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Chapter Five: Return

Lilo entered the living room only to find that two experiments were already watching the TV. Stitch was lying on the sofa, giggling occasionally, but 623 – freshly named Demon – was on the floor right in front of the screen, laughing her head off. Then Lilo noticed that although her antennae and spikes were still visible, she only had two arms.

'Oh, Demon, you managed to hide your arms!' she exclaimed. The smirking experiment looked back at her.

'Yep. I got the hang of it after Stitch showed me how. But I can't do the other bits yet.'

Suddenly Lilo noticed something odd about the experiment's voice.

'Demon… do you have an English accent?!'

She looked up again, but her eyes showed little understanding. 'Hmm? I learned most of your Earth language from this television programme.'

For the first time Lilo noticed what was on the TV. They were showing QI reruns.

'Huh? I don't remember ever seeing this show.'

'Stitch did some rewiring,' she grinned, then jumped up on the sofa to give him a grateful hug. Stitch gave her a lick, and with a faint hum their antennae lit up again, two blue and two yellow.

'Well, Jumba says those lights mean you're good,' Lilo pointed out. 'And you've got your name now… so I think it's time we found you a home.'

Demon froze and Stitch pulled her closer to him. 'Oh yeah…' the female experiment agreed sadly. 'I need to put my abilities to good use here, right?'

'That's it,' Lilo smiled. 'We just have to find someone who can make use of your natural talent.'

'Naga!' Stitch growled. 'Demon belong with Stitch!'

Demon gave him an affectionate lick on the cheek. 'I know, Stitch… but you and Lilo belong together too. Your place is with her, finding all the other cousins and giving them homes. There has to be somewhere for me, too.'

The three of them went outside for a walk, not with any particular destination, but just to clear their heads and maybe get some ideas.

'So…' Lilo started as they wandered in the general direction of the beach, using only the roads with the fewest people on them. '623's powers are… well, there's the destruction part, but we'll forget about that. And the anger induced super strength… oh, and you can breathe fire, too!'

Just to give a demonstration she exhaled a jet of flame into the air. She started to change colour as she did so, and as her fur became redder the fire got hotter. Then, squeezing her eyes shut with extra effort, she was able to pour the crimson flames together in a heart shape. Then the flames died out and she looked back proudly at them, breathing heavily.

'Hmmm…' Lilo pondered. 'And you two can light up like light bulbs. Hey! You could be a street lamp!'

Demon just gave her a "what the hell?" look at the utterly absurd idea. While bouncing thoughts across at each other they managed to wander up to the coast. All three stopped talking and watched the waves break for a while. Demon gave a little shudder. There was so much water…

'Hey! Howzit, Lilo?' called a friendly voice.

'David! Hi!' Lilo greeted. She ran over to meet her friend, the surfer boy. 'We were trying to find a place for another experiment,' she explained, as he picked her up in one arm. In the other arm he was carrying a surfboard, the one with the red and blue stripes around the edge.

'Well, if you're stuck, I know a great way to help you think,' he said cheerfully.

'Yeah? What's that?'

'We go out surfing.'

Lilo grinned. David was always looking for an excuse. Five minutes later David was steering the board towards the waves with Lilo perched on the front. The two experiments stood together on the sand.

'Aaah!' Demon gasped. 'They're going on the water!'

'Surfing,' Stitch explained. 'Don't worry, it's a sport. They can float on the board and if they fall off, they can swim back. It's fun.'

'You've… done that?' she gulped nervously, pointing at the water.

'Ih!' he beamed, before striking a pose on the sand and pretending to be on a board. 'Cowabunga!'

Then they sat on the sand and watched David and Lilo weave in and out of the curling waves. The sun was starting to set by the time they were done, and they walked back up the beach. Lilo immediately plonked herself down on the sand by Stitch.

'Are you sure you two don't want to try?' she asked them.

'Err…' Demon paused. 'Isn't there something a little less exhilarating we could do?'

'Oh. Well, I know a fun game,' Lilo replied. 'It's called "bury Stitch in the sand!"'

The two girls leapt on him and tried to pin his arms down. He let them and pretended to be afraid.

'Oh, no!' he cried. 'Save me!'

Then they piled sand on top of him until only his head and feet were visible. Lilo found some nearby shells to decorate it with while Demon moulded the top to make a sandcastle. Lilo also came across a good leaf to pin to the top as a flag. Stitch just smiled underneath it all.

