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Dissonance

Event XXII

Rule Change

"I don't get why we can't just blast through all this rubble." Hibiki was complaining, lifting up another large rock, handing it to her partner, who was standing right behind her.

"Because we might collapse the whole thing. This is like an unstable mineshaft. We're all tired and complaining won't help you feel better. So just bear with it, okay?" Itsuki took the rock and handed it over to Bloom, who threw the rock into a large hole a few meters behind her.

"Is Dream still out?" Nagisa, who was working in the same position as Hibiki but a few steps to the right, was curious about what was going on at the back where a handful of Cures were all huddled up, talking about something.

"Probably. She was in pretty bad shape when Urara and I found her." Rin was the second piece of the chain that started with Black. Michiru, working behind her, was the third.

"We don't know what is going to happen next, so its a good idea to at least restore accessibility to our base." The redhead threw another rock away and sighed. Just how much rubble had fallen? They had to thank Marine for finding the entrance just fifteen minutes after they started a search but just about all ways in were completely blocked off.

"What do you make of those new Cures? Well, I guess I can't really call them new since they look around the age of everyone else." Hibiki kept working, bored out of her mind, so she kept the conversation going.

"Why do you automatically assume that they haven't become Cures recently just because they're close to adulthood?" Michiru's reply hit a nerve and Hibiki handed Itsuki the next rock a little too rough, making her tumble.

"Ah, sorry, Itsuki." Turning to Bright, Hibiki found herself slightly more annoyed than she expected. "Because everyone else became a Cure around the time when we went to middle school."

"I think we can rule out coincidence on that at this point. How many of us is that now, thirty?" Itsuki was not one to believe in conspiracy theories but this really did smell like one. Not exactly the bad kind of conspiracy, but still.

"Does that really matter? We've got other problems. And I'm more interested in what they are like." Saki hurled another rock out of the way and swiped some sweat off her forehead. She turned around when she felt someone's presence behind her.

"You're interested in us?" Akane wasn't coy at all, and since Reika had told her to grab Nao and go help the others with what they were doing while she went over things with Cure White, there was no reason not to learn more about them.

"Of course. It's not every day you get to meet other Cures. Although that may seem a little weird, coming from me since we all know each other already. But it was a big shock back then!" Saki felt a little embarrassed, the red Cure having heard what she said.

"Ah, dun worry about it. Six of ya I can handle fine, but seeing y'all in one place was way too big! I never woulda thought there be so many of us! Came as a real surprise!" The more excited Akane got, the more her accent came through. A gentle nudge from Nao made her realize this. "Ah, my bad, my bad, I talk a lil' odd when I get all excited, ya know?"

"You're such a stereotypical Osaka person, it's kind of impressive." Like all the others, Rin had stopped working and gave the new Cures a good look. Their hairstyles were a little odd but nothing that was any more unusual than Aqua's hair curtain.

"Thanks... I think? You're the first person to ever see it that way." Keeping her accent in check the best she could, Akane got a little embarrassed. She wasn't ashamed of her accent or anything, but she took great pride in being able to talk completely normally despite having only trained to do so for a little over two years. "I'm Cure Sunny, Akane Hino."

"I'm going to make a really elaborate guess and say you use fire attacks." Rin was being a little sarcastic about the elaborate part. Raising her hand and smiling amused, Rin continued. "Same here by the way. Makes two fire-using Cures." Giving Akane a provocative look, Rin tried to gauge the new girl. "Wanna see who is the stronger one?"

"Someone else that uses fire, huh? Interesting. I'll be your opponent." Not afraid of taking up a challenge, Akane was raring to go. The two of them were stopped short by Aqua and Mint passing by, covered in dust. A single glance at the situation and Rin backed off, not eager to get into a fight with Karen because she was playing around instead of doing her job. "Are you turning tail now?"

"I'm backing off to avoid getting smacked around by the others. The fight isn't off, just postponed until... we fight somewhere where we won't be disturbed."

"Saying it like that, you make it sound kind of dirty. I'm not sure you should be flirting with someone new when you already have some kind of thing going on with Rhythm." Michiru didn't miss that Melody tensed up a little when she mentioned the white Cure.

"What part of that was flirting, huh?" Rin was quick to anger, something she still hadn't mastered after years of trying to and it was especially bad when her love life was involved.

"I'm not free for taking anyway. It's a bit complicated but I'm all tied up with March here. Isn't that so, Nao?" Akane had no problems whatsoever saying those things and she loved to embarrass Nao just a little bit with it.

"You didn't need to tell them about that." Having caught more than just glimpses of romantic relationships between other Cures, Nao didn't worry too much about it, but she still wasn't completely sure that everyone would be accepting of how she handled her relationship... or relationships.

"I'm Cure Melody, Hibiki Hojo. She's my partner, Myoudouin Itsuki, Cure Sunshine. Let's get along!" Hibiki found it a little strange to know two Cures that had names related to the Sun, but then again, stranger things had happened.

"Natsuki Rin, Cure Rouge." Smiling a bit, Rin pointed at the green Cure, who had been really quiet until now. "We haven't heard your name."

"How about you let Saki introduce herself first?" Michiru's tone made clear that it wasn't a real question. She didn't like the idea of everyone else skipping over her best friend. She also purposefully didn't reveal her own name, wanting Saki to go first.

"Are you two are fucking each other or something?" Whenever someone pissed Rin off, her choice of words became more like Urara's, a bad influence that had stuck around over time.

"You might want to watch what you're saying. Saki and Mai are an incredible couple and she doesn't need to-" Michiru was interrupted halfway by Saki, who covered the redhead's mouth with her own hand.

"It's okay Michiru, no need to get angry." Letting go of her friend and turning around, Saki didn't waste time and introduced the remaining three, including herself, all at once. "She's Cure Bright, Kiryuu Michiru. She can be a little direct but please don't hold it against her." Waiting for Nagisa to walk over, the black Cure having been unexpectedly quiet until now, she introduced her as well. "She's Cure Black, Misumi Nagisa, probably the oldest Cure here. And I'm Hyuuga Saki, Cure Bloom."

"Isn't Moonlight older than me?" Nagisa commented on that quickly, not liking the word oldest or old in general. 'Most experienced,' was her preferred term.

"Yuri hasn't been a Cure for more than four or five years now. It's been more for you, right?" Itsuki interjected, knowing that it was mostly irrelevant but throwing it out there regardless.

"I guess I'm the most experienced one here then. Unless any of you have been at it for seven years or more." The last bit was directed right at the new girls who quickly smiled and shook their heads.

"We just recently made the five year mark. It's been five years, right, Akane?" Nao answered first, not completely sure about the date. "And I'm Cure March, Nao Midorikawa."

"Plus/minus some days or weeks, yeah. That comes about right."

"That makes you our seniors." Lifting her arms up and putting her hands behind her, Hibiki grinned. It wasn't all bad to be with the youngest group.

"I appreciate all of you getting along, but I don't think this entrance is clearing itself." Inori had shown up, her face and clothes covered in dirt. She was helping out clearing the rubble from a different spot. The strongest ones were all assigned to the main entrance but that didn't mean everyone else got to sit around and do nothing.

"Yeah, yeah." Hibiki replied first, earning a slightly annoyed look from Pine. The danger was over, that much was guaranteed, but the situation was still pretty bad. Relaxing for just a little bit wasn't all bad. "Should we get going? I don't want to get lectured by White or Aqua." Hibiki respected them but she wasn't too fond of their personality. They reminded her of a more grown up Ako in some ways.

"We don't need four people in one row, so let's take turns and have two people take a break at a time. Anyone especially tired?" Nagisa wasn't bad at organizing people due to her days of playing lacrosse. A lot of it had stuck with her all this time.

"I'll take the first break then." Itsuki stretched a little, still not in good condition from when Nightmare had gigantic roots ravage the place.

"Me too. My legs are killing me." Rin had ran enough to qualify for a dozen marathons in the last twenty four hours.

Rearranging the lines, Akane taking Rin's spot and Nao taking Itsuki's, they continued to get rid of the rubble. "Say, how did you guys become Cures?" Hibiki popped the question without any hesitation, curious about the new girls.

"Miyuki got us into it. I still don't know how she settled on us, but just after she transferred to our school, she got to be Cure Happy and-, what's so funny?" Akane was looking at Rin, who had broken out in laughter the moment she heard Miyuki's Cure name.

"Happy? Seriously, Happy? Oh hell, Urara is gonna have a field day with this. Not that her name is actually any better though." Laughing as hard as she could, Rin could imagine Urara totally making fun of the poor Cure that was called Happy.

Ignoring Rin and continuing the explanation that Akane had left hanging, Nao didn't stop working. "Miyuki became a Cure and more or less picked us out based on her... unique perception."

"You make it sound like she's lost her marbles Nao!" Complaining about her choice of words, Nao's partner handed another big rock to Michiru.

"So she asked you to become Cures? Geez, that reminds me an awful lot of Nozomi. That's my leader, by the way. Cure Dream, Yumehara Nozomi. The one that you saw fighting when you showed up."

"Someone like that is your leader? What kind of group..." Nao wasn't sure she was really comfortable with someone like that around.

"Don't get me wrong, Nozomi is really strong, but that wasn't what she is usually like. That was a life or death thing she probably won't use ever again." Rin didn't want to explain it in detail. Nothing good would come of telling them all about the reflections.

"Akane got picked first, Yayoi was next, then me, then Reika was the last one." Finishing up, Nao wondered how everyone else became a Cure. But asking all of them would take a pretty long time. "How did all of you meet each other? We were never told there were other Cures."

"None of us were told that. Based on what I know, there are a myriad of fairy worlds that don't interact. So they all have their own issues and legendary warriors. Which is how so many of us came to be Cures." Michiru launched in full scientific analysis mode the moment the question was asked.

"Some of us, I think everyone up to Peach's group, met when Fusion showed up. Fusion was, in a way, something like the combined remnants of the enemies the groups that met there got rid of. We met Blossom's group when Bottom attacked us while we happened to be all at the same park." Saki explained it in a way that it was easy to understand, fully aware that Michiru took things a little too seriously in these situations.

"After that, my group met all the others when Black Hole showed up. It's really a great coincidence that nobody but us even remembers those events. When you check the newspapers, it's always gas leaks or faulty construction or unexplained weather phenomena." Hibiki finished off the explanation, taking a deep breath, tired of handling rocks.

"I talked about this with White a while ago. My sister and I had the theory that when a creature that doesn't belong in this world shows up, such as Uzainas, the worlds forces create a memory layer. It's basically a snapshot of the worlds memories of the instant the outside influence arrives. When the disturbance is removed, by us Cures, the memories are restored and society finds some kind of more or less logical explanation for how buildings got destroyed."

"That sounds really far fetched. Then what about that time when everything got turned into a desert?" Nagisa was used to highly-specialized technobabble due to Honoka talking about her work at times.

"You're talking about Dune?" Itsuki remembered that time well. The people remembered for a time but after a while, they seemed to gradually forget until only her friends and she herself still knew of it.

"It's a theory. I suspect that smaller intrusions don't cause the memory effect and massive scales take time to correct. How else would the world still not know about Cures? There are at least thirty of us now, and-" Michiru really got going with topics like that.

"Let's talk about something else. It doesn't really matter now, does it? Who knows how many other Cures there are out there in the world? We're stuck here anyway. Hey, Sunny, March, you play any sports?" Rin didn't enjoy all the smart-talk.

"Volleyball. I'd like to be a professional but I gotta keep the restaurant goin' too, so I ain't got the time." Akane had lost nothing of her competitive spirit in the last years, something that kept making trouble for Nao and Reika.

"I still play soccer as a hobby, but I don't have as much time as I used to." Nao missed playing a little, but her daycare job didn't leave her all that much time except on weekends.

"As a hobby, huh? Do you follow the professional league at all?" Rin was suddenly intrigued. Nobody but her really played soccer, even among the other sporty Cures.

"Not too much. Playing soccer professionally had been an option for me, and it probably still is, but I love my current job. It's something I don't want to give up."

"What do you do for work?" Hibiki didn't mention that she used to play quite a bit of soccer herself, keeping the conversation focused on March.

"I work at a daycare. I've looked after my six siblings for a long time but Keita, the second oldest after me, is looking after the youngest ones now and I work to help support my family."

"Sounds like straight out of a soap opera." Rin shrugged. She had heard weirder things. "But I guess reality always is stranger than fiction. Six siblings, huh? Your parents were awfully productive. Speaking of sex, Sunny, you said you were tied up with March? How long have you two been a couple?" Rin wasn't really the master of treading lightly with words. She wasn't quite as far down the road to cynical behavior as Urara but far enough to put some people off.

"Don't mind her," Itsuki didn't want a fight to break out so she quickly tried to defuse the situation before it became a necessity to defuse it. "She's just like that. We've got all got our crosses to bear."

"I meet some foul-mouthed people working at the restaurant, I'm used to it." Akane dealt with those types just fine. When she was working, she always wore a smile on her face, knowing that even the worst person had a right to enjoy good food. And maybe it would even better them. "And there's no real answer to your question. The situation is a little complicated and I'm gonna save explaining it for another day. Assuming we'll still be stuck here tomorrow. I sure hope not."

"You should settle for being here for a while." Looking up, Rin sighed and took a deep breath. "In a nutshell, we're only getting out of here when we evened out the energy deficit or something ridiculous like that. Whole lot of fighting, running around and god knows what else is gonna happen. I sure can go without another Nightmare busting our butts." Rin's mood wasn't the best and the way she talked really showed that off. "Anyone else want to take a break?"

"Me," Michiru was exhausted and she didn't have any silly pride that prevented her from saying so.

"You two are dating, aren't you?" Continuing where Rin had left off, Saki didn't hesitate to pursue the topic.

"Akane, lets just tell them. There are a lot of other couples here and this is becoming really troublesome." Nao didn't like to just tell anyone but these girls seemed nice and trustworthy enough, Rouge being a bit of an exception.

"Shouldn't we ask Reika before we just blurt it out?" Akane didn't like going behind Reika's back.

"You're right. Ah, this is so complicated! That's why I'm usually against telling others!"

"Lets... change the topic then." Hibiki had her own relationship issues, mainly relating to Kanade being crazy, but nothing that would make act like that. "So March works at a daycare. What do you do, Sunny?"

"Jus' Akane 's fine. It's kinda weird gettin' called Sunny all day when yer talking about stuff like this. My family 's running 'n Okonomiyaki shop. Although we'll serve other stuff too now. Business been real good lately, so I'm often real busy, but if I ever wanna get my own shop, I'm gonna need Reika 'cause I don't know how to handle the finances 'n stuff."

"There's a lot of Cures that can cook, aren't there?" Itsuki had noticed that a while ago but it never really seemed worth the effort of mentioning it. "There's Sunny, Rose, Luminous, Bloom, Rhythm... doesn't Passion know how to cook as well? I heard she was the one that kept Peach fed while they traveled."

"Well considering most of us have partners, at least one Cure should be able to make food." Itsuki really hoped that Hibiki was a somewhat-decent cook.

"I'm counting on you, Itsuki." Grinning and showing her partner a thumbs up, Hibiki could see the rising worry on her face. "What's wrong?"

"Nothing, just... " Sighing, Itsuki started talking to herself under her breath. "I wonder if I can get Erika to teach me..." She had never had any aptitude for cooking but Erika was good at almost everything when she put her mind to it, which was rare enough but not too unusual if someone asked her to help.

"I got a question. What are we clearin' this rubble for?" Akane was starting to wonder if there wasn't an infinite amount of rocks to be carried away.

"Our base is right behind there. Showers, beds, living room and food." Michiru explained briefly, really longing for a shower and something to eat. She was surprisingly attached to those basic physical comforts.

"A shower does sound good. I'm all dusty. I only ever get this dirty when I play soccer during rain." Nao had developed a small obsession with cleanliness over the years.

"You don't know what dirty is until you're literally looking like someone encased you in chocolate. But I agree that a shower would be bloody good. There is gonna be a run for them right the second we break through so I suggest either getting ready for a long wait or sharing a cabin with someone." Playing soccer in the rain was something Rin could live without, though.

"You're planning to take Rhythm?" Michiru brought the topic up a second time, not satisfied that she hadn't gotten a good answer earlier.

"How on earth does everyone think I'm dating her now?" Rin couldn't deny that Kanade wasn't quite nobody to her, but she didn't view her as her lover or anything like that. Although the girl probably looked at her that way.

"Her sleeping in your room, hanging around you and generally seeming pretty attached would be the main giveaways." Michiru really didn't know when she was crossing a line and once again, it needed Saki to stop in and change the topic. Melody and Sunshine were looking pretty annoyed already.

"Where are the others from your team? There are five of you, right?" Saki directed the conversation back to the new team.

"Nao, have you seen Yayoi?" Akane grabbed another heavy rock and kept the chain going. Just how many more were there?

