I don't own TMM, so don't bother asking. SORRY FOR TAKING SO LONG TO UPDATE!!!! I have 20 stories going on at once, personal life, and school life to deal with; I'm so exhausted!! Wow, I got so many reviews! Thank you all! ((Gives everyone who reviewed a giant triple chocolate chip or sugar cookie and ice cream)) I hope that you enjoy this chapter too!! Woohoo! This chapter goes onto 12 pages in Microsoft Word! I'm so happy! ((Cries tears of joy)) I worked so hard on this; I hope it was worth the wait! Just as a little warning for the future, I'm really sorry if events happen out of order anytime in this story. Please tell me what you think! I'm SO sorry that it took so long to update, I was REALLY busy. Please forgive!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! And now, what you've all been waiting for: CHAPTER THREE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

On the aliens' ship:

It had been a week since Kish rescued Lysistrata, and he was wondering yet again about what was causing her to lash out. More and more frequently Kish found Lysistrata fighting something, but he didn't know what. For possibly the hundredth time, Kish wondered what was on her arm, and why it was so important.

"Oh no you don't!!!!!! " yelled Pai. Tart came running around the corner, ran into Kish, and knocked them both to the floor.

"Sorry, Kish" said Tart breathlessly, "Gotta go. Otherwise Pai will kill me for sure, this time!"

"How many times have I told you not to glue Pai's important drawers shut?" demanded Kish.

"But I didn't know that they were important!" protested Tart. Just then, Pai rounded the corner, looking extremely mad. "Eep!" exclaimed Tart, jumping up and running away as if he had been electrocuted. Kish chuckled as Pai stormed after Tart. He felt bad for Tart. Tart was just bored after a week of doing nothing. You see, Pai's plan for demolishing the Mew Mews could not be put into action, so the aliens were confined to their ship. While Kish used the time to help heal Lysistrata, it also meant that Tart and Pai would have more opportunities to find out about her, especially with Tart running all over the ship. Sighing, Kish stood up and walked into Lysistrata's room. Kish smiled. A lot of her injuries were healed and she seemed to be making a lot of improvement, but one thing bothered Kish. Her wounds were healing nicely, but he was wondering if there was something that was preventing her to wake up; she should have woken up by now. Kish crossed the room and sat down in the chair facing Lysistrata. Gently, he laid his hand on her forehead, then immediately jumped up. Lysistrata had a raging fever. Exasperated, Kish wondered why he hadn't realized this earlier, went to see if there was any medicine.

"Kish, what have you been doing?" demanded Pai.

"Wha-, nothing!" lied Kish.

"I was just curious as to why our monitor was picking up tracking waves. Someone is trying to find Red Data, and I want to know why."

"Why would I know something like that?" asked Kish, truly innocent and curious.

"I have no idea," snapped Pai, "But if you find out anything, be sure to let me know right away, okay?"

"Sure," replied Kish. And with that, the two aliens walked down to different ends of the corridor, each wondering about the strange signals. Pai was wondering if this could help with his plan, and Kish was wondering if it had anything to do with Lysistrata.

When Kish went back to Lysistrata's room, she seemed slightly better. After giving her the medicine, Kish sat down to think. After a while he realized that most of his questions had to do with what was on Lysistrata's arm. Inside his head, Kish argued with himself about whether or not he should take a look at what was bugging her. Convincing himself that he had a right to know, Kish carefully unwrapped the bandage on Lysistrata's arm, trying not to disturb her. On Lysistrata's right arm, right below her shoulder, was a strange symbol. It had two lines that curved at the base away from each other. They then doubled back to join together. Kish let out his breath in a hiss as he realized it was a Mew Mew mark. He knew that it meant that they would have to fight each other soon, but he wouldn't tell Lysistrata that right when she woke up. She wouldn't appreciate it. In fact, she would probably punch him for his inconsideration. That thought got a chuckle out of Kish, but it turned into a sigh at the end. Filled with dread, Kish rewrapped Lysistrata's bandage and sat back down. Now all he could do was wait.

Something was trying to find her, but she wouldn't let them. There was no way that she would be caught that easily. Not after what happened last time. She had sworn that it would never happen again. Panic flooded through her. Had they found out where she was hiding? Will they come again to destroy her? Images of those horrible nights came back to her. These scenes strengthened her resolve. Although there was the possibility that the searcher was going to help her, there was no way she would fall for the same trick twice. No matter what the cost, she must never let anyone find her. She put up every defense system that she could think of, even though her body protested. She could tell that she had made herself sick, but right now, she didn't care. The consequences could wait until the danger had passed. None of that mattered anymore. She would do anything to stay hidden. Anything.

