In this country fries were called chips.

Also an elevator was called a lift, gym shoes were called trainers, girls were called birds, chips were called crisps, cookies were biscuits, and the biscuits that were actually biscuits were called rolls. Mob and Sho both felt like they couldn't speak English when they came to this country. They didn't come here that often, to England, and most of their English came from America. That was across the ocean. There were here because there was another esper group here and dad had to do diplomacy, he had said, which meant that they either joined him or bad thing happened to them, Sho had said. That was work that Mob couldn't be a part of and neither could Sho.

So they were eating fish and chips.

Which was not real chips. Mob and Sho had figured that out the hard way when they had first come to this country when they had been little. They also hadn't spoken very good English back then too. They had only known English from books and school stuff. So they had thought that they had been the ones who had been wrong but then it turned out that they had been learning American English for their whole lives. The world had been a lot bigger back then, because they hadn't gone all over it, but now the world felt….not small. Not to Mob at least. The world felt a little smaller than when she had been little but not small like it was tiny or something like that. There were always new things to discover.

Like this fish and chips place.

This place was right next to an arcade that she and Sho had gone to. They had gone because they said, on the website, that it was the biggest arcade in London. It was big, sort of, the not as big as the ones in Tokyo had been. Mob knew that she would always miss Tokyo, they had stayed for a very long time, but there were good things about London too. Like fish and chips. They didn't have this in Tokyo and Mob liked it a lot.

Though she didn't know why the guy had said that she would have liked the fish better raw.

But she said nothing. Neither did Sho. Well he might not have been listening. He had been in sort of a bad mood all day. Dad had took both Shibata and Shimazaki with him, which Mob was sad about a little bit, and also Fukuda which was not something that she had strong feelings about. Fukuda was…a person. He was a person who healed their…Sho's injuries and hung out with them…Sho…and stuff. He didn't seem like he liked her very much but it was because she was getting older, he had said, and they were drifted apart…and stuff. She didn't know. She didn't care. Fukuda was Sho's friend and that was what mattered…even if he was sort of…not nice to her. That didn't matter. What mattered was, on that day, Sho had been without all of the people he usually hung out with.

So she and Sho had gone to an arcade and then gotten lunch.

"If you don't like it we can eat something else." Said Mob. Sho was making faces as he separated all of his food. He put his dish of mushy peas on the table far away from the rest of his food and then put his fries, no they were chips here, he put his chips on one side of the plate and his fish on the other. He made sure that they didn't touch. That was kind of his thing now, making sure that food didn't touch, and Mob didn't understand. The whole thing just seemed like extra work. If Minegishi hadn't been laid up, they were going to be laid up until at least the seventeenth they had said and Mob had to find a way to carry on without them, they would have said something about Sho making extra work for himself. If Shibata had been there he would have taken Sho's peas away and brought him more fries, chips, or something because Sho hated peas. If Shimazaki had been there then he would have been stealing off of everyone's plates even though he would have had his own food in front of him. If Hatori had been there he would have been asleep at the table because he was still trying to fix his sleep schedule. Those times that they stayed up all night watching TV and playing videogames didn't exactly help…

She missed her friends.

And she even sort of missed dad, too. If dad had been there then…well if dad had been sitting at this table with her and Sho then he would have told Sho that he was being ridiculous and that he had to eat his food and stop being like this. Dad hated it when Sho did this and he had told Mob to tell Sho to stop but, really, Mob just wanted him to eat food so that he would grow up big and strong. Also she wanted him to eat all of the food groups. Not just the deep fried and sugary food groups but also the green and mushy food groups too.

Mushy peas were the worst kinds of peas but they both needed to eat all of their food groups or they would never grow up to be big and strong like mom had always told them for as long as Mob could remember.

"No, I like it. I just don't like it when my food touches. It's gross." Said Sho. This was his food and eh would eat it however he wanted to. Like dad always said. He had two options, eat or starve, and he chose to eat. He just had to keep his fries on one side, his fish on the other, and his peas far away from everything else.

If Shimazaki had been there then he would have stolen his peas.

He would have been stealing off of his plate but it would have been ok because Sho would have stolen his food right back. Sho and him would have made a game of it. That was just something that they did. They would have pretended to steal from each other or actually stolen from each other…and it would have been fun. Then they could have gone outside and played in the snow or they could have gone back to the arcade. They had skeeball and pinball and crane games there. Games without screens. Shimazaki could play games without screens because he could see things that existed in life. He was really good at pinball and sometimes when they versed each other he sang that song about the pinball wizard and also sometimes they played air hockey but Shimazaki was such a cheater at that because he could teleport and read Sho's movements so Sho would use his telekinesis….

