Author's Note: Before I start my ramblings, I urge all of you to look up the author animezebra and read her Ryou/Lettuce fic Metamorphosis. That's Sheeba, and she's the TMM community's newest R/L fan after watching the amazing episode 41.

Regarding that ep, I was shocked to see that Ichigo seems to grow a brain. She actually remembers Kisshu waking her up, and feels remorse. I was speechless for a full five minutes after that one, yet obviously pleased. Perhaps my fic-Ichigo isn't as radically OOC as I thought.. Ichigo does have a brain! Huzzah!

And you guys are so sweet! Dun worry about me. I can stay up and not eat and whatever and still by fine :P. I have that ability. Really, if I don't write, I feel bad myself, so don't worry about it. Heh.

On another note, Toni's getting me Volume 6 for Xmas, and she has already received it in the mail. She tells me that it's bad. For those of you who don't know, it corresponds to ep 45, and from what I know, I'm going to have to watch Kisshu cry. Toni has already warned me that I'm going to have serious problems reading this. Needless to say, I'm rather afraid --

Eh… I'm going to forego the AN review replies... I think I'll eventually send out replies via that little reply link thing in the review section. I just really want to go to bed right now. Hehe.. sorry. But thanks for the reviews! They made me very happy :P

Now, without further ado…

Disclaimer: If I owned TMM… some random Chimera Anima would have eaten Aoyama and we could dance and sing the praises of the K/I pairing. Unfortunately, this is not so, so we're stuck with travesties like eps 39, 45, 51, and Volume 6. Dammit.

She was perplexed, to say the least, as she walked down Ichigo's street, a thermos of hot miso soup cradled in her arms.

Like the other Mew Mews, Lettuce had been enjoying the week and a half off Shirogane had given them. It wasn't like him, to be sure; he hardly gave them breaks when it came to running the café and protecting the Earth, but after that battle over the Mew Aqua, after Aoyama's getting injured, after that Chimera Anima possessing Ichigo… needless to say, he was not a heartless boy. He allowed them the remainder of their school holidays away from Café Mew Mew.

The time had been wonderfully relaxing for all. Lettuce, for one, had been spending some much-appreciated time with her family. She knew that the other Mews were doing the same.

This was why she had been so surprised at Ichigo's unexpected, rather distressing phone call.

Walking down the street, carefully treading through the newly fallen snow to avoid any patches of ice, the girl found her brows drawing together in a light frown of concern.

What in the world had happened to influence such a call? The desperation, the urgency, in Ichigo's voice had made Lettuce's skin crawl. It was why she hadn't asked any more questions. All logic had suggested calling Shirogane, calling another Mew Mew, thinking it all out more. Logic demanded a good reason.

Lettuce, however, found herself less concerned with logic and more concerned with the strangled feeling in her heart. She knew that something was terribly wrong, and she knew it couldn't wait. Moreover, she somehow sensed that this could not be shared with the remaining Mews.

Not yet.

Wasting little time, she had reheated some of the miso soup her mother often made during the colder months, packed it into a thermos, and rushed out the door, telling her parents that one of her friends was ill. Lettuce being the trustworthy girl she was, they believed her. It had left her feeling slightly guilty for lying and not really knowing what she was getting into, but Ichigo's tone would not be forgotten.

What could Ichigo-san need? She said she wasn't sick, but then why did she sound so tired and anxious, and why did she ask for soup? What could she possibly want?

Try as she might, Lettuce couldn't come up with even an educated guess. Her frown softened into an expression of simple worry as she walked on, finally spotting the cat-girl's house and entering through the gate, pausing a moment to stare at the snow blanketing the sidewalk in front of the house.

It had just finished snowing, and any tracks had been generally covered, but Lettuce could still see the faint impressions of tracks. She studied them carefully, suddenly strangely interested in the fact that one set seemed fairly normal, while the other was slightly smaller and irregular. The fresh snow didn't completely hide the hint of a bare foot having made that print, and the girl quickly found herself all the more eager to enter the house.

Something was painfully wrong.

With that thought flitting about her psyche, she rang the doorbell and waited.

She didn't have to wait long. Within seconds, she heard the sound of frantic steps before the lock clicked and the door swung open.

Standing before her was Ichigo, and for a moment, Lettuce thought that she truly was sick. Her hair was disheveled, her eyes were red, her face drawn and wan. She was even in her pajamas.

