Author: The next song on Kyandi's playlist is "Top Secret" by Hatsune Miku. This song is in Japanese, as Kyandi has experienced both American and Japanese cultures. There are translations for this song on YouTube.
Kisshu stayed in Kyandi's room for a while longer. Eventually, Kisshu got bored with just sitting there, holding her. He leaned in to give her a kiss, but she stopped him by placing a finger over his lips and shaking her head.
"Not yet, mister," she teased. "You have to earn your reward. I don't give kisses for free."
Kisshu raised his eyebrows and playfully nipped at her finger, causing her to gasp in shock. Then he smiled. "Is that a rule, or a challenge?"
Kyandi pondered his question for a moment before hesitantly answering, "Both?" At Kisshu's dubious expression, she nodded and affirmed, "Both."
"Why both, Kyandi-chan?" he purred seductively, leaning forward and pressing his forehead against hers. She met his eyes with her own, and Kisshu was awestruck by that ice-blue hue. Her eyes reminded him of Mew Aqua.
As Kyandi stared into Kisshu's exotically beautiful golden eyes, she grinned broadly. "Well, something tells me that you are the kind of person who has no qualms about breaking rules. However, you don't strike me as the type that would back down from a challenge. So, if I challenge you to follow a rule, then it is simultaneously a rule and a challenge, neh?"
Kisshu blinked and something shifted within his eyes. Finally, someone had set a boundary for him not to cross. Still, he wanted to see if she would punish him if he broke that rule. However, doing that would cause him to lose her challenge. "Oh, she is too good at this," he concluded. With a smile, he backed away and stood. "Alright, peacock. You'll get away with it this time, only because I'm in a good mood." He turned toward the window, as if leaving, and began to hover in its direction.
Kyandi snorted. "Of course you're in a good mood. You won today."
Kisshu stopped in midair. "Pardon?" he asked stoically, managing to hide his shock. "How did she figure that out?"
Kyandi stood too and made eye contact with him. "Don't think I didn't notice all of those blue bubbles following you into oblivion. I don't really understand why you need them, but I know that you certainly took a roundabout approach in order to get them. You make something garish appear and tricked us into believing that it was a decoy to distract us from your true intent, and it turns out that the bold display was merely a means by which you could obtain what you've been seeking this entire time. It was a rather brilliant plan." Kyandi gave a low chuckle. "I still kind of geeking out about it, honestly. Before today, I had no idea that you were capable of something like that." Kisshu stared at her, dumbfounded, as she continued. "What I want to know is: how did you know Strawberry's scepter would make millions of Mew Aqua drops? Heck, until today, I didn't even know that Strawberry had a scepter. I'm not even sure that she knew she had a scepter. It seems like it would be an awfully big gamble to make for something that you're not even sure would happen. So tell me, Mr. Devious, how did you do it?"
Kisshu smirked. He had actually managed to get her to admire him for something. Step One of his enticement plan was working out wonderfully. Although, he had figured that her admiration would have been for his drop-dead gorgeous looks, but whatever. Now for the second step, he would feed her some harmless information in order to deceive her into thinking that he trusted her… or underestimated her or anything that would get her to underestimate him. She wanted to know today's plan? No problem. It wasn't like he could use it again anyways. "I didn't know," he confessed. "Honestly, the scepter thing was a total surprise. My plan was to use Mew Strawberry like a… magnet of sorts. It didn't really have to be Strawberry, but she's the most easily provoked, so that's just how things worked out."
"Like a… magnet?" Kyandi asked, furrowing her brow in confusion.
"Of course," Kisshu rolled his eyes. "Pai and Taruto have been going about this in the wrong way. Mew Aqua isn't found. Mew Aqua finds. It can't be searched for. It searches. The natural inclination of Mew Aqua, for whatever reason there might be, is to seek out and make contact with Mew Mews. That's why I named the d*mned stuff Mew Aqua in the first place."
Kyandi made a stunned face. "You named the Mew Aqua?"
