We use words to try and get closer to each other, but all they do is break us apart.
-Chris Hawken, Earth Girl Arjuna

WORDS
(KOTOBA)

"Get in there," growled the Chihuahua-Shih Tzu mutt, giving Haru a rough shove into the dark, stuffy cell.

Once more she stumbled, and once more she got a close-up view of the ground. She coughed away the dirt from her mouth, knelt up and looked back, glaring at her tormentors, who sneered at her helplessness and closed the cell door with a clang.

"I hope someone neuters you!" she shouted after them.

"Oh, be quiet," came a low voice from behind her.

She turned. In a corner of the dimly-lit cell sat one of the Stormy Cats. She could recognize him by his characteristic baggy khaki pants, if nothing else, for he was blacked up and everything he carried at the start of the voyage was missing.

"It's you! What happened?"

The cat snorted. "What does it look like? I got caught." He spat into the opposite corner of the cell. "Everyone got caught."

Haru's heart turned as cold as ice. "Everyone?"

The commando looked up. "Everyone."

"B-but how?"

"They were waiting for us. You saw that funny-looking secret entrance, didn't you?"

"No. They took us in through the big door, the one with all the strange machinery inside it."

"Eh? I didn't see any big door. Anyhow, the secret entrance the tanuki showed us was a trap. They gassed us and here we are." The cat shifted. "From what I could gather someone spilled the beans, a traitor or spy somewhere."

"Where are the others?"

The cat gestured with his head. "Some of them are in the cells beside ours. Others were taken away. I don't know why."

"Baron?" Haru blurted out, unable to help it.

"Your loverboy escaped," the cat said flatly. "We helped him. I don't know where he is now. He could be still wandering around in this place, or be miles away by now."

"That can't be! Baron wouldn't leave you guys! More likely he's trying to find a way to rescue us, even now. In any case, we didn't meet anyone before the pirates took us in."

"We?"

"Two cats came here with me. One of them was wounded."

"Haru?" called a familiar voice from somewhere outside the cell.

Her eyes lit up and she stood up and rushed to the door. "Muta?" she yelled, trying to squeeze her face in between the iron bars so she could look down the corridor. "They got you too?"

"Yeah. What the devil are you doing here?"

"I was looking for Baron."

"Oh, and not me? I'm hurt, Haru. A fine kettle of fish you landed yourself in."

"Yeah, well... can't you bend the bars of the cell door?"

"Who do you think I am, Superman?" A note of disgust entered the already grumpy voice. "You should've accepted your fate and stayed on board the ship."

"Well, I didn't, so there! That was very hurtful, what you guys did." Haru's voice broke as she said it.

"Baron only wanted you to remain safe."

"Then he should've trussed me up and sent me home after he got well," she retorted. "I'm not sure I want to forgive you for what you did."

Muta didn't answer for a long time. When next he spoke, it was to inquire how she got to the pirate base and if 'that idiot bird' was all right.

"I–" Haru suddenly stopped as she remembered Sturmvogel and Sergeant Jarashi and Corporal Fisher. "I got someone to carry me here, Muta. He–he's dead now. I don't know how Toto is. Last I knew he was chasing us here with Shizuku and Seiji-sensei on his back, but one of the cats with me shot him and they fell into the sea." She continued, telling how she, Sturmvogel and the two cats had flown up the valley at high speed, and how the osprey had been shot and barely managed to pull out of his dive before death overtook him and he shattered upon hitting the ground.

The giant cat's voice didn't return, and Haru pulled her face out from between the bars and sat down dejectedly beside the door. She didn't have much time to brood, because in a couple of minutes another pair of dogs wearing bandoliers and scarves on their heads threw the irate, spluttering Tweep Fisher and the wounded Sergeant Jarashi into the cell. She shook herself out her maudlin funk and tried to see what she could do to make the Sergeant more comfortable. He had saved her life by taking a bullet meant for her in his arm.