Before the green-haired girl could point any of this out, she was pulled into the house with a small yelp, and the door was shut. The next thing she knew, she was finding breathing rather difficult. Ichigo was giving her such a strong bear hug, that Lettuce realized that there was no way the girl was sick.

"I-ichigo-san… could…" she managed to gasp out, and Ichigo let her go, though kept her arms in a firm hold, as if worried that her friend would leave. Now Lettuce grew aware of the stark relief in her eyes. Her suspicions of something awful had not been exaggerated, judging by the way the cat-girl's eyes bore into her own with a gleam of sincere gratitude, or the way they were slowly filling with tears.

Breath regained, Lettuce felt a new wave of concern.

"What is it? Are you all right? You don't seem well."

For a moment, she thought she had said something terrible and struggled to form a quick apology, for the tears spilled over, and Ichigo began to cry. These were not shallow tears, but tears of true stress and fear that compelled Lettuce to overstep what she normally considered her boundaries and give her companion a reassuring hug.

"Ichigo-san," she continued gently, abruptly recognizing a serious need for calm in the face of whatever was troubling the girl, "what's wrong?"

"I'm so glad you came," Ichigo gasped between noisy sobs. "I thought… and he… it's all my fault. He…he—"

Lettuce had very little idea of who "he" was, though a strange feeling told her that "he" was whomever she had brought the soup for.

A thought suddenly struck her. "Is Aoyama-san all right, Ichigo? Did something happen?"

At this, a chuckle, sad, almost sarcastic, broke through the sobs. "Not him." She shook her head, trying, slowly succeeding, to curb her weeping. Wiping her eyes, she repeated it. "Not him. If it were him—"

"Then… then who?"

The next second, Lettuce faintly wondered if something had gone very wrong with her hearing, for she couldn't truthfully believe what passed Ichigo's lips at that moment.

"Kisshu."

"Wha… what?"

Ichigo swallowed, and Lettuce realized why she had not said anything over the phone. She could tell by her eyes, that Ichigo had been terrified of her refusing to come. She knew it as she said the name again.

"Kisshu is upstairs." This was the last thing she managed to say calmly. The rest was blurted out in a flurry of tears. Biting her lip, Lettuce struggled to calm her friend down in order to gain any sense out of her.

"It's ok, Ichigo-san," she said kindly. "If you calm down, maybe you could—" she winced as Ichigo's frantic voice interrupted.

"I can't calm down! He's sick, and I've been trying to be calm for the past two days, but nothing's working, and he's getting worse, and Lettuce, it's all my fault! It's my fault he's here like this, and I don't know what to do, so I called you, and…" she trailed off, her voice losing strength as a sense of hopelessness overtook her.

Lettuce was rather surprised at her own level-headedness, but she did not question it as she found herself speaking quietly and calmly to Ichigo, as a mother would to a small, distressed child.

"Where is he?"

"Upstairs. C-come on." Lettuce began to follow Ichigo, picking up the thermos as a quick afterthought. Faced with a thick silence as the girl led her upstairs, Lettuce's mind began to digest and react to what had just been said.

Kisshu… here… sick…wait a minute… just, wait a minute!

As she climbed up the stairs, her own panic and unease began to rise, and she found herself swiftly meeting the distress she realized Ichigo said she had been living with for the past couple of days.

Him, here… oh my goodness…

Now she had something of an idea about what she had just gotten into, and could not blame Ichigo for not explaining it over the phone. As Ichigo opened the door, ushering her into her room, that thought only rang clearer. Lettuce failed to contain a gasp, failed to stop an expression of sheer shock from twisting her features. She could have guessed that his condition was bad from Ichigo's behavior, but little could prepare her for seeing the alien boy in such a weak, obviously ill state, and for a moment, she felt distinctly faint.

"Ichigo," she breathed, eyes not leaving the boy, who was sitting up, barely lucid, yet watching her with as much focus as he could manage in his state. "Ichigo, what…?" She had to take a deep breath before she could continue, and when she did, she heard a note of distinct compassion in her voice.

"What happened?"

When no answer came, Lettuce realized that her comrade was torn between an explanation and returning to the alien's side.

That took her by some surprise.