Kish suddenly woke up. He looked over at Lysistrata and saw that her breathing was slowing, slowing, and then stopped. Frantic, Kish jumped out of his chair and leaned forward to confirm whether or not she was actually breathing. Kish let out a sigh of relief. Lysistrata's breathing hadn't stopped; it had just slowed down to a rate that would be alarming to anyone else. However, Kish was only slightly worried. He recognized the pattern from when he was younger. Lysistrata had put herself into a sort of meditation that only she could exit. It was a way of sealing the soul off from the normal world, so that it could be protected. What worried Kish, was how Lysistrata was going to get back, and what caused her to do it. Standing for a moment in unease, Kish decided that there was not anything that he could do to help her. Shrugging, Kish slumped into his chair and went back to sleep.

Kish awoke with a start, promptly slamming his head against the back of the chair he had been sleeping in. A blaring horn was resounding throughout the ship. Groggily, Kish floated down to where Pai was in the control room. When Kish got there, he saw that Tart was also there, looking puzzled in front of a very smug looking Pai. "Now that you are all assembled," began Pai, "I have an important announcement to make. It is now the perfect time to attack the Mews. Now, Kish, you are going to go in an opposite direction from Tart, and you both will provide a distraction in the form of attacking the city of Tokyo, Japan. Meanwhile, I will be setting up the final project. When you see a purple flare of light, that is your signal to desert your posts and teleport towards me. Once you are with me, I shall explain the plan further. Any questions?"

"What should we do to distract the Mew Mews?" asked Kish.

"Anything that you have to do. Any other probing questions?"

"Yeah," said Tart abruptly, "Why do you have to talk so…so…prim and official?"

"Never you mind," retorted Pai, "Now let's go!"

"What?!? Right now?" asked Kish, aghast.

"Yes, now. Hurry up, I'm leaving," replied Pai while teleporting. Tart followed suit, leaving Kish alone in the control room, looking very much like a goldfish out of water. Great! thought Kish, snapping his mouth shut with a jerk, Exactly what I need, a mission while Lysistrata's still sick. Sighing, Kish teleported to earth, hoping that the battle would at least be short.

On Earth:

Groaning, Ichigo stumbled into the Café and plopped herself down into one of the chairs. She promptly crossed her arms on the table, laid her head down, and fell asleep. All of the other girls crowded around Ichigo, staring at her. "Do you think that she's okay?" asked Lettuce.

"Well, she's not going to get any work done if she keeps on lying there like that," said Mint while prodding Ichigo in a futile attempt to wake her up.

An alarm sounded and Ichigo jumped up screaming, "AAAAAAAAIIIIIIIEEEEE!!!"

"I'm glad that something managed to wake her up," muttered Mint.

"Girls, you have to transform immediately. There are two different alien attacks," Keiichiro said breathlessly, poking his head into the workroom of the Café.

"Right!" said Ichigo, "We're on it." With those words, Ichigo ran outside with the other girls right behind her.

"Oof!" said Ichigo as she bumped into something. It was Masaya. Ichigo stayed back while the other girls ran ahead.

"Hey, Ichigo, where are you going in such a hurry?"

"Oh, um," stammered Ichigo, not quite sure what to say, "We, uh, you see, we're…picking a special order for the Café!"

"Do you mind if I come with you then?" asked Masaya.

"No! I mean, that is, it's supposed to be a secret, so if you came with us, then that would ruin it. Sorry!" Ichigo mumbled, hoping that Masaya would leave so that she could transform into a Mew Mew, but not think that she was being an idiot or dumping him.

"That's okay. Maybe we can hang out another time. See you later!" Masaya called, waving over his shoulder.

"'Bye!" Ichigo called after him, feeling a mix of relief and disappointment. As soon as Masaya disappeared around the corner, Ichigo dashed after her friends, wishing that she didn't have to lie to her boyfriend all the time. Before she could reach them however, she heard the last voice she ever wanted to hear.

"Hello, Ichigo! Missed me?" asked Kish as he landed in front of her.

"In your dreams, loser!" Ichigo yelled at him, "What to you want?"

"To tell you something," Kish said with a smile.

"What?" Ichigo asked warily.

Kish's smile broadened. "Look up."

