Chapter Two: Kish, Tart and the Deal

Pie came back into his lab, a cup of coffee in his hands, breathing in the caffeinating aroma. With blurry vision, he walked towards his computer console, but was suddenly stopped by something clinging onto him. Two something's.

"Please don't die on us, Pie!" Tart begged from where he was clutched onto Pie's leg.

"Hang in there, buddy, Tart and I are going to make sure you get better ASAP! Just whatever you do, don't go towards the light!" Kish said, his arms around Pie's chest.

"Uh…" Pie said, looking down at the two with a raised purple eyebrow. "What?"

"Come on!" Kish said, taking the coffee out of Pie's hand then quickly pulling Pie out of the room, Tart pushing against the small of his back to get him to move. Rather reluctantly, he did so.

Pie—in his sleep-deprived stupor—realized that his brothers were taking him to the ship's medical ward.

"What are we going to the medical ward for?" Pie asked.

"Well, we don't keep the medical equipment anywhere else do we?" Kish said in a patronizing tone as he opened the door. "Dang, I can't believe your brain was the first thing to go."

"This is worse than we thought!" Tart said, beginning to freak out.

"What are you two bakas going on about?" Pie demanded, but got no answer.

Before Pie knew what was going on, he was lying on the cot in the medical ward and Kish and Tart were hovering over him. It was not a comforting view, and Pie wondered if it would end up being his last.

Tart and Kish were attempting—and failing epically—to use every piece of equipment they found, even if they had no idea what it was for. Pie prayed that he would never really need to be in the med ward with only these two idiots to act as caregivers. The two together could barely work a toaster, let alone a Band-Aid. The bumbling bakas clearly had no idea what they were doing tending to their 'ill' brother, and were mostly making things up as they went along.

"What the heck does this do?" Tart asked as he held up a pair of surgical forceps.

Pie opened his mouth to tell Tart what the object was, but as soon as he did, Kish shoved the thermometer in his mouth. Pie glared at Kish, who gently patted his head and gave him a grin.

"Don't worry, Pie," Kish said proudly, not even noticing the death stare he was getting from his 'patient'. "Like I said, Tart and I are going to make sure you get better."

A few minutes later, Kish and Tart were arguing again over who was reading the readouts on the thermometer correctly. While they weren't watching, Pie slipped away.

"Ha!" Tart said as he pointed at a line in the first aid book he had grabbed off the wall and shoved the book in Kish's face. "I'm right! That is not a high fever!"

"Yeah, but it's still higher than normal," Kish argued, snatching the book and tossing it over his shoulder, ignoring the sound of glass breaking as the book went through the glass cabinet behind him.

And it was a higher-than-normal temperature. By a half-degree.

"Okay, so what do we do now?" Tart asked.

"Well first we-" Kish said, turning around. His eyes went wide at seeing the empty bed. "We find our patient."

Tart and Kish were scrambling all over their ship, searching for Pie. Finally, they found him in his lab.

Pie looked down to see that, once again, his brothers were attached to him, and not going to let go anytime soon.

"Can I help you?" He asked calmly.

"Don't ever scare us like that again!" Tart said, trying to sound angry but ended up sounding both relieved and still scared as he buried his face against Pie's leg.

Pie sighed.

"I understand you are trying to be…" Pie searched for the right word. "Helpful. But I am not in need of your ministrations at this time."

"Are you sure?" Kish asked, still worried.

"Positive, now will you please leave me alone so I can finish this?" Pie asked, taking another sip of his coffee.

Tart and Kish nodded and left the room.

In his sleep-deprived state, Pie didn't even question that Kish and Tart left without an argument. Usually, he would have been suspicious. But now he was just glad they were gone.

"What do we do now?" Tart asked once he was sure Pie wasn't going to hear their conversation.

"Well, like with everything Pie tells us to do, we search for a loophole," Kish said. He smirked. "And I think I have it."

Fifteen minutes, several cuts, bruises and well-aimed kicks later, the now very-annoyed waitresses of Café Mew Mew stood on the bridge of the aliens' ship.

"You must be wondering why Taruto and I brought you here tonight." Kish said dramatically.

"But it's only two o'clock in the afternoon, na no da," Pudding said, confused.

"Start talking, elf boy!" Ichigo demanded angrily.

Kish frowned, his dramatic moment ruined. He sighed and began to explain.

"See, Pie's sick and he won't let us take care of him. Thing is, what he said left a loophole so that someone other than me and Tart can take care of him. So, we brought in the first people we thought of!"

Kish gave the Mews his most winning and charming smile.

Zakuro, Mint and Ichigo were clearly unimpressed, Pudding still looked confused, and Lettuce looked worried.

"And, why should we help you?" Zakuro asked dryly.

Kish's grin fell to a scowl and he reached into a pocket in his pants. He pulled out a piece of paper and unfolded it. He cleared his throat and read,

"We, Kisshu Ikisatashi and Taruto Ikisatashi (And, by default of this contract, Pie Ikisatashi), hereby swear to not engage any form of battle with any member of Tokyo Mew Mew, or its affiliate, Café Mew Mew, for an entire month (31 Days), no matter what our leader, Deep Blue-Sama, orders us to do. There will be no Chimera Animal attacks, no searches for Mew Aqua, no kidnappings, no stalking, no interrupting dates with idiotic, one-dimensional Gary Stu tree-huggers and generally no disruption of normal human life."

Kish looked up at the Mews and tried to hide his proud smirk. They all looked sorely tempted by the thought of no battles for a month. Ichigo was already fantasying about all the dates she could go on with Masaya. Pudding dreamt of all the money she could earn performing in the park. Lettuce thought of all the time she would have for reading. Mint longed for days of shopping and dancing. And Zakuro just didn't want to deal with more idiots than she usually had to put up with.

"Deal," The five girls said simultaneously.

Kish and Tart grinned victoriously.


Poor Pie, he's doomed. Heheheh... *grins evilly*