Disclaimer: All original characters, places, etc. from FLCL are property of Gainax studios, any original characters/please/etc. that are made by me are mine!

Author's Note: This Chapter felt...kind of forced. I dunno, it seems kind of slow. I'll consider rewriting it later but for now, it'll do. First battle comes next chapter!

Naota stared with a dull shock masked with an annoyed scowl as he watched Haruko go to work on her 8th plate of rather expensive cuisine, using two sporks to shovel it into her mouth. In front of Naota sat a half eaten plate of rice with heated shrimp. Apparently Naota's next plan to try and get the truth out of Haruko by bribing her in a way with food, wasn't working.

" Aren't…GULP you… CRUNCH gonna…MUNCH eat…MOO! Ta-kun?" Haruko asked between mouthfuls as she practically inhaled a lobster in mere moments. It seemed that the stares that the two got from the rest of the restaurant's patrons didn't affect her in the least.

" Haruko! " Naota finally yelled, losing his nerve and slamming his fists on the table, getting up. "You're going to tell me EXACTLY why you came back or I WON'T pay for this feast you've managed to eat!"

Haruko stopped eating, slurping up a stray noodle hanging from her mouth. With a toothy grin coming to her features, Haruko slowly raised herself up, resting on her fists, mimicking Naota. After a moment of just staring into her smoldering eyes she simply said "Thanks for the date, Ta-kun."

"Wha-?" Naota managed before being pounced on, right on top of the table, as Haruko first started crushing him in some sort of bear hug, kissing him all over his face, then throwing him down, jumping on his back, then making some rather weird animal noises, finally jumping off, waving back to Naota wordlessly, and pulling on her helmet. In a flash Haruko was out the door and could be heard racing down the street on her Vespa as Naota lay limp on his table, shocked faces on all the patrons of the place.

"HA…RU…..KOOOOOO!" Naota yelled after he took a moment to recover, throwing a couple of hundred yen on the table, not near enough to pay for the dinner, and ran out the door and down the street, flailing his arms like a madman and shouting obscenities at her.

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After chasing Haruko's fading form for nearly a mile, Naota gave up, doubling over and breathing hard. Now that Naota thought about it, he knew that Haruko's Vespa could have been out of sight long before she had and realized she had led him on some wild goose chase for nearly a mile and a half.

Shaking his head, Naota righted himself, pivoted on his right foot and took one step forward….right into a solid metal body, covered by a cheap Hawaiian shirt. After a moment of recovering from the pain shooting up his nose, Naota looked up into the TV-like face of Canti.

At that very moment Haruko came flying over the roof of a nearby apartment building, using the pointed roof like a ramp. She seemed to freeze in mid-air at the zenith of her jump, then titled her Vespa downward, falling straight towards Naota. Before Naota could move out of the way, Haruko used Naota's head like an airbag for the wheels of her Vespa, bouncing off of it and coming to a clean stop. Naota looked blankly ahead for a few moments, then fell over like a board.

" You…really suck Haruko…." Naota kind of gasped from his spot on the street.

"…and well too, you'll find out soon enough!" Haruko replied, throwing a wink and a grin his way, silencing him in confusion and embarrassment, a blush actually painting his now quite deformed head.

" I was wondering where you went!" Haruko turned to Canti, prodding the machine's chest with one, long index finger. Canti responded with an odd salute, then quickly ripped open his Hawaiian shirt, revealing several bumper stickers and postage stamps of where he had been. He seemed to point to his favorite, which read "I Can REALLY party in Neptune!". Had the robot a face, it would have been smiling broadly in accomplishment.

" Hmm…well, OK, I SUPPOSE I could let you off the hook. Now go back to the restaurant over there and wash dishes until Ta-kun's debt is paid off, and no lip!" Haruko pointed, her beautiful features set into a Naota-like scowl, as if Canti had been the one who had eaten all that food and skipped out without paying. Canti lowered his TV head, trudging towards the restaurant, patting Naota's head in a really strange show of affection as he passed by.

" Tsk tsk, what a lazy piece of junk sometimes," Haruko shook her head in mock disgust, "C'mon Ta-kun!" Haruko said, more of an order than question, grabbing the paralyzed mass of human and throwing him onto the Vespa, taking off at near impossible acceleration speeds on her bright yellow scooter.