"She was with a short blue Cure. Miyuki was with them as well." Nao didn't know even the names of half of the people that were around.

"Did that Cure also have blue hair?" Itsuki quickly got a very bad feeling.

"How did you know?" Looking to the yellow Cure, Nao had a curious look on her face.

"That's Erika, Cure Marine. She's a bit... hyper." Itsuki knew full well that Erika wasn't going to step on any brakes, no matter how new people were.

"Fits right in with Yayoi and Miyuki then." Akane grinned.

"I hope they don't explode." Letting out a sigh, Itsuki kept working. "I think we're almost through." She didn't really believe that but it would keep the mood from falling. A little optimism never hurt anyone.

"...What?" Nao was confused. What did she mean, explode?

"Watch out!" Akane was quick to react to the noise of rocks grinding on each other and grabbed Melody's arm, pulling her away from the rocks that came crumbling down.

"Thanks, Sunny." Worn out, her reflexes weren't quite what they should have been and getting stuck under several dozen kilos of stone would have really sucked.

"Isn't that the entrance?" Itsuki pointed at a small hole that had opened up from the miniature avalanche. "Looks like we really were almost through."

"Meltdown!" Launching a basketball sized projectile towards the base of the rubble, everyone but Sunny jumped away and tried to shield their faces from the immense heat. Now that they knew the ceiling wasn't going to come down, they could go havoc on the remaining rubble.

"That's pretty impressive. How do you do it?" Akane was used to high temperatures but she wasn't all that comfortable with this either, just being a few meters away from a small pool of molten rock that kept increasing in size little by little.

"Stop running your mouth and help me. This isn't parlor tricks and magic shows, this is tiring as hell."

"It's my turn now! I'll show you what a real Fire Cure is capable of!" With a smug grin, Akane took position, raised her right arm and created fire spheres right above her own head. With a second delay, each sphere, no more the size than a pinball, instantly crashed into the rubble, melting down the rock around it. With dozens of spheres hitting every second and more being spawned rapidly, it was a contest of who could melt down more rubble.

"Shouldn't we stop them?" Hibiki was holding on to Itsuki's arm, not sure it was safe to be around those two.

"It's impossible to stop Akane when she gets like that. She's competitive by nature. This isn't even that bad, it used to be a lot worse." Smiling as she explained Sunny's behavior to everyone else, Nao was reminded of the past. She couldn't even count the times she and Akane had competed over something.

"What are they doing?" A familiar voice spoke to the six watching Cures from behind them. Michiru was the first to turn around and recognize Muse, standing there and just watching the two hotheads have a go at the entrance. "Didn't White ask you to go and tell her when you freed up the entrance?"

Michiru instantly took charge of the situation. "As you can see it isn't freed up yet. They're working at it. We got rid of the rubble that was likely to cause a cave in without any problems and now they're merely removing the last bits."

"I'll tell White then." Ako was just as eager as everyone else to get back to a decent bed and showers and possibly a warm meal. Considering everything and all the worse possibilities, they weren't really all that badly off. They didn't go hungry, they could decide themselves when to sleep, eat and play, and the fighting had no long term consequences. It was only things like Nightmare popping up that made their lives in this place a living hell.

"Isn't Lemonade with you?" Nagisa was a little nosy when it came to other people's relationships, and this time too, she couldn't help but be curious.

"She is lecturing Marine and two of the new girls." Ako couldn't directly look at anyone, knowing that those two would get a really bad impression of her partner because of this.

"They're... alright, aren't they?" Hibiki didn't get along too well with Lemonade and who could blame her. Kanade almost blew off her head that one time, not quite literally but it would've hurt quite a lot, and ever since then, the relationship between Lemonade, Hibiki and Kanade had been more than just a little strained.

"For now. They got really out of hand. I didn't see them in action but Pine told me that they caused a hallway to collapse after being a bit careless with their abilities." Ako had appeased Urara, resulting in just a lecture. That her partner had been inside said hallway while it was collapsing she kept a secret.

"Erika..." Itsuki just shook her head in disbelief. "She never changes..."

=== Dissonance ===

"I'll take this one!" Nagisa didn't even stop to look if someone else was trying to get into the cabin, swiftly entering, transforming back and turning on the water that was miraculously even hot. There was one damaged cabin of the combined bathroom so that left six more stalls.

Each stall was about four meters long and two wide, the shower head big enough to sprinkle water over the entire inside. The floor was still tiles of stone, and several small drains in-between them. The door was as wide as the full width of the room itself and could be locked to the wall with a small mechanism. Each cabin had high, at least two meters, walls to either side of the other cabins, but left a small gap to the ground to avoid flooding.

"Hibiki!" Itsuki pulled her partner with her, almost tumbling over a rock and just barely keeping her balance. She really couldn't stand the dirt and sweat anymore. Getting into the cabin right across the one Black had gotten into, they locked the door and got rid of their clothes. They felt not a grain of shame seeing each other naked by now. "You got bruises all over your back... and your breasts, Hibiki."

"Don't say that in such a loud voice!" Blushing and covering her breasts, Hibiki turned her back to the taller girl, taking a quick look if there was any soap or shampoo. "Black?!" Calling for the other Cure, she knew that others would arrive any second now.

"Yes?" The noise of two cabins being used at once was making it difficult to talk without actually shouting.

"Is there any shampoo or soap over there?!" Hibiki found it secretly a little funny to talk about soap not even hours after they had all narrowly escaped death.

"Can't see any! Nothing on your side?!" The lack of answer was pretty self-explanatory. Rubbing the dirt and blood as good off her arms as she could, the hot water getting on the bruises did burn a little.

Saki showed up next, quickly occupying the second stall on the left side, right next to where Hibiki and Itsuki were. She didn't lock the door yet, since it was obvious when a stall was being used and Mai shouldn't have to wait.

Leaving Sunny behind, a hot shower taking just slight priority over establishing her superiority as Cure. Rin made it to the shower only seconds after Bloom, no doubt a whole storm of people not far behind her. In her hurry, she tried every handle until one opened and she walked right in on a naked Bloom. "My bad." Closing the door and disregarding any glimpse of Bloom's well trained body she might have seen, Rin occupied the third and last stall on the left side.

And it really only took a few seconds before the first Cures from outside the clearing team showed up. Surprisingly, it was Peach and Passion who were pulling Beat with her, both of them looking quite eager to get into the bathroom before whatever was apparently hunting them caught up. "Three people won't fit! I'll take another one or just wait!" Ellen was absolutely sure that those stalls were not made for that many persons.

"I've fit with Setsuna in much smaller places, don't worry." Love was also quite in a hurry so she just shoved Ellen into the first cabin that wasn't showing any signs of occupation, went in after and waited for Setsuna to close the door and lock it. It really was quite cramped with three people but they still had enough space to turn. "Setsu, turn a little, your boobs are in the way."

Ellen was so embarrassed and excited at the same time that her face closely resembled a gigantic tomato with purple hair. "Hold still, I'll turn on the water." Using one hand to grab Ellen's shoulder to balance herself and the other to reach for the faucet, Love didn't bother to wait for her new partner to transform back. She intuitively did when water started to rain down on her.

Two slamming doors signaled that other people that arrived as well. "Did we really need to shower together? I'm not sure I was needing one that badly after all." Despite her complaints, Ako was already undressed and didn't object to Urara locking the door.

"The others would make a huge fuss if we bothered to take separate cabins so just get on with it. Not to mention, that enormous red stain on your face tells me you really like what you're seeing." Turning the water on, Urara felt like she had just come back to life.

"Look who's talking! I'm not gonna buy 'it's the water temperature' one moment to explain how excited you are."

"I didn't know you liked my breasts so much that you could tell when I got stiff nipples. Maybe you'd like to have a little fun while we're already here?" Pushing her breasts against Ako's, Urara laid both her arms around the younger girl's shoulders and showed a really smug grin. And it lasted for a full three seconds.

Pushing Urara's head away and turning slightly, Ako started to clean her arms and legs, worried that someone else might have heard them talking.

In the last cabin, a surprise contender had shown up. Inori, as one of the fastest Cures, had overcome the handicap of being far away when everyone started going for the showers and made it in time to take the last stall.

"Love, stop pushing. Eek, where are you touching?" The complaint was followed by reluctant and roaring laughter, Setsuna pouting in response. "Ellen, don't hesitate to shove her when she gets too close!" Ellen was standing almost against the wall in the back of the cabin, Love just centimeters in front of her and Setsuna towards the door. They really just fit barely in there.

"Oh, your hair looks great when it's wet Ellen." Playing with a few strands, Love was having fun just teasing her partners a little. She let out a surprised gasp with Setsuna poked her sides, one of her weak spots.

"Stop playing around! I think this is gonna leave a small scar Love." Putting her finger near a wound on Love's wet back, Setsuna circled around a source of small agony for the brave Cure. "It won't be visible unless you wear a bikini but still... you got such a nice back, it'd be a shame..."

Nagisa felt a little hot just listening to them. Seven active showers obfuscated a lot of the words and what little she could make out sounded like they were getting it on in the shower. She could also hear several others arrive and turn away, disappointed, when they saw all the showers being occupied.

"Nagisa, are you there?" Honoka couldn't find her partner moping outside, so that made her having made it to a shower stall the next best bet. She had left Beauty with Aqua, who was bringing her up to speed from where Honoka had left off.

"Here!" Knocking on her own door from the inside, Nagisa hoped that would be enough for her partner to find her. A second knock from the outside and Nagisa opened the door just a bit, her hair hanging in her face, slick and wet. Honoka slipped in right away, already transforming back as she stepped through.

"Everyone else looked really disappointed. We all had the same idea it seems." Shoving Nagisa gently to the back, Honoka shook her head a few times, loosening up her hair. While she didn't have anywhere close as much hair normally as she did in Cure form, it was still multiples of Nagisa and it was all sticking together. "Ah... if it stays like that I'm going to have to cut part of it." Trying to unravel the complicated and sticky mess that her hair had become, she really wanted some of the shampoo and oil repair she had at home.

"Turn around." Making her partner show her back to her, Nagisa slowly started to fix her partners hair. "I don't want you to cut it. It'll take a bit but I think I can get it apart."

"I really love you, Nagisa." A huge smile played around Honoka's lips, moments like these always showing just how much Nagisa was a part of her. "Are you feeling okay? Any big injuries?"

"I really love you too." Giggling a bit, Nagisa sneezed, some water having gotten into her hair. "A ton of bruises that burn like sandpaper being rubbed all over me but other than that I'm fine." Focused completely on Honoka's hair, she didn't even notice that Honoka was reaching over and keeping the long strands of wet hair out of her partners face.

Right across the room, two other Cures were even closer. Hibiki's long hair was getting stuck in Itsuki's hands as they moved over her back, the two of them catching up on lost time. Both of them trying to out-do the other in their passionate tongue kiss, Hibiki was on the losing end, having to break off and catch her breath.

Itsuki was pushing her against the wall, not hard enough to seem forceful but with enough determination to give her the feeling resisting would be pointless. And without the wall to support her, she feared her legs might give in. Her partners hands didn't stay on her back for long. Standing only far enough away to just barely keep their bodies apart, every time she took a deep breath, she could feel her breasts touch Itsuki's, a thrilling sensation that sent a shiver down her back every time.

Breathing quite heavily, they were absolutely sure that nobody would catch them having sex in the shower, not with all the noise and everyone quite focused on themselves. Caressing Hibiki's left cheek, Itsuki made the girl raise her head just enough to look her straight in the eyes. The water was a welcome new element to their little love play, tickling their now quite heated up bodies. "Shouldn't we... get clean... first...?" Pushing out one or two words between a quick series of soft kisses, Hibiki couldn't hide that she was still nervous.

"I'm doing that right now." With a small grin, Itsuki's left hand drew a small trail from Hibiki's shoulder to her breasts, pushing down just a bit on them. "See?"

"You hardcore pervert." Hibiki's face completely belied her words, a massive blush having taken up most of it. "But two can play..." Pulling her arms around Itsuki's neck, she forced the yellow Cure closer, their bodies now fully touching, wet skin rubbing against each other.

"And look who's blushing the hardest." Itsuki didn't hesitate to one-up her girlfriend again, putting her right leg between Hibiki's. A moan that only she could hear, hidden away by the noise of the shower, escaped the lips of the younger girl just before they were sealed again by a furious kiss.

The last Cures had finally arrived and looked if one of their partners had managed to score a cabin early. Mai, despite knowing that Saki was somewhere in the showers, refrained from joining her, not quite feeling up to that yet. The incident with Wither was more difficult to deal with than she had thought. She urged Michiru or Kaoru to at least take the chance and join up with Saki. It wouldn't be the first time they'd see each other naked.

"How do we decide who has to go back?" Michiru and Kaoru were both eager to take a shower but three people in one cabin was much too cramped.

"Whoever finds her first can take a shower. I suggested it so I'll take the side with less doors." Kaoru had no objections to that."

Michiru got lucky and started on the left side, where Saki was. After getting no answer beside what she thought were surprised gasps, Saki's voice came out of the next stall. "Mai?"

"She'll take a shower later, she was really tired. She said one of us should use the chance and shower with you. Do you agree to that?" Michiru looked at Kaoru, who looked a little disappointed that she would have to wait to wash dust and dirt off her face.

"That's fine." Opening the door a bit to let Michiru in, Kaoru last saw the naked back of her sister. She was also a little jealous, since Saki was quite nice to look at. Banishing that thought from her mind, Kaoru was about to leave when the door she stood in front of opened a bit.

"I overheard. If you want, you can join me. It'll be a while until a cabin clears out and unless you stay right here, you'll have to wait." Inori had contemplated about it for a few seconds before actually making the offer. Even though being seen naked didn't bother her that much, as she occasionally goes to the public bathhouse, it was a little weird since she didn't know Windy all that well.

"I'm... well, I'd like to say I'm fine but that is clearly not the case. I'll take your offer." Kaoru didn't know much about Pine either. She was smart, busty, a speed orientated fighter and seemingly a loner.

Her back facing the door, Inori could still see over her shoulder as Windy transformed back. She was quite a bit taller than her, had really long, deep blue hair. From what she could tell through the clothes, she wasn't anywhere near as athletic as her sister. She kind of wanted to strike up a conversation but it was questionable if Windy even wanted to talk.

Standing in the shower, her back turned towards Pine, Kaoru tried to undo the mess that her hair had become. Much like Honoka, it stuck together in ways that the blue Cure thought impossible. It was near impossible to do without actively tearing and pulling very hard and that would completely ruin her hair. "Pine, I have a favor to ask."

"Your hair, isn't it? I suspect a lot of the others are having this problem right now. Stay that way, let me see..." Facing Kaoru's back, Inori tried to make sense of how the hair was tangled up. It seemed to stick together from sweat and dirt, and that would be a real pain to undo. "How long have you been growing your hair out?" It was as good a topic as any, and she didn't want to just stand there in silence.

"It hasn't gotten much longer after I was made, but since then, it's been about five years and a half."

"Made? You mean, when you became a Cure?"

"My sister and I aren't really human. Biologically, mostly, yes, but we were originally created to kill Saki and Mai. Bloom and Egret."

It wasn't often that Inori was speechless but the directness of her answer surprised her. But maybe it was best to answer in the same way. "That explains why you two seem a bit different from most of the others."

"We try not to be. Back then, we really knew nothing about the world that wasn't deemed necessary to deal with our designated targets, the Cures. We learned about the world, changed sides and immersed ourselves as good as we could but it looks like there is only so much we can do."

"Do you want to talk about something else? I'm not too fond of gloomy subjects. Please hold still, this might hurt a little." Finding a strand that was impossible to untangle, she had to pull it apart with force. If that didn't work, it needed to be cut.

Kaoru flinched a little when the pain hit. "Did it hurt? I'm sorry."

"I'm grateful you're doing this for me. I would usually just ask Michiru, but if I wait until after the shower, it would probably before even more difficult."

"Don't mind it. Say, what do you do for work?" Before Kaoru could answer, the two of them were interrupted. A loud thud from the stall next to them made both look at each other in slight confusion. Did someone hit the wall? Who was even in there? The bathroom had become rather steamy due to all the hot water and the noise was making it hard to hear anything. There was no real way to tell.

"You didn't have to hit me, goddammit! How about holding back some?" Urara was rubbing the back of her head. She knew she kind of deserved that hit, but she still put up a tough front.

"I have no problem if you touch me a little or with kissing, but fondling me like I'm some kind of toy gets you hit in the head, remember that. And don't even think about trying to start anything more than that in here."

Grabbing Ako and pushing her against the wall, the water spray was directly hitting Urara's head, thick trails of water running through her face as she started to grin wide. "So touching is no problem, is it?"

