"Ryoko?" Washu tugged at her daughter's sleeve impatiently. "What's the matter Ryoko?"

Sasami's outcry distracted her. "Oh no!" The little princess scurried over to the kitchen. There the air seemed somewhat smoky and Washu noticed a pungent smell.

"Oh, you burned it! It's ruined!" she heard Sasami's voice. The blue haired girl came back a few moments later, holding a platter with the remains of what had been supposed to be the missing rest of their lunch but now rather remained charcoal.

"I thought it should be crispy."

The little scientist gave a start when she heard Anei's voice from next to her. She had not noticed her sitting down.

"Crispy, not cremated," Washu muttered.

"It doesn't matter, the rest will still be enough," Sasami said in a conciliatory tone and was about to put the burnt food away.

"But I think I like it that way." Anei reached for the platter.

"Oh no, it's okay, you didn't do it on purpose. There's enough for all of us you don't have to eat that." Tenchi tried to hold her back but Anei gently but firmly pushed his hand away.

"I said I like ... cremated things." She shot a sideglance at Washu and the others looked at her in disbelief when she started to eat.

"Why are you standing, Ryoko?" she asked casually while squeezing a generous amount of Wasabi on her plate.

"I... oh." Ryoko sat down hastily. "Nothing. Nothing, really." She glanced around. "I just remembered the dream I had this morning. Had completely forgotten what it was about."

"Oh, well, bad dreams, huh? Can be pretty disturbing, but you shouldn't worry about it as soon as you woke up and realized it had just been a dream, right?"

Ryoko narrowed her eyes and gave Anei a strange look, but Washu was not sure why exactly. "So what was it?" she asked her daughter. "You don't look as if it was something very pleasant."

"It did sound rather unpleasant this morning, first of all," Ayeka remarked dryly.

"You sound rather unpleasant every single time you open your big mouth!" Ryoko growled.

"What are you -"

"No NOT AGAIN!" Tenchi shouted desperately.

Washu watched the lunch descend into chaos and shook her head. She seemed the only one to remain calm, as usual. The others were all busy with fighting, trying to separate or pacify the two squabblers or being afraid to come into the firing line. Or, in Sasami's case, trying to safe the food from being spilled. All the others? Not exactly, Washu realized. Anei was sitting in the corner of the room, unnoticed by everyone else. Washu raised her brows. Was she smiling?

"Amano!" Kiyone growled and narrowed her eyes while she stared at the mug shot on the screen in front of her. She would get him. She looked at the tiny blue spot that was now coming closer into view and adjusted the course of her ship slightly. No time to lose. It was nothing else than her career that was at stake and he was the one who was responsible for it.

And the only trace they had led to this backwater planet.

It was ridiculous. All in all, it was just silly and ridiculous that she of all people was sent to such a place for such a minor interview. Every trainee could have done that, but they had sent her, first class detective Kiyone Makibi. Former first class detective, a nasty little voice insider her head reminded her and she scowled. This task itself was a mortification already. When she would get him – and there was no doubt for her that she would – this man would regret ever having been born.

"Damn traitor" she muttered before she reached for her key pad. Ready to enter the atmosphere.

"So now that everybody has calmed down," Washu said and glanced around, "hopefully," she added, staring especially hard at Ryoko, "we'll finally get the chance to talk, won't we?"

Ryoko glared daggers at Ayeka who returned the look, but both of them remained silent. Tenchi let out a sigh that sounded like a mixture of relief and worry.

"So will you tell us now why you came here?" Washu asked Anei.

The woman played with a chopstick in her fingers and sipped at her tea. "I did not exactly come here, I rather crashed down," she said, "My ship is damaged, as you might have noticed, and it had been damaged before it crashed down which was the reason why it crashed down in the first place." She balanced the chopstick on her fingertip without looking up at them.

"Isn't that a strange coincidence that of all places you come down exactly at the Masaki shrine?" Washu asked suspiciously.

"Not a coincidence, in fact. There was a spaceship ascending from exactly that place and I followed its trace down here, as I hoped for some help. I wouldn't even have made it to the next solar system in that condition, I fear."