Kisshu nodded. "Yes, I named it that, and that's why Pai and Taruto call it by that name. As for why your lot started doing it, I have no clue." Kisshu paused to glance at Kyandi, who seemed satisfied by his explanation. So, he continued with his story. "Mew Aqua searches for Mew Mews. I don't know why, but it does. So I used this fact to my advantage today. I figured that I'd lure it out of hiding, and then swoop in and grab it." He cut his eyes at the peacock mew. "However, somebody tackled me and prevented me from reaching it in time."
Kyandi stifled the giggle that rose in her throat at his obvious disdain for her earlier intervention. She winked. "Well, somebody had to."
Kisshu smiled, quickly inverting his grin before she could notice. He managed to make a disappointed face. "Unfortunately, even though there were several drops of Mew Aqua, the power contained in the sum of the ones I collected is still only a fraction of that emitted by the whole. Most of the drops were used up to destroy the Chimera Anima and the pollution it caused. Even though I won today, I kind of lost. I didn't get all of it."
Kyandi grinned. She was pleased to think of it this way. She had thought that the aliens were merely using the Mew Mews like pawns, and that their resistance didn't do a thing. But they didn't get everything. However… there was one small problem. It caused her to frown. "So… what you're saying is: if we Mews didn't exist, you wouldn't be able to obtain any Mew Aqua at all."
Kisshu cackled. "If your lot didn't exist, we probably wouldn't even know that Mew Aqua exists. Mew Aqua is drawn to Mew Mews, after all. What would it be drawn to without you? Nothing. It would probably still be inactive, beneath the ground somewhere, waiting for something that didn't exist to call it to activity."
Kyandi rubbed her forehead, feeling a headache coming on. It seemed that Mew Mews were of no help after all. Sure, they kept the Chimera Animas from destroying the planet. But they were also the reason that the aliens now had Mew Aqua. It seemed like some unseen force was working against Kyandi and her comrades, and she stared at the floor and wondered how to stop it.
Still, she was glad that her secret mission to dig for information had been a success tonight. Kisshu probably thought that she was beginning to underestimate him, too. The rest of today had been horrible, but at least one thing was going perfectly. She turned her head back up, looking toward where Kisshu was standing. Empty air. He was gone.
That night, Kyandi cried herself to sleep. Her dad was mean. Her mom was dead. And being a Mew Mew seemed completely pointless. The tears soaked the pillow as the sobs racked her exhausted and battered body. With a life like this, what was the point of waking up?
The next morning, walking to the café, Kyandi wondered why she had let Kisshu comfort her at all. Weren't his actions the cause of her father's abuse last night? If he hadn't broken her iPhone, would that argument between father and daughter ever started? But Kyandi sighed. No. She couldn't hold it against Kisshu. Her father would have found some other reason. He always found a reason.
When Kyandi entered the café through the back, Ryou was the first person that she saw. "Kyandi, we need to talk," he told her. She followed him to the basement.
"I understand that you had a visitor last night," Ryou began.
"Huh? How did you know that?" Kyandi asked, somewhat surprised.
He pointed to the pendant that hung from its beaded chain. "Your communication device was still on."
She glanced down at the golden object. "Ah. I see." She unconsciously tugged at the fabric hiding her left elbow, remembering the cause of the bruise hidden there. Ryou had overheard her talking to Kisshu about it. She was busted. Kyandi Coffman pursed her lips sheepishly.
"I was able to gather a lot of data from listening in on your conversation. The aliens have some interesting theories about Mew Aqua," Ryou stated.
Kyandi held her breath. Hopefully he would go into some dramatic, science nerd rant, and she would get off scot-free.
"However, the intel that you've provided does not excuse your using your powers to attack your father," Ryou added with a frown.
Kyandi sighed in disappointment. So much for that ranting…
To Kyandi's surprise, Ryou didn't raise his voice. He began to lecture her in a rather calm tone. "From what I heard, it sounds like he asked for it. However, I don't appreciate the fact that you blatantly lied to me." He was silent for a long time. Then, he sighed. "I can't allow you to remain in a situation that causes you to use your powers so recklessly."
