Chapter 21. Emergency Mission?

(By the way, song lyrics are written in bold in this chapter.)

Ashley walked down the hall towards the kitchen to get more Nutella for the pancakes the gang was all feasting on in the living room when she heard a strange ringtone coming from one of the closed rooms. Curiosity was one of Ashley's weaknesses so without thought she opened the dark stained wood door and peaked inside a room where only a single mirror stood. Across the shiny surface was black writing saying, "Incoming Call from Lord Death." Ashley walked towards the mirror and tapped the screen confused when suddenly a huge blinding beam of light dazzled her for a few seconds and finally died down. She looked up to seem Lord Death looking straight at her in the mirror.

"Oh Ashley! Heya! Hi! How ya doin? Did you enjoy the party last night? I didn't realise you were going out with Kid, I'm glad he chose wisely!"

Ashley turned pink, "Oh yeah it was awesome! Everyone's here in Gallows Manor now, would you like me to get Kid?"

"No no there is no time for that. Ashley I need you and the team to come to the DWMA ASAP. We have had an important report from Sid about the Madness Pool in Brazil; apparently Kishiben is on the move wiping out villages and anyone who stands in his way. He needs to be stopped before he reaches any large cities like Rio de Janeiro where he would kill thousands of residents. You all need to pack your bags now and get here as fast as you can so we can send you on the first train to the airport and send you off to Brazil. You will be accompanied by Death Scythe Spirit and Blaire, I'm still deciding whether I should send your father with Marie or not but please do try and be ready in less than three hours."

Ashley nodded, "Don't worry Lord Death I'm on it! I'll see you later in the death room then."

The mirror changed to its norm and Ashley gazed at her reflection, this was bad. She raced out of the weird room slamming the door behind her before dashing into the living room.

"Where's the Nutella?" Patty moaned.

"No time for food. Everyone go home and get your bags packed right now with at least enough supplies for two weeks. We have received a call from Lord Death with information back about Kishiben in Brazil. Shits going down over there big style so we need to get our asses in gear and get to the death room in less than three hours, got it? Oh and by the way Maka, your creepy dad is accompanying us along with Blaire."

Everyone burst out laughing at Maka's scared expression before cramming the rest of the food into their mouths and rushing off to homes and bed rooms to pack. Ashley, who had already moved all her stuff into Kid's room, reached into the wardrobe and grabbed eight pairs of clothes along with practically all the underwear she owned, yes even four of the sexy pairs she owns and shoved them all neatly into a green camouflage hiking bag along with a purple sleeping bag. Kid had an identical bag and also carefully organised all the contense of his bag at record breaking speed along with his black sleeping bag. They joined the Thompson sisters at the front door. Liz and Patty turned to the twin pistols which Kid held as Ashley clinged onto him while they flew on Beezlebub to BlackStar and Tsubaki's house where they were just walking outside the door. Ashley high-fived BlackStar before he raced them with speed star with Tsubaki was in weapon form to Soul and Maka's. Soul was revving up the engine on his motor bike while Maka sat on his back pack and had hers on her back, after getting the signal from Kid and BlackStar they all zoomed off through the streets to the DWMA and up the stairs; it only took them a few minutes to reach the death room and they were one hour early!

Lord Death turned to see the gang running up to his station in the death room, "Heya guys! I assume…"

"FOOL!...And thus why I only drink a cup of coffee with cream in the morning."

The gang's expressions suddenly went all strange, like they were disgusted, afraid and depressed all at once.

"Father, why are you having Excalibur of all people round for breakfast at a time like this?" Kid groaned.

"FOOL! I invited myself." The weird white thing interrupted.

Maka rested her head in her hands, "Of course he did." She muttered under her breath.

"Lord Death it says on the packet of this croissant that the out of date is tomorrow. Number 602 of my 1000 provisions clearly states that food should be prepared with the freshest ingredients. This is out of date so it is not fresh."

Patty's smile finally faded along with the others, Ashley whispered to her, "What the hell is that thing, and what's that face you're all making?"

"It's the Excalibur face…and that's Excalibur over there wearing no pants."

"Oh…I thought that was a duck."

"FOOL!" Excalibur pointed his can at Ashley as she said that, "You're the daughter of Franken Stein aren't you?"

"Um…ye…"

"FOOL!"

Ashley's face finally warped into the same 'Excalibur face' her friends wore, "I swear to god I want to kick that duck's ass."

"FOOL! I am not a duck."

Ashley fell to her knees and buried her head in her hands, she felt a shadow over her,

"Lord Death I would appreciate it if Ashley wasn't to interact with the Holy Sword…"

"FOOL!"

Stein cringed as the mentioning of that word, it bought back too many unpleasant memories of his youth when he first met Excalibur with Spirit, Maire, Azusa and Justin when they were all students. He only went because Spirit literally had grabbed the back of his coat and dragged him. He shook off the memories and continued,

"Should I take the team to the taxi? Spirit and Blaire are already waiting."

"Ya ya, Ashley already knows the main details so she can inform the team of them if she hasn't done already while you're on the train but Sid can tell all of them the true facts when you all meet him at camp in Brazil. All of you have a good time! Oh and by the way…which ever one of you does destroy Kishiben, whatever you do; do not eat his soul."

The team nodded and followed Stein out to the car. They decided to bring Soul's motorbike with them since it would be another fast way to get around and may come in handy.