"I dug that hole myself." Closing her eyes for a few seconds and then opening them again, Ako found herself in a fiery kiss with the older girl, one of Urara's hands sliding up and down her left leg, the other hand's fingers intervened with hers, Urara still pushing her arm against the wet and warm wall.

If her personality was questionable, Ako still couldn't find a single fault with the more intense things Urara was doing to her. The kissing specifically made her feel like she was floating. Even though she could stand up to the yellow Cure normally, as soon as their lips met, that was all over. Ako blamed that on her inexperience. It wasn't that she liked to be pushed around by Urara at all!

"Where did all that sass from just a moment go, huh?" Switching from kissing to licking her neck, she loved to tease Ako. At times, the girl would stand up to her, other times her reactions were just priceless. And then there was obviously the fact she was really hot.

Urara gasped in surprise when Ako took the chance and softly bit the smaller Cures earlobe. Being taller in her adult form was really useful after all. Nibbling on it, she almost couldn't keep doing it, so wide was the grin that quickly grew on her face. She had found a weak spot!

"Enough... dammit, you win, stop... ah..." Urara was really sensitive in some spots, and her ears were one of those. Her breathing completely out of whack, she couldn't keep her composure and let out a moan.

"Shouldn't you keep your voice down? They might hear us, you know?" With obvious spite, Ako was now on top of the tease train, pushing Urara around a little. "Maybe I'd be willing to stop if-" Her expression instantly shifted to surprise and she had to cover her own mouth to not shriek.

"Where... where do you... think you're touching me?" Her face lit up like a red neon lamp, she could see one of Urara's arms go right between her legs.

"Oh, I know where. And I'm pretty sure you know I do." The smug grin only grew wider as Ako kept resisting, not quite enough to make it seem like she was genuinely uncomfortable with it but plenty to give the impression she would like Urara to think she was. "Let me hear that voice again."

At the same time, Kanade walked into the bathroom, having failed to find Rin anywhere else. She also hadn't seen Itsuki and Hibiki, and thinking that they were showering together got her jealously running hot once again. Trying to focus on something else, she called out to the red Cure. "Rin? Are you there?"

She didn't get an answer and after a few seconds, Kanade decided to just give up. If she was there and just didn't answer, that alone was reason enough to leave. If she wasn't there, Kanade didn't want to see Itsuki and her crush come out of the showers together.

Walking past the cabins, she felt someone violently grab her arm and pull her backwards. A door slammed behind her, water was sprinkling down on her, a wet hand covered her mouth and wet hair was touching her neck. "Not a word." Rin's voice cast a happy smile on Kanade's face. Letting her go, Rin took a step back and got the wet hair out of her face. "Your clothes get see-through by the way."

Blushing and transforming back, Kanade didn't know why exactly she got embarrassed over that. She had slept naked right next to Rin before, so what was the big deal now? "Why didn't you say something?"

"Because I can't stand the dumb faces of everyone when they look at me and think I'm dating you. I can't even talk to some new girl without getting one of the others go on how I shouldn't flirt when I'm seeing you." Kanade, like most of the long haired Cures, was having trouble getting her hair in order. "What are you doing?"

"Trying to avoid my hair turning into one giant tumbleweed. And who were you flirting with?" Her tone dropped significantly for the question. She still wasn't sure what her exact feelings for Rin were. Right now she was pretty infatuated with her, but she couldn't tell if that was only because she was the only one that was being nice to her.

"I wasn't flirting with anyone. Bright got a stick up her ass and misunderstood things." Trying to help Kanade, Rin only worsened the hair issue. "How do you girls deal with hair that long... when mine gets even to shoulder length I go crazy."

"So you do care about me after all!"

"Hey, that's not what I said at all. Just because I'm not flirting with the new girl-" Interrupted by Kanade turning around and throwing her arms around Rin's neck and kissing the older girl on the cheek, Rin felt a little bit of her resolve to not go anywhere with Rhythm die inside her.

"If you didn't care, you wouldn't have secretly pulled me into the shower. Aren't you just embarrassed to tell others you're dating a younger girl?"

"You have this horrible habit of jumping to conclusions. And getting really clingy." Flicking Kanade's forehead. Rin found that to be acceptable punishment. "I got you in here because I know you'd just start moping again if I ignored you."

"That's the same as caring about me." No matter how much Rin tried to paraphrase it, Kanade noticed that she was just trying to not admit she cared. "I'm happy."

"Stop it... it's creepy." Rin cursed a few more words under her breath with a tiny blush on her cheeks for which she gave the hot water the fault.

The mood in the cabin next to them was a lot more dry than that. Michiru was not the best conversation partner after all. There was nothing really to talk about either. Nothing beside Mai. "Did Kaoru leave?"

"It would make sense. It seems unlikely that another cabin freed up right after we got here." Trying to get a very persistent patch of dried blood off her cheek, Michiru tried using her fingernails, with barely mediocre success.

"You don't feel bad about leaving her?" Saki knew all too well about the problems the sisters had with emotions and generally what was considered normal behavior. But she never really got the hang of teaching them how not to be odd.

"It was a fair contest. In theory, I was even at a disadvantage since my side only had three working cabins."

"You said Mai was so tired she didn't want to shower? Is that really the truth?" Saki felt a little depressed. "I wonder if something happened with Wither."

"Its possible. The only explanation for why Wither would take Mai and run is that she was trying to keep Mai to herself." Michiru didn't like talking about this topic. Seeing Mai and Saki not happy together was like a knife in her sides. It hurt, even without thinking about it.

After that one sentence, Saki stopped talking, just trying to get all the dirt off her and out of her hair. Michiru felt like guilty for making her even more depressed but she just couldn't think of anything else to say. An analytical mind wasn't always a blessing. It had gotten better over the past few years but evidently not enough to be sensible enough to avoid things like this.

Across the room, the atmosphere was the complete opposite. Ellen was gotten somewhat comfortable leaning against the warm wall and was helping Setsuna to get some payback at Love. While the blue Cure held Love's arms back, even though she wasn't really fighting it, Setsuna tickled her and abused all her weak spots. Ellen watched with great amazement how Setsuna managed to drain Love of all her strength with a single move.

"Stop... I... give up... I give up... Setsu... please... ah no more..." Love couldn't stand it anymore. If the girl continued sliding her hands over the inside of her legs, she'd go completely crazy. She was already so horny that she wanted to go at it with Setsuna right there, but the presence of Ellen holding her back was like an unmovable anchor for her conscience that kept her lust and desire in check.

"Okay. Ellen, don't let her go, I know how she is. She needs a bit time to calm down."

"I don't mind being held. I can feel her breasts on my back so it's quite comfortable." Saying that line completely nonchalantly, Ellen gasped, pushed Love in Setsuna's direction and covered her breasts with her arms.

"Love!" Her face was completely scarlet. She hadn't even thought about it that way until Love mentioned it like it was something really kinky. "You're horrible!" Of course she didn't really mean it, but she did feel like she had just been taken advantage of.

"I'm surprised you're handling being in this cramped space with both of us this well." Setsuna grabbed Love and helped her stand. The pink Cure wasn't in any condition to be shoved around all of a sudden. Thankfully, the door had gotten considerably warm from the water and the general presence of three people so she could lean against it. Unlike Ellen, she didn't mind Love resting against her breasts.

"Well... we sleep in the same bed and... I thought it'd be really prude of me to shower on my own." She couldn't admit that she was curious to see them naked. Absolutely not! Her head would explode! And Love would never let that slide. She'd tease her about it for the rest of the day and beyond.

"That's so cute Ellen. That reminds me of when I first got Setsuna to bathe with me." Looking over her shoulder, Love leaned even more against her first partner, enjoying the situation. "She used to be a bit of prude."

"I did not. You're just too much of a pervert in the bath, Love. I wasn't even five minutes in the water before you went behind me and started feeling me up!" Kissing a specific spot on Love's neck, Setsuna got her to moan in pleasure. "Don't give Ellen weird ideas about me!"

"You two really fit together so well."

"That's not right." Love tensed up a little and her a much more serious face now. Leaving her partners wet embrace, she grabbed Ellen's hand, pulled her a little closer, not that there was much space to begin with, and made her part of their little hugging game. "We three really fit together so well. Isn't that so Setsu?"

"I must have been stupid to think you'd be mad about me liking Ellen. It's almost like you decided to bring her in instead of me now." Saying those things jokingly, Setsuna did enjoy Ellen's embarrassed face, her body directly touching Loves. They were all roughly the same height but the way Ellen stood, she had perfect access to pat her head.

In the cabin to their left, Nagisa had finally finished unraveling Honoka's hair, more exhausted than after a hard battle. "That was the most difficult thing I've ever done." Using the cabin wall to support herself, she felt almost out of breath.

"Stop exaggerating, silly." Kissing her partner on the forehead, Honoka was incredibly grateful to Nagisa. "It's so sweet of you to do this for me. I probably would have had to cut it."

"I can't let my future wife cut her hair because of something like this." Taking Honoka's hand and drawing her in, Nagisa returned the kiss. Looking in each others eyes, they didn't just see love for each other but also appreciation. "I often wish we would have started dating earlier."

"I'm not sure. It was really hard work to teach you so you could attend the same school as me. If I had been always thinking about what you looked naked or that cute voice you make in bed, I don't think you would have learned much."

"I bet you actually used to think that." Slowly putting her forehead against Honoka's, Nagisa started to smile. "I know I did. There were a lot of nights where I couldn't sleep because you were wearing something sexy that day."

"You're one to speak, miss wear clothing that shows off your midriff. You even changed back your Cure outfit that way. I know it's all just to give me some eye candy." Letting go of Nagisa and crouching, Honoka started to kiss around Nagisa's navel.

"So? Don't tell me that huge cleavage cut in your... uniform isn't... Honoka stop... you're making me really... horny..."

"That's what I'm trying to do, silly..." Lowering her voice a bit, just in case there was someone in the next cabin that had a really good sense of hearing, Honoka continued playing with Nagisa's navel, her tongue sliding over the wet skin, leaving a slightly sticky trail that was soon washed away again. It was driving Nagisa completely nuts.

Taking her partners heavy breathing and quiet moaning as a cue to continue, Honoka knelt on the warm, wet ground, her face right on the height of Nagisa's sensitive spot. The short haired Cure let out an excited gasp when her partner started using her tongue to pleasure her. They hadn't slept with each other since the whole mess with the reflections had started and doing it in the showers was a bit kinky, not that Nagisa disliked that. "Honoka... stop... that's unfair... I want to touch you too..."

Her legs were starting to give in and without the wall to help her, she surely would've gone down on her knees. Even so, the second Honoka's tongue went inside her, she couldn't take it anymore, grit her teeth to avoid moaning loudly and got down on the ground. "You tease..."

Licking her lips suggestively, Honoka was quite a fan of Nagisa's taste. Pushing her partner further against the wall, Honoka was right in front of Nagisa, kneeling, starting to kiss her neck, their bodies pressed against each other. Honoka was often the aggressor when they had sex, but Nagisa never just sat back and let her do everything.

Thankfully, the noise of the showers being used was enough to drown out Honoka's loud moan when Nagisa's fingers reached behind her legs. On the other hand, the sound of a door slamming close and two people walking over the cold floor tiles was something nobody missed.

None of those outside either. Saki and Michiru had finished and felt almost reborn. Reaching the exit, they met Marine and Blossom, the latter holding back the first by the back of her uniform. "Calm down Erika, nobody is gonna cut in line." The experience of meeting Ember had left noticeable changes in Tsubomi. She didn't want to be Ember but knowing that self-esteem went a long way to make Erika like her even more, she took a cue or two from her reflections.

Erika wasn't sure what to think of Tsubomi trying to be more like Ember. The reflection had her own charms and while she had fallen for that, Tsubomi was the girl she had been for years now. It wasn't all bad, but it was really something she needed time to get used to. At the very least, she didn't dislike Tsubomi not letting herself be pushed around as much at all.

"The humidity in here is crazy..." Tsubomi was soaked before she even got anywhere near the actual showers. It was starting to become hard to see as well since the bathroom wasn't exactly made for continuous use of all showers at once.

Erika, as soon as Tsubomi had let her go, had raced to the cabin and was already standing under the shower by the time her partner joined her. "What got you this dirty anyway, Erika? Nobody else was so covered in dirt."

"One of the new girls, the yellow one called Peace, has a really awesome ability and I was able to copy it. So we played around with that a little."

"A little too much maybe? You collapsed a hallway! I'm just happy nothing happened to you, but Lemonade was about to hang you up to dry." Changing back into civilian form, Tsubomi still had to undress, one of the few Cures that still hung on to their actual clothes. That came as no surprise, considering it was an outfit that Erika had made for her.

"Ha ha ha, my bad Tsubomi." Stretching on the spot, Erika quickly looked once to the left and once to the right. "Wanna see who else is in here?" The impish grin on her face was met with harsh contempt from the pink Cure.

"Erika! Didn't you learn your lesson when you got Rouge so angry she wanted to deep fry you?!"

"Oh come on, what are the chances she's to either side?" Keeping her grin, Erika seemed to have trouble to pick one side to spy on first. There were two ways to do that. Laying down on the ground and spying through the small gap between floor and the walls, and somehow getting further up to spy over the walls.

Tsubomi wasn't quite used to actually speaking her mind or being pushy. She tried really hard but it just wasn't who she really was. A spark of admiration for Ember, who had managed to make Erika fall for her even though she was the enemy, was deeply rooted in her mind now, but that still... "Erika!" While she had been deep in thought, Erika had decided on a side and was already trying to peek through the gap below to the right side.

She couldn't quite muster the courage to pull Erika back but she didn't want to just stand by and watch her get into trouble again. Because it would no doubt get herself into trouble as well. "Erika! That's bad! Stop it! What are you gonna do if whoever is in there catches you?!"

"Dash." The super nonchalant answer came without any hesitation. "There are two of them... and they're... wow..." Erika started grinning wide. "Tsubomi, take a look, they're totally going at it." Pushing herself a little more, the gap wasn't enough to let her actually shove her head through, but if she positioned herself right she might be able to spy upwards just a little.

"Look at me instead." Tsubomi needed all her courage to say just that. Trying to put on a tough face, she couldn't hide how embarrassing it was to say it. But to her surprise, it had the desired effect. She could barely follow Erika with her eyes, so fast did the shorter girl get up and behind her. "I said look! Kyah! Erika, stop!"

"Oh, it's too late to take that back now, Tsubomi."

Even the two in the cabin that Erika had been spying on heard the helpless Tsubomi gasp right after that. Not that they bothered to think about it or pay any attention. Hibiki's mind was almost completely blank, Itsuki pushing her against the wall, the fingers of her partner going right between her legs and inside. One arm thrown around Itsuki's neck, desperately trying to hold on and support herself, her other pleasuring Itsuki's intimate spot.

"You practiced... didn't you..." Itsuki had to hold on to the wall as well. Hibiki had gotten pretty good at using her flexible fingers, giving Itsuki an incredible time.

Hot air escaped her lungs with every breath, and she wanted desperately to taste Itsuki's lips again before she reached her climax. "Don't say... stupid stuff... and kiss me..."

No matter how hazy their vision got from being under the hot water for too long, it didn't matter. Having only eyes for each other, Itsuki heeded the plea of her partner, letting her tongue into the girls mouth as far as she could. The water could not take away from what she felt was a sweet taste, their kiss slower and a little uncontrolled compared to before.

Their kiss underway, Hibiki came first, the last erratic moves her fingers did before she needed both her arms to hold on to her partner drove Itsuki to came right after, the two of them sinking on their knees, Hibiki tightly holding on to Itsuki. In-between heavy breathing, a body with no strength and mind that didn't work properly, the girl could still say what she needed to say.

"I love you."

Three words that made Itsuki smile with happiness. Forcing herself to move her tired arms, she laid her right hand on Hibiki's head, slowly stroking her hair. "I love you too, Hibiki."

"I can't move..." A little embarrassed, Hibiki enjoyed the comfort of the tight embrace just after she had come.

"Should I carry you back?" Grinning a little, Itsuki wasn't sure she could stand, never mind carrying Hibiki. But she knew the offer would be rejected anyway.

"Don't be silly... I'd die of embarrassment." Trying to punch Itsuki's shoulder, it was no more than a weak jab. Spending a few seconds in silence, holding on to the pleasure she had felt when Itsuki made her come, Hibiki tried to hide her face in Itsuki's bosom. "Maybe if you promise not to laugh..."

"I wonder if I can hold it in. You're kind of adorable when you're embarrassed." Playing a little with Hibiki's hair now, Itsuki enjoyed teasing her a bit.

"You're horrible!"

Itsuki was not the only one that enjoyed teasing her partner. Honoka was kneeling next to an exhausted Nagisa, who had just received a bit of a reward for saving her partner's beautiful hair. Slowly and pleasurably licking her own fingers, Honoka almost made it a display to Nagisa.