Naturally, she had been concerned about the most recent time they had all seen the aliens. She had allowed a soft worry to simmer over the days following that last battle. She had felt a disconcerting twinge of remorse.

Honestly, she had hoped that they all had felt that way, and by the expressions she remembered everyone had worn, they had.

Regardless, Lettuce had not expected the cat-girl to react like this. She had always been so deeply in love with Aoyama-kun, so absorbed in him, that it seemed totally unfeasible for her to show such obvious concern over another male, especially Kisshu. Lettuce was still having difficulty associating that name with this scene.

Nevertheless, she responded to Ichigo's urgency by taking a small step back, a gentle bit of encouragement for the other girl to move forward, and she did just that. As Lettuce watched, eyes wide in unabashed surprise, Ichigo sat down on the edge of the bed, placing a hand on what Lettuce guessed was Kisshu's knee in an attempt to grab his attention. This was a partial success; he turned to look at her, but his attention dissolved in a coughing fit that broke Lettuce out of her frozen stupor. A hand immediately went to her mouth as she watched Ichigo take the boy by the shoulders, softly telling him to look at her and breathe in an attempt to help him.

A part of her was completely, utterly shocked at this show of affection.

The other part was bubbling over with concern for both girl and alien boy.

And another part, another small, yet strangely persistent part, was actually rather pleased…

If she had been aware of that part, even faintly so, her face would have been the envy of tomatoes everywhere. Her urgent concern quickly extinguished any real possibility of that. This was very obviously not the time to mull over such details.

Still, she could not ignore the curiosity sparked by the tender light in Ichigo's eyes as the girl helped the boy lean back and brushed stray hair out of his eyes. A sense of resolve seized her as she buried that thought for another time, watching Ichigo as she turned to her, motioning for her to come closer.

Gingerly, Lettuce approached the two, lip held firmly between her teeth as she stared down at Kisshu, wide eyes brimming with innate concern before Ichigo stammered a command to sit in the desk chair. She did so, but never did her eyes leave Ichigo's charge.

A soft "Kisshu-san?" left her lips, and to her surprise, the alien turned to her with a weak, wan smile.

"You're the fish, right?"

"H-hai."

She was taken aback, even as she nodded, by how desperately weak his voice sounded. The girl was no expert in medical matters, but a single look at Kisshu totally justified Ichigo's calling her over. The only problem was that she had no idea how she was going to be of any help.

Before she could dwell on that, Ichigo's voice broke into her thoughts.

"We don't know if he can take any of our medicine."

Well, thought Lettuce, that classified as bad.

"And his fever, it won't… it won't drop."

And that's very bad.

"It's—" Here she broke off, and for a few seconds, Lettuce wondered why, was about to prompt her to continue, when the reason hit her.

Ichigo did not want to frighten Kisshu. While that seemed almost ridiculous, considering how obviously terrible the situation was, it proved one serious thing.

His fever was extremely high.

That gave Lettuce a chilling shock of fear.

She's afraid for his… she's afraid that he'll…

Die.

The word rang in macabre tones in Lettuce's mind, but she wisely kept that unpleasantness to herself. She found herself growing more concerned about the same thing.

"Ano…" she began, trying to meet Kisshu's eyes to gain his attention, cautiously plowing forward when she captured his fever-dulled gaze, "are you sure, Kisshu-san? You can't take…?" She trailed off as the alien began to shake his head, mumbling a weary "Dunno…" before closing his eyes against what seemed to be a wave of dizziness. Out of the corner of her eye, Lettuce saw Ichigo clench her fists. The cat-girl's nervous desperation seemed to be contagious, and Lettuce found her voice, urgent and unnaturally trembling, filling the silence once again.

"H-have you tried c—" Just before finishing her query, she spotted the bowl of water and damp cloths ling on the night table. Beside her, Ichigo nodded, then looked up into her companion's blue eyes.

"Lettuce, there has to be something else, something you could…"

Now it was Lettuce's turn to don that expression of hopelessness. What in the world could she do? Sure, she knew some first aid, but that was it, and Kisshu needed more than first aid…

He needed medicine and supplies that she and Ichigo had, but only for humans. If only, if only they could acquire the supplies the aliens used. Surely, they had to have some in their dimensional headquarters. Surely, they did not come to this planet unprepared. If only there was a way to get to it…

As if to sharpen her anxiety, Kisshu murmured, "We have some… Pai keeps it for emergen—" he broke off in a light cough, but not before that name stirred something in Lettuce.