"That was Mihoshi," Tenchi noted, then he seemed to remember something as his eyes widened. "Do you happen to know anything about an emergency at galaxy police headquarters? That was the reason why our friend left this morning – the one you saw with the ship."

"Oh, so you didn't hear about that yet?" Anei seemed mildly surprised and put the teacup back on the table without dropping the chopstick, then she started to spin it around her forefinger. She ignored the others staring at her expectantly until Ryoko snatched the thing out of her hand.

"So what happened, then?" she asked impatiently.

Anei bent over to her and raised an eyebrow. "I thought you might know, at least, as you're yourself a space pirate, aren't you?"

"What?" Ryoko looked at her in surprise.

Anei sat back. "There has been a massive pirate attack on the galaxy police at... well, at the time you'd call last night from an earth point of view." She tossed the chopstick and let it spin in the air and Ryoko shot a puzzled look at her own hands only to find them empty.

"I think you will be happy to hear that your friend is probably all right, as the time I saw her ship the fighting was almost over. I guess she must have been... late."

"That would certainly not surprise me," Ryoko remarked, "They must've been calling her for hours until she finally woke up, I guess."

"Have you been there? I mean have you seen anything?" Ayeka asked.

"Well, I was close when it happened and I kind of got caught in the middle of it. That was why my ship was damaged, you see?"

"But why would the pirates attack GP headquarters?"

"As far as I've heard they were trying to steal something. But don't ask me if they finally succeeded." She stood up. "Would you mind if I go outside and look for my ship now? Maybe there are a few of my belongings left that I can save. And maybe, even if I have only little hope in that, I could start to repair it."

"Of course... but I don't think it can be repaired," Tenchi said doubtfully, "not that I'm an expert for spaceships, but..."

"It is not a Jurian ship and thus it works different from everything I am versed in, but I guess the damage might have been too severe," Ayeka stated.

"To me that thing definitely looks as if it has had it," Ryoko agreed.

"As if you'd be the one who is at home in that subject," Washu jeered, "but I think this time I have to agree with my daughter. You could let me – hey!" the diminutive scientist looked around in confusion. "Where did she go?"

"She must have left already," Tenchi said and got up to pick up his stuff from the table. Washu and Ayeka followed close behind while Ryoko turned around and looked out of the window. She was not sure what to think about this. At the moment, she did not even know what to think at all. This dream still floated around in her head. The smell from the kitchen had brought it back into her mind and now she remembered what it had been about and unfortunately it had startled her so much the others had noticed it. She did not like to admit it, not even to herself, but it was scary. It had seemed so real and, unlike usual, it had not been just a recall from her past. Oh, she was used to this kind of dream and those were bad enough, but this... was different. It felt different. Ryoko shuddered but then immediately scolded herself for thinking that way and quickly checked the mental link that connected her with Washu. It was blocked. Good. No need to give her so called mother a reason to make even more fun of her. It was embarrassing enough she had overreacted that way a few minutes ago, not to speak about the incident earlier in the morning. Anei's comment about it had seemed strange, though. Oh cut it out already, it is just a dream! she thought and rubbed her forehead angrily.

"Ryoko, get your dishes over here already! It was your turn to clean the table, anyway!" Washu shouted from out of the kitchen. Ryoko rolled her eyes and turned round to take her plate and bowl and then – froze. Her chopsticks were sticking upright inside her rice bowl.*

::Ryoko?::

Damn that link! Ryoko turned around and saw Washu sticking her head out of the kitchen door and looking at her in confusion. "What's up?" she asked aloud. Ryoko did not answer but pointed at the table next to her. "Well?" Washu raised her eyebrows. "Is this an attempt to cop out of your chores or what?"

Ryoko shot a puzzled look at the table and her eyes widened. The chopsticks were placed on the chopstick rest, one next to the other, as they were supposed to.

"Excuse me, please?"

"YIIIAAAAAAAH!"