"I can never get enough of your cute moans." Smiling, Honoka gave her partner a quick kiss. Just as Nagisa tried to reach for Honoka's legs, she got stopped. "Not here." Blushing a little bit, she didn't want to say why but she didn't need to.

"Are you worried they might hear us?" Nagisa locked her fingers with Honoka's, playing around for a bit.

"They all know we're together but I don't need them to know we did it in the shower. And you know... I..."

"You can't keep your voice down." The smug grin on Nagisa's face pissed Honoka off a little and started pouting immediately.

"That's because you always overdo it with your tongue." Looking away, she still kept playing with Nagisa's fingers. "But if we go to our room..."

"I'd love to... but..." Often, words weren't really necessary to get across what she meant. They had been together for so long, they knew each other better than anyone else did.

"Maybe some of the others got out early and cooked something. I'm pretty hungry too now."

"Sometimes I think love doesn't quite do justice to how much I need you by my side, Honoka."

"Silly." Looking really happy, Honoka moved and sat next to her partner, leaning her head against Nagisa's. "But yeah, sometimes I feel I love you is not just enough to tell you what I feel. But then I always remember, you can tell what I feel. You know when I'm worried, sad, happy, excited... you know me better than anyone else in the world. You're my one and only beloved."

"You're the only person that makes me happy like this, Honoka. I want to be with you forever. The worst thing I can imagine is a life without you. I wouldn't know what to do if we're ever separated."

"You're so sweet." Closing her eyes, Honoka started to feel a little dizzy. "I think we should get out... I'm starting to feel lightheaded."

Helping her partner up, Honoka turned off the water and immediately felt pretty cold. Nobody had thought of taking a towel, if there even were any left, so all they could do was transform and walk around with wet hair for some time. Opening the door, Honoka leaving first, she was suddenly face to face with Sunshine and Melody, the both of them looking gave off the same vibe as she and Nagisa did. Looking exhausted, clinging to each other, a certain kind of smile on their faces and the same look of realization in their eyes as they saw White and Black.

Both couples didn't say a word. Staying behind for a few seconds, Honoka looked around and got lucky finding the towels near the entrance. Sunshine and Melody were gone by the time she had dried her hair up somewhat. "They looked like..."

"We probably shouldn't talk." Smiling at each other, they were pretty sure that a great deal of others would follow their example, unknowingly.

Not all of them though. Kaoru and Inori were a little frustrated and worried since Inori was having difficulty with the blue Cures hair. She did enjoy the time talking with her on the other hand. Kaoru was both fascinating and weird. Both closely relating to her past. "I'll need to get out when I'm done with this. I'm already feeling like a sponge."

"You don't need to worry about my hair. If you need to leave, you should-" Trying to move a step away from Pine, the yellow Cure grabbed Kaoru by her shoulders and forced her back, keeping her in one spot. "Pine?"

"Inori is fine. And please don't move, this is difficult as is."

"You seem like a very honest but also informed person so I have a question for you."

"That sounds ominous. But ask. We'll be here for at least a few more minutes." Dealing with a particularly horribly tangled strand of hair right next to her scalp, Inori didn't mind having a fun past time. And it certainly was fun to not have to explain anything at all and just talk without having to hold back on technical details.

"I would like to become more human. Like everyone else here. Even the quiet and intelligent ones like Moonlight aren't as obviously different as my sister and I. How do I do that?"

"There is no single all encompassing answer to that. You said earlier that you have trouble with emotions. You and your sister are like little children in that regard. It takes a long time to properly understand emotions but we learn them when we are very young. Part of it is in our upbringing, another part we carry with us from birth. From what you told me, you most likely lack the latter."

"Since we cannot be reborn, there is no way for us to be completely like other humans then."

"I didn't say that."

"Please explain."

"It's... really just a guess but just because you weren't born with the knowledge of how to deal with emotions doesn't mean you can't feel them. I'm sure that you've felt sad, happy, thrilled, surprised before."

"I can count numerous occasions where that was the case, yes."

"What about others? What about feeling jealous? Wanting something? Loss? Love?"

"I'm not sure what any of those specifically feel like. I'm of course aware of the concepts and the common perception but I can't quite say if I've ever felt those."

"I think what you two lack is a puberty of your own."

"The period of when humans undergo their last growth spurt?"

"Yes. But for you two, it would mostly be emotional growth. I've never dealt with something like this before so all I can think of for now is to go and experience as many situations as you can. The main issue is that it'll be difficult to experience Jealousy, desire, loss and love just like that."

"We have tried imitating the behavior of others that showed those emotions. Melody and Rhythm were showing signs of irrational behavior so we reenacted what they did."

Blushing a little, Inori hesitated briefly before she asked. "All the way?"

"If you're asking if we included sex, yes. However, we couldn't reproduce their behavior that way."

"Just imitating actions won't make you feel love for someone else. We can continue this discussion in my room if you'd like. I'm done taking care of your hair."

"I'm really grateful to your help. I should probably talk to Michiru first before we continue this conversation."

"I'd like you to keep this between us for now instead. I'm still not sure if this will help you in any way."

"I understand."

The conversation on the other side of the room was quite in a different tone.

"Let... go... already..." Trying to get Kanade off her, Rin resorted to pinching her arm, finally getting results. "You had jealousy issues to begin with but if this is how you act around someone you like, its no wonder they're trying to get some personal space back!"

"Isn't it normal to want to be close to someone you like?!" Kanade felt she was being treated unfair now.

"Close yes, but there's a limit to everything." Turning around and turning the water further up, Rin took a deep breath. She wasn't one to call names. She had her own issues to sort out and one of them was that she easily lost her temper. "Why do you need to be that close to whoever you like anyway? Doesn't this distance cut it?"

"It feels like they're going to slip away if I let them leave." Kanade completely ignored what Rin said and hugged the girl from behind. Resting her head against the redhead's back, she felt more secure that way. "If I'm not with them, I always start thinking that they're going to leave me for someone else. Or that something happens to them."

"You're that afraid of being left alone?"

"I hate being alone..."

"Most people don't like being alone and how many times do I have to say that everything has a limit? You're full of extremes! Jealousy, scared of being alone, clingy, those are all things you take way too far!"

"I can't help it!" Shouting, Kanade wildly shook her head. "It didn't use to be like this... I was fine with just my friends, with being a Cure and my team being there when I needed them, with my parents... but when I fell in love with Hibiki, I started to feel like she was slipping away whenever she was away from me. It only got worse over time. And now I feel like I'm being abandoned every time I'm being left alone. I don't want to be left behind! I hate feeling this way! I felt like nobody in the world cared about me when you let me stay with you. And now, whenever I'm with you, I start to feel the same way I used to feel about Hibiki. If it continues like this, you'll just get sick of me and leave me, just like Hibiki!"

Rin was shocked by how emotionally broken Kanade was. Slowly loosening Kanade's grip on her, she turned around and hugged the girl, trying to calm her down. She hadn't noticed from the erratic and hurried way she had talked but she could tell, even through the water from the shower, that Kanade was crying.

What was she supposed to do? She had thought that Kanade had just that kind of personality, but she didn't expect it to be all connected. Her behavior at the time was almost like she had some sort of panic attack. Was she even qualified to try and help Kanade? What if she ended up making it all worse?

"You're thinking about leaving me, aren't you? I'm creeping you out, aren't I?" Looking up, Kanade's eyes were red from her crying and her whole face spelled out fear. "Don't go away Rin... it hurt so much when Hibiki left me, I don't want to feel like that ever again..."

"There is nowhere I want to go, stupid. You're messed up, but it's not creepy and I'm not thinking about leaving you or anything. So please calm down." She couldn't be angry at someone that was so desperately holding on to her. Nobody had ever wanted to be with her this much, not even close. Even though her reasons weren't exactly what Rin wished they were, but that didn't change the way she felt.

"Promise me you won't just leave me... I want to stop feeling like this. I want to stop being afraid. Even if it's just for a little while..."

"You always feel like this when you're not with me?"

"It's not always the same... sometimes it's worse than other times."

Taking a deep breath, Rin showed a bit of genuine affection, kissing Kanade on the cheek. "Stop crying." Trying to sound as gentle as possible, she didn't let go of the girl. "I promise I won't go away."

"Rin..." Kanade lowered her head, staring at the white floor. "I'm sorry..."

"I don't know if I can help you sort this out but I'll try. I'm not heartless after all."

"Yeah..."

"But we need to get out of here. I'm starting to feel like I'm about to dissolve."

"Yeah..."

"Stop being a vegetable and give actual ans-... why is your face so red?"

"Because... nobody has ever been this nice to me."

"Oh boy..."

Leaving their cabin, Rin caught a glimpse of Pine and Windy just leaving the bathroom and Karen and Komachi come in. Of all the people to show up...! Kanade was still clinging to her, and she couldn't just get back into the cabin. Getting a smile from the blue and green Cure, Rin knew that they would totally misunderstand what was happening.

"I guess it doesn't really matter at this point..." With a sigh, Rin walked towards the exit, Kanade clinging to her right arm, a happy look on her face.

Love, Setsuna and Ellen were about to leave as well, both Love and Setsuna helping their partner to get her hair sorted out. Setsuna's hair was only shoulder length and while Love had grown hers out a bit, it wasn't as long and problematic as Ellen's.

"We should have done this before we started playing around. I feel kind of dizzy. This is your fault Love."

"Please don't argue."

"No, she's right. I should have paid a bit more attention to your needs. But all we can do now is fix it as quickly as possible. And you shouldn't feel guilty, Ellen."

"How do you know-" Stopping midway into her sentence, she realized who she was asking. "Silly me."

Getting a laugh out of both Love and Setsuna, they finished up untangling her hair. "Thank god we only had to do yours. Setsuna got really, really smooth hair by nature so she never has this problem. My hair tends to be really robust so I can just comb it out later." Relieved, Love exhaled and tried to reach for the water. Ellen quickly reacted and turned it off instead. She was getting used to the way Love was thinking.

"I don't think all of us transforming in here is a good idea. It's cramped even when we're naked normally. In our Cure outfits, we won't be able to move." Setsuna tried to back off a little to open the door only to realize that it didn't move both ways. It only opened to the inside. "We're gonna have to squeeze quite a bit to get that door open."

That said, Ellen tried to make herself as small as possible, crouching in a corner, Love standing next to her, almost bend over the blue Cure, with Setsuna pressed against love, her arms just barely reaching the handle. The door got stuck on her own butt. Forcing herself against Love, the pink Cure had to step between Ellen's legs. And just barely, they got the door open, almost bouncing out of the cabin. Transforming the second they had space to do so, Ellen tried to hide her scarlet red face. In that last push, Love's crotch had gotten unreasonably close to her face.

"I thought we were gonna end as pancakes. That was a really tight situation." A soft jab from Setsuna later, Love regretted making that awful pun. "Ellen, are you feeling lightheaded? Your face is all red."

"That's... because... well... It's nothing, really." Trying to hide her face, Ellen quickly walked towards the exit, almost running over Egret, who was looking incredibly exhausted. "I'm sorry!"

Not saying anything, just waving and smiling, the girl vanished into the first cabin on the left side. Love and Setsuna caught up with Ellen a few seconds later, both of them quite in a good mood, now that they were all clean again. "I kind of just want to go to bed already." Love had a lot of energy but even she got tired.

"Remember what Bright and Windy said? If we're not going to stick around we have to be out of Cure form. I want to try and check the kitchen if there is something we can make quickly. I doubt anyone has started cooking something, since we're all tired, but I don't want to go to sleep with my stomach empty."

"I'm in favor of food." Ellen outvoted Love with that and smiled at Setsuna. She was getting the hang of being with those two and not feeling like a third wheel.

Back in the bathroom, the continuously arguing couple was just about done. Having committed the same error as the trio before them, they had realized much too late the mess their hair was in. Both Urara and Ako got rid of their own mess, occasionally helping each other. "I wonder what's going to happen now. Think we'll be going back to being split into teams?" Ako didn't like the idea of being on a separate team from Urara very much. All arguing aside, she greatly enjoyed being at her side.

"Can't say. There are five more of us now, so if they split us again and keep the whole exile thing, there's gonna be an uneven number of people on the teams. It would suck if we get split up. I haven't even slept with you yet."

"This better be as good as you say, for all the fuss you're making." Ako wasn't sure she should be so agreeable with the whole thing. It was making things for Urara a little too easy. On the other hand, all that constant talk about it did make her curious.

"I'll run around doing handstands if you can honestly say you didn't like it."

"The way you're so certain about this is really pissing me off." Ako finished taking care of her hair and moved behind Urara. "Let me handle it. I don't want to be in here another hour."

"Nothing stopping you from leaving alone."

"Stop being obstinate and let me help you."

"So what are we gonna do if we get split up again? Honestly, I don't want you to do the whole exile running exchange thing. I'd feel responsible if you got stuck."

"I doubt it would even do anything to you of all people, but lets not tempt fate. So if neither of us.. wow, what did you do to make it get like this, roll in the dirt?"

"Remember Marine and those new girls collapsing a damn corridor? What do you think got in my hair during all that?"

"Don't make a fuss about this later, I don't like it when you act like a bully towards the others."

"So its okay to bully you?"

"No, but I can't stop you from doing that anyway so I might as well stop bothering."

"I don't really see a way to change teams without the whole exile run thing. I don't think I can even go back to sleeping alone."

"You're exaggerating."

Turning around with one swift move, ignoring the stinging pain of some hair getting stuck in Ako's hands and thus ripped out, Urara grabbed both of the black Cures arms and pushed her towards the wall. "I'm not exaggerating. Are you just acting stupid or do you really think I want to go back to being a loner after all this? Do you have any idea how happy I am like this?"

Ako was so taken back by the serious tone and those words that she needed a few seconds to collect her thoughts. Blushing didn't stay out but that wasn't bothering her. "You're that happy to have me around? We're always bickering!"

"That's just part of what makes you suitable for me! I don't need a stupid yes-saying parrot as partner. I want someone that's smart, got courage and isn't afraid of standing up to me. Someone who is fun to tease but can dish out too. And of course, someone who is sexy."

"Awfully specific. Are you sure you're not just making that up to impress me?"

"See, that's what I'm talking about! Comments like that make me feel challenged. I can't be lazy around you and I likes that, a lot."

"Jeez, you really know how to make a girl feel wanted." Her face had gradually become more and more red and she didn't even have any rebuttals at this point. "And no, I wasn't being sarcastic."

"I know. I can tell when you're just playing with me and when you're serious." Urara was still smaller than Ako in her adult form, and not just marginally. There were six or seven centimeters between them. Getting on her toes and forcing Ako to look down, they kissed again, this time not fierce but softly.

Ako broke free only a few seconds later. "Urara, we need to stop getting distracted, finish up with your hair and get out of here. I'm starting to feel like cardboard that was out in the rain for too long."

"Your analogies are really horrid sometimes. But fine. We'll continue in my room."

"I knew you'd say that."

In the first cabin on the right side, Karen had been the only one smart enough to rummage through her room and find her favor, getting shampoo and conditioner for herself and Komachi.

"I'm so glad all of this is over." Komachi wasn't super comfortable being naked right next to Karen like this, but she didn't want to be seen as prude.

"Everyone must think that way. I'm just happy that everyone seems to have made it through alive. Turn around." Turning the water off for the moment and standing behind her partner, Karen put shampoo on her hands and started to take care of Komachi's hair.

"We still don't know what happened to Moonlight. Her reflection is still around, too, isn't she? Ah, Karen... that tickles." Twitching a little and trying not to laugh, Komachi thoroughly enjoyed being able to take a shower with Karen. Even if the situation wasn't good, she was really thankful that they had been brought to this place. If not for that, she might not have been able to get together with Karen.

"Berry is still out cold, too and so is Nozomi. It'll be pretty tiring for her when she wakes up and has to return the power she borrowed." The shampoo had a nice apple fragrance, something Karen really liked.

"Is it okay for her to even stay like that while she's passed out? Isn't it making matters even worse?"

"Hard to say. The petals aren't doing anything, as if they're in stasis. But I don't think we could do anything to help her even if we wanted."

"I hope she never has to use that again. I heard from the others that if Bright and Windy hadn't come up with an idea, she would have died..."

Karen stopped for a moment, having heard that as well. "It's something she would do. Sacrifice herself for everyone else. Nightmare wasn't something we could have handled without her. But I'm really glad that it didn't turn out like that. Okay, done." Turning the water back on, Karen washed the shampoo out of her partners hair thoroughly. "Say Komachi..."

Before she could answer, Karen hugged the busty girl from behind. "Don't ever try to do something like Nozomi... we're all together in this but especially you... you're together with me. If there is something, we'll take care of it together, no matter what."

"I couldn't ask for anything more than that." Answering happily and touching Karen's hands, Komachi smiled wide, her eyes closed. "I never want to let go of you again."

"That might be a little difficult, unless you come to travel with me to my concerts."

