Love Bites

"For the last time, I cannot tell you how old I am," Picard was considering making a run for it, but considering he was surrounded by fangirls, it was somewhat difficult. "It is a sacred subject and I have sworn never to breach my vow of secrecy, so please be gone. OW! Who pinched my-"

"How do you get such amazing pecs?" A blonde girl asked, squeezing Picard's muscles. "I wish my boyfriend could have such impressive muscles like yours, then I wouldn't have to tell him to work out all the time. He's getting a little bit on the tubby side actually."

"Do you dye your hair?" A mousy, short girl asked, peering owlishly at Picard and blinking her big brown eyes. They reminded him of Felix however and he involuntarily shuddered. "My boyfriend doesn't do that."

"Wait, wait!" Picard held up his hands and stemmed the flow of questions. "You have boyfriends?" The girls looked at each other in consternation, then turned solemn gazes towards him and he was dismayed to see most of them briskly nodding their heads. "Oh no... Where are they?" He began to feel panicky as he saw a group of boys or men standing nearby. The girls who had nodded pointed towards the men. Picard gulped as they started walking towards him. "H-Help!"

"Hey! Over here!" A girl's voice sounded nearby and all the guys turned. Mia stood nearby, smiling devilishly. "Leave Picard alone!" The guys started advancing towards her, and of course the fangirls guessed what was happening. They immediately rushed up and slapped their boyfriends... well, the ones with boyfriends anyway, leaving not very many girls behind at all. Mia immediately started running for dear life before the girls could go after her too.

"I'm afraid I must go now," Picard swept a low bow to the remaining girls who screamed and fainted down to the ground, before taking off in a different direction from Mia. He almost accidentally crashed into a fierce pyromaniac. Unfortunately the wrong female pyromaniac.... if he had been lucky, it would have been Jenna, Jenna was not as likely to kill him than Garet's sister was. "Um..."

"Look where you're going, you moron!" Kay yelled, her eyes flaring with rage. "Are you so dense that you can't even see where you're going? If you crash into me again then trust me, you'll be made to regret it." Her mouth curved into an evil smile.

"You're obviously not like that gaggle of girls who tried to kidnap me earlier," Picard responded smoothly. "They all surrounded me and talked too much, even though half of them had boyfriends. And their boyfriends nearly beat me up. Come to think of it, Jenna's not like them either. You and Jenna are officially my two favourite Valean girls."

"You are so weird," Kay shook her head and stalked off past Picard. Picard stared at her back dumbly.

"Talk about weird," Picard murmured under his breath so that she would not hear. "No wonder Felix thought I was crackers. She's worse than even Jenna." 'Not to mention she's being cruel and apparently manipulating Garet,' Picard thought. Jenna had been talking about it a fair bit at the table after all.

"Kraden!" Isaac hollered, bursting into the cottage as he flung the door wide open, his scarf flapping in the breeze as he tried to look all dramatic while the door clumsily banged against the opposing wall. "You, me, talk now!"

"You want to talk to me, Isaac?" Kraden looked joyfully at him from where he was standing in the middle of the room. The elderly scholar looked at the large book he was holding then dropped it to the floor where it landed in a flurry of dust. "Come in, come in, this is truly a joy, you want to talk to me!"

'I don't want to talk to you, not really,' Isaac thought mournfully as he stepped further into the cottage. When he was a short distance away from Kraden but nonetheless a safe distance that would not let Kraden grab him and dip him in the pot to see what happened when you dipped Venus Adepts in a pot or something. Isaac cleared his throat. "Er-hem... now..."

"Er-hem!" Kraden echoed delightfully. "Er-hem is a wonderful sound, it signifies the motion of you clearing your throat with what's a sound between a cough and a swallow, so that you can talk without breaking off to have to-"

"Kraden, please," Isaac interrupted hastily. "I am afraid that I have to talk to you. Something very serious has come up and I urgently need to talk about it with you right now."

"Really?" Kraden grinned. "Did you discover the true secret of Alchemy? Wait, we learnt that stuff on Mars Lighthouse, did we not? Did you learn how to get a new Stone of Sages or something? Quickly, tell me!"

"Well, unless Mia grossly murdered him, it seems that Alex is alive but that's not what I want to talk to you about," Isaac waved his hand dismissively. "Do you remember meeting a girl named Feizhi in a certain place? Champa ring any bells?"

"Feizhi?" Kraden tilted his head, deep in thought. Isaac crossed his arms and waited patiently, stonily staring at Kraden. Time passed and passed as the sage continued to think, his eyes glazing over. Isaac frowned and tentatively stepped forwards, reaching out towards Kraden with a trembling finger.

Isaac poked Kraden in the side and he fell over to the floor with a soft thud.

"Aah!" Isaac yelped in shock and jumped back, shaking all over as he stared at the old man lying prone on the floor. "Kraden! Are you okay?" 'The old coot can't die yet!' He thought in alarm. 'Maybe I should get Mia, or cast Revive or...'