"How are we all going to fit this is only a seven seater? There are eleven of us along with another eleven huge rucksacks." Maka sighed as she saw the adults drawing out a plan.

Spirit put his hands on his hips as Blaire, who was acting as his assistant, held up a sheet of paper.

"I will drive the car with Stein in the passenger seat while Ash, Kid and Tsubaki will sit in the middle section while Kid will hold one of the Thompson sisters in their weapon forms and Blair will remain in her cat form and stay on any of their laps. Then BlackStar will sit in the back next to Liz or Patty, if either of the two girls wants to take a break from being in weapon form they can switch seats. Meanwhile Soul and Maka will follow us on the motor bike; we'll just have to cram the bags around us." Spirit explained.

Death the Kid, Tsubaki and Ashley clambered into the middle seats as ordered while Blaire transformed into a cat and curled up on Ashley's lap. Spirit and Stein started to cram their bags around them, making things very uncomfortable however it would only be for about half an hour so they put up with it. BlackStar leaped into the back seat with Patty while Liz transformed into a pistol, but she fell to the floor, Kid didn't catch her.

"Hey Kid what the hell that hurt!"

"Idiot! I can't hold you without Patty! Then I would be unbalanced on my left and right sides, not to mention ASYMETRICAL GARBAGE!"

Ashley gripped onto his shoulder with one hand, "Kid relax; I'm sure someone else can hold Liz for you"

Kid sighed and looked embarrassed, "I really am pathetic if I can't hold a single weapon without freaking out about symmetry. Screw OCD." He muttered.

"What makes you say that? You want to know what I think OCD stands for?" Ashley whispered as Kid shifted his tired gaze from the floor to her pretty face, "Obviously. Cool. Dude."

Kid's eyes widened in shock before returning to a sexy half smirk, "Thanks beautiful." He said as he stroked a strand of hair behind her left ear to preserve her symmetry.

Tsubaki reached down out the car door to pick up Liz and shut her door as Stein and Spirit got into the front seats. BlackStar signalled a thumb up to Soul who was revving up his engine on the motorbike before he followed the car to the train station.

"I have pins and needles real bad!" Patty complained.

"Rich coming from you! You don't have a single huge hiking back pack crushing you!" Kid groaned.

BlackStar swivelled Patty around in her seat so her legs rested on his lap and started to massage her feet.

"Aaaahhh much better." She sighed as everyone else in the car sweat dropped.

After a while, things started to get boring for the gang, they thought the journey would be at least half an hour but they had been seated in the same taxi for double that time now.

"Stein, I thought Marie was coming?"

The professor turned around as his glasses flashed and let out a puff of cigarette smoke, "Marie is waiting at the station for us, she's getting the tickets."

Everyone spluttered and coughed at the stench of the smoke while Ashley, Liz and Patty cherished the moment.

Suddenly Blair leaped off of Ashley's lap and onto Spirit's before transforming into a human…stark naked of course.

"Come on Spirit I'm bored, play with me!" She whined as she pushed the death scythe's head against her jugs.

Spirit flung back and nose bled everywhere as Stein whipped his own blood from his nose and grabbed hold of the wheel as the car skidded to the side rapidly and swerved back on course.

"Blair calm down, has anyone got any nonsexual games we can play in the car so Blair doesn't feel the need to rape our driver?" Stein stammered.

"What about eye spy?"

"No way, too dull."

"20 Questions?"

"Nope."

"Why don't we play the Radio game?"

Everyone turned to Tsubaki and questioned what kind of game this was.

"Basically you hit the scan button on the radio and it will choose a station with a random song, the first person to guess what song it is gets a point. The person with the most points by the end of the game wins." She smiled sweetly.

Stein clicked the scan button and landed on a song.

Oh believe my dedicated fix, simply blast it,

it ain't a trick.

Just one click, then a second click, rest is oh my goodness your history.

"Bang Bang Bang Bang have a nice Dream!" Liz shouted, "Seriously I can't believe Kid forgot his own fighting theme."

"I tend to focus more on the fight itself Liz, not my backing track." Kid argued back.

So scary but I can't give in to this,

Fear of pumpkin carriages,

Cause all the witches see it in your eyes.

See you in your dreams, yeah baby

Your nightmares too, that's where I'll find you

Fairy Blue…

"Black Paper Moon!" Blair giggled, "that's one point to me and Liz!"

Can't fight the fate especially mine,

Dynasty's coming from the battlefield to unwine.

Go sign, go sign green it's a go sign,

Death scythe is red hot man that's a hold sign

"Step Up, my theme tune."

Everyone looked up out of their windows as they pulled in at the station parking spaces to see Justin Law and Marie waiting for them on a path, Justin for some strange reason had his earphones out, probably why he looked like he was trying to cover up sadness. Everyone piled out the car as Maka and Soul parked up next to the car and joined in the hugs.

"How come you're here Justin?" Stein started, only to be interrupted by a tall woman with black hair and glasses in an extremely smart black sort of ladies suit.

"A-Azusa?! What the hell are you doing here?" Spirit spluttered with terror.

"I'm here to ensure you and Stein don't do anything stupid." She said sternly as she flashed her glasses.

"I see you're as bratty as you were the last time I saw you Azusa Yami…" Stein started.

"That's enough, everyone line up at attention!" She yelled as everyone, yes even the students, formed a line one behind the other and held their arms out straight in front of them as Azusa once again flashed her glasses.

"Not this again." The adults all sweat dropped as the students pondered at their reaction.