He wished that Shimazaki had been there.

And the rest of them, too, they could have come around if they had wanted to. If they didn't have anything better to do. Even Minegishi. They could have played crane games with big sis or something. She had spent like a million British yen trying to win a stuffed cat. Minegishi could have helped her with that and then Hatori and Shibata could have played on their own and then Sho and Shimazaki could have had fun…not to be mean but that was just how the group divided up.

So it was normal for Sho to want to be all alone with Shimazaki.

"Oh. Ok. I just thought that you didn't like it because of how your aura was…but of course you like it. We've had this before. Remember? The last time we were in London?" asked Mob as she started to eat her mushy peas. You always had to start with the worst first. That way once you got to the best part, the fish you had been looking forward to it for a while. Mom had said that. Dad just said that if you didn't like something then you didn't have to eat it because they were Suzuki's and Suzuki's could do whatever they wanted to. Mob knew that she could do just about whatever she wanted to do…but she also knew that being a Suzuki didn't mean that she didn't need to eat all of her food groups. Sho had to eat all of his food groups too.

She eyed his peas.

He was going to fight her about those peas. She knew that he was going to fight her about those peas. He would eat nothing but Cheetos and Doritos and soda and energy drinks if he could, like Hatori, but then if he did that he would end up with skin like Hatori's. Minegishi had been teaching her about skin. They said that she was getting older and she needed to start taking care of her skin now or else she would end up like Hatori. She really wished that people would stop making fun of Hatori…but she was also glad that he was trying to take better care of himself too.

But that was why she had to teach Sho how to take care of himself now, at ten, so he wouldn't have to start learning when he was nineteen and all grown up.

"Last time we had this they gave it to us in a newspaper. That's cooler than on a plate…even if it touched." Said Sho as he dumped all of his white sauce on his fish. He'd had this before, it had been good, but this was….different. There were peas with this. He knew that the pees were in their own little dish and stuff, and not touching the rest of his food, but he just…did not like peas. They were gross and also they sounded like pee and who would want to eat a food that sounded like pee?

Shimazaki would have thought that it was funny.

He thought that everything Sho said was funny. Sometimes he laughed really hard at everything Sho said even if he wasn't trying to be funny. He was a lot of fun during those times, when he was in a really good mood, and Sho and him had the best times when he was in one of his super good moods. Like the time when they had that pudding eating contest and Shimazaki ate seventeen cups of pudding in half an hour…and he was still hungry! Or the time when they went to that store and chewed on all the candles and then put them back in the boxes….and he didn't care what big sis thought. It was a funny prank. Like the people would buy their candles and then go to light them but they would have been chewed on already. Or like the time when they went to that animal shelter after closing and played with all of the dogs…well that had been fun until it came time to put the dogs back in the cages.

Sho couldn't remember which dog was which.

And Shimazaki was no help because he couldn't read. Some of the dogs had collars and some didn't and come knew their names and some didn't and some wanted to go back in their cages and some didn't…and it had been a mess….so Sho just put the dogs back in whatever cages they fit into and let the workers sort it out when they came back. That hadn't been funny because not only were the poor dogs sad to be in cages but also they were in the wrong cages…

But most of the time he and Shimazaki had a lot of fun together.

He must have been so bored hanging out with dad all day. Sho wished that he could have gone with but dad said that he would have just been underfoot….and Sho really wanted to go with. Then he and Shimazaki could have been here and they could have stolen food off of each other's plates or thrown food into each other's mouth or seen who could eat the most food or play the game where they said a curse word louder and louder and louder until someone complained. The winner was the one who got the most complaints. Big sis wouldn't have wanted to play that with him. She cared about rules and disturbing people and stuff.

Shimazaki thought that it was fun to disturb people and Sho mostly agreed…but that didn't matter because Shimazaki was working and he was hanging out with big sis now…and she had better not have been thinking about making him eat those peas because there was no way in hell that he would.

"We can go back to the newspaper place tomorrow if you want. They had pretty good fish and fries, chips, but these might be good too. You really should eat something, Sho." said Mob

"I will in a minute. I have to get my food right so I can eat it." Said Sho

"Ok….but be sure to eat everything." Said Mob. She was about to use her powers to slide his peas across the table but instead decided to use her hands. She was in public and when they were in public she couldn't use her powers for things. Not yet. They still had to hide what they really were and stuff because dad wasn't the king of the world yet. When he became the king of the world then he would be able to make it so that espers didn't have to hide who they were and also he would bring all of the espers in the world together and he would make the world such a better place…

Mob couldn't wait.