Pai.

If she could get to Pai, maybe she could… couldn't she?

Was it possible to convince him…?

Wait, she suddenly thought, why is…?

"Ichigo-san, why isn't Kisshu-san with—?"

The pink-haired girl cut her off with an abrupt shake of the head. The answer seemed to be too much for her to voice in her state, but she managed to mouth, "Deep Blue."

Like the other Mews, Lettuce had little idea as to who or what Deep Blue truly was. Nevertheless, she caught on very quickly, and a wave of despair overcame her. It explained everything and made it so horribly difficult.

Still…

She straightened again, that little idea gaining a mite of strength as she ran over that night's events in her mind.

Still, Pai hadn't seemed displeased with Kisshu.

Perhaps scornful, yes, but concern had still been there, hadn't it?

Yes, there had been definite care in the way he helped carry his fallen comrade off.

Perhaps, then… perhaps…

"I-ichigo-san?" The girl looked up at Lettuce with a tinge of surprise in her eyes.

"Do you think… do you think maybe…" a sudden burst of resolve strengthened her speech, "if I could speak to Pai-san, do you think maybe I could—"

"Lettuce…" Ichigo's eyes had never been so wide. The conversation was completed with a feeble chuckle from Kisshu.

"He's a stubborn bastard."

"Kisshu!" Ichigo now, turning to the alien, shocked at what the two were suggesting. She whipped back to the other girl. "Lettuce, you can't be thinking—"

Now, it was Lettuce, voice hardened by a new determination, who interrupted, eyes confidently trained on her distressed friend. "It's the only way, isn't it? He needs the medicine, and I think that I… I can do it!"

And she meant it. The more she thought about it, the more she played it over and over in her head, the more confidence she gained. It brought a small smile to her face as she held Ichigo's bewildered gaze. "I can."

It took a few seconds for that affirmation to truly settle in Ichigo's desperate mind. Her first reaction was blatant refusal; she could not see a way to convince Pai, not at all. However, as Lettuce's words rang in the tense silence, as they sank in, the cat-girl realized that it was the only option. She also realized that Lettuce was the only person remotely capable of the job.

She was the only one who had understood it all during that battle.

She had to do this.

All that was left was how.

Swallowing, stuttering, Ichigo tried to tackle that question. "How do you plan… w-what do we…?"

"I thought…" Lettuce began, suddenly taking to playing with the buttons of her sweater as the difficulty of the task became clearer, "I have to find him. Just find him and…" And hope she could persuade him to allow the girls access to whatever medicine Kisshu needed. Hope…

Within moments, just like that, Ichigo accepted the idea. She accepted it because it was obviously the first, last, and only option.

"Kisshu," she gently shook the alien's knee; he had closed his eyes and she wasn't sure if he was asleep or awake. Whichever it had been, he slowly gave her his attention, and she continued with an urgency that was as gentle as she could hope to make it.

"Did you change the door to your dimension?" She was, of course, referring to the entrance they had used when Masha had been taken into the aliens' domain.

At first, he looked slightly confused, then seemed to grasp what she was asking. He shook his head mutely, and Ichigo gave him a tiny smile and a quick pat on the knee before allowing him to close his eyes again.

"Then… I can start there."

Ichigo's attention snapped back to her fellow Mew Mew, and she was momentarily shocked at the deep determination settled in Lettuce's face. That shock quickly gave way to a surge of hope.

"Hai." With that, Lettuce rose, fingered her charm in a brief moment of affirming her resolve, and brushed the yellow metal with her lips.

"Mew Mew Lettuce, Metamorpho-sis!"

A second later, the girl stood fully clothed in Mew Mew attire. Ichigo swallowed as her friend moved to the door before blurting out an anxious "Be careful!" Lettuce turned to give the girl a reassuring smile and silent nod. Then she was gone; Ichigo heard the door click shut.

"And please… hurry back," she whispered into the silence, reaching out and dampening a cloth before pressing it against Kisshu's cheeks and neck in a vain attempt to cool him down.

It took Lettuce only a few minutes to reach the area she knew hid the opening to the aliens' dimensional base. The ability to tirelessly leap over buildings made the trip quite simple.