"I'm so sorry you got into this mess," she murmured as she yanked the bottom edge of her blouse from under her leggings and tore a long strip from it. "Here, let me see that." She replaced the bandage on the wound; it was already soaked with blood and was full of dirt.

"Thanks, Miss Haru," the noncom said, grimacing as he lifted the arm to pat her on the shoulder.

"Please, Sergeant, don't mention it. It's my fault you got shot." She rested him against the wall of the cell, and began stroking his pate while Fisher continued his tirade against their jailers by kicking the cell door and shouting curses that involved their parentage and toilet habits.

The cat commando, who had so far lain silent in his corner, stirred. "Hey, Army brat, shut up!" he snarled.

"Make me, pussycat," the dark-furred cat challenged him. "I don't know how you can just lie there like a contented pig."

"You nincompoop," the Stormy Cat shot back. "You should save your strength until a chance to break out shows itself. You're not doing anyone any good acting like a jackass."

"He's right, Fisher," Jarashi agreed as Haru gently tweaked his golden hoop earring. "Sit down. Miss Haru, you'll scratch his head too, please?"

"Sure." As Haru kept on scratching his head, the wounded cat's fur rippled. "You know, Sergeant, you never did tell me your first name."

"Hmm? Oh, it's Neko."

Haru raised an eyebrow. "Neko?"

"Yeah. I know what you're thinking. My father had a weird sense of humor."

Neko Jarashi, Haru thought in disbelief, remembering large, pale green panicles that swayed and fell as she cut them with borrowed shears. Those plants the servants of Lune's father planted on my lawn. Sheesh.

"Funny name or not," said she, "I'm still grateful for you saving my life."

"Ah, all in a day's work. Actually, I was trying to push you out of the way, but I guess this old body of mine was too slow."

"Heeey," Fisher grumbled, "don't hog all the attention, Sarge." He sort of collapsed like a boned accordion beside Haru. "Just because you got that piddling wound doesn't mean you got the right to monopolize Miss Haru."

Haru's chuckled and scratched another feline head, and her ministrations soon calmed Fisher's nerves and his hackles lay back flat against the rest of his fur as he waited along with the rest of them.

------oOo------

"Fish in the water, port forward!" shouted one of Captain Loriel's bridge lookouts.

"Tuna or mackerel?" she dryly inquired. The young crew of the Longshallows was too excitable. Only Papazzo, Kagaccha and the other senior department heads were cool and collected under fire. "Personally, I'd like bonito. Hard to port, helmsman. Keep an offset. Defense, a clacker, please?"

"Yes, ma'am," acknowledged the russet-brown cat sitting behind and to her right. "Clacker away."

The seconds ticked down as the Longshallows heaved to like a terrified whale and altered course. Everyone heaved a sigh of relief when another lookout eventually reported, "Torpedo missed us!"

"Does anyone see the sub?" asked Loriel. They found out what had holed the Grimalkin, when around a half-hour ago someone saw a periscope snooping out of the waves. Loriel had taken it on her own initiative to engage the vessel, despite the additional burden of the Grimalkin's survivors, to protect the Matatabi and the Conquistador as they began to release their troops

"I got it!" called the lookout who had reported the torpedo earlier.

"Good! Kagaccha, open the two top rows of the Wall. Lookout, steer us to a collision course."

"Pardon, ma'am?" the shocked lookout asked.

"You heard me! Do it!"

The cat swallowed. "Come hard to starboard, five points," he began, setting the Longshallows to ram the underwater menace.

In the meantime Kagaccha, who was also a weapons officer, flipped a bank of switches on her front-facing console. Everyone on board heard the loud clanking of pistons and the whir of electrics as doors high in the front superstructure of the monitor fell away, exposing two rows of large-caliber cannons to the world. They were part of the Wall of Fire, an experimental system intended to turn shore targets into instant rubble and to quickly sink faster opponent ships.

"Wall armed and ready, Captain."

"Fire at will."

"Yes, ma'am." The OD pulled up a huge pedestal-mounted gunsight from her console and began to search through its camera eyes for the offending submarine.