'Hey,' David spoke up. 'Why don't you meet me tomorrow, Lilo, and help me wax our boards again? It looks like they need it.'

'Already?' Lilo inquired. 'When was the last time we did it?'

'Don't you remember? That time when Stitch kept eating the wax, and you two couldn't work together. That was when I tried to teach you about Yin and Yang.'

'Oh yeah! Then I found the experiments and named them that after what you taught me.'

'Who?' asked Demon.

'Oh. 501 and 502,' Lilo clarified. 'They could work together in harmony and use their lava and water to make land.'

'In fact…' David wondered, 'it was this surfboard that reminded me how Yin and Yang worked, so that I could tell you. This is the symbol of Yin and Yang,' he said, pointing at the circular intertwining teardrop shapes on the surfboard.

'Hey!' cried Lilo suddenly. 'I just saw a crab!' She ran off to find it.

'Uh-oh,' David went and ran after her.

'It was a really big one, too!' she shouted as they both ran off around a corner.

There was silence for a while as the sun sank deeper into the horizon.

'Wow. This really is a beautiful planet,' Demon sighed.

Stitch grinned and looked at the yin-yang symbol on the board next to them. He reached out and laid a paw over the blue part.

'Meega.'

She blinked at him and put her hand on the crimson part. 'Meega.' Then her own fur was flushed with a deep crimson red, apparently her equivalent of a blush. She purred delightedly for a while.

The intoxicating silence was broken suddenly by a new voice. It was soft and sultry, and gloatingly said:

'Gucha.'

Stitch immediately froze. Demon looked over somewhat angrily, then Stitch got up and turned around.

'Angel?!'

His voice was one of pure surprise. A dominantly pink experiment walked towards them, her long antennae sweeping over her head and down her back. She held a proud pose and looked at the 623rd experiment disdainfully.

It was difficult to tell what Demon's initial feelings were. Nothing happened for a moment, then the brown experiment snorted. 'What's that?' she scorned. 'A pink naked rat?'

The newcomer's face changed and became an expression of pain and hardship.

'I've been looking for you, darling! Ever since I got out I searched!'she looked proudly at Demon's sincerely confused face and continued. 'Where have you been? I've missed you so much…' In one swift movement she grabbed Stitch, pulled him to her and gave him a lick, 'Buchibu!'

She just watched Demon's reaction as the hit went home. Absolutely nothing; there was no movement. No twitching, no breathing, no blinking. Just standing.

Stitch still made no movement either, he was too confused and overwhelmed. He didn't resist Angel's advances, just looked pleadingly in Demon's direction. When he came to his senses he pulled himself up and asked the most important question on his mind.

'How did you get out?'

'Thank your little friend here,' she replied triumphantly. 'She came all the way and unlocked my cage.'

No sooner were the words out than Demon was gone. In a flash she seemed to disappear. Stitch instinctively took a step to follow her, but the pink experiment began to hum and he fell back, captivated.

Lilo and David returned, coming around the corner.

--------------------

It was raining. Hard. At the house Lilo was just finishing explaining the series of events to Jumba and Pleakley.

'So David went home, then I came home to tell you, and I have no idea where the other three are.'

'Hmmm…' Jumba was giving it a lot of thought. 'Reappearance of 624 is very… interesting. She says she was accidentally released by 623 when she went to get 323?'

Lilo worked through the numbers and nodded.

'Hmph… 626 and 624 will then probably be together. It is 623 I am very worried about. At the moment she will be very unstable. Could be in life endangering situation, especially in downpour like this.'

'Why?' Pleakley asked. 'Can't your little monsters fend for themselves?'

'Not like this, she can't. From your description, 623 may be severely psychologically damaged. Remember, to allow access to strength she feels more than anyone, could have much bigger consequences. I suggest you find her.'

'I wish somebody had told me about this earlier,' Pleakley complained. 'I've been getting ready to shoot my sequel to my masterpiece "Gushiest Love Story" which was unfortunately trampled, like Jumba said.'

A few minutes later Lilo was dressed up in her raincoat and a hat, and was somehow managing to get on top of the dome which was her room. Carefully she scrambled over the sloping sides which were made much more treacherous in the rain. Just as she had thought, Demon was up here.