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After several hours of driving, Haruko finally stopped deep in the wood in the nearest mountains whose name escaped Naota's battered brain at the moment. As much as Naota had wanted to question Haruko at every strange turn she made, something told him to keep quiet because for once he might get the answers out of Haruko that he had originally wanted.

" Uhhh… Haruko, where are we goin?" Naota asked, curiously, from his rather smashed spot in between Haruko and the steering handles for the Vespa, like he had done when he was twelve.

" You wanted answers, right Ta-kun? Well, I'm taking you to a place where I can really SHOW you what they are. " Haruko replied from above him in a strangely straightforward matter. Something was up and Naota hoped that Haruko was dragging him out into the middle of the woods to do some perverted freakish things to him. He would find out soon enough as the Vespa stopped in the middle of a small clearing soon after this initial thought.

Haruko hopped off the Vespa and yawned up at the sun which was now falling from its zenith and heading west to set. She stretched her arms up then intertwined her fingers above her head, brought them back behind her back and cracked her bones that scored louder on the decibel scale then trying to cut rocks with a chainsaw.

How absolutely obnoxious…I'm beginning to wonder if the only reason I had…loved her was because she'd bashed my brains in so many times that I couldn't think straight. Naota thought to himself as he stared rather blankly at Haruko's form as she seemed to stretch like a cat and crack her bones loud enough to shake boulders lose.

After a moment she turned around, noticed Naota staring blankly in her direction and smirked slightly. "Like what ya see Ta-kun? You've really developed into quite the little pervert. Then again, like father like son they say here, hmm?" Haruko asked as she walked past Naota, retrieving her base and hopping up onto the handlebars of her Vespa, beginning to play random chords to the slowly setting sun.

"Well, what now Haruko? Aren't you going to tell me the reason why you came back?!" Naota asked, disregarding her earlier question which had been meant to embarrass him. This time, Naota was resolved that he would NOT leave Haruko alone or do any favors for her until he got some truthful answers from her.

"We wait, and when it's time, you see" she replied quietly, not even bothering to glance over her shoulder at Naota, content to just let her feet dangle over the handle bars of the Vespa and play a number of chords of a song that Naota didn't recognize. Shaking his head, Naota, wordlessly, took up a seat in the soft grass next to the Vespa handlebars, staring at the blank sky and wondering exactly why he'd been deemed to be the kid that had to grow up the fastest in the universe.

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Something shook Naota, rather hard, but all he did was groan slightly and try and push whatever was shaking him away. No matter how old you get some things just never seem to change. Another shake and another groan, Naota refused to come out of his slumber that he had fallen into up against the Vespa. For a few moments, there was absolutely no disturbance, and then a thunderclap seemed to invade Naota's ears, punctuated by a dull pain shooting up the side of his head as his eyes snapped open.

There, in front of him, stood Haruko, grinning and holding her Rickenbacker Bass by the neck, the actual base of the guitar pressed up against Naoata's head. Naota wasn't sure exactly what expression was on his face, surprise…maybe anger. Whatever it was, a murderous rage built up inside Naota and he lunged at Haruko, hands outstretched and ready to throttle her.

Haruko grinned broadly, grabbed Naota by his wrested and voluntarily fell back, bringing her right foot up and flinging him head over heels to land on his back with a soft thump. In a flash, Haruko was on top of Naoata, pinning his arms to the ground and with a giant grin painted on her face. Naota, at first, was contemplating spitting in her face to show just how ticked he was at being repeatedly bashed with a massive bass guitar, but noticed that Haruko wasn't looking at his face but his forehead.

" Oh no…" Naota muttered, looking up he could make out something that he thought would never come back. He had seen no reason to keep the eyebrows with Haruko gone, especially after Amaro discontinued contact with him, he was no longer important to the IIB and was discarded by them, just like Haruko had discarded him…and Mamimi… Three long pointed spike like masses of flesh stuck straight out of Naota's head like upside down nails, a N-O Channel had been opened…

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Medical Mechanica Base 12:05 AM

" Commander Amaro! We've got one HUGE energy reading up in the mountains! It's the biggest we've ever seen, even bigger than the ones exhibited five years ago!" Kitsurubami yelled, excitement and an edge of fear nudging its way into her voice.

" Naota…" Amaro voiced silently, as he looked at the massive screen that displayed a map and one, large red beeping area that showed where the energy reading was coming from…