------oOo------

There was a peculiar humming and thrumming in King Lune's blood as the longboat made its way to shore. He knew it for what it was: the adrenalin surge, the anticipation of battle. When he was younger he secretly courted it the way a bravo would court a maiden, but now, with so many lives entrusted to him, and the thought of beautiful Yuki waiting back at the Cat Castle for his return, he was more somber and level-headed in his actions. But that didn't stop him from exulting in the rush.

There were, all in all, 742 troops and sailors in the attacking force. Slightly over three hundred of these were infantrymen and marines. The rest were anchor-clankers, spar monkeys, quartermasters, cooks and the ilk that the landlubbing soldier cats disdained. Sixty of these troops were cavalrymen, divided into two units, one under Lune and the other under the command of General Gastron, his best cavalry officer. The horseclaw riders had disembarked first, to secure the landing beach, while the next waves got ready behind them.

"Our plan's working!" he shouted to his tabby aide, who was trying to keep both her stomach and Lune's horseclaw nice and calm in the choppy water. "They can't shoot at the ships with the sun in their eyes!" Their approach had been so planned as to keep the troopships lost in the glare of the morning sun, invisible to whatever lookouts the pirates might have.

"Yes, Your Majesty," the long-suffering aide replied. She had fought to gain this position of hers, since she admired both Lune's societal reforms and his handsome looks. Too bad he was already married to Queen Yuki...

"Heaven willing," she heard him say in a lower voice, "we'll get through this with a minimum of casualties and we can all go back home and bicker about rights-of-way and other such petty things."

Behind them, the Conquistador andMatatabi's twin cannon and the Albedo's numerous deck guns boomed out their symphony of thunder. Shells whistled far above their heads, to impact against the mountainside far away in orange blossoms and dirty clouds of smoke. The assault had begun.

------oOo------

Haru's nose wrinkled at the dust falling from the rock ceiling. "Aw, crap, they've started," she heard someone from a nearby cell say.

"They're not going to bring this place down around us, are they?" she asked, her voice unsteady as Corporal Fisher and Sergeant Jarashi huddled against her.

"They probably think we've already left," said the Stormy Cat. "I wish someone could've told them about our situation."

"Hey, Iijayu," called the same voice.

The Stormy Cat's ears perked up. "Yeah?"

"I thought you were wearing those special pants of yours."

"I am. Lost the detonators when they took our stuff, though."

"I got one with me. You feel like setting off some fireworks of our own?"

"Shhh. They might be listening." The Stormy Cat quickly scampered to the bars and stuck his paw out. Haru watched a pencil-like object roll to a stop near it. He quickly snatched it up and withdrew to the rear of the cell, where he started to unbuckle his pants.

"Um–" Haru noised, embarrassed.

The commando looked at her. "What's the problem?" he asked innocently.

Haru subsided. Why was she flustered? After all, this was the Cat Kingdom; wearing bottoms was optional for the felines. It was just so human-like an act her reaction had been automatic.

"Nothing, nothing."

The commando quickly began to rip his pants apart. As Haru watched, he gathered up a whitish, gummy material that had been secreted into the seams of the garment and rolled it into a ball, which he stuck on one end of the pencil-like object.

"Oi," a wavering voice called from outside the cells. "Eatin' time, me hearties." There was a thumping and shuffling noise, and a stooped old pirate cat, black-furred and in mufti, wearing an eyepatch and with a wooden right leg, came into view of Haru, pushing a small cart before him. Their cell was nearest to the entrance.

"You is lucky King Phaecis' feelin' kind today, he is. You gets to eat before we kills you," the old tom commented as he pulled a ladle from the cart and opened a big casserole pot on top of it. He blinked a rheumy yellow eye at Haru. "Oh, I thoughts you was all cats in 'ere," he said, steadily staring at her. "Hopes she likes what I made."

The Stormy Cat surreptitiously handed the device in his paw to Jarashi, who shoved it behind his back. "Ah, old father," he said ingratiatingly, "I don't suppose we can convince you to let us go."

