Kisshu stood up. He was done fighting this annoying new Mew. With a smirk, he teleported to Mew Strawberry's side. "Hello kitten!" he exclaimed.
Strawberry squealed at his sudden appearance and misfired her Strawberry Bell. The energy surge from her weapon nearly hit Zakuro in the face, but the wolf-girl managed to duck out of the way in time.
"Did I surprise you, kitty?" Kisshu asked, moving closer to the pink-haired girl.
"Hey! Elf perv!" shouted a voice from the top of the building. "I wasn't finished with you yet!" Mew Candy dove off the side of the building with her peacock tail splayed open in anger.
"Tsk," Kisshu sighed. "Now Mew Candy, why do you follow me around like this? Could it be that you find me so attractive that you can't help yourself?"
Candy landed on the ground, on her feet. "Are you an actual, three-dimensional being?" she asked.
Kisshu looked confused, but answered, "Yes."
"Then don't worry," Candy retorted. "I don't find you attractive. Ribbon! SECRET CHORD!"
Kisshu was shocked by her words before being pummeled by a surge of air. He stood up and dusted himself off. "Denial is not the ans-" but he never finished his sentence.
"Ribbon! STRAWBERRY SURPRISE!" Kisshu was smacked in the face by a beam of light. Mew Strawberry was getting revenge for his earlier comments.
Candy shrugged and directed her attention to the one remaining sheep Chimera. "Ribbon! SECRET CHORD!" A burst of wind hit the Chimera, and it dissolved into a sheep and a flying jellyfish. A pink, furry thing flew by and ate the jellyfish. Candy figured that the little thing was on the same side as she was, since it didn't try to attack her.
"We finished our task, na-no-da!" yelled a cheerful voice as Mews Pudding and Mint came into sight.
With the Chimera Animas gone and the street successfully cleared of innocent by-standers, all of the Mews could now focus on the aliens. Pai appeared next to Kisshu. "We're severely outnumbered. Let's go."
Kisshu grunted in discontent, and both aliens teleported away.
Mint, Pudding and Strawberry celebrated as Zakuro stood by with an ominous expression. Lettuce jumped off of the roof and landed on the ground, panting from the exertion of her battle with Pai. Candy stood there with her hands on her hips. "That was it? That was way too easy. It was kind of boring, don't you think?"
All of the other Mews looked at her with various expressions of disapproval. "Do not desire a fight to become more difficult," Zakuro said solemnly. "Otherwise, you may get your wish."
Candy raised an eyebrow. "I guess wolf-girl has a point…" But of course, she wasn't going to admit that.
Back at the café, the girls gathered around a table. "Good job, everyone," Keiichiro Akasaka told them. "Have some tea."
Minto smiled and sat down. "Thank you, I will."
Each of the other girls sat down to partake of the hot beverage. But again, Kyandi was the exception to the rule. "I'll pass," she said. "I really have to get home."
"But this was your first battle," Ichigo's eyebrows formed an upside-down V. "Don't you want to celebrate your first victory?"
Kyandi tried to disguise the worries in the back of her mind with a cold quip. "Not really. I'm more of a coffee person, anyway."
"Well you don't have to be so mean about it!" Ichigo huffed.
Kyandi just headed for the door. "I'll see you tomorrow." She didn't even bother to look over her shoulder as she left.
"Kisshu," Pai called his adopted brother over to him.
"Yes?" the green-haired alien asked.
"I have an assignment for you."
"And that is?" Kisshu asked impatiently. Pai always took too long to explain everything. Why couldn't he just say everything right away? Why did he always wait for a response before continuing?
"I need you to spy on Mew Candy," the science-minded alien replied.
"Nani?" Kisshu sputtered, his golden eyes wide. Then, catching a hint of some strange vibe from his brother, he narrowed his eyes and asked, "Why?"
"I have been trying to determine our enemies' weaknesses. Because of this, I have permitted you to follow around Mew Strawberry like an obsessed teenager. I have also permitted Taruto his leisure with Mew Pudding. Meanwhile, I have spied on Mews Lettuce and Zakuro myself." Pai paused to make that he still had Kisshu's attention. His brothers both had pretty short attention spans.
"Go on," Kisshu growled in annoyance.
"I have already reassigned Taruto to spy on Mew Mint, as we have realized that Mew Pudding's weaknesses are her siblings and the woman that she calls 'Sensei'." Pai explained. "Unfortunately, I have come nowhere close to discovering the weaknesses of Lettuce or Zakuro."
"And this concerns me and my koneko-chan how?" Kisshu responded peevishly.
Pai turned and looked at Kisshu. "It is painfully obvious that the pink mew's weakness is that human boy over whom she always obsesses. Also, putting her friends in jeopardy would work as well. We have all of the needed information about Mew Strawberry. However, Mew Candy is an unexpected variable in our equation. We have no intel about her at all. For us to be victorious in the end, this fact has to change. Do you understand me, Kisshu?"
Kisshu sighed in frustration. "So I have to watch the peacock mew and figure out how to beat her?"
"Exactly," Pai nodded in response.
"Ugh," Kisshu groaned. "Why me?"