"Isaac, honestly!" Kraden growled into the floor, scrambling to his feet. "I had just remembered who Feizhi was when you poked me like that and sent me crashing to the floor! When you are old as I am and have a lot of knowledge in your soul, remembering simple things such as people and their names and faces takes a lengthy amount of thinking!"

"Sorry," Isaac chuckled nervously, a sweatdrop rolling down his head. He seemed to be having very bad luck lately. First he had blown Kraden's cottage up and then knocked him over, which was clearly not very good. In fact, Isaac was surprised Kraden wasn't beginning to have a personal vendetta against him. "Do you remember Feizhi well? Anything? Perhaps a PROMISE?"

"Hang on, Isaac," Kraden flapped his hands impatiently, signalling for Isaac to shut up. "If I remember correctly, Feizhi was some odd girl who mistook Felix for you even though you two share so little resemblance at all. You, Isaac, have short blond spiky hair and blue eyes while Felix has long brown hair in a ponytail with brown eyes. Okay, so she saw us from the back, but you two still do not look alike from the back, and your outfits-"

"Kraden, please!" Isaac interrupted wearily. "I get the picture. Now could you please get to the point?"

"Shut up, Isaac, you should learn to be polite and not be so rude to your elders, especially after you blew up my cottage, made me roofless and pushed me over!" Kraden commanded. "Now, this girl Feizhi, she clearly liked you and she had even made you a golden ring. I naturally promised, since Felix was lost for words by the shock of being mistook for Isaac and it didn't help that Jenna was laughing like a hyena the whole time and Sheba was coughing loudly and Picard was constantly asking who Isaac really was..."

"Mm-hmm," Isaac nodded wearily, his eyes also beginning to glaze over. 'No! Must not even think of losing consciousness, must let the old man keep talking! ... I want Mom...'

"I promised to give you the Golden Ring and tell you how Feizhi felt, or Felix could do it for you, or even Jenna or Sheba or Picard since they were there too," Kraden said finally. "Oh, didn't they tell you?"

"Nobody told me at all," said Isaac dangerously. "Why wasn't I given this... ring?"

"But it was so useful, so beautiful, so lovely..." Kraden sighed, and he noticed Isaac's dumbfounded look. "No, really, it was very beautifully made, Feizhi is very talented. I am not sure who took it, it could have been any one of them for all I know, and they probably equipped it. At least you know now... hang on, how did you find out?"

"Feizhi told me," Isaac smirked, crossing his arms again and trying to look imperious. "She turned up in Vale and tried to plant a gigantic smacker on me! Actually, she succeeded with it... right in front of MIA! And then she just lets it out, telling me about your promise to tell me how she felt and to give me the ring!"

"Mia?" Kraden immediately latched into Isaac's usage of the female Mercury Adept's name. "It concerns you that Feizhi kissed you in front of Mia? Does this mean that you are thinking of having a relationship with Mia or you're in one that I was not aware of?"

"Tell Mia and you're in big trouble," Isaac said warningly. "I'm going to tell her when the time is right. Now I'm off." He hurriedly turned and ran out of the cottage, mentally screaming at the old man's ability to pick up on such things.

"Kids," Kraden shook his head. "They grow up so fast."

It was well into the afternoon when Jenna walked out of her house, her gloriously auburn-free hair cascading down her shoulders. Felix was surprisingly enough still asleep but she didn't care, however she was hoping very much that Garet was out of his house. After all, they had to get their revenge on Ivan and Sheba.

"Jenna!" Garet hollered, charging down the steps towards her, a big goofy grin on his face. "Over here!"

"Garet-kun!" Jenna squealed, rushing into his arms. They spent the next few minutes fervently kissing as if they had not seen each other for a whole week, then at last they parted, gasping for breath.

"Your hair's a nice colour now," Garet beamed.

"It's the same colour as it's always been..." Jenna raised an eyebrow.

"Exactly!" Garet responded.

"Right..." Jenna blinked and shook her head, knowing fully well how eccentric her boyfriend was capable of being. "Well, how are you going to get your own back on Ivan? I think I know what I'm going to do to Sheba..." Her smile spread into a wicked grin, and it was reflected on Garet's face too.

Meanwhile, in the plaza, Ivan and Sheba both shuddered.

"Whoah, that was a weird feeling," Sheba felt the tingle fade from her spine and stared oddly at Ivan. "Did you feel that too?"

"Yeah," Ivan's eyes narrowed. "I bet a certain duo are thinking of us. Hey, why have we been standing in the plaza the whole time?" Sheba merely looked at him, lost for words, her mouth hanging open. "You look like a fish," Ivan grinned. Sheba's face transformed into a scowl and she lightly punched him in the shoulder.

"Help me!" Felix screamed as the spaghetti noodles tightened around him, binding him to the candy cane that was stuck in the ground. The ground was odd, it looked more like chocolate. He was sure it was because it was the right shade of brown. "Let me go now!"

"Bwahahahahaha..."

"Oh, very funny," Felix stopped screaming as he saw a pink rabbit bouncing up and blinking its big blue eyes at him. "What the heck? Rabbits aren't pink."