The old pirate looked at him as though he had lost his mind. "You think I'm daft or sumptin'?"

"Oh, no, no. We just don't want to die, that's all."

"Well, you is gonna die, and I can't change that." The cat took out a pile of shallow bowls and began ladling something that looked like slop into each bowl. "'Ere, my good cat, you give this to your friends in there. Don't try anything funny," he warned as the commando reached for the bowl, "or I'm goin' ta blow you away." He patted the hefty bulge at his waist, underneath his shirt.

"Lady Yoshioka," said the cat named Iijayu, handing the bowl to her. She took a sniff. Whatever the yellow gruel was, it didn't smell bad. She handed it to Jarashi. The Sergeant was about to taste it when the commando motioned for him not to.

The old cat had finished giving them all bowls of food and was wheeling the cart over to the next cell when he paused and looked back at them. "Well, you know, there is one thing I'd like. But you gotta promise you won't give me away."

"What is it?" asked Iijayu. He had not been expecting the old cat to take him up on his offer.

"I'd, um, I'da like a kissh from that pretty girl you gots with you, seein' as how I'm an old cat an' all whom the tabbies don't even give the time of day to."

"What?" Haru spluttered. "No way!"

"You mean you'll let us go if she'll give you a kiss?" the Stormy Cat quickly asked, setting his bowl down on the floor and clutching at the iron bars.

The old cat nodded.

Iijayu turned. "Lady Yoshioka?"

"I-I..." Haru looked at the faces of the cats around her and imagined the others listening for her response. "You're not pulling my leg, are you, Uncle?" she asked. "I mean, you're not just going to get your kiss and then lock me up again?"

"You have the word of an old seaman," the tom solemnly swore. "It's been over twenty years since I kissed a lass, and by that I mean not a lady of the night."

Haru hesitated. Why did these things have to happen to her? "Oh, all right. One kiss."

The old cat nodded. "An' then your friends will have ta knock me out so I can say it was a jailbreak."

The highly unusual deal—whoever heard of betraying your comrades for something as trifling as a kiss?—was still swirling in Haru's mind when the old cat slowly unlocked the door with a set of keys. Haru gingerly stepped outside, and in a flash the pirate shut the door and advanced upon her with an evil gleam in his remaining eye.

"J-just a kiss," she reminded him, backing away.

"Of course, of course."

To get things over with as quickly as possible, Haru bent down and kissed him on the cheek. Of course the old tom was having none of that, and he shifted her face and kissed her full on the lips.

Haru gulped and closed her eyes at the icky warm feeling and not-so-nice smell of the old pirate. The things she did for friends... Seconds passed and the horrid lips left hers, but she didn't want to open her eyes for fear of gagging when she saw the cat who had kissed her. Such an insult would probably land her back in the cell and nix any more chance of escaping, or worse, get her shot.

"Why, Haru, I thought you liked kissing me."

Her eyes popped open. There, standing in front of her, was the old cat, but the erect posture and the twinkle in his beautiful big yellow orbs (the eyepatch had been turned up) marked an entirely different person within.

"B-Baron?"

"Oh, it's so good to be able to stand up straight," the Cat groaned. "It's no joke when you have to take a goodly portion of your height off for hours at a time."

"Baron?"

"I think my leg's gone to sleep. Could you help me take this stump off?"

"Baron?"

The old cat gave her an exasperated look. "Well, what? It's me! I'm in disguise, as if you didn't already realize that by now. God, this mask stinks."

"Baron!" she squealed, throwing herself at him. "I must be dreaming!"

"And I must be having a nightmare," he returned as he caught her up in his arms. "What are you doing here?"

"I came after you."

"I wish you didn't."

"Well, I did. Wait a minute, why am I so happy to see you? I should belt you a good one for fooling me the way you did." Haru's eyes narrowed and her countenance became unfriendly.

"So you should. Go ahead, hit me."

Reliving the embarrassing episode of a few hours earlier, Haru felt totally disgusted with herself. Did she have so little pride that she would let that trespass of Baron's by without even so much as a slap? She balled her right hand into a fist and prepared to let one fly.

