaze was headed for Ichigo, who still didn't move. She was frozen in fear. Kisshu had never seen Ichigo this afraid of anything. Finally he couldn't take it anymore, and shouted, "Ichigo, MOVE!"
Ichigo didn't hear him either; she wasn't paying attention to anything besides her own terror.
Ignoring his brothers, who were looking at him like he was insane, Kisshu teleported and picked up Ichigo right before the flames reached her. He teleported back to his brothers, and felt Ichigo clinging to him.
"Kisshu, what are you thinking?" Pai hissed. "Deep Blue will have your head for this!"
"Deep Blue is no longer a problem," Kisshu said. "Ichigo's insane school friends killed his human host without realizing it."
"Why didn't you stop them?" Pai asked.
"I was too late, and besides, we both know Deep Blue would just kill us once we were of no more use to him," Kisshu said calmly.
Pai sighed. "What are you going to do with Ichigo?" he asked. "She's asleep, and she's attached to you."
"I'll take her home," Kisshu said. "And I'll stay with her until she's awake, at least."
"Fine… we'll deal with the others," Pai said.
"Thanks," Kisshu said, and teleported off.
He landed in Ichigo's room, and listened. No one else seemed to be there, so he tried to set Ichigo down on her bed. This idea failed; she was literally attached to him, her hands clutching his shirt with a death grip. He tried to loosen her grip, but this only served to make her hold on tighter. Sighing, he sat down on the bed, then laid back. Ichigo snuggled into his chest, much to his surprise, and continued sleeping. He started stroking her hair gently, and she purred. Eventually Ichigo's purring put Kisshu to sleep, and he relaxed.
About four hours later, Ichigo started to wake up. She realized that she was curled up against something warm, and looked at whatever she was clinging to. She was shocked to see that her hands were clenched in Kisshu's shirt, and he was lying next to her, fast asleep. Normally I'd yell at him for sleeping with me, but he probably only did it because I wouldn't let go, Ichigo thought. She unclenched her hands, wincing as she realized they were pretty cramped up.
Looking at Kisshu, she saw that for once he looked relaxed. Wow, he looks really cute sleeping, she thought. She hesitantly reached out, and smoothed his hair back. His hair is really soft…. she thought, stroking it.
Realizing she was still in Mew form, she detransformed, and kept stroking Kisshu's hair. He sighed happily, and she barely restrained a giggle.
About half an hour later, Kisshu started to wake up, and the first thing he noticed was that someone was playing with his hair. Thinking, he remembered he was in Ichigo's room, which probably meant Ichigo was the one playing with his hair. It felt nice, so he decided to pretend to be asleep a while longer.
Unfortunately, Ichigo had noticed that he wasn't really asleep anymore, and asked, "Kisshu, are you awake?"
"Maybe…." Kisshu said. "I like that sensation…."
"You like it when I play with your hair?" Ichigo asked.
"Yeah…." Kisshu said. "So what was up with earlier? It looked like you were frozen or something."
"I'm terrified of fire…." Ichigo whispered. "It came with the cat genes."
"Seems like cat genes have a lot of disadvantages," Kisshu commented.
"I hate cat genes," Ichigo sighed. "Why did you save me?"
"I love you," Kisshu said. "Isn't that reason enough?"
"We're enemies, though," Ichigo said.
"Not anymore, your insane school friends killed our leader's human host," Kisshu said. "Pai said he and Taruto would talk with the other Mews while I stayed with you."
Before Ichigo could respond, her cell phone rang. Sighing, she picked up, seeing it was Ryou. "What's up?" she asked.
"Where are you?" Ryou asked.
"I'm at home," Ichigo said. "Why?"
"Apparently the aliens want to form a truce now; we need you here," Ryou said. "Is Kisshu with you?"
"Yup," Ichigo said. "We'll be there soon."
"Good," Ryou said, and hung up.
Ichigo looked at Kisshu, and said, "Apparently we need to go to the Café."
"K," Kisshu said. He took her hand and teleported.
When they landed in the main room of Café Mew Mew, they immediately realized their mistake. Lettuce, Pudding, Pai and Taruto were tied up in the middle of the room, with Mint and Zakuro guarding them. Keiichiro was nowhere to be seen.
"This was a trap!?" Ichigo shrieked.
Ryou smirked. "Yes, and you fell right into it," he said. "You didn't really expect me to form a truce, did you? The aliens need to die, whether they want to cooperate or not."
"So what are you going to do to us?" Ichigo asked.
"I won't do anything to you; I'm just going to kill Kisshu, so I can have you," Ryou said. "You're mine, Ichigo."
"I'm NOT yours," Ichigo said angrily. "I belong to myself, and I have the right to make decisions of my own. And I hate everything about you, so there's no way I'm going to be 'yours'."
"That will change," Ryou said confidently. He took out what looked like a remote, and pushed a button on it, aiming it at Kisshu. Kisshu tried to teleport out of the way, but realized something was blocking his ability to teleport. Unable to dodge in time, the ripple in the air that the remote created hit Kisshu.
Strangely, nothing seemed to happen, and Ichigo looked puzzled. "What was that supposed to do?" she asked.
"That will show you that all this time, he's been lying to you," Ryou said. "I erased the fake personality he's been using. Now you'll see that I was right, and you just fell for his act."