"Wha- AAAAAA!" screamed Ichigo, covering her head with her hands. The building to the left of Ichigo was falling, and through the holes came gigantic kirema anima spiders. Ichigo screamed again as she was buried underneath huge slabs of concrete. Luckily, the concrete fell in such a way that they did not hit Ichigo, but they created a sort of cave or room. However, all around here were concrete slabs, so she was stuck. "Aaaaah! Help me, someone!!"

"Sorry, kitten," said Kish, "But your friends are all gone. There's no one who can hear you." What Ichigo couldn't see, due to the fact that she was trapped in her little concrete home, was that Kish was scowling; he didn't like doing this to Ichigo, it hurt him to have to do it. But he mustn't let her know that. If she knew, she would be able to persuade Kish to stop attacking, and then he'd be in BIG trouble. Sighing slightly, Kish turned to watch some of his kirema anima spiders start to crawl down the side of the quickly deteriorating building. The rest of the spiders were destroying the building. Kish couldn't help smiling. It was one of his strokes of brilliance to make kirema animal spiders. Most humans are afraid of spiders and spiders are amazingly strong. Kish remembered something Lysistrata had once told him.

Flashback:

Lysistrata ran up to Kish, taking his arm and pulling him. "Come on Kish!" she called, "I want to show you something cool!!"

"What?" asked Kish, running after Lysistrata with his arm still in her grasp.

"Look down here," responded Lysistrata, crouching down next to a tree's roots. There was a little hole in the fork made by two of the roots and there was a spider web over the top of the hole, like a little roof. Kish couched down next to her, not understanding.

"But Lysie," said Kish, sounding perplexed, "It's just a spider's web."

"Watch this!" responded Lysistrata. She picked up some of the dried pine needles from the forest floor. They were a coppery color, similar to Lysistrata's hair. Slowly, she poured the needles onto the web and they stuck there. It was as if she was adding thatch to the web roof. Kish picked up a handful of needles too, and proceeded to help Lysistrata make a tower on top of the spider web. When the tower was about five inches high, the web collapsed, the needles falling into the hole, filling it up. "Do you remember what we learned about that strongest metal?" Lysistrata asked Kish while dusting off her hands.

"Yeah, it is called steel," Kish replied, "Why?"

"Because spider's silk, the stuff spiders use for their webs, is stronger then steel. So the web we were just playing with, if you hade the exact same web, but made out of steel, it wouldn't have been able to have held all of those pine needles," Lysistrata informed him.

"He-ey!" whined Kish, pretending to be upset, "You just tricked me into doing school type work!" Lysistrata laughed.

"One little experiment can't kill you. C'mon! You're still it!" Lysistrata called as she started to run away from him.

"That's not fair!" Kish yelled at her retreating back. She just laughed again as he started running after her so that he could tag her.

End Flashback:

Kish growled slightly and shook his head to clear it. He shouldn't have been thinking about her, he should have been concentrating on what was going on. With a small yelp of surprise, Kish quickly flew up into the air. The minute it took him to relive that memory was all the spiders needed to demolish the building and to start heading towards him.

I should be more careful, thought Kish, his heart still racing, that spider was about to eat me! The other reason that Kish chose spiders, was because of their ability to reproduce in large numbers. If he gave his kirema anima an hour, there would be hundreds of them, maybe even thousands! Of course, only if the Mew Mews did not destroy them first.

"Hi-ya!" yelled a muffled voice. Kish turned to look at the pile of rubble. A small crack appeared at the top of the pile of concrete. There was only one layer of concrete slabs in the top right hand corner, so Ichigo was trying to get free from there. As Kish watched, a gloved hand came into view.

Oops! thought Kish, She must have transformed while I was thinking.

"I wouldn't do that if I were you, kitten."

"And why not?" snapped Ichigo.

"Because of them," Kish stated simply, waiting for Ichigo to understand.

"Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!" shrieked Ichigo as one of the spiders stuck it's pincers into the hole Ichigo had made, and proceeded to try and eat her. Ichigo tried to move away from the pincers, but didn't get very far since she could barely move.

"Ichigo!" called a voice from not to far away. Kish cursed and backed into the shadows of one of the remaining buildings, waiting. "Ichigo, where are you?" the voice called out to her. The spider lunged at Ichigo again. Ichigo screamed, retreating as far back as she could in her confined space. The hole she had created was big enough for her hand to get through and for the spider's pincers, but too small for her to get her weapon out to attack it. She was defenseless. Suddenly, the spider let out a squeal, its pincers retreating. Ichigo stayed were she was, too afraid to move.

What if they're fighting over which one will kill me? Ichigo thought in a sudden panic, nearly in a state of hysteria, It shouldn't have to end this way!!