The voice next to her ear and the icy cold touch on her shoulder - this had just been too much. Ryoko's heart seemed to stop for a moment just to start beating with double speed a second later while she stumbled aside, trying not to fall over the chair cushions. She had heard the sound of breaking porcelain from out of the kitchen and found herself gazing at four pairs of eyes that were staring at her in shock.

"Oh my, I'm sorry. I didn't know you're so easily scared." She turned around and saw Anei looking at her in a mixture of mockery and bewilderment.

"YOU! That's – YOU -!"

"Yes, it's me?"

"You little – you did that on purpose, you -"

Ryoko grabbed her by the collar and pulled her close, glaring at her furiously. She felt her energy crackling in the air.

"Ryoko!" Tenchi shouted.

"Excuse! Me!" Anei looked at her with an expression of nothing more than slight annoyance and rapped her over the knuckles two times. Ryoko was astonished enough to loosen her grip. "What do you want me to do, send you a letter first?"

"You did that!" Ryoko pointed to the table, trying not to loose her temper.

"Did what? Oh, I see, I didn't clear away my dishes but that is just what I have come back for. This is no reason to go wild like that, especially as I can see you didn't clear away yours either."

Ryoko blinked. "Dishes? That is – where have you been?"

"Do I have to make an official announcement every time I have to use the restroom here?"

The others looked clearly embarrassed at that notion.

"Okay. Let's have another try: Would you please go out of my way now?" She did not wait for an answer or even a reaction, but grasped the space pirate's arms and firmly pushed her aside.

Ryoko shuddered and shook her hands off. "Get off me! What are those... you're cold as ice!"

"Well, this is what happens, I guess, when you wash your hands after -"

"Uhmmm why don't we just go and do something else, Ryoko, and somewhere else, at best, and we'll come back later to do our part in cleaning, okay?" Washu's question was the sort of question that meant, in fact, an order and no one even tried to object.

::You still owe me an explanation for your reaction earlier!:: Washu sent Ryoko via their mental link while she grabbed her wrist and dragged her along.

"Hey, somewhere else is NOT your lab, right?"

"No back talk, Ryoko!"

As the door closed behind the two of them, Anei turned around and gave Ayeka a look of mild astonishment.

"Is it always like this in your family?"

"Err, well..." Ayeka gave a little cough. "Kind of. I'm sorry if there is anything –"

"Oh, but I find it quite entertaining," she stated simply and balanced the remaining dishes to the kitchen.

Ayeka looked at Tenchi and Tenchi looked back, his expression as helpless as hers. She held out her hands to take the dishes from Anei.

"You do not have to help us, please."

"Oh, but I insist."

After they were finished, Ayeka went to her room with Sasami.

"Ryoko is acting strange today, don't you think, sister?" the little princess asked as soon as the door had closed behind them. She sat down, playing with the seam of her coat.

"Stranger than normal, you mean?" Ayeka raised her brows and Sasami looked at her reproachfully in response so the crown princess could not hold back a smile. "You're right, I think. But today was a strange day so far. Starting with an unpleasant wake up call."

"You know, I don't think Ryoko did it to make anyone angry, Ayeka."

"I know that, Sasami. I'm not angry about this, I'm angry about the fact that she shows no manners, as always. If you or me or anyone else would do something that harmed or disturbed others, as unintentionally as it might have happened, we'd be polite enough at least to apologize. Look at that girl, she is our guest and she did offer her help immediately. What do you think about her anyway, Sasami?"

"She certainly can not cook," the little princess grumbled.

Ayeka giggled.

"You know, sister, she was not even able to cut the vegetables. She made such a fuss about the knives," Sasami complained.

"Is that so? At the table she didn't seem to be... clumsy or something."

Sasami chewed on her lower lip. "No, I don't think so, you're right." The little princess took a pen from the table and tried to spin it around her finger. "This doesn't work." She scowled.

"This all doesn't help at all!" Washu peered at the screen in frustration. "So that is what this dream of yours was about?" She looked at her daughter sceptically.

"That's what I say!" Ryoko peered at the thing on her head. "Could you finally remove that, Washu? This is ridiculous. It was just a dream."