'Uhh… hi!' Lilo waved an arm to try to get her attention. There was no response; the experiment's back was facing determinedly towards her.

'Don't you wanna come in?' she offered. 'You'll get cold and w-,'

'I'm already cold and wet!' she snapped back quickly. Lilo was just glad to get a response out of her. She took a few steps forward.

'Come on, now… let's not do anything drastic…' Demon jumped up suddenly.

'Naga! Meega-o-itume!'

The shock made Lilo fall over and start to slide. She was about to scream as she fell off the wet, curved roof, but Demon's paw flashed over the side and caught her arm. With a pull she brought her back up. Lilo was almost glad that it had forced her to do something.

'I'll… come in,' she submitted.

Once they had go inside, propped Demon up on a bed and covered her with a blanket, they were ready to talk.

'So…' said Lilo hopefully. 'Is there anything you want to say?'

'Tell me,' came the whispered reply, 'what happened.'

'Okay,' Lilo took a deep breath. 'Quite a while ago Stitch found 624 in an alley. Stitch really seemed to like her, named her 'Angel' and claimed she was a "buchibu". Unfortunately, she was still evil and turned Jumba evil and looked up all the data on his computer about the experiments we had caught and found homes for. Then she went around turning experiments evil again, and Stitch followed her. They were on this ship which was going to take them and a bunch of other experiments away, but I found the way to make people turned evil by the song to good again. We rushed up there and the ship crash landed. When Stitch came out, he claimed that Angel saved him and everyone else.'

'…And?'

'Oh yeah, and then Gantu turned up, shot one of those baggies at Stitch and took her away.'

Nobody said anything for a while.

'How do you feel?' Lilo inquired.

'I… don't feel anything. It's like I'm… hollow.'

Lilo wondered whether the experiment could be broken.

'But we know Stitch loved you!' Lilo tried to reassure her. 'Because of the… thing!' She pointed first above her head, then at Demon's antennae. 'That can't just have gone away.'

'I can't believe this is happening!' the experiment wailed, suddenly seeming willing to talk. 'As soon as I saw her I should have guessed something like this would happen! And why is it that I get tossed aside like some Flufftrog runt?! Why does she get him and not me? Just because I was activated later?! This… isn't… FAIR!'

'Okay… anger now…' Lilo observed. 'At least it's better than nothing.'

'It was me! I brought this on myself! If I hadn't stupidly gone to get the… and the fact that he named me after that… ARGH! I'm gonna wring her scrawny little…'

'Okay! Enough!' interrupted Lilo. 'Look, I think Stitch was left very confused by this. I don't think we should make any decisions until we get his side of it.'

'Yeah,' she agreed, taking a cleansing breath. 'I'll… go to bed.'

'Lilo!' Stitch's voice called from downstairs. The two girls looked at each other and then raced towards the front door.

Stitch had just come in from the rain and shook himself to disperse some of the water. Angel was with him and took his hand as Lilo and Demon came in. On seeing them, Demon paused and briefly clutched her chest, but shook it off. Angel had a hand on her hip and was smirking.

There was a long, awkward silence.

It was Lilo who broke it. 'Now, Stitch, I think we're all a bit confused by what's been going on. What do you have to say?'

'Ah… oh… um…' he looked at his feet but lifted his gaze up to Demon. She couldn't help but feel completely obliterated inside.

Angel decided to take this opportunity to address Demon. 'Meega na la qweesta,' she swore carelessly at her.

Demon streaked across the room in a flash of rage. The two female experiments faced each other and showed their teeth. Only Demon snarled and growled. Just as she was about to spring to attack her, Stitch put his arm over her shoulder from behind. They both interpreted this in different ways. Angel was convinced that he was protecting her by keeping the uncouth experiment away. Demon, however, felt his other paw close around hers and knew that he didn't want them to fight, and he didn't want her to be hurt. She felt him squeeze her hand just a little bit and remembered how much she really loved him. From his hand up her arm tingling emotions started to spread, flooding across her body. When they reached her head, the antennae glowed as brightly as they had before.

Angel didn't seem to understand the meaning of this, but it seemed to be a signal for her old programming to kick in. The world stopped and watched as she started to sing.

'Acuta… chimeto…

Eegata nomuta…

Naga tonala,

Itume… tiduka…'

Stitch and Lilo turned to Demon, the only one who might be affected, but…

As soon as they turned back, the door was open and Angel was gone.