She couldn't wait until Dad ruled the world. Then they wouldn't have to move around all the time. Then they wouldn't have to hide their powers all the time, either, because she just…didn't like hiding who she was. She was Mob, Suzuki Shigeko, and she had powers. They were a part of her and having to hide a part of herself just felt…not good. But that was ok. Dad would take over the world soon and then things would get better for all of them.

Maybe Sho would even eat his peas by then.

"I will. That's why I'm separating everything." Said Sho

"The peas too. You haven't had a vegetable since last Tuesday." Said Mob

"Not true. I had a vegetable with breakfast this morning." Said Sho

"No you didn't, I remember. You had an omelet with bacon and ketchup and a glass of milk with a spoonful of sugar in it." Said Mob

"Ketchup is a vegetable." Said Sho

"No…it's a condiment. That's why it comes in bottles and little packets and…and is not at vegetable." Said Mob

"No, it comes from tomatoes so it's a vegetable. Things that come from things still are those things. Like how if you mine ice it turns back into water. If I mined ketchup it would turn back into tomatoes." Said Sho

"Um…I really don't think that it works that way. If it did work that way then your berry burst pop tarts would be a fruit. Just…please eat your peas. They're good for you. They'll make you grow up big and strong." Said Mob. She didn't want to fight with him. Why did every single meal have to be a fight? She gave in too often, that was the problem, but he just got so upset and she couldn't stand to make him upset. She had read on the internet that she had to be firm with him to get him to eat right. She didn't want him to end up with bad skin and stuff. She had seen how hard a go of it Hatori had. She didn't want people to make fun of Sho like they made fun of him…and also she didn't want him to have to put oatmeal and witch hazel on his face every single morning. That looked like it took up a lot of time and also it was a waste of oatmeal.

"Well then I guess we should call a scientist because I think that it works that way." said Sho. He didn't know why every single meal had to be a fight. It was a fight he could win, he usually won these fights, but he was getting tired of fighting with her about every little thing on his plate. She was trying to be mom again. Why couldn't she try to be like dad? Dad may have been a jerk but at least he let Sho eat whatever the hell he wanted to.

"I don't know any scientists but I can Google it later. For now just…please eat your peas, little brother. They're good for you. Things that are green are good for you." Said Mob

"I'm going to need to ask a scientist about that too." Said Sho

"Sho….I don't even know where we would find a scientist. Can you please just eat your peas? They're mushy and I bet that they'll go down easier. Like mashes potatoes. I know that you like mashed potatoes." Said Mob

"Peas are nothing like mashed potatoes." Said Sho

"They're mushy." Said Mob. She was running out of ideas to get him to eat these peas. Why wouldn't he just eat what was put in front of him? It wasn't like she was serving him citrus or anything like that. She had even made sure to tell the people who made the food not to give them any lemon because if Sho had citrus then he could die. They had been very nice and understanding…once they had been able to understand her. She didn't think that her English had been that bad…but maybe it was because she was used to American English and stuff. Yes, that was it.

She would go out and learn every language in the world if that was what it would take to get Sho to eat his peas already.

"I hate peas. They'd disgusting and if I try to put them in my mouth then I'll throw up everywhere and it'll be gross." Said Sho as he pushed his peas away. He did it by hand, too, because he had to hide his powers when he was in public. Well not always, Shimazaki said that people never noticed things and when they did notice they tried to explain it away because they didn't want to think that they were going crazy, but big sis wasn't as cool as Shimazaki. She didn't have a lot of chill, Shimazaki had said, just like Minegishi.

But for some reason he liked people who didn't have a lot of chill.

Sho had a lot of chill! He was freezing cold! But no, Shimazaki still liked to hang out with Minegishi and big sis. He'd even taken big sis on a nighttime Tokyo adventure. Sho would have wanted to go and he would have been a lot more fun than big sis! But no, he just went and took big sis, and while he was in a closet with some girl trying to stick her tongue in his mouth and make him touch her boobs and stuff big sis was out there having adventures with Shimazaki…and it was totally normal for Sho to feel this way…because of….reasons. The reasons being very reasonable….reasons…of…reasoning…

He liked adventures!

Yeah. That was it. There were girls everywhere! There were girls in every single corner of the world and…and girls had tried to kiss him in every country he had ever been to…and so that was just not anything unusual. If he wanted to he could get a girl to kiss him and stuff…and a lot of girls had boobs so he could touch a girls boobs whenever he wanted. Well he would have to ask, first, of course because otherwise he would get slapped but he could totally kiss a girl and touch her boobs if he felt like it. Shimazaki said that the trick to getting women was to ask every single woman you met out and then eventually one would say yes…and the only reason Sho didn't do that was because he had better things to do…like go on adventures…and stuff….

He was normal. He was the most normal person in the whole world.