"Ichigo, can you hear me?" called the voice again, very close to her.

"Yes, I'm alright! Thank goodness you came!" Ichigo replied, tears starting to well up in her eyes.

"No," said the voice, "Thank Keiichiro, he was the one who noticed your distressed signals on the screen."

"RYOU!" yelled Ichigo, annoyed.

"Arg! Stupid spider! Take that!" yelled Ryou, "Hey, Keiichiro. Did you manage to persuade Becky to lend us her Texas flyswatter?"

"Very funny, Ryou, but no. However, I have been able to get this," said Keiichiro, handing Ryou a gun. "It will have effects similar to Ichigo's when she takes on kirema animas."

"Thanks, Keiichiro, I owe you one," said Ryou, starting to shoot the spiders.

"Miss Ichigo, are you alright?" asked Keiichiro, walking over to the pile of concrete and talking through the hole.

"So far," responded Ichigo, "but I'm trapped. Help me!"

"I'll try to get you out as soon as possible," Keiichiro told her, "Ryou! Get my back. I'm going to try and free Ichigo."

"Al-" Ryou started to say, but Kish interrupted him as he emerged from the shadows.

"Never! I won't let you take her!"

"Kish!" snarled Ryou. "Ah!" he shouted as a spider bit his leg. Ryou quickly shot the spider. "Keiichiro, I need help!" Ryou said in a slightly less-then-calm voice as Kish summoned his dragon swards. Keiichiro stopped pushing the concrete and turned as Kish charged Ryou and three spiders came barreling towards him. He froze in a sudden indecision, should he help Ryou, or save himself? Two of the spiders exploded right before they reached Keiichiro, helping him make up his mind. Ryou ducked and Kish just brushed the top of his head with his swords. Kish did, however, manage to chop Ryou's gun in two. Keiichiro quickly picked up part of a metal pole. It was long, thin, and very sharp. The other spider that hadn't been blown up proceeded to attack Keiichiro. It turned slightly and shot some of its silk at Keiichiro; he barely was able to dodge it.

"Ichigo!" Keiichiro called, "You're going to have to try to get out on your own."

"Yeah," shouted Ryou, frantically searching for a weapon as Kish soared past him, landing on the wall, "We're kind of fighting for our lives, here." Kish had his legs bent, ready to attack. All he needed to do was to push his legs and he would spring from the wall, straight at Ryou. Everyone, except Keiichiro and the spider he was battling, froze and listened to a new sound; the sound of running footsteps.

"Ribbon Mint Echo!" shouted Mint, running into battle. The spider Keiichiro was facing turned back to normal and Masha swooped in and ate the parasite alien. Keiichiro allowed the pole he was holding to slip to the ground.

"Thank you, Mint" said Keiichiro breathlessly, his hands on his knees and his head down. Lettuce, Pudding, and Zakuro ran over and started to help destroying the kirema animas. Kish was still on the wall. Seeing his chance, he sprang from the wall, intent on attacking Ryou.

"Ryou, look out!" screamed Lettuce, who was the only one to see Kish speeding towards Ryou. Ryou turned, just before Kish was upon him. There was a blinding flash of light, and both Ryou and Kish disappeared.

"Where did they go?" asked Pudding, still fighting.

"I don't know," replied Keiichiro, picking up his pole and charging back into the fray, "Can one of you girls help Ichigo? She's trapped in that pile of concrete."

"I'm on it," said Zakuro, turning from the fighting to go help Ichigo. "Ichigo, are you okay?"

Ichigo groaned. Zakuro figured that Ichigo had fainted from all the stress. Silently, Zakuro drew her weapon and started attacking the concrete slabs, hoping to weaken them. With a quiet rumble, parts of the slabs started to fall, clearing the way to Ichigo. "Aaaah!" screamed Ichigo as she woke up, trying to curl into a ball so that a piece of concrete that was falling wouldn't hit her. Zakuro put away her weapon; it was too dangerous to continue with it. Ichigo could get killed.

Tart teleported right behind Mint and shouted, "BOO!" as loudly as he could in her ear. Mint shrieked and fell down, giving the spider she was facing a chance to attack her. Laughing, Tart teleported away. Right before the spider could reach Mint, it blew up, just as Kish and Ryou both fell with a loud THUD! onto the concrete pile. Zakuro backed up with the smallest smile imaginable of satisfaction on her face. When the two boys had landed, they had knocked aside the rest of the concrete slabs that were imprisoning Ichigo. The only bad thing was that Kish was now sitting on Ichigo and Ryou had fallen right above her head. It did not take long for Ichigo to figure this out.