Kyandi looked up at him in surprise, and a small smile crept across his face. Ryou was protecting her, and he was being careful to use his words in a way that wouldn't embarrass her. She fought the tears that welled up with the tiny glimpse of hope. Bowing at the waist, she murmured, "Thank you," in English.
Ryou nodded. "Now, go home and pack the things you need. I'll be over to your house in an hour to pick you up. From now on, you'll be living here at the café with Keiichiro and me."
"Yes sir," Kyandi nodded. She rushed up the stairs, through the kitchen and out the back door. Her heart was singing as she ran. "Mom," she wondered as she ran, "can you see me? I escaped too. He won't be able to hurt either of us anymore."
In her room, Kyandi ransacked her closet for her suitcase. Finding the black box on wheels, she unzipped it and tossed some bras and panties inside. She rushed into the bathroom and grabbed her toothbrush. She shoved it into a zippy bag as she walked back to her room, and then threw the bag into her suitcase. She packed her blow dryer, her hair straightener, and her make-up. She took her deodorant and her arsenal of various perfumes. Then she added her box of hair accessories, and her jewelry box. Her suitcase was rather small, so it was now full. She zipped it shut and rummaged around in her closet again, this time pulling out a stylish black trunk. Into the trunk she put her school uniforms and her favorite outfits. As a last minute thought, she grabbed the spare set of bedding from her closet and added both it and the pillows from her bed. She managed to close the trunk by sitting on top of it and snapping the locks into place. "There," she said with a smile.
Jack Coffman wondered what his daughter was doing that was causing such a racket. He peered into her bedroom and frowned when he saw that she had been packing her suitcase and her trunk. "What the h*ll are you doing?" he grumbled.
Kyandi gasped when she saw him standing there. She was caught. She gulped fearfully, but there was no point in lying to him. "I'm leaving. A friend of mine is letting me stay with him, so I'm moving out."
"Like h*ll you are!" he hollered, raising his hand above his head to slap her. But… something stopped him. It was strange. He seemed to have a blurry memory – perhaps the memory of a dream – of Kyandi turning into a horrible monster and hitting him hard enough to toss him quite a good distance backwards. He dropped his arm to his side, then stood back and smirked. "You're my daughter. You're not going anywhere. I'm calling the cops."
"I don't think that would be very wise," said a voice from the hallway. The figure of a blue-eyed blond male appeared, leaning against Kyandi's doorframe.
"Ryou!" Kyandi exclaimed happily. She was so glad to see him that she dropped the formalities and called him by his first name.
He continued as if he hadn't heard her. "If you do that, Mr. Coffman," Ryou was speaking in English, "I'll have to show the authorities the reason that I'm bringing her with me. That bruise on her cheek has been puzzling her peers for the past three days. And there are probably others, after what you did last night. If you do call the police, Mr. Coffman, you're the one who's likely to be arrested, not me."
Jack Coffman realized that he was stuck. He had no choice but to let this boy take his daughter away from him. "Have fun f*ckin' with your boyfriend, you little piece of sh*t," he growled at Kyandi as he left the room.
Kyandi stood up from her seat on the trunk and blushed. Her father had gotten the totally wrong idea. Ryou sighed in annoyance and went over next to her. The blond teenager lifted the trunk and swung it onto his shoulder as if it were light. Kyandi grabbed the handle of her rolling suitcase and slipped her school bag over her shoulder. As she passed her end table on the way out, she grabbed the framed photograph of her mother and slid it inside next to her math book.
On the top floor of the café, at the very end of the staircase, there was a bedroom with a private bathroom. As he carried in her trunk, Ryou explained that it was the biggest bedroom in the café. Kyandi gawked around the room and realized that his statement seemed rather believable. Out of curiosity, she asked, "Why didn't you take it?"
"Do you think I want to climb this many stairs every day?" he asked humorously. He laughed when all Kyandi did in reply was shrug.