Now came the hard part.

She stood on the rooftop, staring at the empty air where the gateway lay.

The problem was, how was she to get Pai out? How could she even be sure that he was in there?

All of this swirled about in a cloud of threatening doubt in her mind as she bit her lip.

Then, she decided to do the only thing that she could think of.

"P-pai-san…" she murmured, taking a deep breath in an attempt to steel herself against her habitual timidity.

"Pai-san!" she called, voice ringing with new volume in the frigid air. Again and again she called, with an added "Please, answer!" punctuating her final plea. Now all she could do was wait.

She had not expected it to be such a short wait.

Thus, she couldn't help gasping when the alien appeared on the rooftop across from hers.

Her first thought was a strangled Oh my God, what now? Her second, however, was more concerned than anything else.

She could immediately see that he was tired, awfully tired, and that he was trying his damned hardest not to show this. From a single glance, she saw a deep depression, a cold worry that she had never seen on his normally-apathetic face.

Now she knew that it was possible. Now she knew that he did care.

All she needed to do was convince him that she could help. Needless to say, she expected this to be easier said than done.

"P-pai—"

"Why are you here, human?"

The blunt coldness of his voice silenced her with stark abruptness, but she looked at his drawn face once again, and it inspired another attempt.

"I'm not here to fight," she began, deciding that that was the most important thing to establish before going further. "I—"

She stopped here, because she saw him tense, saw that he did not believe her. At first, this discouraged her. However, she realized that between his obvious exhaustion and worry and her Mew Mew attire, she could expect little else. This influenced her next action.

She powered down.

As Pai watched, a perplexed expression creeping into his face, Lettuce shimmered and her regular jacket and winter skirt replaced the battle costume.

"I need your help," she continued, straining to meet the alien's eyes. "Ki… that is, Ichigo… I mean…" she frantically searched for a way to tactfully word the unorthodox situation, but he interrupted her before she succeeded.

"I know where he is, and I can't help you."

He sounded so final, so utterly rigid in that statement that for a fraction of a second, Lettuce considered giving up. Then she remembered a tearful Ichigo tending the weak Kisshu, and that fraction of a second fell, forgotten, to oblivion.

"Please, Pai-san," she saw that, for the briefest of moments, he seemed to almost jump when she said his name in that pleading tone.

"Kisshu... he's very sick. We… Ichigo can't bring his fever down, and I—"

"You heard me," he began, a true growl lacing his voice, "I can't help you."

She heard the anger, heard the hopelessness, in his voice, and she realized two things.

One: His anger was not truly directed at her, but at Deep Blue, and two: he was as afraid for Kisshu as Ichigo was. As she herself was.

They're like us. If Ichigo was that sick, and I couldn't do anything… if I was forbidden to help her… it's the same, all of it.

Pai was worried about his friend.

It was as simple as that.

Her voice rang with a new confidence, a new compassion as she wrung her hands.

"I know what Deep Blue said. I know, and I… I understand how you—"

"Don't compare yourself to me, human." That same coldness, yet that same worry running underneath its surface, met her ears.

"Please… it's the same. You are worried about someone important to you, just as I would be. Pai-san…" she trailed off as a look of disbelief crossed his face. Apparently, he had not expected her to guess his thoughts with such absolute accuracy.

Suddenly, Lettuce was aware of a shift in the conversation. Suddenly, Pai lost his dominant stature, gazing back at her with… she was surprised to see it… desperation in his eyes.

"Deep Blue has forbidden it."

She knew she was making progress when he said that name with a tinge of despair. Now she was getting somewhere.

"We just need medicine. We need to bring his fever down. Surely there has to be a way…"

He looked down at the ground, seeming to mull her words over in his mind before looking back at her. What he said next surprised her, really, truly shocked her.

"May I see him?"

Taken aback, she could only stare at him, lips silently parted before the request completely registered. There was only one answer she could give.

"O-of course."

"May I ask you to…" He trailed off, either embarrassed at asking his enemy, or plainly worried about the reaction his master would have. Either way, Lettuce allowed herself a reassuring smile and a nod.

"I'll lead you—"

He cut her off by flying over from the other building and landing in front of her, disconcertingly close. She did not know how she knew, but she was quickly certain of exactly what he was asking.

"I—"

"It is the fastest way."