"I didn't mean that literally, silly."

"I know."

"You're so mean."

"Am not."

"I know."

"Why you...!" Tightening her embrace, Karen almost shoved Komachi away when she had to sneeze. "Sorry... I got... some hair in my... nose..." Sneezing two more times, she could hear Komachi giggle. The sight of Karen like that was priceless.

Across the room, Tsubomi and Erika had mostly finished showering, both of them dizzy and their vision a little hazy. On top of that, the pink Cure had trouble walking straight, which was entirely Erika's fault.

"Your voice is always so cute when you get excited. I wanted to hear more of it." Her arms behind her back, Erika almost danced around the bathroom, quite in a good mood.

"Stupid Erika..." Tsubomi had stopped her partner short just of when she was trying to seduce her in the showers. And still, she didn't get away without a lot of fondling and kissing, enough to drain her of the little energy she had left.

"Tsubomi, you're trying to be more like Ember, aren't you? Putting on a tough act earlier and in the shower." Things like that didn't slip by Erika. Especially not if it was someone she had known for years doing them.

"Can you blame me? She made you fall for her despite us being together."

"Now look, Ember is Ember, you're you. I liked her for different reasons. If you want to be tougher and a more direct, that is okay, but don't force yourself there if you think you need to do it to keep me interested." Now walking side by side with her partner, Erika grabbed Tsubomi's hand. "I love you for who you are, not for who you could be. That isn't going to change, Ember or not."

"I do think I shouldn't be so indecisive sometimes... Ember was really strong emotionally, wasn't she?"

"She never waited or hesitated, yeah. But she was also really pushy and arrogant and a bit selfish. I like that you aren't like that. Being a bit pushy isn't bad at times but she didn't know where to stop."

"Would you like me more if I-" Tsubomi's mouth got covered almost immediately with Erika's hand.

"There is no room to like you more, Tsubomi. I love you more than anyone else in the world, so what are you so worried about? Ember is gone, too."

Blushing fiercely after hearing that, Blossom hid her face by looking away a little. Erika really didn't hesitate to declare her love loudly and with pride. "You're not sad she's dead?"

"She wasn't going to be around for much longer even if Nightmare didn't kill her. She might have lived on in the back of your mind but I don't think it really would've made a difference. You're great the way you are. I don't want you to be all self-conscious and try to be more like Ember."

"You said its okay if I want it for myself."

"Do you? I think being a little meek but headstrong when it counts really suits you better."

"Thanks."

"No problem." Both of them starting to laugh, they tried to forget all about the reflections. At long last, they were back to normal.

Normal was not quite the status in the living room. Almost everyone had showered by now, and with the fatigue washed away, the new girls had suddenly become the center of attention. Yayoi in particular was surrounded by a few others, questioned about all sorts of thing. "Yayoi!" Erika shouted from the distance, joining the crowd around the yellow Cure together with her partner. "What'cha doing?"

"I was just telling them about the manga I draw. I'm kind of surprised so many of you know it. It isn't really aimed towards girls." Sitting on one of the chairs, Nagisa and Saki were behind her, sitting on the table, while Love, Setsuna, Ellen, Hibiki and Itsuki were spread across several chairs positioned around the popular mangaka.

"How did you end up drawing shounen manga? It's not something I'd expect a Cure to take up." Hibiki was immensely curious, being a long time fan of that series. "I've been reading your story for over two years now. I'm kinda sad they haven't announced an anime adaptation yet."

"I always loved drawing and even though I was much more into superhero stuff, it was too hard to find a job as character designer. Miyuki, Happy over there, was the one that told me to try it with manga instead. My first work was actually a revision of a much older short story I did called Miracle Peace. It didn't do well and there was this really cool mecha anime running at the time which inspired me."

"I didn't know you were into anime, Hibiki." Itsuki was surprised to learn something new about her love.

"I don't watch a whole lot, just the adaptations of the manga I like." Hibiki wasn't really invested in the whole scene. She didn't own any goods or posters, just a lot of volumes. It got boring during breaks at work after all.

"Miracle Peace... don't tell me..." Nagisa tried really hard to think of a name she had forgotten. "Do you draw fan works as well?"

"Doujinshi? Why... why do you ask?" Yayoi got a little nervous by that question, not sure what the consequences would be if word got out.

"There is this circle, Smiling Lily, that makes really high quality fan works of... girls liking girls. If I remember correctly, Miracle Peace was about a blonde vigilante that fell in love with a girl she saved."

"You read ero stuff Nagisa? Does Honoka know?" Saki's impish expression alarmed Nagisa.

"Don't you dare tell her."

"I won't."

"What... a coincidence. That someone made a doujin with the same name."

"Peace, you're sweating really badly." Itsuki remarked, knowing the signs of someone that was hiding something. "Why don't you tell us. I'm sure nobody here is going to think any less of you just because you draw girls love comics."

"That would be pretty silly. After all, I can count the Cures not in any relationship in this place on one hand." Setsuna tried to think of anyone that wasn't Dream, Bright or Windy. "Does Berry count? She's trying to make Moonlight her partner."

"I don't think she counts then." Love had a smug grin on her face, looking at Ellen who seemed oddly comfortable with the whole discussion.

"Are you serious? Aren't there over twenty of you here?" Yayoi looked around and while there weren't anywhere close to twenty people present, she couldn't believe that they were really all having relationships with each other. "A few I can believe but..."

"You see the Cure in white over there, the one with the hair pipe? That's my partner and lover, Honoka." Nagisa's grin was big enough to make very clear that she was proud of having Honoka as her partner.

"My partner isn't here right now but I'll introduce you next time." Saki was no less proud of Mai.

"Hibiki here and me are a couple as well."

"Don't forget about me and Tsubomi."

"Aren't you going to boast about having two partners, Love?" Setsuna asked her that so openly that Love was looking really amused.

"Setsuna," Kissing her first partner on the cheek, "and Ellen," kissing her second partner on the cheek as well, "are both my partners and lovers."

"You're just making fun of me now, aren't you!" Yayoi pouted a little, finding that scenario too unbelievable to be true.

"Should we demonstrate?" Itsuki looked at Hibiki, who was giving her love a questionable look.

"Itsuki, I don't mind, but could you ask me about this stuff before you decide?"

"I'm sorry darling."

"Don't try to sweet talk your way out of this."

Leaning forward and kissing Hibiki passionately without any prior warning, the yellow Cure laid both her hands on Itsuki's cheeks, somewhat thrilled by kissing with so many others present.

Yayoi blushed a little witnessing that. "...You weren't kidding." Watching them continue to kiss, she blushed even more. "Okay, I get it, you can stop now! Aren't you embarrassed?"

Breaking off, both of them a tint of red in their faces, they grinned at her. "Not a bit." Their synchronous answer put the mangaka girl off even more.

"I wouldn't mind giving an example or two of my own." Love immediately earned a dab to the back of her head.

"Forget it. I'm not going to let you embarrass Ellen in public, you flirt." Setsuna was fully aware that Love was merely joking. That didn't stop her from teasing Love some.

"So... almost everyone here... is in love with... another girl?" Yayoi was speaking really slowly, each pause making her eyes shine brighter until they were like miniature stars.

"Minus Dream, Bright and Windy... oh and Pine."

"Speaking of which, I saw Windy go into Pine's room earlier. Without Bright." Nagisa was fueling the rumor pot a bit. "You think they is something happening there?"

"Bright and Windy don't really strike me as the type to... you know... be in a relationship. They're... odd." Saki almost immediately put a lid on the pot.

"So Peace-"

"Just call me Yayoi please. Reika said we should settle for being here for a while, so lets be friends!"

"Just friends? Do you already have a special someone-" Another dab to the back of her head and Love started complaining now. "Setsuna!"

"Stop flirting Love! You don't even realize when you're doing it, do you?" Pouting a little, Setsuna earned a laugh from everyone but Love.

"I don't really have time for that. My work keeps me so busy, I often need to ask Miyuki to help me out to even make my deadlines." Yayoi wasn't that interested in romance in her own life. She much preferred to look to others for that.

"You do draw girls love comics, don't you? I saw how your eyes lit up when you asked if we're really all in relationships with other girls." Itsuki redirected the conversation back to it being about Yayoi's work.

"I suppose it doesn't hurt to tell you since you're all interested in it. Yes, I draw girls love comic, but not for Shueisha. It's something I only do for comiket."

Nagisa, knowing what comiket was, saw the look of confusion on Saki's face and quickly explained it to her in a mouth to ear whisper.

"I knew it. You're running Smiling Lily, aren't you? Breeze by the Frozen Lake is something you drew!" Itsuki got a little too specific and earned a curious look from Hibiki. "Don't look at me like that. I'm just human, too! I work in a dojo, not in a temple!"

Yayoi was sweating a little again. If she knew that much, she must have realized where the inspiration for that doujin had come from. And it would be pretty awkward if the inspiration in question got wind of being used as material for girls love comic that went on sale at comiket.

Getting up, ignoring the questioning glare from Hibiki, and bending over a little, Itsuki whispered a question in Yayoi's ear. "Could you please keep that a secret?" She was more than just a little nervous now. It didn't take much to embarrass Nao and this was definitely a top contender for biggest embarrassment in her life.

"I'll keep my mouth shut about Flames in the Sky, too." Having figured out that much, the rest was pretty much a given. "Stop glaring Hibiki. Don't tell me you have never looked at any kind of porn before!"

"Well... that is..."

"See!"

"You're really interesting people." Facing Love, Yayoi got a little curious. "But were you serious about having two partners, uh... I don't know your name yet."

"Momozono Love. Cure Peach. Just call me Love. And of course I was serious. The pink haired beauty to my left is Cure Passion, from the same team, and my first partner."

"Higashi Setsuna. Nice to meet you, Peace." Setsuna still preferred to be formal with people she didn't know that well.

"And the purple haired cutie to my right is Cure Beat, my and Passion's second partner. And just in case you wonder, there is no second-class or privileged treatment between us. We're all equals in this."

"Kurokawa Ellen. Let's let along, Yayoi." If she had already offered others using her first name, she didn't want to be impolite and ignore her.

"Yayoi! I almost didn't see you surrounded by everyone." Miyuki had shown up, taking the chance earlier when the shower freed up and get clean.

"Miyuki." Pushing her chair a little to the side to make room for her friend, Miyuki sat down right next to her, giving everyone in the round a quick look. "We were talking about you earlier. I was telling them how you help me out with work a lot."

"Ah, I don't really do much. A bit of filling and inking, sometimes commenting on perspectives and such." Smiling wide, Miyuki couldn't wait to learn about all these people. She had never met a Cure other than those in her own team and it was a very exhilarating experience to meet that many all at once. "No matter how much I walk around, I seem to always find people I don't know yet. I'm Cure Happy, Hoshizora Miyuki."

"You two work together? Or is there something else going-" Nagisa's curiosity quickly alarmed Yayoi, who started to flail her hands around and try to stop the older Cure from saying anything else.

"Miyuki just helps me out at work! Don't give everyone weird ideas!" Yayoi was much more interested in the relationships of others than have one of her own. And Miyuki wasn't exactly someone she could imagine in anything that resembled a normal relationship to begin with.

"The way you get all worked up about it makes it suspicious." Itsuki found it pretty fun to get the small Cure all worked up. "Now that you stand... you're even smaller than Erika, aren't you? Erika, go stand next to her."

"Like this?" Standing next to the new girl, Erika realized that she was indeed taller than her, by a few centimeters. "Wow, you really are tiny, Yayoi. How-"

"A hundred and fifty four centimeters! Don't look down on me!" Getting a good laugh out of everyone, Yayoi pouted a little and sat back down. "I can't wait to learn more about everyone. superheroes were always a passion of mine and now there are this many!"

"Superheroes, huh..." Nagisa looked at Saki.

"Superheroes indeed." Saki commented, the two making a little fun of calling it that. "I always thought of it more like a guardian kinda job. Protecting our world and those of the fairies."

"That's still superhero business." Yayoi wouldn't budge from her classification of Cures, no matter what. The excitement had died down a little over the years but she could still hardly behave herself. "What kind of powers do you have? I know those of my team in and out, but with so many others, there must be some really crazy ones! Ah, I already know Erika's though. I never expected there to be someone who could copy my Partum ex Fabula."

"Is that your ability?" Nagisa thought that it couldn't hurt to learn a bit about the new girl's ability since they would be likely fighting again at some point.

Holding out her hand, Yayoi summoned a drawing block, several incredibly detailed linearts on every page. Going through the pages towards the back, she stopped at what looked like a dwarf in heavy armor. "Partum!" Emitting electricity from her fingertips, Yayoi directly hit the block. Despite the expectations of everyone for the thing to go up in flames instead it seemed to absorb the electricity.

And they watched in surprised as the drawing came to life, slowly emerging from the block. It was no bigger than a fist but it was still kind of fascinating. A construct made entirely of electricity. "It can even move things, watch." Taking one of the cups that stood on the table, she put it down in front of the creation, the dwarf started to move the cup around. "It does what I want it to, but I have to be in eye-contact with it to control it."

"How big can you make them? Like a person?" Hibiki was impressed by such an unique ability. Did it stem from her job as mangaka?

"I suppose the biggest one..." Quickly going through the pages again, she stopped at what looked like a chinese dragon that took up the entire page. "If I created this it wouldn't fit into this room. It's over a hundred meters long."

"That's kind of scary. Doesn't it tire you out really badly to make something that big?" Love did kind of want to see it come alive though.

"The really big ones, yes. But if it's only as big as an ogre or a human, I can make several in a row."

"Not at once?" Ellen was also a little fascinated. The idea of a full band made of electric figures popped into her mind.

"I can only make one at a time. And it uses up the drawing, see?" Going back to where the dwarf was, who was walking around the ground and attacking Black's boot with what amounted to a tooth pick, Yayoi showed them that the drawing was completely gone. "I usually keep the block full with various things, but if I create a whole lot of them, it takes time to make them."

"Can you make anything?" Erika's eyes were sparkling with a certain light.

"Almost!"

"Then, how about..." Going up to Yayoi and whispering something into her ear, the yellow Cure also started to have big glittery eyes. "Can you do that?"

"It'll be difficult but I'm sure I could!"

"I'm looking forward to that." Grinning and laughing to herself, Erika returned to her partner's side, Tsubomi quite worried about that little exchange of starry eyes.

Yayoi was already whispering to Miyuki, who was now looking a lot like a pink dyed Peace, with the same overly excited sparkly eyes. "Whaddya'll doing?" Akane had caught on to the excitement that was slowly spreading due to Yayoi.

"Akane. You'll see soon." The smirk of genius was on Yayoi's lips, something one could only see on a creative mind.

"Hey, March, Sunny, this reminds me. Weren't you going to tell us how you two are connected exactly?" Hibiki brought it back up, remembering it from earlier.

"That's a fun story. I still remember Miyuki's face when she first got wind of it." Hiding her big smile behind her hand, Yayoi looked at the pink Cure next to herself. "Isn't that so Miyuki?"

"You'd be surprised too if you came into the library and the first thing you see is that!" Defending herself, she hadn't quite walked in on them on purpose.

"Reika said she doesn't mind, so we might as well tell you. It'll become really obvious if we're going to be here, anyway." Nao looked for a chair so she could sit but the next best one was halfway around the table. Noticing that both Black and Bloom put some space between each other so there was enough to sit down, she took the silent offer.

"There's an empty chair here." Itsuki made the offer after quickly pulling Hibiki on her lap. Lowering her voice and whispering to her partner, she earned an angry glare.

"I'm not heavy!" Hibiki didn't quite whisper quietly enough so that both the trio next to them and Marine could hear her. Blushing fiercely, she hid her face behind her hair. "Stupid Itsuki!"

"Ah, don' mind. I'm fine standin'." Akane didn't know if it was such a good idea to sit down next to Sunshine. She seemed like a bit of a tease.

"Don't be stubborn Akane." Nao was already pent-up between Black and Bloom, who couldn't resist poking the long side tails she had. "Could you please stop that? I feel like I'm up for auction." The double grin made clear that they hadn't had any ill intent so she didn't mind too much.

"You see, Nao used to be really popular with everyone, not just the girls. Reika and her knew each other since they were children and Akane was always competing with her so they got really, really close." Yayoi started the story without waiting for her teammates to be ready.

"Yayoi, ain't we tellin' the story?" Akane had heard Yayoi's version of the events more than once already and she didn't want to give people the wrong impression.

"You always leave out the funny details." Yayoi was fully aware of Akane trying to forget about the funnier parts of the story. Nao always tried to remain outside that particular argument.