"You're the only plausible option, Kisshu. You need to make yourself useful in order to ingratiate yourself to Deep Blue-sama again. Remember that your job as a warrior comes first. Pleasure activities are not a priority. If you want to help save our people, you will do the job that needs doing."
Kisshu frowned. "Fine." He sulkily crossed his arms over his chest and teleported off to who knows where.
Pai let out an exasperated sigh. "That boy is going to have to keep his emotions in check. He's getting entirely too attached to that pink Mew Mew. Hopefully, this new assignment will nip those affections in the bud."
Kyandi ran home as fast as she could. As soon as she opened the door to her house, an angry voice echoed off of the walls.
"Where the h*ll were you?" her father's shout reverberated in her ears.
"I told you, Dad. I got a job today. I was at work. Didn't you get my text?" She responded in as monotone a voice as she could, trying not to set him off. Even the tiniest hint of sarcasm would cause the ever volatile Mt. Dad to explode. He often heard 'tones' in her voice that were non-existent. Today was no exception.
"Don't you take that smart-*ss tone of voice with me, young lady!" he yelled. "I told you to be home by six. It is almost seven o'clock. That is unacceptable!"
Kyandi choked back the tears that had threatened to rise into her eyes. "Dad, it wasn't my fault! I had to-"
"Like h*ll, it wasn't your fault!" her father steamed. "If you're going to be late, you tell me. You call me. You don't text me. You and you alone are responsible for your actions, Kyandi. So don't give me any bullsh*t excuse!"
As he yelled, the tears that she had forced down had managed to well up again. "Don't cry. Don't cry," she told herself. But it was too late. The tears spilled over and quietly rolled down her cheeks. She didn't wail; her shoulders didn't rack with the emotional anguish that he was causing her. She had learned better than that.
"Are you crying?" he asked in a temperamental voice. "Kyandi, you're not a child anymore. You need to stop with that dumb sh*t."
"I have homework," she replied in a shaky voice before heading towards her bedroom.
"I wasn't finished talking to you, young lady! You get your *ss back in here, now!"
She ignored him and flung her school bag onto her bed. She slipped off her shoes and kicked them under her bedside table.
"Kyandi Coffman! I am giving you to the count of three to come out of that room, or I'm going to come down there and whip your *ss!"
Her heart leapt into her throat. "No. Not again."
"One!"
She squeezed her eyes shut tightly and opened them again, trying to force the tears to stop.
"Two!"
She opened the door and glared at her feet before walking down the hallway.
"That's right," her father bellowed. "You do what I tell you! I won't let you pull any of that defiant teenager sh*t. Do you understand me?"
"Yes," Kyandi choked out.
"Yes what?" he snarled.
Kyandi cleared her throat so that her voice was calm and even. "Yes, sir."
"Good," her father replied, placated for now. "Now go do your homework."
Kyandi turned away slowly. It took all of her self-control not to stomp down the hallway like an angry child. She went into her room and shut the door. "Why does he treat me this way? I get excellent grades. I keep to myself. I've never even kissed a guy! Doesn't he know how lucky he is to have a daughter like me?" She collapsed onto the bed and pulled out her science book. "It's a good thing that I left the café when I did. If I had stayed longer, it might have been worse."
This was the reason why Kyandi never had friends over; it was why she never made friends to invite over. She kept herself at a distance from everyone, not wanting them to see behind the happy smile. Her mask and her walls kept everyone out. She was like her father in that way: good at disguising how things really were.
Her mother had gotten sick of it and filed the divorce papers two years ago. The custody battles were ugly, as Kyandi was an only child. Her mother tried to convince the court of her father's verbal abuse, but had failed. Mr. Coffman was just too skilled at acting like everything was fine when it wasn't. He had won the custody battle when the judge had looked at all of the family's medical records and determined that her mother's health suffered too often for the woman to be a good guardian for Kyandi. The divorce trials had taken six months.
And six months after that, Mr. Coffman had carted his daughter off to Japan out of pure spite for his ex-wife, claiming that it was because of a huge promotion that his company had offered him. But Kyandi knew that he could have turned the promotion down and let them find somebody else for the job. Kyandi knew that her father had done this out of pure hatred.
She had discovered ways to deal with it. So many girls at her age, in her circumstance, would have turned to boys, giving themselves away in hopes of finding love and ending up pregnant or something. Kyandi was smarter than that. She had quickly realized that love was no less a fairytale than the Disney movies she once watched as a child. Love was a myth, a work of fiction that cruelly promised happiness and gave only pain. Love existed only in movies and otome games. In the real world, there was only lust and greed. But as fictional as this love was, she couldn't help but desire it. And so she found it in the games that she so often played.
None of these brief interludes was a reality. In truth, the characters that she became in these games were not who she really was. Or were they? Who was she, anyway? Kyandi often wondered this. She had so many masks. There was the cool and mysterious mask that she used around Yuki and Mikuru. There was the seductive and flirty mask that she used around boys. There was the mask of self-confidence that she used around everyone. These masks… Was anything underneath them? If her true nature were effaced for the world to see, what would it be?
In truth, Kyandi was no more than a frightened child that cowered in the corner and hoped that someone would come rescue her. She was no more than a wounded animal backed into a corner, angry at the world that would injure her so. She was nothing more than a skeptical teenager, standing in the corner, and daring love to prove that it exists.