"Please? Just take…um…two bites. That's all. They're good for you." Said Mob. Mom had said that, when they were little, they had to take two bites of something new and if they still didn't like it they could leave the table. She didn't want Sho not to eat his vegetables but…but two bites were better than no bites at all.

"…fine. Two bites." Said Sho. He picked up his spork and took two, tiny, baby sis sized bites. He wondered if she ate food yet. If she did then this would have been the kind of food that she would have eaten. He missed her and he felt sad when he thought about her, she would have loved this place there were napkin for her to rip up and windows for her to look out of and a TV in the corner for her to watch…but he would see her again. Fukuda said that the next mission, the next away mission, was going to be in Korea and he would go in dad's place because dad hated Korea for reasons that Sho was too little to know about. On the way back from Korea they would make a stopover in Seasoning City to inspect the Seventh Division again. Then he would see baby sis.

He couldn't wait.

He was a good big brother to her and he knew that if she was big enough to eat real food he wouldn't make her take even a single bite of food that she wouldn't like. He would only feed her things that she liked even if it was only junk food like cake and cookies and ice cream. What did it matter if she got sick? Fukuda could heal her if she got sick and died from too much sugar like Shimazaki's dog had when he had been a kid. Sho knew how to be a good big brother. He was going to take such good care of little sis…

And also he had to be a good little brother too.

He took his two bites. He could tell that big sis wasn't going to give this up. He usually won the food wars but, sometimes, you had to let your big sister win so that her feelings didn't get hurt. Like when he let Fukuda win their Smash matches even though he sucked more than an after work businessman in a public bathroom near a middle school on a Friday night…whatever that meant. He didn't know. All he knew was that Shimazaki had said that to Hatori and then Shibata had covered Sho's ears and carried him out of the room like it was on fire…so it had to have been really bad. Sho would use that one later.

But not now because good brothers, little or big, did not tell their big sisters that they sucked in any way.

"Thank you." Said Mob even though those were the tiniest bites that she had ever seen in her life. Those were like the polite bites that everyone had taken of Shibata's curry. He had made a British curry, which was really an Indian curry, which was really a spicy curry that made your eyes water and your tongue swell up really bad. Mob had taken as many bites as she could before she couldn't take it anymore and her tears had started to make the curry salty. Everyone had thought that it was too spicy. Shimazaki had even cried. She hadn't even known that he could cry but he could. He hated it because he had to clean out his eyes afterwards but he could totally cry. Sho shouldn't have had to take such tiny bites. There were no spices at all in mushy peas.

And if there were she knew that the restaurant people would have made sure to take the seeds out of the peppers before they put them in.

"Whatever….trade with me. Give me your fish for my peas since you like the peas so much." Said Sho. She would say no and then she would be exposed…but not the kind of exposed where you had to be careful when you peed on a tree so girls didn't see and then freak out and slap you. The kind of exposed where she would be forced to admit that peas sucked, green vegetables sucked, and he was right about everything. Nobody in their right mind would trade disgusting mushy peas that looked like they game pre-chewed and digested with a delicious piece of crispy fish-

Big sis wasn't in her right mind.

He should have seen this coming. She was too nice to him. She had always been way too nice to him. Here she was giving him her whole piece of fish. Not only a little portion of it but the whole thing. She was just handing it over without a fight….she was way too nice. Like Shimazaki had said, she was way too nice, and…and it made no sense! Why did she always have to be so nice to him all the time!

He took the fish.

She was nice and she was offering so she got his peas and he got her fish. She could have said no…but she never said no…but that was ok because she must have liked these peas…because she could be sort of weird sometimes. She slept in high socks, she liked to do school work, she watched the same movie over and over again on a loop, she had been in love with Hatori when someone as cool as Shimazaki was one of her closest friends, and she liked to eat peas.

His sister was a weirdo. A generous weirdo but a weirdo…and he wouldn't have had her any other way.

"Here you go." Said Mob. She had wanted that fish. She had really wanted that fish. That had been a very good looking piece of fish…but there would be others. There would be other pieces of fish at other fish and chips places in the future. She only got one little brother and…and if he wanted her fish then he could have it. She still had her fries…and double the peas…so…so this was ok. This was what love was. When you loved someone then you tried to make them happy. Dad had said that and dad was always trying to make her happy.

And she had to try and make Sho happy.

He deserved that, someone in his life who made him happy, and she would be that person to him. Even if it meant giving up the best part of her meal. She would gladly give up the best part of every meal if it made her little brother happy. That was all that she wanted, his happiness. Who could ever ask for more….like another piece of fish…no. She was not going to ask for more because she was his sister and it was her job to make him happy.

Besides, she at least still had plenty of fries…no, wait, they were called chips here.