"The real story 's startin' when we were in our first year o' high school, 'n Reika was talking about maybe goin' overseas after all, to study, thinkin' she coulda just come back 'n see us after schools over, but the times gonna be a problem so she ain't sure, and there was the problem of her bein' part of our Cure team. Ain't big of a problem though 'cause we got this magic portal thing goin' so we can just go 'n get her if we need her. Anyway, Nao was applyin' for a different high school than me so I got a lil' worried I mighta not see her as much. Same time 'round, Reika came 'n talked to me, tellin' me she got someon' shes interested in and she doesn't know if she shoulda postpone her overseas study to stay with her."

"Stop, stop, stop! Why did she come to see you and not Yayoi or Miyuki?" Erika raised her hand while she asked, for comical effect.

"Askin' Miyuki that stuff back in the day when we were all teens was like askin' a stuffed teddy bear. 'cause all her mind was all stuffed with fairy tales all the time. Ain't that right, Miyuki?"

"But fairy tales are so fun! And I was still constantly finding new ones. For example, there is this story called-" Miyuki was stopped by Yayoi, who used both her hands to gag her friend.

"If she starts like this, there is no end. Akane, go on." Trying to keep Miyuki silenced, Yayoi focused on the pink Cure and didn't bother to listen to the story, knowing it in and out anyway. After all, she had made several doujinshi with it as base. A very exact base. Remembering that and Sunshine being in the know about it did make her sweat a little.

"Yayoi was all sparkly sparkly eyes for superhero stuff at the time too. And she still ain't any different. Anyway, Reika didn' tell me who it was so I just said, go for it girl 'n thought that'd do it. Thinkin' about how even walkin' lexicon Reika got into romance, I started to get goin' again too."

"Akane used to have a crush on a guy, but they lost contact eventually. That's another really funny story, I'll tell you all later." Finally able to let go of Miyuki, who had accepted that nobody wanted to hear about fairy tales at this point, Yayoi sat back and grinned.

"Don' you dare, Yayoi! Ah, this ain't good. I never shoulda agreed to this!" Akane ruffled her hair and sighed. "So when I thought about it, the only one I really wanted to be with was Nao. 'n I didn' mind that we were both girls. This ain't Edo anymore. There's lesbians even 'n popular media 'n stuff. But I was helluva late! When I went 'n tried to ask her out, she was just goin' to a meet with someone who had given her a love letter! Can ya believe it! A love letter, 'n this day 'n age! I was blown away, I tell ya."

"You're exaggerating this Akane. It was just a really... sensibly written letter that asked me to come to the back of the school after class."

"And that's a love letter! So, curious like a cat, I went 'n followed Nao, 'n boy was I shocked when Reika was there, all waitin' calmly for Nao, confessing her feelings on the spot, not even embarrassed! I was so surprised, I yelled out 'n they found me, askin' me what I was doin'. So I got all pumped up 'n did the same as Reika, tellin' Nao that I wanted her to be my girl."

"That can't have gone well. So did you and Reika duke it out for superiority?" Nagisa wondered what that situation had to be like back then.

"Nah, we ain't livin' in caves. So we did the sensibl' thing 'n asked Nao who she wanted to be with. And guess what she said!"

Everyone started talking at once, most of them guessing that Akane was picked, a few other guessing that Reika was picked. "All wrong, all wrong, seriously! Nao played us both for fools 'n said she didn't want to date either of us! She wanted to go 'n get herself a boyfriend so she can have kids of her own one day! Can you believe that? Fifteen years old 'n thinking about that!"

"Can you blame me? With so many siblings, that thought was always on my mind, and getting older, I thought it was time to look for a partner." Nao was sitting a bit higher up than Akane, so she could give her a bit of an unfriendly contempt that didn't have any serious meaning.

"So how did you still end up together?" Hibiki couldn't quite make sense of how the story had to go from there to arrive where they were now.

"First 'oall, I talked to Reika, askin' her if she was serious about datin' Nao. After some back 'n forth, we agreed that we both wouldn't back off. 'n that we had bigger problems than just who was gonna go 'n date Nao. We went 'n flirted with Nao all we could, chasing off all guys that dared even look at her."

"So when Nao realized we ain't gonna back off, she asked if we couldn't settle for someone else. We said no 'n told her that we ain't givin' up. So Nao came up with this. If we could make her all forget about wanting a boyfriend, she'd date the one that got there first. Datin' on probation if ye want. Problem was, Reika was 'bout to leave for overseas 'n I didn't wanna screw her over bad. So we said, whenever Reika got back home, usin' the library to come back, she'd get to be with Nao and I'd be the girlfriend in the meantime."

"I... haven't heard of something like that before. Weren't you two jealous of each other? And you were okay with that March?" Nagisa was sure she couldn't have handled something like that.

"Reika 'n me are really good friends, so we were good. This way there ain't no cheatin' or anythin'. We both got to see Nao."

"So, you're still on probation even now?"

"Nah, sure not. Took us over a full year but at sum point, Nao realized she ain't even thinking about getin' a guy anymore. Mean, there's gotta be plenty a kids that want a nice home 'n Nao is gonna be the nicest Mom you coulda possibly find anywhere."

"So you settled for adopted kids instead of having your own?" Saki hadn't thought about kids before, considering that she and Mai couldn't really have some of their own that easily.

"I love kids and honestly, if I can give some that don't have loving parents a good home, I'm happy." Nao caught a glimpse of Akane smiling after she said so.

"Wait a second. So you three, you're still doing that? The whole, switch-a-roo?" Erika looked at Peach and her two partners and figured that there were really multiple ways to have more than one partner.

"Reika's workin' overseas a lot n' I have busy weeks so we switch when the other one has time. I actually like it this way. Reika's my best friend, but I ain't wanting to have any romance with her, ye know? I can still see Nao even if it ain't my turn, we just don' do all the couple stuff."

"That's a really unique relationship you got there. I'm amazed you three were able to keep that up." Tsubomi was very impressed by Sunny's and Beauty's dedication to March.

"Ya' flatterin' me. Really, it ain't that special if ye been at it for a while."

They were all distracted by someone loudly clapping to get the attention of everyone present. "Dream has come to. Everyone that made a temporary contract with her please return to your room and stand by in civilian form. That only serves to ensure her survival." Michiru, after checking on Mai, who was sound asleep in her own room, had made a round, met up with Kaoru halfway and proceeded to inform everyone.

"We'll call two at a time so don't turn into a Cure until you have been called to meet with Dream." Not waiting for everyone to acknowledge this, Michiru had already terminated her contract with Dream. She didn't feel any different but Dream had clearly felt the effects.

Kaoru, who was checking if there was someone they had missed, was so deep in thought that she walked straight past White and Beauty, who were just outside the entrance to the base area. "Where are you going Windy?" Honoka noticed that she was really deep in thought so she raised her voice and repeated her question. "Windy. Where are you going?"

"White? I was... never mind. Everyone has been asked to go back to their room since Dream has woken up and we need to terminate the contracts everyone has formed. Michiru and I went first so we're able to go around and collect the others."

"We'll continue this later then, Beauty." Not losing any time, Honoka left the blue Cures, waving her hand briefly before making her way to her room.

"What shall we do? As I understand, none of us have any relation to this."

"I'm not sure. There are no additional rooms, so we can't assign you living space just yet. I assume you might best collect your team and stand by in the dinner room." Almost walking in the wrong direction, Kaoru turned around and followed the same route as White.

Reika had learned most of the situation, and had already explained the basics briefly to her friends, but this was an optimal time to explain the rest to them, with everyone else busy. The place was eerily quiet without any of the other Cures walking around or chatting. There were twenty four rooms in total, just like White had explained.

"Reika!" Miyuki had spotted her friend from the distance, Yayoi right behind her, Akane and Nao further to the back, just coming out of the big hall. "Everyone went back to their room for something. Did they explain to you what they're doing? It's a bit eerie."

"There is a lot to explain so we should sit down. Lets return to the big hall for now."

The big empty room wasn't anywhere as comfortable, now that they were the only ones in there. Not to mention that they still were in a completely unfamiliar place. "I will start with the reason why we are here. I believe it is important that we understand why it would make no sense to try and break out."

Nao sat down next to Reika, having spent the last few hours with Akane while Reika was busy. Akane sat down between Miyuki and Yayoi, not bothered in the slightest by Nao separating for now.

"There is no doubt we remember the Bad End kingdom. What we never paid sufficient attention to was that they were using the power of darkness. Even I didn't think of darkness as anything but an enemy until now."

"But it's the enemy. Joker 'n Pierrot and the others were all usin' it to attack us 'n everything." Akane didn't see where this was going.

"They were using darkness, exactly. Just like we are using light. Those forces are not sentient or have a consciousness. They are readily available to everyone that has the means to tap into them. If they so desired, they could very well have used the forces of light." Reika found that to be a honestly terrifying outlook. "Darkness does not make evil and evil does not make darkness. It just happens that darkness is a much favored choice for those with ill intentions because of the powers it grants."

"So you're saying that it depends on the user if something is good or evil. Not on the power they are using."

"Yes. And in this case, we, users of light, vanquished the users of darkness. Thus, a small imbalance was created. What do you suspect would happen if this small imbalance was to be created over and over again?"

"One side would vanish eventually." Yayoi had read enough shounen manga to understand basic principles like this. She didn't like actually being inside one of those stories though.

"Darkness is part of the world the same way light is. Without light, plants will not grow. But without darkness, there will be no night, no rest, and everything will be facing an never ending drought."

Putting two and two together, Nao realized what Reika was talking about. "With this many Cures... the imbalance must have been enormous."

"Yes. I am not familiar with the physics concept of entities embodying forces like this, but White said that when they first arrived, they were told that those forces brought them here to remedy the imbalance and prevent us from worsening it."

"So we're stuck here until whatever imbalance was created is evened out?" Yayoi was surprisingly sharp on topics like these "Just how long is that gonna be? And isn't it kind of unreasonable that we all need to help for parts we're not responsible for?"

"White couldn't tell me anything about that. The fact is that even if there was a way to escape by force, to return to Earth, eventually it would turn into a living hell."

"Talk about a bleak outlook. So it's being stuck here and doing whatever or findin' a way out and getting' roasted back home." Akane didn't like that scenario at all. "Are you sure she was telling the truth? I mean this sounds incredibly far-fetched."

"I'm confident that she was not lying. She seemed especially concerned that we are all here as well now." Reika didn't like being imprisoned in some other dimension either, but there were greater things at risk.

"So what exactly are we doing here? The others mentioned battling, but I didn't really pay attention to it." Nao wanted to know what exactly was waiting for them.

"In the most normal case, there exist two teams which will once a day select participants for a battle that serves, so I understood, to generate energy. From the looks of it, this complex and all it's systems are kept alive by the generated light energy, while the dark energy is stockpiled to remedy the imbalance that was created."

"That doesn't sound right. Everyone was getting along fine. I can't believe they were forced to fight each other." Miyuki didn't like the sound of the whole fighting aspect.

"There seem to be various conditions in place to reduce antagonizing and stress to near zero. First, there is a mechanism that appears to highly stimulate the part of our brain that handles our battle drive as well as numbing the part of our senses that handles pain. That makes it possible to fight between friends without causing personal issues to develop. Second, after each battle, every participant is healed. White mentioned that she witnessed several fighters suffer great injuries only to wake up in their room later with nothing more than a few bruises. Third, every participant is rewarded with a form of currency the system uses to fulfill what White called wishes. It allows teams to create food, drinks, goods and even entire locations by expending this currency. There are two bases of this. Each team as a public pool which is used to pay for food and similar necessities and each Cure has a private pool which they use for personal things. White demonstrated this by creating a novel-" Reika was interrupted by Nao standing up so abruptly that she kicked over her chair.

"You gotta be kidding Reika! Fighting each other? Severe injuries? Are they all insane?" Nao couldn't stand the thought of that.

"Aqua said that it is highly likely some of you would react that way."

"But she's right, Reika! Us fighting each other isn't just wrong, it's sick!" Miyuki stood up as well, hoping that Reika wasn't going to blindly believe in what she was being told.

"I think everyone else thought this way at first, too. But look at how close they all are. I'm sure that some of them must have fought each other before." Yayoi couldn't quite face the others but intuitively, she knew that what Reika was saying wasn't just any bold faced lie the others came up with.

"Ye mean they already got used to it? Na, Reika, how long have they been in here?"

"They couldn't quite pinpoint the time but roughly two to three weeks."

"I don't think they're lying, Nao. I ain't happy with this whole fightin' either, but think what the alternative is. If we just sit around, we'll be here even longer. I think we should at least give this a chance."

"Akane, are you serious? What if you end up fighting Reika, or me?"

"These battles aren't one versus one, right? And Reika said it does something to... something and we're able to fight easier with that."

"Peach and Melody, both of whom you have met I believe, fought each other. Black and Bloom have met each other in battle as well." Reika had seen them sit together briefly, so she hoped the example would show some results.

"But they were really friendly with each other." Yayoi commented, on Reika's side in this argument.

"I say we should just wait 'n see. If it's as bad as Nao and Miyuki think it is, we can always think of something then." Akane didn't want to fight with Nao or Reika. Not to mention, sitting around and arguing wasn't going to help.

"I'm in favor of that too." Yayoi quickly agreed to that notion.

Calming down after seeing both Akane and Yayoi want to take the wait and see approach, Nao still didn't like the idea. "I'm gonna talk to Black and Bloom later. I don't believe all of this."

"The more pressing issue is how the system will adapt to our presence. The current situation is far from normal but they seem to be about done fixing it."

"Are you talking about those two monsters fighting each other? What was that about anyway? I've never seen anything like that. To begin with, why didn't we show up together with everyone else if they've been here for almost three weeks?" Akane didn't want to have to deal with someone like Nightmare ever again.

"Before we woke up in the ruins earlier, we were using the library portal. I can only assume that we got transported here while we were moving through it and that ended up displacing us far away from the others. If this complex is setup to generate energy and otherwise protect it's inhabitants from dying as suggested by the healing effect applied after a battle, then it makes sense that it would do something to prevent us from dying by being displaced inside a wall."

"Reika... can you try to explain that again without all the difficult words?" Miyuki had trouble making sense of that explanation.

"In a nutshell, because we were using the library portal, we got stranded." Akane summarized it quickly.

"I'm gonna hit the showers." Nao was in a bad mood and whenever that happened, she went off alone, sorting herself out before she blew up at someone.

"Hey." Nagisa waved to Yayoi and Nao, both of them a little surprised by her sudden showing up. White was with her, wearing glasses and scribbling things into something that Akane immediately recognized as a sudoku book. "Settling in? You're welcome to check out the kitchen. Just don't leave a mess or Hikari and Kurumi will give you hell."

"Don't give them the wrong impressions Nagisa. Hikari would just lecture them about not leaving behind a mess. You know she's empathy personified."

"Black." Nao figured she might as well bring it up right away. "Is it right you and Bloom were on different sides in a fight?"

"Sure. Man, I really hate fighting her. She hits like a tank. If you're ever ending up against her, try to keep your guard up."

Nao was so taken aback by how easygoing Nagisa was about it that she didn't know what to say. It was Akane who came to her rescue. "How come you and her act so friendly when you're together then?"

Nagisa earned a scornful look from Honoka. "She really just means friendly Honoka! I swear we're not plotting anything! She got- that hurts Honoka, that hurts!" Having her arm pinched, Nagisa was completely at her partner's whim. "We were just getting along normally, like everyone else."

"Is this all an elaborate joke for the new girls?" Akane was looking at Reika, starting to lose faith in her story. "You two ended up in a serious fight and you still get along?"

"Honoka, what did you tell Beauty? They seem to have a really bad idea of what is going on." Walking up to Akane and sitting down on a chair, not daring to sit on the table while Honoka was watching, Nagisa was ready to give an explanation. "I think I understand why you're confused about this. The battles are pretty serious, yeah, but everyone gets healed and while in battle we don't really need to think about stuff like I'm about to punch Saki in the face with everything I have. We remember it, sure, but we all know it's something we need to do and nobody holds any grudges."

"So you beat each other up but forgive each other right away?"

"I guess you could call it that. We had to get used to it in the beginning, but once you had three or four battles it's nothing bad. Some of us even like to look at it like a competition." Lowering her voice, Nagisa tried to hide what she was saying from Honoka. "Honestly, I kind of want to fight Sunshine. She's good at martial arts and a pretty balanced fighter so I think it'll be kind of fun."

The five new girls were pretty stumped by that. She was looking forward to the battling? "What if you ended up fighting your partner?" Nao was afraid of that aspect the most.

"What about it? I know it's just part of the whole process to fix things, so it's not like its personal. Say Honoka, would you be angry if we ended up fighting in a battle and I hit you?"

"Assuming you could get close enough before I toast you, no, why would I?"

"Does everyone see things that way here?"

"Some others probably don't like fighting their partners but nobody takes any permanent damage so it's really not as bad as you imagine. Nobody liked the idea in the beginning and we had some fairly loud protests but as time went on, everyone got really accepting of it. We have some volunteers every time now since they're saving their favor for something big. And if the team you're on wins, the team gets a bonus. That usually means better food and better facilities."