There was a polite clearing of the throat. "If it's not too much trouble, could you two free us before someone else comes along?" Iijayu asked.

A chorus of agreement sounded all along the length of the corridor, and the embarrassed couple broke apart and went to work. Baron had liberated the keys from the pirate cat who was supposed to be the jailer—and that worthy fellow was even now sleeping soundly just inside the cell block's main door, thanks to a generous serving of knockout powder in his rum—and set about opening the first few cell doors while Haru took hold of the ladle and began doling out what turned to be a decent curry from the pot to the freed soldiers.

Muta emerged from his cell looking none too happy. He was angry at having been deprived of food for the last couple of hours. If a pirate had been around at that time, his life would've been held hostage to the powerful rumbling in the fat cat's stomach.

"Glad to see you, my friend," Baron greeted him as he emerged into the higher-ceilinged corridor like a wall of supple moving fat.

"About time you got here."

"Sorry. I couldn't resist stopping by the kitchen and the armory after I located this place on the map. I knew you'd be hungry, so I brought along another helping of food."

"You stopped to cook?" was Muta's disbelieving question.

"No, I just took what was already there."

"Oh. Give me the keys, I'll release everyone else. Where's Gabriel?"

"I don't know. Before I escaped I saw him being carried off with a few other Stormy Cats to a place the pirates called the 'Freezer.'"

"I don't like the sound of that." The giant cat turned away and headed for the cell doors further down the passage. "Hey, Baron?"

"Yes?"

"The kid must really love you, to come after you like this."

"I'm aware of that."

"Well, I think you ought to stop jerking her around. Trying to protect her is fine, but when it means hurting her feelings by fooling her... You should tell her in no uncertain terms that you want to break your relationship off now. At least be that kind to her." There was a dull boom, and the mountain shook again, as if to emphasize the giant cat's words.

"Muta, I... I'll talk to her if I have the time. Right now we've got to get out of here. And you know something? I learned that it wasn't Louise who tried to kill me."

The fat cat spun around. "What do you mean?"

"I heard a lot and saw a lot while I was sneaking around," the Baron said. "The Black Cat isn't Louise. It's my old arch-enemy the Doctor, the one I told you about."

"You mean the old fart who could make mechanical insects and stuff?"

"The very one. I don't know how, but he's somehow taken on Louise's form."

"But why?"

"I don't know. To spite me, I guess."

"Wait, that can't be right," said Muta, after a moment's consideration. "That was more than fifty years ago. He's still alive? And the Black Cat was here even before you arrived, so the Doctor couldn't have taken Louise's form just to spite you. He wouldn't have known you were coming. He must've had some other reason."

"I know. There are some points which are still unclear to me."

"Well, the Black Cat not being Louise must be a load off your mind, then."

Baron nodded grimly. "I won't be so held-back the next time she decides to play with me. The only thing that worries me now is whether we've been chasing a phantom all along, and Louise was never really here to begin with. But all I remember of the Black Cat's behavior during our fight contradicts that." Baron wouldn't tell Muta of Louise's 'please kill me' speech, which still disturbed him; he owed her memory, her reputation that much.

"Maybe he knows where the Baroness is," suggested Muta.

"I know, and I'm going to ask him myself. Care to join me?"

"Just after I've unlocked the doors and eaten a little." Muta paused and looked past his friend. Baron's gaze followed his, to where Haru, smiling, was continuing to distribute bowls of food from the cart to those who hadn't gotten a serving yet. "What're you going to do with her?"

"I've got no choice. I'm taking her with us." Baron sighed. "I love her too, Muta, but don't go telling her that, okay?"

Muta's expression was unreadable as he said, "No worries. My lips are sealed." He trudged off to open the remaining cells. The Cat returned to talk to the commandos, the two soldiers, and Haru.

------oOo------

The Longshallows' cannons erupted in a wall of flame and the surface of the water responded by leaping on high in story-tall white geysers.