"If it was just a dream, then tell me why it scared you so much you are acting stupid over the whole day?"

"So it was a scary dream, okay? Happy now?" Ryoko grumbled. "I woke up and remembered something, and it was something important, and then all that nonsense happened. You saw it."

"But you did not wake up."

"I dreamed about waking up."

"You know, maybe that's the problem. I guess I can always extract it from your memory if you can't remember something you have done or, in that case, you have been dreaming about, which means nothing but temporarily forgetting something that is still there. I know where to look for something and I find it, you see? But that's not the case now. You dreamed about not remembering something you dreamed about without maybe actually dreaming it – inside your dream, I mean – and therefore things start to get complicated."

Ryoko gave her a baffled look.

"What I want to say is that if you dreamed about remembering something this does not actually mean you really remembered it. The feeling of remembering something important can just be part of the dream, you know?"

"No, not at all." Ryoko frowned.

Washu rolled her eyes. "If you dream you're falling, it feels like you're falling, but you're not, in fact, because you're only imagining it, right?"

"Uh-huh." Ryoko nodded.

"So if you dream about the feeling to have a déjà vu, this feeling does not have to be an actual déjà vu, maybe you're just imagining it."

"Well..." Ryoko scowled. "So that would mean there was just nothing and it meant nothing? Because the I-remember-something-feeling was just imaginary?"

"Could be. The other possibility, though, is that you dream about remembering something from your past which is something you actually are able to recall. Which, then, means that you did not forget it at all, you're just not able to make the connection between the actual memory and the feeling of remembering it inside your dream. This would also explain why I didn't find anything hidden in there. Like if you want to say something and there is a word missing that just doesn't come to your mind at this one single moment but, of course, you know that word."

"So you want to tell me that I actually know it, despite the fact that I forgot it?"

Washu gave a loud groan. "The point is that if, and only if the latter of the two opportunities is the case, you'd have to look through your memory and it would be anywhere there, I guess."

"So what's the problem?"

"The problem, my little Ryoko, is that you do not want to peruse everything you do remember from the first moment you remember anything, right? That would be a few hundred years of work, literally."

"Oh."

"Yeah, oh. Good point. Like you wouldn't read through a dictionary because you are looking for your distinct word."

"So that means...?"

"There is a difference between knowing exactly where to look for something and then digging it out, or looking for the needle in a haystack without knowing where to look. I',m a scientist, not a clairvoyant! " She scowled at her daughters still confused expression. "That means we can't do anything!"

"Well, that's new."

"Did I hear some irony in that statement?"

Ryoko looked up at the ceiling and pretended to have missed Washu's last sentence. "So what do you think about this other stuff?" she finally asked.

"What other stuff?"

"At lunch. I mean, didn't you smell that?"

"Smell what?"

"It smelled like inside that burning house."

"Well, there was burned food inside the oven. That is supposed to smell burned and I'd rather be worried if you had not noticed it. It reminded you on that dream and you were startled, I guess."

"Earlier the day inside that ship it did not remind me on anything."

Washu shrugged. "We were all quite distracted by the fact that a ship had crashed down next to the shrine."

"But then the chopsticks, I told you–"

"I can only tell you what I saw when you showed your memories to me-"

"You extracted them, you mean-"

"Don't split hairs now and stop interrupting me! As I said, what I saw is not more than you already know and it is not a very clear memory. You might not have looked closely enough, overlooked something or misinterpreted?"

"You interrupted me first! So, whatever, and what if I haven't?"

"Then it would mean that you are either malfunctioning or it wouldn't make any sense to me."

"Malfunctioning?" Ryoko snarled and shot an angry glance at the scientist.

"I am sure my inventions do not tend to malfunction. I'm a genius, after all."

Ryoko gave her a look of pure annoyance when suddenly something started to beep next to Washu. The little scientist turned around and typed something on her halotop.

"Looks like we're getting another visitor," she muttered, "and the term visitor excludes Mihoshi."

"You must be kidding!" Ryoko said in disbelief.

Footnotes:

*This symbolizes death in Japanese culture as it reminds of funeral rituals.