"Eek! Get off me, you freak!" Ichigo yelled at Kish, pushing him off her. "Thanks for helping me, Zakuro," Ichigo said more calmly, standing up. Zakuro just nodded, then ran off to fight the spiders. Kish flew up into the air with his torso bent, his arms and head hanging limply. It looked like he was trying to touch his toes. When he reached the top of the almost destroyed building, he sat down and sighed. Tart teleported next to him, and they talked while the Mew Mews and Keiichiro were fighting.

"Why did you come here, Tart?" asked Kish in a defeated tone of voice.

"The Mew Mews defeated my plant kirema animas, so I followed them when they ran away."

"Did Pai give the signal yet?"

"No. I don't know why though. Do you think he's okay?"

"Probably," said Kish, more then a little irked. Why hadn't Pai done his part of the mission? Was Pai deserting them? With one last sigh, Kish stood up and hitched a smirk upon his face. The Mew Mew crew had defeated all the spiders and they were now looking up at Kish. No one noticed as Ryou woke up, too weak to stand up.

"AHAHAHAHA!" Kish suddenly laughed, "You think that you have defeated us? Well, you are wrong! There is one more spider left and in exactly five minutes, it will explode, thus creating over a hundred new spiders! HAHAHAHA!!"

"No!" yelled Ichigo.

"This can't be!" cried Lettuce.

"You don't have much time," Ryou said weakly, "Don't waste more of it by talking."

"He's right," muttered Zakuro, "Let's split up. We'll cover more ground that way."

"Right!" Ichigo, Pudding, Mint, and Lettuce said at the same time. Before she took off, Zakuro looked over her shoulder and saw the two aliens teleport away.

"I'll stay behind with Ryou," said Keiichiro. Zakuro nodded to show that she understood, and then raced away. Keiichiro looked down at Ryou. He was bleeding from the bite on his leg, and from numerous other wounds all over his body. Kneeling down beside Ryou, his head bowed, Keiichiro watched as Ryou closed his eyes again. Ryou's wounds started to heal all by themselves. Ryou moaned slightly in pain and opened his eyes to look at Keiichiro's shocked face.

"Keiichiro," he said slowly, noticing the man near him, "what happened? I remember Kish attacking me, but what happened after that?"

"You and Kish disappeared," Keiichiro said gently, knowing that it would probably be a huge shock for Ryou. "You came back all covered in cuts and you were unconscious. Kish came back too. Your wounds healed all by themselves right before you woke up."

"Oh. … Wait! I remember something," Ryou muttered, sitting up. "I was in a place where it was all white. Something attacked me. And then…I heard a voice. It was calling… someone."

Flashback:

Ryou couldn't see. He felt something crash into him and he cried out in shock. He heard it growl and turn around. It charged him again and again. Ryou heard a voice say, "Stop that nonsense." And Ryou waited, but nothing attacked him again. "Ryoujin," he heard the voice call. "Ryoujin…Ryoujin. We need you to respond…Ryoujin, come to us!" Ryou suddenly felt pain as he had never experienced before. He screamed as the voice faded away. It all went black, and Ryou could remember no more.

End Flashback:

"I see," said Keiichiro softly, "I wonder where you were. Do you know who was speaking? Who is Ryoujin? Do you know?" Ryou didn't answer; he just turned and looked away.

After a while he asked, "Why aren't the girls back yet? Keiichiro, there are too many questions. They are making my head spin." Keiichiro nodded, but remained silent, wondering if Ryou knew more then he was letting on. At that very moment, Ichigo came storming back with the rest of the Mew Mews behind her.

"He was lying! There was never another spider! Why that rotten - "

"Of course he was lying!" scoffed Mint, "Did you really expect him to tell the truth?"

"Ryou's better," Zakuro said bluntly. Keiichiro gave a small half smile that no one noticed. There wasn't much that Zakuro did not catch.

"Yay! Ryou is all better now!" said Pudding, jumping up and down with excitement.

"Not completely better," said Keiichiro, "but he should be able to get home." Ryou nodded and pushed himself into a sitting position and slo-o-o-o-owly pulled himself to his feet. He wobbled for a moment; then steadied himself.

"Keiichiro's right. Let's get back to the Café; your work is done here. Good job, Tokyo Mew Mew," Ryou said. The girls and Keiichiro headed back to the Café while Ryou turned around to look back at the rubble, thinking about the voice calling… A breeze blew past Ryou and he shivered, cold, and hurried to catch up with the others; still limping.