"Did we get her?" asked Captain Loriel as the geysers fell back into the sea from which they had been conjured.

"Can't tell yet, ma'am. I—oh! Oil slick in the water."

Some of the bridge crew cheered, but Captain Loriel cut them off. "Wait for it. Kagaccha, keep your eyes on that slick. See if you can tell if it's just a decoy."

There was a tense silence for several seconds, and then one of the lookouts shouted, "Debris coming up, Captain! Lots of it!"

The cheering started again, and this time the Captain let them alone.

"Well done! That should take care of that pesky nit. Helmsman, take us around and head for the firing line. We're too late as it is."

"Yes'm."

The monitor began turning, pointing its nose towards the beach and heading for the place where she was supposed to be, on the right end of the landing beach. She was halfway through the maneuver when disaster struck.

The ship shuddered mightily, and from somewhere deep within came the creaking and groaning of tortured metal.

"What in blazes is that?" Loriel shouted as she gripped the armrests of her chair to steady herself.

The cat manning the sound-powered telephone looked up. "Captain, it's Engineering. They think the sub's trying to surface under us!"

Another huge rumble and a loud boom sent everyone, standing or seated, sprawling to the deck. Loriel picked herself up and ran outside.

The Chief was right. There was that cigar-shaped monstrosity crosswise underneath the keel, and bubbles were rising in great sheets from her starboard side. Her small conning tower showed obvious damage, bent and punctured metal and broken antennae.

"Kagaccha!" she yelled. "You've got the helm!"

"Wait, Captain, where are you going?" asked the OD in alarm. Loriel didn't answer her as she rushed off, her metal feet clanking on the deck.

------oOo------

Twenty minutes later, the Longshallows had herself prisoners: the crew of the submarine. The intrepid Captain had run along the length of the monitor until she was close enough to jump onto the submarine, which she did with alacrity. Then, wielding a length of metal pipe, she hauled herself up the conning tower and banged against the hatch on its top until it opened and a pistol was pointed at her. With her faster-than-fast reflexes she snatched it away and offered the pirates a choice: either die with their doomed vessel or be taken aboard the Longshallows as surrenderees. There was a hurried consultation, and the cats and dogs chose to take the prudent course of action and were sling-lifted quickly onto the monitor.

All was not well, however: the ship itself had suffered grievous damage. The Chief reported that in several places the hull of the Longshallows had been breached, and the seams were too wide to repair. Damage Control was working as hard as it could, and the pumps were howling like banshees, but... she was going to sink in an hour or so.

------oOo------

On the island Lune and his riders were already charging forth. The King was a sight to behold, astride his mount in his shining silver-colored armor, with the huge royal blue cabochon on his winged helmet heralding his status to all who could see.

Everything was going well so far. The troops were now a third of the way to their goal. The pirates were only giving sporadic resistance to the three columns pushing steadily inland. They would fire a few shots, then fade into the boulders and trees. There were already a few casualties, but far less than he had expected. It was puzzling, though: he had always wondered why the Phaecis Gang chose to defend this place, instead of running off and looking for another, as they did in the days of his father's reign. At least now things would end.

"King Lune!"

"Mister Toto?" The crow flew up to him, and Lune halted his mount. "What brings you here?"

"Am I glad I found you," the avian panted as he landed beside the King's mount. "I've got bad news. It seems Haru has been captured by the pirates."

King Lune groaned. "I hope she's alright."

"That's not the worst of it." Toto told him about the pair of mechanical monsters Seiji and Shizuku had seen.

"What are these 'robots', Toto? I don't think I understand."

"Haven't you seen one before?"

"Humor me."

The bird fired off a quick explanation. "Oh," King Lune commented, "you mean something like those silly toy dogs that are sold in the human world? How can something so small be a threat?"

"Not those robots," the irritated bird said. The almighty roar of a large gun caused both of them to look towards the mountain. "Those robots!"

King Lune's jaw fell open.

