A/N: I've done quite a lot of Kishigo, so I figured it was high time I devoted some fanfiction to my other favorite alien/Mew Mew couples. This one is Pai x Lettuce.
Dreams
Lettuce sat up in bed abruptly, blue eyes wide with shock and fear. It's not real. Look around. See? You're in bed at home. It was just a dream. Once again, she'd experienced that same—was it still technically a nightmare if nothing bad happened to her?
Yes, she decided. Because bad things do happen in that dream. Just not to me.
How many variations of the nightmare had she woken up in the midst of? He played a key role in each and every one—always as the tragic hero.
Scenes from each nightmare flashed into her head:
Pai, lying in a pool of his own blood.
Pai, slowly choking to death as the Blue Knight squeezed the life out of him.
Pai, fighting her and the other Mew Mews, gaining new wounds by the second.
Forcing herself to take a deep breath, Lettuce consciously tried to slow her heartbeat. She sat in the dark for a few moments.
Was that the sound of the window opening?
Looking in cautiously, Pai was surprised to find that Lettuce was up and awake. She was sitting up, eyes trained on the window—almost as if she was waiting for me, he mused. Then, as a thin trickle of blood trailed down his temple, he wondered where that extremely unscientific thought had come from. After all, what were the chances that she dreamed about him the way he dreamed about her?
Her big eyes widened as she took in his appearance. She opened her mouth but no sound came out.
He knew what she was trying to say though. "Mew Lettuce—" he began almost involuntarily. His voice was even quieter than usual—he didn't even have the strength to teleport.
Why is it that I can't stand the sight of her in pain? I still don't know. Then—Wait. Why does she look so tortured?
"Pai-san. . . you're bleeding," she observed quietly, still a bit shocked. What happened to him? Her heart hurt as if she were the one with a head wound.
"It's nothing," he insisted.
Lettuce kicked off her covers and stood up. "What happened?" she asked, her long white nightgown swishing around her ankles as she rummaged through a drawer.
The purple-haired alien considered possible answers slowly. He couldn't risk blowing it the way Kisshu had. His green-haired comrade probably didn't have much of a chance with the leader of the Mew Mews—he kept forcing himself on her, and that was simply not how love worked.
Pai finally decided on the truth—or at least part of it. "I had a nightmare."
The green-haired girl softly closed the drawer and walked over to the window he leaned against. The ends of the long white bandage in her hands fluttered in the breeze from the open window. Pai looked ready to leap out at any second. "But why—?" she pressed gently when he fell silent.
He gave up on concealing the truth. Hoping it wouldn't cause her any pain or trauma, he hurried through the events that led to his presence here—in her room at night.
"Well, firstly Kisshu and Taruto decided they needed more practice. They thought that since I'm older and more powerful, a two-on-one battle would be more equal. But of course they underestimated their own strengths, and I got the worst of it.
"Then after reviewing and revising my next plan of attack—fatality rate 95.73%, by the way—I went to bed.
"Soon after, assuming that my brothers didn't sneak in and reset my clock as they did the night before April Fool's, I woke up sweating. It was likely the worst nightmare I have ever had the misfortune to experience."
"But why are you here?" Having reached him, Lettuce reached up to wrap the bandage around his head. The wound didn't seem to be as severe as it had first appeared to be.
His hand closed around her wrist. "I saw you—dead," he said. The proper terminology would have been "blurted," but Pai never blurted anything—he was too calm, too analytical.
Or was he?
A moment of silence passed. Then green Mew Mew wondered, "Why do we have to fight?"
For once in his life, Pai had no good answer.
Momentarily stunned by the emotional query, his guard slipped enough for his emotions to gain the upper hand—a very rare and only temporary occasion, of course.
He couldn't resist.
He leaned down and softly pressed his lips to hers.
One second. . . two seconds. . .
The oldest of the aliens pulled away almost reluctantly. It had felt so good, so right.
And that was why it could never be.
Taking advantage of the temporary burst of energy he'd received, he immediately teleported away before he could do anything else he would regret—and, at the same time, not regret.
When Pai had gone, Lettuce looked down, her pale-green bangs obscuring her face—not that anyone was there to see.
He's so mysterious. So cold, and so hard to understand.
She had a feeling that, like Ichigo, she held the heart of one of the aliens.
But unlike her friend, she had no unhappiness over the fact that he had stolen her first kiss.
A/N: The end result was completely unplanned; this oneshot just kind of wrote itself. I think I'll do Taruto x Pudding next, unless you guys have other ideas? (Review please!)