After Kyandi had settled all of her belongings into the café loft room, she headed downstairs to the changing room. Before she reached her destination, she ran into Zakuro. The purple-haired girl spoke with her. "Shirogane told me to tell you that you may work in your normal clothes today. You don't need to wear the uniform." Kyandi nodded her thanks to Zakuro for relaying the message and continued downstairs to the kitchen. Zakuro turned and followed her.
As the two girls walked out into the main dining area, the front door of the café flew open. Bu-Ling, Retasu and Minto were all lined up in front of the now open door. Ichigo stood there, appearing somewhat disheveled. "Sorry I'm late again," she apologized. She made a weird face.
"As expected, Bu-Ling's guess is correct," Bu-Ling said in a serious tone. Kyandi balked at seeing the little girl act so unlike herself. The blonde girl continued, "Ichigo onee-chan is moody today, na-no-da."
"Ichigo-san," Retasu added sympathetically, "please cheer up."
"Did something happen to her?" Kyandi wondered.
"People say that falling out of love is part of growing up…" Minto began, blushing.
"Oh no," Kyandi assumed. "Lover boy dumped her because she didn't show for their date."
"F- Falling out of love?" Ichigo asked.
"Yes," Bu-Ling answered, her voice still serious. "How could there be an onii-chan who's willing to wait for so long in the rain? He must have dumped you so hard." While Bu-Ling was speaking, Retasu nodded her head in agreement.
"I… I didn't get dumped at all," Ichigo explained, blushing awkwardly.
"Huh?" the three girls exclaimed in confusion.
"As a matter of fact," Ichigo began twiddling her thumbs, "we happened to find out that we're in love with each other…"
The silence that followed was the most awkward thing that Kyandi had ever seen. The ecchi otaku snickered at the sight of everyone standing there, processing. Finally, all three of the younger girls squealed, "WHAT?" It was a long, drawn out word that lasted for several seconds.
"Is that so?" Retasu asked, her eyes sparkling with relief. "Everyone was so worried about it." The bespectacled girl and Minto both clasped the redhead's hands.
"If that's true, you should have told us sooner!" Minto exclaimed cheerfully.
"Hmm… There is indeed such a guy around. It's a miracle," Bu-Ling mumbled.
"Indeed. Isn't that a relief?" Zakuro added, walking over to join the conversation.
Kyandi walked over too. "Congratulations. I stand corrected about his intentions toward you."
At Kyandi's words, Ichigo blushed even harder. "Now, b- because he said he'd like to try the cake here… right now… he… came here."
Minto and Retasu both blushed as Masaya Aoyama walked up and stood next to Ichigo. He was also blushing. "H- Hello everyone," he stuttered, taking Ichigo's hand with his left hand and running his right hand through his dark hair in an awkward gesture.
"'Sup?" Kyandi asked casually.
Bu-Ling grinned from ear to ear. "Ichigo onee-chan's boyfriend has come to try our cake!" she yelled rather loudly toward the back, as if she were trying to notify Keiichiro in the kitchen. The blonde girl spun back around and bowed. "Welcome."
"B- Bu-Ling… boyfriend is a…" Ichigo began.
"But it's true, isn't it?" the blonde interrupted.
"Well, it's not exactly wrong, but…" Ichigo struggled. Kyandi stifled a laugh as Ichigo's cat ears popped out and the redhead quickly threw her hands over them to hide them. "Wah! I- I'm going to go get changed!" the cat-girl shouted as she dashed toward the dressing room.
"I'll seat you right over here, na-no-da!" Bu-Ling exclaimed, leading Masaya to one of Ichigo's regular tables.
"Well, that was awkward…" Minto sighed.
"It really was," Kyandi laughed.
"What was awkward?" asked a voice in English that made the peacock mew freeze.
Kyandi whirled around. "Joshu… what are you doing here?"
Author: Happy 12/12/12! I know that all of you wished for this story to be updated, so here you go. And if I'm not mistaken, this is the longest chapter so far. Your wish came true! Ta-da!