------oOo------

"I am going to release my army in a matter of minutes, Phaecis. Good luck with the trouble upstairs."

"Thank you. Try to keep the carnage down to a minimum, please. Otherwise, we'll be weeks cleaning up the mess. And you know how grouchy everyone gets when the place stinks."

The Black Cat laughed. "Of course." She watched the Pirate King walk into the dark corridor and turned to look at the recesses lining the wall of her chamber. Normally dark, these were now lit, and figures occupied two of them.

Well, my dears, you've gone and gotten your foolhardy selves into something you shouldn't have. You'll be my ace in the hole, if everything else fails. And if they don't, I'll have a lovely time experimenting on you, my dear magic-user.

------oOo------

When everyone had been freed and had eaten up (there had been a bit of a scuffle when Muta drove everyone else away from the second stewpot and proceeded to gulp its contents down like a giant drain), the commandos and agents conferred on what to do. Some wanted to find Gabriel and those of their number who had been taken; others wanted to find a way out and warn King Lune that everything was in a shambles and a potential disaster was in the making; still others wanted to go on with the original mission, which was messing around with the pirates' lair and defenses. In the end they agreed to compromise: a small number would look for their missing leader, the majority would continue to their goal points and disrupt them as much as possible, while Baron and Muta took on the responsibility of hunting for a way to warn King Lune. Aside from the defenses Shoukichi had been rather vague about other places in the pirate lair, but there had been mention of radios and the like, so they were reasonably confident that they would find a way to contact the Cat Kingdom forces and tell them that the operation was compromised.

Just before leaving on their mission Baron opened the bottom half of the cart to reveal a cache of weapons he had recovered from the pirates along the way. To the soldiers' surprise it was their kit, almost complete. Haru got her smallsword back, and Jarashi even recovered one of his derringers; but the explosives the Stormy Cats had brought with them were gone.

They were standing in the corridor waiting for their turn to exit the jail (having agreed to leave it in pairs at irregular intervals to minimize the commotion) when Haru nudged the Baron. He was once again his usual prim and proper self, aloof and distant in his black tuxedo and top hat.

"Aren't you even a little glad to see me?"

"Not really. You seem glad enough to see me, though I wonder why."

"The answer's simple, but you have to apologize for what you did first."

"I won't."

"Apologize."

"No."

Haru sniffed. "Stuck-up, stiff-necked cat. If that's the way you feel about it."

Two pairs of Stormy Cats had just snuck out the door when Baron spoke. "I apologize."

"No, I won't accept it. You said it because you were forced."

"No, really. I'm sorry."

"Nope. Not sincere enough."

Baron let out a noisy sigh of irritation. "Look, Haru, stop playing this game. If you've got something to say, say it! I'm really not in the mood to deal with you right now."

"Fine, Mister High-and-Mighty." She pulled on his coat so that he turned to face her. "You never let me finish saying this before, so I'm going to do so now. The reason I came here is because I love you, Baron Humbert von Jikkingen, and I want to be with you just in case you need me. I love you even if you returned deception for my trust. I don't care if you have to go back to Louise, or cast me aside like an outgrown toy, or whatever."

"Haru, I didn't mean to–"

"I know. You don't need to explain anything to me."

An awkward silence enveloped the two. The Cat shifted on his feet. "Muta was just telling me a while ago to be clear about ending our relationship. He said I owed you that much."

"So end it, as we agreed. That doesn't mean I have to stop caring about you."

"What it means, little girl," the Baron answered, his voice harsh for some reason, "is that I'm not going to be obliged to return your affections any more, so you might as well drop that act of yours." God in Heaven, he thought. To be lying again—when will I ever learn? I'm so sorry I have to be pitiless with you, brave young lady.

"It's not an act, Baron. But whatever happens, I'll always have a special place for you in my heart." Haru looked up at him for a moment with eyes that suddenly seemed far too old for her years, then moved up the line and left him alone.

The cat gentleman looked down at the floor. For some strange reason he felt stung; he was supposed to be dumping her, but now—it felt like she had just dumped him.