"Yeah right," Ichigo said. "I bet you just erased his real personality, so you could try to fool me."
She spun when she heard Kisshu say, "You're wrong, Ichigo." Looking closely, Ichigo noticed Kisshu's eyes looked blank.
"What am I wrong about?" Ichigo asked, while trying to think of a way to reverse whatever Ryou had done to Kisshu.
"I never loved you," Kisshu said. "I just pretended to in order to get the Earth." He got out his swords, and said, "You're going to die here, and we can get the Earth for Deep Blue."
"I KNEW it," Ichigo said. She dodged Kisshu's lunge, and before he could fully turn, she knocked him out. Then she turned to Ryou and said, "Kisshu told me earlier today that Deep Blue's human host was killed. I happen to know that's a fact; my friends killed him. If Kisshu wasn't brainwashed by you, he wouldn't think Deep Blue is still alive, Blondie." She grabbed Kisshu's swords, and said, "I hope you're ready to meet the Devil, Blondie."
"If you kill me, Zakuro will kill Pai," Ryou said. Ichigo looked over, and saw that Zakuro was holding a knife to Pai's throat.
"So you brainwashed them too?" Ichigo asked. Without waiting for an answer, she walked over to Zakuro, noticing her eyes were also blank. Before the older girl could react, Ichigo had backflipped over her head, and slammed the hilt of one of Kisshu's swords into the back of her head, knocking her out. Ichigo turned to Mint, just as the bird Mew got her bow out. She shot an energy arrow at Ichigo, who slashed it in half with Kisshu's swords, then performed the same move she had used on Zakuro, knocking Mint out. She slashed through the ropes binding Pai, Taruto, Lettuce, and Pudding, and they started to wake up.
"Pai, go see if Kisshu's okay," Ichigo told the eldest Cyniclon. "Ryou did something to his mind."
"On it," Pai said. He went over to Kisshu as Ichigo turned back to Ryou and said, "Any last words, Blondie?"
"Would you really kill me?" Ryou asked.
"Yes," Ichigo said. She lunged at him with Kisshu's swords, and he tried to dodge, but still got stabbed in the shoulder. Ichigo smirked and stabbed him through the heart, ripping the swords out as he screamed. Soon after, he collapsed, dead. Ichigo cleaned Kisshu's swords off on Ryou's shirt, and went over to Kisshu, who was still unconscious.
As she reached them, Pai said, "I reversed whatever Ryou did, but he's going to be kind of out of it for about a day. I'm taking him back to the ship; do you want to come?"
"Yes please," Ichigo said.
Pai picked Kisshu up and said, "Grab my shoulder."
Ichigo obeyed, and Pai teleported them to a large green room. Ichigo let go of him, and he set Kisshu down on the bed, taking his boots off before tucking him in. "Do you want to stay with him?" Pai asked.
"Yes," Ichigo said. "What are you going to do?"
"Stay with him," Pai said. "I'll get hell if I go in the kitchen, so I'll stay here."
"Taruto claims you're a kitchen disaster," Ichigo said. "He was teasing Lettuce about telling her kids to keep their dad out of the kitchen."
"Taruto will now go down," Pai said, and teleported out before Ichigo could stop him. Ichigo sighed and went back to watching Kisshu.
Two hours later, Kisshu started to stir. "Kisshu?" Ichigo asked softly.
Kisshu turned his head to look at her. "Koneko-chan?" he asked. "What happened?"
"Ryou did something to your mind that made you think you never loved me, and Pai reversed it," Ichigo said. "That was about two hours ago. I freed Pai and the others and killed Ryou. Oh, and here's your swords back."
Kisshu sat up and took them, then made them disappear. "Where's Pai?" he asked.
"Probably beating up Taruto," Ichigo said. "He told me he'd get hell if he went into the kitchen, and I mentioned that Taruto told Lettuce to tell her kids to keep their dad out of the kitchen."
"Great…." Kisshu groaned. "I hope Pai doesn't kill Taruto."
"I'm sure he knows better," Ichigo said. "How are you feeling?"
"I think I'm fine," Kisshu said. He got up, and said, "Yeah, I feel fine. I'm hungry, do you want something to eat too?"
"I'm pretty hungry too," Ichigo said.
"K, let's go to the kitchen," Kisshu said.
Before they could go anywhere, though, Pai teleported in and said, "Taruto ran for it."
"Oh well," Kisshu said. "I'm going to go make something, are you hungry too?"
"Yes, actually," Pai said. "Can we have mac and cheese?"
"Fine, but we're having something before that; I'm starving," Kisshu said. "How about apples?"
"Are we out of peaches?" Pai asked.
"No, but you wanted peach cobbler, so if you still want that, you can't have one," Kisshu said. Pai drooped.
"Apples are nice," Ichigo said.
"Okay, let's go eat apples," Kisshu said. "Then I'll make mac and cheese."
"I didn't know you could cook," Ichigo commented.
"He's better than Keiichiro," Pai said.
"Wow…." Ichigo said.
Kisshu looked a bit embarrassed, and said, "It's not a big deal. Come on, let's go."
Pai nodded, and Kisshu took Ichigo's hand, then teleported to the kitchen.
I'll leave it at that; I have other things to work on. Review!