"That's what you think," The rabbit said, popping on a pair of glasses and pointing a finger at him. "I am here to lecture you on the evils of noodle eating."

"I'm definitely dreaming," Felix said decisively. The rabbit glared at him and then started to sprout green hair. "This is going from scary to insane... green hair? Hang on..." It reminded him of a certain old man right after his cottage had been blown up. "NO! IT'S KRADEN!"

"That's right!" The pink rabbit metamorphosed into Kraden. "I am punishing you for letting Isaac blow up my cottage!"

Music started to stream through the air and some mice wearing crowns walked forwards, playing flutes. Kraden disappeared in a puff of grey smoke and the crowned mice surrounded Felix, continuing to play the flutes.

"Mice Kings," Felix struggled against the noodles. "Save me from the Mice Kings!"

"Prepare to experience your worst nightmares..."

Felix blinked as the Mice Kings disappeared and he saw Garet and Jenna. Garet was holding a ring and Jenna was staring at it.

"Jenna, will you marry me?" asked Garet.

"Oh, yes, yes, yes!" Jenna squealed and threw her arms around Garet's neck. "YES!"

"Noooooo!" Felix screamed. The scene changed again and now Alex was standing in front of him. "Oh, no... and I thought the last one was bad," He said sarcastically, glaring at the Alex-nightmare standing there.

"I shall rule the world..." Alex tittered, his voice sounding unnaturally high. "And you shall be my slave!" Felix blinked in confusion, stared at Alex's chest and started screaming again, his screams reaching to a much higher pitch, especially as Alex started walking towards him, a grin on his face.

"Wake up," Picard spoke from behind him. Felix managed to twist his head and saw the Lemurian. "Wake up. Wake up. Wake up."

"SHUT UP!" Felix howled, sitting up in his bed. His head connected with Picard's and he yelped at the pain while Picard fell to the floor in a faint. "Oops..." Felix chuckled nervously and rubbed the forming bruise on his forehead. "That Lemurian sure has a hard head. Or is it me with the hard head? I have no clue. It was just a dream... just a dream... thank goodness..."

The rest of the day fortunately managed to pass without any further incidents. It was not until nighttime that the Adept War took a further step. Garet and Jenna had ensured that Ivan and Sheba would not know what their revenge was until bedtime, and it was going pretty well. The two Mars Adepts had made sure they got to bed earlier, they really didn't want to be awake for the Jupiter Adepts' wrath. Ivan and Sheba had avoided their wrath, so why shouldn't they?

Ivan scampered across the hallway, his teeth freshly brushed and he closed the door behind him as he entered his room. The Jupiter Adept looked around cautiously just in case, he couldn't be too careful when being a guest in Garet's house after all. Deciding there were no traps on the floor or ceiling, Ivan was satisfied and walked over to the bed, sitting on it. He stretched his arms and yawned widely, exhaling deeply with a soft snuffly sound. Isaac and Garet had made fun of him for that in the past but he simply did not care.

He rubbed his tired eyes and slipped off the bed onto the floor, his bare feet not making a sound on the carpet. Ivan slowly drew back the duvet and he blinked, for there was something on the mattress, something which had not been there before. Ivan took a sharp breath and reached out towards it, the strange little object which should not have been there. He had a pretty good guess what it was, but he just had to make sure.

Ivan unfolded the slip of paper, sitting back down on the bed, and smoothed the creases where it had been folded. His mouth lifted up at the corners into a wide, amused smile as he saw what was on the paper, the contents clearly readable in the moonlight that shone on the paper. It quite simply said 'U SMEL OF POO' and there was a little stick figure in the corner with spiky hair just like Garet's, frowning and sticking his tongue out. Ivan had to put his hand over his mouth to quell the gales of laughter that threatened to burst forth, he couldn't believe how childishly simple Garet's revenge had been, but he supposed it was better than a noogie or something. Garet had done worse to him in the past anyway. Shaking with silent laughter, Ivan tossed the note onto his nightstand and slipped into bed, pulling the duvet up to his shoulders and closing his eyes shut.

Sheba glanced suspiciously at the lump that was the apparently sleeping Jenna in her bed, as she walked towards her own bed. Sheba had a nervous feeling that Jenna had already done something to do with getting her own back, but whatever it was, it clearly hadn't happened yet. Sheba didn't think that Jenna had poisoned her food or anything like that, they weren't really trying to hurt each other or worse, they just wanted to annoy each other.

Gulping, Sheba drew back her duvet and screeched loudly. Unlike Ivan, she had not received a note from Jenna. Instead it was a doll lying in her bed. The eyes had been torn out, leaving small sockets, and its face was covered in dark red lipstick which looked surprisingly like blood, especially in the light shining through the window. There was a lipstick message on the torso as well, it basically said 'HA HA HA SUCKER'. Sheba gasped and stepped back, waiting until her breath evened out before angrily grabbing the doll and flinging it into the bin with a loud clang. She ignored Jenna's quiet cackling as she slipped into bed and tried to go to sleep, still a bit shellshocked since the doll had looked quite scary on first sight.