"It's like being in an RPG." Yayoi's eyes were sparkling again, the entire explanation Black was giving heavily reminding her of that game genre. "Tell me you have a secret move, Black, please." Yayoi was in her own world already, no longer worrying about the whole process. Excitement had already overtaken her.

"It's not exactly a secret move, but my strongest attack is Blacklight Devastation. I focus the energy I control into my fist and release it in one go when I punch something. It has pretty high power, you know?" Pretty proud of her physical strength paired with her limited energy control, she noticed Honoka glaring at her. "Maybe I shouldn't give away how my technique works." Laughing awkwardly, even Nao couldn't resist but smile.

"So everyone has already accepted fighting each other? We're the only ones that have to get used to it now?" Miyuki felt a little left out.

"Hm, Honoka, didn't Dream pretty much resist fighting until recently?"

"She was stubborn about it, yes. She eventually got around after really messing up in her first battle, though." Honoka didn't bother to look up from her sudoku puzzle. Taking a pen she had put behind her ear, she wrote down a few numbers and immediately realized they were wrong. "Who makes these?"

"That same girl that was so stubborn about fighting anyone else is the same one you first saw I guess. That's not what she is normally like though. Think of it like some kind of super upgrade with limited duration."

"It's a hidden form!" Yayoi was getting hyped even more now. It was only getting better and better. "This place is great! There are so many Cures here and they're all partners and they have special moves and secret forms and-" The words couldn't come out fast enough and Nagisa was a little worried she might have flipped a switch or something.

"I think Yayoi is accepting this a little too easily..." Nao sighed, still not fully convinced.

"Say, what do you do about meals? Anyone on cookin' shift today?" Akane was getting hungry. Seeing Black so relaxed would make her feel silly if she kept being tense about the situation. Since everyone was like that, it couldn't really be that horrible. Nao would come around soon, surely.

"Hikari and Kurumi prepare food pretty often but there is really no order who cooks. We were running out of favor just before Nightmare ran amok, too, so I'm not sure how much we have left in the kitchen."

"Learning all these names is gonna take me a while..." Akane was a little worried. She didn't have Reika's exceptional memory so learning twenty five normal names and another twenty five Cure names was going to take a bit of effort on her side.

"You got more than enough time. Nobody is gonna be offended just 'cause you don't remember their name right away. I'm Cure Black. Should be pretty easy to remember since my outfit's color matches my name. Misumi Nagisa. Don't bother remembering it all, just Nagisa or Black works for me."

Quickly introducing themselves again, Nagisa's stomach started rumbling, the thought of food stimulating her appetite. "I wish Hikari was here. Honoka, do you know in what order they're going to terminate our contracts with Dream?" Leaning on the table, her chair standing on just the two back legs, Nagisa tried to wrestle her partners attention from her sudoku book.

"I didn't ask. If you want to know, you could go and ask Bright or Windy, they're calling us up after all."

"You're so cold, Honoka..."

"I'm really tired and just want to relax a bit before I go to sleep."

"Relax? You're doing an impossibly hard sudoku!"

"So? I find this relaxing."

"I give up..." Turning around and sighing, muttering "Unbelievable." under her breath, Nagisa looked at Sunny. "I know what Yayoi does for work, but what do the rest of you do?"

Pointing at herself, Akane figured the look designated her as the one first to explain. Putting her fist before her chest, she proudly proclaimed what all the others already knew and had heard countless times. "My family runs the best okonomiyaki shop in japan!"

"There it is." Nao teased.

"Akane-mania." Yayoi joined in.

"Shaddup, both of ya! Ya know I ain't exaggeratin' one lil' bit!"

"Yeah, yeah." Nao was smiling wide, always amused by how worked up Akane got whenever they didn't pretend to be in awe. Her okonomiyaki were excellent, but the way she bragged about them made it fun to tease her.

"Why, you...!" Shaking her fist, Akane cursed several unspeakable things in her mind, none of them meant seriously.

"Why, Akane, you should aim for the best okonomiyaki in the world. There are incredibly powerful artisans overseas. The world level is completely different from the national level." Explaining it with a completely serious expression, both Yayoi and Nao knew that it was a completely lie. Okonomiyaki wasn't that popular overseas.

"What? There are cooks that high level? Do they use special ingredients, Reika?" Akane fell for it, hook, line and sinker.

"One of the greatest okonomiyaki chefs in the world comes from Russia. They say his lightning reflexes and speed let him serve ten customers in five minutes. There is also that one Taiwanese chef that is said to be able to make okonomiyaki with ingredients you will never see otherwise. His cho chun sui okonomiyaki is legendary."

"This is bad... this is really bad. I can't hold up to them at all. Black! I'm gonna borrow the kitchen, okay? I need to see how fast I can be!" Totally pumped up, Akane was up and away with a single nod of Nagisa.

"You were making fun of her, weren't you?" Turning to Reika, Nagisa thought that was a bit mean. Then again, it wasn't much different from how Honoka sometimes teased her.

"You could tell? Oh my." Smiling innocently, her left hand laid against her cheek, Reika was quite amused that Akane continued to fall for her pranks.

"I'm always wondering if I shouldn't help out Akane when you tease her with your fake reports. She believes all of your stories since you spend so much time overseas." Nao was amused despite her usually scolding Reika a little for teasing Akane.

"Eh, you were lying, Reika?" Miyuki had been spending some thoughts on okonomiyaki grilled with actual lightning bolts.

"Miyuki..." Both Nao and Yayoi were a little surprised that she too was still falling for those stories.

"You work overseas? What do you do?" Nagisa was curious since being overseas would put considerable distance between her and everyone else.

"Reika's a vigilante!" Yayoi blurted out without waiting. "She fights crime and terrorism!"

"Now, now, I was only involved in one case where they attempted to bomb am embassy."

"That's amazing. You really do vigilante work as Cure?" Nagisa was very impressed.

"Oh, yes, I do." Reika's expression and speech was completely different from before. Being overseas had taught her the lesson of relaxing when you could since the next crime could be waiting just around the corner.

"The bombing of an embassy?" Honoka was listening in on the story half-heartedly but now she was becoming interested. "Where and when did that happen?"

"In Hong Kong, about two years ago. It was the American embassy. Have you heard of it in the news?"

"I remember seeing an article. They said a rogue criminal element interfered in the police's special forces mission. The bomb was found frozen in a solid block of ice. That was your work?"

"Yes. I'm flattered you remember that much."

"It got the police stumped and they looked for an answer everywhere. I'm a scientist. I knew that magic had to be involved in that." Looking at Reika, Honoka showed a little smile. "Nice to meet you, Ms. rogue criminal element."

"Oh please, don't call me that. I'm only helping out the police when I can. I tried out several other occupations but found my powers to be best suited to this." Holding up her hand, Reika created a spear with over two meters of length instantly. "I'm most skilled in the use of various weapons and their creation. I excel at using a bow." The spear dissipated instantly when Reika closed her hand and crushed the shaft of the weapon. Not even fragments of the creation remained.

"You're a lot more talkative now that we're not on the topic of what this place is." Honoka was smiling even more now.

"Even a Cure or a vigilante has to relax sometime. That is also part of the job. Stress only causes a lack of concentration, which might end up endangering your life or that of others."

"A very informed statement. I think we will become good friends, Beauty." Ending the conversation and going back to her sudoku, Honoka was quite thrilled to have found another conversation partner.

"Please, do call me Reika."

"Reika, Reika. Why haven't you come up with a fancy name to call yourself? You know, like Sailor V!" Yayoi turned the conversation around once more.

"How about Blue Rose?" Miyuki was simply saying the first thing that came to mind.

"Miyuki... that's from that Hero Anime." Yayoi was grinning wide when Miyuki realized that as well.

"I don't think it is a good idea to be known by the people too well. It is my job to help them and that involves making hard decisions sometimes. Unlike in fiction, you often can't save everyone."

"You never told me about this, Reika. You had to chose some people over others?" A little shocked over the sudden reveal from her childhood friend and partner, Nao turned to the blue Cure.

"And your reaction is why I haven't told you. You love people even more than I do and I know you would have an extremely hard time living with leaving people behind."

"I can't tell if you're being really considerate or not trusting me enough." Nao pouted only long enough for Reika to lean forward and briefly kiss her in front of everyone else.

"You know that I would trust you with my life, Nao. I just didn't want you to be sad, thinking that I was suffering from having to make hard decisions." Actions like these always made Nao's heart skip a beat. Akane had her own ways for that but Reika always surprised her the most.

"If you're always overseas, how do you go back to see March?" Nagisa wasn't embarrassed by the public display. She had been in a similar relationship too long for that.

"It likely will not work here, but there is a place called the magical library which... hm... Miyuki, did Pop or Candy ever explain to you where exactly the library is located?" It was rare that Reika had to ask others.

"Huh? Isn't it just part of Märchenland?" Nao interrupted before Miyuki could answer.

"I never really asked. If Candy was here she... likely wouldn't know either." Letting her head hang, Miyuki was reminded that the fairy wasn't exactly highly informed. Those things fell to Pop.

"Then, let's us just say that this magical library connects every bookshelf in the world. Going from Japan to England for example is a matter of minutes with this. Due to the specific way you need to arrange books and likely other conditions we don't know, I don't think any humans but us have ever found it."

"Don't you think that there might have been previous Cures that used the place? I've been thinking this for a while now, but considering that there are over twenty other Cures, there had to be an earlier generation at some point." Nao had been slowly pushing her chair towards the table, putting her elbow on it and resting her head against her palm.

"Come to think of it, Miyuki's grandmother was awfully accepting of Candy and Wolfrun, existences that would be considered highly controversial normally, especially for people as settled and levelheaded as her." Reika was thinking about the idea of there being previous generations.

"Oh come on. My grandmother is really great but I can't believe she'd be a Cure!" Imagining her grandmother transforming and in a frilly outfit made Miyuki cringe a little. The face she was making was evidently laughter inducing as everyone but Honoka and Reika burst out in it.

"I would not rule it out entirely but that is a story for another time. To come back to your question, I often use the library to travel between different locations. I also return home that way when I take a break."

"How do you pay for living expenses like that?" Nagisa and Honoka were both working, saving up to own a house of their own someday, still living in an apartment.

"My family is reasonably rich and while I wouldn't need to worry about money if I just followed my family's wishes, I prefer to follow my own path. Since I'm traveling a lot, I live in two places. Aoki Reika lives in Japan and Cure Beauty lives in the magical library."

"You should see all the stuff she has collected there." Nao was having a difficult time holding it in. "There are scrolls with 'The Path' written on it everywhere."

"While many countries treat my intervening with extreme caution, there are others, mostly smaller states in America as well as China and Korea, that welcome the help. There is often reward money associated with capturing criminals and while I don't do this work for that reason it does pay for my living expenses."

"I offered her a few times to move in with me and save herself the trouble, but she's saying that it'll get in the way of my time with Akane even though Akane said she wouldn't be bothered at all." Nao explained, waving her hand back and forth.

"It is a matter of pride." Reika was very proud of helping people and doing what she thought to be the right thing.

"How did you end up becoming-, wait a minute, I think the next pair is coming." Looking towards the entrance, Nagisa wasn't let down by her sense of hearing. The first thing she saw was a purple outfit that belonged to Rose. And right by her side was Hikari, the two of them talking about something. "Hikari! Over here!" Waving to her long time friend and teammate, Nagisa waited until both of them were close before she introduced them. "That's Shiny Luminous, the third and final member of our group. She's a bit younger than me and Honoka, but she is responsible and a good cook."

"Both qualities you were never all that good with." Honoka sent a single verbal jab flying over the table, causing Hikari to smile.

"Don't tease her, Honoka. You know she is always trying." Turning to the new girls, Hikari bowed slightly. "I'm Kujou Hikari. Nice to meet you all."

The eyes of the Smile group switching to the purple Cure at her side, Rose introduced herself as well, without bowing and instead a quick nod. "Milky Rose, Mimino Kurumi."

"Say, both of you don't have Cure in your name. How come?" Miyuki was instantly curious about that. Yayoi wanted to ask as well but her friend had been faster.

"That's pretty complicated so can we delay that until later? I'll tell you sometime, I promise." keeping up her innocent smile, Hikari turned back to Nagisa.

"So... so cute." Yayoi was already plotting things in her mind, promising herself that she wouldn't be caught dead telling someone about it.

"I'm sure that if you ask her, she will tell you if she is still romantically available." Reika purposefully spoke loud enough to let Hikari hear her words, making her blush a little.

"Reika! I didn't mean it like that! Don't tell me you didn't think she was cute when she smiled!" Yayoi blushed fiercely. The blue Cure used to be always so incredibly serious about everything that it was impossible to get used to her suddenly teasing her friends a bit.

"Of course she is cute. However, that is a purely objective perception that has nothing to do with romantic interest. You-" Reika was interrupted by Nao, who sealed her lips with her index finger laying on them.

"You shouldn't tease them so much." Nao was the only one exempt from Reika's more carefree attitude, even though she wouldn't mind a bit of teasing here and there. Akane took mostly care of that when they were together, so it wasn't something she missed too much.

"Say, Nagisa, what is that smell? It looks like someone is cooking." Hikari had specifically asked if she could be picked soon so she could prepare at least dinner before everyone would go to sleep, exhausted as they were. Though, looking at Nagisa, there wasn't much sign of exhaustion.

"Akane, Cure Sunny, is probably trying to make okonomiyaki at the speed of sound in there. Reika, I'll go and tell her you were just pulling her leg." Getting up, Nao quickly walked over to the kitchen entrance, hoping that Akane had not made a mess of the place. It would be really embarrassing if the first impression she left with the others was that of wrecking the kitchen.

Stepping into the kitchen, she found Akane desperately trying to balance two more okonomiyaki than she could possibly handle. "If some overseas chef can do this, I can do it too!" Noticing that someone had entered the kitchen, she looked up and saw a very amused Nao. "Nao? What's so funny?"

"Geez Akane, how many times has Reika told you silly stories about the world outside of Japan? And you always believe her. She was just making fun of you, there probably isn't really any okonomiyaki business in the rest of the world."

"Reika! Why you!" Yelling through the window, she was immediately greeted by said girl standing in front of it.

"Oh my, did you call me?"

"I'm gonna get you back for all of this one of these days!"

"Now, now, you're welcome, Akane."

Smiling and giggling a bit, Reika walked away, leaving Nao and an annoyed Akane behind. Turning around when Luminous entered the kitchen together with Rose, Nao introduced her partner. "Cure Sunny, our team's expert in all things okonomiyaki." Introducing the most likely older girls to Akane as well, Nao figured it was time to drag her away.

"Kurumi, do you think we could just make okonomiyaki for everyone today?"

"Considering what we have left and that we don't know when we're going to be able to get more favor, that's a pretty good idea actually. Sunny, do you mind if we help you out?"

Nao was surprised by how easily those girls adapted. They didn't know Akane for more than a minute and they were already trying to make her feel part of the large group. "Show them what you've got."

"Count on me to show ya the best okonomiyaki ya lot have ever seen!" Pumped up even more than before, she quickly shoved Nao out of the kitchen. "Sorry but even girlfriends should stay away when chefs are at work!"

"Yeah, yeah, I'm looking forward to your prized okonomiyaki."

Getting back to the others, they were now all sitting at the table. "Nao." Nagisa had still more questions. "What is it you like about those two?" Pointing at Reika and the kitchen, supposedly Akane, Nagisa wasn't sure if she was going to get an answer.

"It's rude to point at people, Nagisa." Honoka was the conscience that followed her around.

"My, I don't mind." Reika was amused more than anything by the interaction of those two.

"Since Reika is already here... I like how she has a cute side to her she doesn't show anyone else but me. She's also extremely responsible, composed, intelligent and refined. In a way, she's the exact opposite of Akane in some of those aspects."

"When she's with me, Nao is the aggressive one. But it's the other way around with Akane, isn't that so Nao?" Reika didn't mind talking about these things at all.

"I just can't keep up with her energy anymore. It was fine when we were just competing over things but after she got interested in me since I also have a calmer side, it was all over. Akane is really wild and I like that. She often makes jokes to cheer people up and she never gives up either. She isn't dim just in case you think that since I mentioned her being the opposite of Reika. She's a bit crude at times but that's part of what makes her lovable."

"That's kind of interesting actually." Putting down her sudoku and looking at March, Honoka found herself intrigued now. "So for the two sides of your personality, the strong one and the calm one, each of them compliments only one. That's different from most couples since they look for a partner that works well with them in general. But I guess like this, you have partners that make a perfect match with just one of your sides."

"I never looked into it that deeply, but I suppose you can say it like that. Of course there isn't really a switch or anything for the way I behave, that would be silly. I just happen to fall into a routine when I'm with just one of those two."