She knew now how desperately he wanted to see his friend, and she could only nod before moving towards him and allowing him to encircle his arms around her waist. A moment later, she faintly heard his voice through the blood that had suddenly begun pounding in her ears.

"Stay still, and concentrate on the destination. You have to… lead me."

Lettuce nodded, nervously, shyly, as his arms tightened around her and a shift in reality occurred. In moments, they were teleporting, and the girl's vision blurred as she tried to focus her mind on an image of Ichigo's room.

The teleport seemed to last forever, and the girl found herself losing her senses. Everything was becoming indistinct, fuzzy, for lack of a better term, and she briefly wondered if she was going to pass out.

The only reason she didn't was because Pai gave her a quick squeeze, bringing her back to total consciousness, even if it did make her blush with a ferocity that startled her. After all, why should she blush…?

The topic could be pursued no further; the lines of Ichigo's room came into focus, and Lettuce suddenly found herself standing on solid ground again.

That, and she saw that she was going to have to do rapid damage control. Pai's sudden appearance in the room had shocked Ichigo into a violent defensive mode. Lettuce had never seen her so frantic, so agitated.

Had she been in cat form, her fur would have been standing on end.

"Get away from here," she snarled at the older alien, eyes narrowed into dangerous slits, posture similar to a feline ready to leap in attack. What she thought, neither Lettuce nor Pai could really know, but the fact that Pai seemed most loyal to Deep Blue, to the one who had ordered Kisshu's banishment, could only have given her the worst of thoughts. It was quite probable that she thought Lettuce had failed, and that Pai had come to kill the other alien.

"No! No, Ichigo, it's ok. I brought him," Lettuce frantically jumped, realizing that she had been obscured from view and stepping out where she could be plainly seen. "He just… he wanted to see Kisshu-san. Ok, Ichigo?"

It was amazing how quickly the cat-girl wilted. Her posture relaxed. The anger in her eyes melted away into that old concern and a new, suspicious curiosity as Pai took a few steps forward. She looked to Lettuce, who nodded, and cautiously stepped aside.

The older alien stared down at his green-haired companion, who seemed to have fallen asleep in his propped up position, chest rising and falling rhythmically even while his breaths held a slight rasp. In a solitary glance, Pai could tell that his worst fears were true, that Kisshu was gravely ill, that the Mew Mew hadn't been lying. It all brought a fresh wave of guilt and despair. As he reached out to place a hand on Kisshu's forehead, carefully, so as not to wake him, frowning at the temperature, he had only one thought: this is all my fault. All of it because of him… for listening to Deep Blue… yet, what could be done? How could he sacrifice his entire race for Kisshu's wellbeing? Still… it made the sight of the suffering alien no less difficult to behold.

As Ichigo and Lettuce watched this, a strong sense of sympathy overcame them both as they saw the gesture, the moment, for what it was: a friend caring for a friend. Both saw how easily the situation could be applied to them, how close it all was. Ichigo struggled with the meaning of all of it, while Lettuce murmured a pleading, "He needs medicine."

Pai's brow furrowed, his eyes narrowed as he tried to find a way, a compromise…

In the end, he gave in. Simple as that. A soft cough from his ailing friend only sealed the decision.

With a wave of his hand, he produced a small bottle filled with a clear red liquid from the air. Without hesitating, he tossed it at Lettuce who, though startled, managed to catch it.

"We are not taking care of him," he said, voice ringing with a sternness that did not match his actual emotions. "Do not bring him anywhere near our base, do not ask for assistance." Lettuce watched, transfixed, as he turned his gaze to her.

There was a shadow of a smile on his lips.

"You stole that from us. We will not allow you to steal anything more."

Before he vanished, Lettuce was positive he gave her a look of total gratitude.

The two girls were left to stare at the vial in stunned silence before a jolt of relief overcame Ichigo, and she threw her arms around her friend.

"Arigatou!"

Author's Note: People… no sleep rocks I dunno when the next installment will come, but hopefully it won't take as long as this one. I'm also planning to do a little drabble… always fun As always, read and review!

P.S. This is getting posted after I really had it done because was being... bitchy, for lack of a better term. I also would like to inform you all that I got my full 8 hours of sleep because we had a snow day! Of course, there actually wasn't that much snow, but who cares? XD