On the aliens' ship:

"YOU BAKA!!!!!" (A/n "baka" means "idiot" in Japanese)e heard it growl, and then charge him again. It kept on attacking him, eventhough he couldn't fight back screamed Tart when he got back to the ship, seeing Pai sitting calmly in a chair reading. Pai looked up, startled. Tart kept on yelling. "FIRST YOU TELL US TO GO ON AN IMPORTANT MISSION, AND THEN YOU DON'T EVER APPEAR YOURSELF! AFTER YOU SAID YOU WOULD BE THERE!! WITH A SPECIAL SIGNAL!!!"

"I'm so sorry to have deprived you of your chance to see a flash of purple light," Pai said coolly, "but I was busy."

"With what, Pai?" Kish asked menacingly. Pai shrugged and looked back at his book.

"Nothing that will concern you two just now," he said evenly, "Anyway, you had everything under control; there was no need for me." Tart was so mad, Pai and Kish were half surprised that steam was not coming from his ears. Tart made an exasperated noise and stomped out of the room. Kish glared at Pai for another moment before he teleported out the room, not saying a word. After his room was empty, Pai grimaced. They would never appreciate what I've done, thought Pai, They don't need to know anything until I can get everything set into place, otherwise one of those two will spoil everything! Then all of this work would have been for nothing! I worked for months on this project! With that thought, Pai put down his book and pulled a drawer in his desk open. Or should I say, tried to. Pai sighed in annoyance; it was this drawer that Tart had glued shut, and he needed to fill out the documents inside before his plan could be set in motion. Abandoning trying to open the drawer, Pai picked up a new sheet of paper, and began to plot. He filled the paper with strange looking runes and a picture of a girl. A girl he should know nothing of.

Kish teleported to Lysistrata's room when he was sure that Pai was just being his normal mysterious self, and not endangering the mission in any way. If he was, then Kish had to file a report, and make sure that Pai was not going to kill them all. After standing in the doorway for a few moments, Kish sank into the chair by Lysistrata's bed. He thought about the battle that took place a few moments ago. Kish sighed; shaking his head with a slight smile on his face, imagining what Lysie would say if she could have seen him leave for hours without telling her what was going on first.

"I'm sorry," whispered Kish, "I didn't want to leave you here to battle the Mews. To be honest with you, I didn't even want to fight, but, well… I had to. You know what it's like on my planet. Anyways, why were you sent here? Were you caught? I hope not; that could ruin everything. I know that you've worked hard on it. You practically devoted your whole life to this…project. I guess the Empire is actually getting smarter." Unknown to Kish, Lysistrata twitched when she heard Kish talking. Kish kept on rambling on, pretty much talking about everything he could think of, just so then he had an excuse to stay with Lysistrata.

She could feel the probe moving away. They either were not looking for her, or were giving up. She could go back to the normal world. But… did she want to? She couldn't remember something to live for. All she could remember was the pain and torture of living in secret and being punished, sometimes for no reason. Suddenly, she heard a soft voice. She could not make out the words, but it seemed familiar. She listened harder, twitching in frustration when she couldn't figure out where she had heard the voice before. All of a sudden, she could remember times when she was happy. She remembered that same voice laughing, and laughing with it. She could remember happy days spent outside in the sun. She remembered why she wanted to live. Smiling, she slipped out of her coma and into a normal, untroubled sleep. However, she didn't want to stay asleep for long; she wanted to live.

Kish continued to talk nonstop about all sorts of random things. For some reason, Kish felt as if he kept on talking, Lysistrata would get better, but if he stopped talking, then she would most likely die, or never wake up. The speakers blared when he was in the middle of a word. Kish glared up at the speakers, wishing they weren't in that room.

Pai's voice came over the speakers, shouting, "The tracking waves have disappeared. Thank you for listening."

"I wish you'd disappear!" Kish heard Tart shout from a part of the ship that was farther away. Kish chuckled. Tart could be funny sometimes, in a childish way, of course. Sighing, Kish stood up to save Tart before Pai could incinerate him. Amused, Kish realized that he was sighing more and more often. Kish shrugged, figuring that he had more reasons to sigh nowadays. Silently, Kish crossed the room to the door. When he was just about to turn the doorknob, Kish looked back at Lysistrata to make sure she was okay. Kish froze, not believing what was right in front of his face. Lysistrata slowly opened her eyes, propped her self up onto her elbows, and blinked.