"I've been listening for a while, but how come you never mention me helping you three get together? It was really difficult!" Miyuki was starting to feel a little left out.

"You were just meddling a whole lot. And Yayoi wasn't any help either, always fantasizing about how we might end up." Scolding them, Nao unintentionally demonstrated how her personality could shift from calm to serious in a heartbeat.

"Nao, you shouldn't scold them. I now think it was really funny when Miyuki tried to help us out. Do you remember that one time where she and Yayoi dressed up as delinquents in order to let you impress me? And they ended up being chased by a nearby police officer until we, who knew the entire time it was them, told them it was just a joke?"

"How could I ever forget that? Every time Miyuki smells a romance in the making, her brain fries all her common sense."

"Wow, that's mean! Ha-ppu-ppu!" Making her usual face when disappointed or annoyed, Miyuki earned a loud laugh from Nagisa.

"Your face just now was priceless. And that story! Did you really dress up as delinquents?"

"Oh they did already. You'd never catch them having any romance of their own but they meddle all they can in those of others. Akane and I ended up locked for half a day and a whole night in the gym storage room once. They thought it would give us time alone and then those two forgot all about us!"

"Yayoi, it wasn't our fault, was it? We just got a little... distracted." Miyuki didn't like being scolded very much.

"No, Miyuki... that one really was our fault." Rubbing her head, Yayoi still remembered Akane giving both of them a single punch to the head so they wouldn't think of something like that again. "But it worked, didn't it?"

"I can't argue that. Your methods aside, that was the first time Akane kissed me."

Just as Nao finished saying that, Saki showed up without Mai. They had both been called together, yet...

"Is Mai not feeling good?" Nagisa didn't wait for her friend to sit down.

"Apparently she wants some time alone so she can work out being led to believe that Wither was actually me. I can understand why she wants to be alone but it still sucks. What is this smell?" Saki was looking a little depressed with a bit of gloom on her face.

"Akane, the fire, watch the fire! Ah, Kurumi, no, don't use that to-" They heard Hikari shouting from the kitchen, everyone kind of curious but also afraid to go and check.

"How is Dream holding up?" Honoka was a little worried about side effects. She wasn't a close friend of hers but they all had to thank her for saving their lives.

"Okay, I guess? She was looking drained when Mai and I got there. I gotta say, I expected something fancier from the whole terminating the contract thing. Michiru and Kaoru played it up a bit too much."

"I know what you mean." Nagisa agreed right away.

"What were you doing?" Reika hadn't been informed on the details ans she was curious.

"Right, all of you don't know. Honoka can you explain? I'm not really sure how it all worked either."

Sighing briefly, Honoka turned around and faced the new girls. "Earlier, when you arrived in the middle of their battle, Dream and Nightmare, they were fighting by using our power. Technically, only Dream was really using our power and Nightmare was drawing on the power of something else, but I'll leave the full explanation for later. So, the power Dream borrowed to fight off Nightmare needs to be returned. From what Windy said, it usually would return it all at once but if all but those that already got their power returned aren't in Cure form, the power has nowhere to go and so it basically stalls."

"You kind of lost me around the part where you explained they were using power from something else." Nao wasn't that interested so she kind of lost track.

"So everyone gets called out, transforms and has their power returned. Then we go to Dream, she creates a small rose bloom for us and we crush that, as a sign that we're no longer linked to her." Honoka didn't bother with any more technicalities since everyone but Beauty didn't seem to care.

"The poor roses." Miyuki got a bit of a weird look from Nagisa, saying that. "Bloom, the girl called Mai you were talking about..." The sparkling eyes were eerily reminiscent of Marine when she got excited over something. Or causing mischief. "Are you having trouble with your partner? Do you think I could-" Miyuki was stopped, almost violently so, by Nao hitting her on the head gently.

"Didn't we just talk about you meddling?"

"Bu~t...!" Seeing Yayoi snicker from the corner of her eye, Miyuki leaned back and started to pout.

"Wanna play something? I think I got a pack of cards back in my room. Looks like most of the rooms are fine." She liked talking and learning more about the new Cures but she found it easier to do if she was just a tiny bit distracted.

"I think I'll use the chance to shower instead." Nao was starting to feel like she had fallen into a bucket of dust.

"I'll accompany you." Reika was used to be in a state of moderate dirtiness but if showers were available, she would happily use them.

"It's been a while since we've all showered together, right?" Miyuki and Yayoi didn't even think about asking if they could tag along. It was something completely normal to them.

"I recommend not showering as Cure. Especially not you, Nao, and Yayoi. You'll never get your hair dry ever again." Nagisa didn't mind being turned down at her offer. "I'm going back to my room to take a nap then. The others should eventually show up if there is anything." Getting up and walked around the table, Nagisa leaned down, Honoka intuitively looking slightly up, turning her head, the two of them exchanging a brief kiss. "Coming with me?"

"I'm pretty tired, so a nap actually sounds good." Taking her partners hand, Honoka waved the new group goodbye for now. "I'll see all of you later."

"They're on a completely different level from us, aren't they?" Nao was impressed by the relationship that Black and White seemed to have. Despite some slight bickering and doing things on their own, as soon as one of them asked the other for something, they were like one.

"I believe you're selling yourself short, Nao. They're different from us, yes, but I don't believe we're any less of a couple than they are."

"Maybe you're right." With a smile on her face, the green Cure turned to Black's friend. "Bloom, what are you... oh she's asleep. She must have been really tired."

"Come to think of it, we don't have a place to stay for the night, do we?" Reika had realized this earlier but didn't think Black and White would end up leaving before she remembered to talk about it. There were surely other Cures she could ask later so she let it slide for the moment. "I'll ask White or Windy later. With so many couples, a lot of rooms are bound to be empty."

"I'll tell Akane we're going to hit the showers." Nao ignored the issue about the rooms. If Reika was going to handle something, anyone else bothering to do something about it was wasted effort.

Walking ahead of Nao, the group of three was no longer worried about the place they were in. "I can't believe I'm actually having fun here." Miyuki recalled that they were all supposed to battle each other. "While we were talking, I completely forgot all about it."

"I'm confident that everyone else acts that way here. If they all constantly worried about fighting, they would only unnecessarily make it hard for themselves." Reika took a quick glance down the floor, seeing Black and White walk arm in arm, White leaning a little against her partner.

"Maybe. I'm not looking forward to having to fight other Cures." Miyuki put both her arms behind her head and sighed. "I wonder if there is a way around it?"

"You're just afraid you'll get beaten Miyuki. I know your ability isn't any good in a battle." The verbal jab from Yayoi hit the nail on the head. "Don't worry about it. You can just stall everyone and your team can deliver the finishing blow!"

"They'd have to knock them out in one go. You know my ability breaks if someone gets hurts even a little. And I feel horrible just thinking about abusing it to fight others!"

"Now, now, you should worry about that later." Watching Nao arrive at her side, Reika could guess what Akane had to say just from the face she was making. "Did she say something like 'Tell Reika to keep her fingers off ya!' by any chance?" Trying to emulate Akane's accent made both Yayoi and Miyuki laugh.

"Jackpot. I wasn't even thinking about that until Akane basically shoved it in my face. We're not going to take the same cabin."

"Oh, you're boring Nao." Yayoi was fond of seeing those three be together and even more so when they didn't want to be seen. It was excellent fuel for her fantasies.

"So sorry that I'm boring." Shrugging, this time it was Reika who giggled a little.

"I believe it won't be as bad to be here as we thought." Given how nice everyone was to each other, Reika couldn't imagine that not a single one of them had a mindset similar to that of Miyuki. If they had accepted their being there, Miyuki would eventually too.

=== Dissonance ===

Returning to the big tables in the dining room, Miyuki the first to finish, a lot of Cures were already there, eating what looked like Akane's okonomiyaki but not quite. Spotting nobody she was directly familiar with right away, she decided to just ask the next best person if they had seen Nagisa.

Walking towards a yellow Cure that sat next to a black Cure, both of them already eating and surrounded by empty chairs, Miyuki bowed down next to the yellow one. "Hi. I'm Cure Happy, one of the girls who just arrived. Have you seen-" Miyuki found it rather weird that the yellow Cure suddenly started laughing like someone was tickling her everywhere at once.

"Urara, if you make fun of her name I'm going to call you Cure Fanta for a week."

"Goddammit, you're serious aren't you?"

"Of course. I don't appreciate someone sitting in a glasshouse throwing rocks. It's enough that you throw rocks all the time anyway."

"What... are you two talking about?" Miyuki was completely lost now.

"So, Happy, what do you want?" Urara couldn't have possibly rolled her eyes more at Miyuki's Cure name than she did.

"I wanted to know if you... knew where... Nagisa is... you... is there something on my face? What is so funny?"

"You're horrible, Urara." Ako hit her partner on the shoulder, not thrilled that she was already making fun of the new girls.

"Who is Nagisa again? Which Cure?" Urara averted her eyes slightly, trying not to look at Miyuki too much.

"Cure Black. Why are you looking away now?" Trying to get back in Urara's line of sight, Miyuki bend over the table so far she was almost falling on it.

"Haven't seen her. I can't hold it in! I just can't! So Happy, are the others of your team called 'Satisfaction', 'Pleased', 'Content' and 'Blissful'? Do you turn into 'Cure Depression' when you're not Happy enough? Don't you think you should go for a nice Happier color than just pink? Why not use-" Urara winced in pain so hard that she punched the table out of reflex. Ako had pinched her leg really hard and was giving her a scornful look. "Oh come on!"

"No, Fanta, enough is enough." Looking at Miyuki, who had a pretty annoyed expression on her face but no suitable comeback, Ako sighed. "Don't take it personal, she's just a bit on the mean side."

"You're going to feel really damn silly calling me Fanta for a week. I'm betting you'll stop in a few hours."

"Try me."

Miyuki had already walked off, leaving the mean yellow Cure and the scolding black Cure behind. "She must have had a really bad day..."

Instead of continuing to ask people, she decided to just go to the kitchen and check on Akane. There was a little bit of a line in front of the window where the finished food was handed through but she couldn't make out who it was that was serving.

Opening the door, Miyuki felt something very solid but not very heavy hit it, followed by a scream. "Miyuki, what are you doing?!" Akane was standing in front of a large oven field, used to make okonomiyaki. Looking down, Miyuki found Luminous next to a few broken dishes.

"I'm so sorry! Are you okay?" Crouching down, Miyuki tried to pick up the shards only to immediately cut her finger on one. "Ouch!"

"Ah geez Miyuki, what are you doing? You should stay outta the kitchen when we're workin'!" Trying to keep her speech accent free, Akane served the next Cure in line. "Kurumi, please get Miyuki out of here. She doesn't mean ill but she can be kind of a klutz."

The purple Cure grabbed Miyuki by her arm and shoved her outside before she could do anything else. "If you want food, please wait in line." Closing the door and kneeling down, all three of them let out a sigh.

"Hikari, are you alright?" Helping her friend up, the pink Cure slipped a little and she too cut her finger on the broken dishes. "Geez, what is it with everyone today?"

Akane completely forgot about cooking for the next instant. Kurumi took the finger of the innocently looking Hikari and sucked on it briefly. Neither of them seemed to be embarrassed at all about it but they didn't appear to have any romantic air about them either. Were they just naturally dense?

Hikari was daydreaming for a few seconds before noticing Akane's look. She wasn't that dense after all. Pulling her hand away, she pointed at the plate. "Akane! The food, the food! It's burning!" She didn't want Akane to keep staring just because she fell and broke some dishes.

Quickly getting back to work she didn't know what to make of those two. They seemed really, really close but... there really was nothing romantic about how they interacted. She wasn't like Miyuki, who loved to meddle, but she wasn't entirely uninterested.

A lot of sudden commotion caught Akane's attention. Looking through the window, she saw a blue Cure walk as fast as she could without running through the room. Her first target was the white Cure that Hikari had introduced to her as Egret. The next was a blue Cure called Aqua. A few others followed and Akane noticed the increasing commotion. Getting really close and whispering, each Cure that was talked to stopped eating and got up, leaving as fast as the blue Cure had come.

"What's going on?" Akane put out the heating for the plate. "Hikari, Kurumi, lets check this out."

There was a lot of confusion. Mai, Karen, Urara, Ako and Inori had all been called. "Did something happen to Dream?" Akane couldn't identify who asked it but unrest was growing rapidly. "Did Nightmare survive or something?" Rumors were growing faster than weeds.

Seeing Reika run past the entrance with Nao and Yayoi instead walk into the thoroughly confused dinning hall, Akane knew that something was very, very wrong. Quickly walking up to Nao, Akane didn't even bother to hide how worried she was. "Where is Reika going? What's going on?"

"A yellow Cure showed up and asked her to go. She didn't even look at us. She was pretty rude." Yayoi spotted Miyuki at the back, walking around with an empty dish.

"This is bad, this is really bad." Akane felt a single shiver go down her back.

Quite the distance from the base, a group of Cures had finally assembled. "I don't think this needs an explanation." Kaoru watched the spectacle together with the others. The group totaled nine people. White and Egret, Aqua and Lemonade, Bright and Windy, Pine and Muse as well as Beauty.

"I thought the reflections were all gone. Did one of them make it?" Urara was suspicious of the whole thing. It smelled of Nightmare somehow surviving.

"Moonlight's reflection is still alive. And there is something about it that bothers me." Karen was one of the two people who knew and she didn't like telling the others. "We put both her and the reflection into the same room. Komachi, Mint, isn't using hers so we used that one. We noticed that Poison's and Mint's names were absent from the glass. It was a blank mirror."

"Oh wonderful. You brought her in and the mirror turned into theirs, yes? Good work, Karen, now we're going through all this crap again, yes?" Urara was going to be seriously pissed.

"Half of your theory is wrong. We checked Dream's mirror and both names were gone as well. The same for everyone else. My partner's mirror didn't show any signs of changing at first but when we came back it had both Moonlight and Eclipse engraved."

"I fucking knew it! Can't we catch a goddamn break? So what is this shit over there? Nightmare trying to come back to life? Eclipse or whatever attacking us?"

"Calm down. I don't think this is related to Eclipse at all. She was unconscious and resisted all our attempts to wake her up." Kaoru, the other person who knew about the changed mirror, was completely calm and composed. "Let's focus on finding out what is happening before we accuse each other or Eclipse of anything."

"What is it trying to do? I assume it is the right way to describe it." The adrenaline from watching the scene unfold before her was driving away all of Mai's exhaustion.

"Restoration." Kaoru took one step ahead, no more than centimeters away from an artificial cliff, created by Dream and Nightmare. Looking towards the far distant other end of the spherical hole, Kaoru felt extremely uncomfortable.

The nine Cures watched in disbelief as part of the walls continued to replicate itself only to crumble under its own weight. The process repeated itself every two seconds in over fifty different places and it was spreading. The system was trying to offset the destruction Dream had caused.

"It's not restoring itself." Karen stepped up next to Windy. "It's not failing to restore. Pay close attention to the moment it falls apart."

Honoka focused her eyes the best she could. And she saw it. "It's breaking up on purpose."

"I think you're close. But there would be no real purpose to just breaking up and rebuilding from the same material. Urara, can you use your chains to get us down there?" Ako felt like there had to be a reason the system was stagnating at the other end.

"I could but I'm not going to. I'm not going to watch you get buried under a crap load of rocks."

"This is no time to be worried about me."

"It's always time to be worried when someone suggests a crazy idea. I'm not-" Both of them felt a chill all of a sudden, turning around. Right in front of them was a bridge like structure made of ice, pillars extending sporadically from it to the ground. It appeared very solid. "Karen, did you-"

"Beauty governs the ability to control and create ice evidently." Michiru stated it just in case someone wasn't clear about it. Jumping on the bridge, she immediately lost her footing and fell. "It looks like following her on this is impossible." She didn't pay any attention to her ungraceful fall.

"I can." Inori jumped on the bridge and managed to do what Bright couldn't. "It's going to really tear this thing apart, but I can follow her. I'm worried about her going alone. Kaoru, if something happens don't hesitate to call everyone else." The other Cures and especially Michiru were surprised by Pine directly addressing Windy by her first name.

Using energy blades and attaching them to the sole of her boots, Inori traversed the bridge like a rink. Looking ahead, Beauty was moving at an near impossible to catch up, creating the bridge as she went, a huge lance in her right hand. She was clearly expecting some kind of attack.

Reika noticed Pine following a few seconds later and stopped, creating a large platform. It took almost a full minute for Inori to catch up despite her style's emphasis on speed. "We're all a team so you shouldn't go off on your own like that."

"I have a lot of experience working alone. I also believe that it is not likely that any foe-" Reika stopped her sentence short. The distance between them had at least four meters and still, all it took for Pine to vanish and re-appear right in front of her was one blink of her eyes. Inori was so close that Reika could feel her breath on her own face.

"You're probably really strong but you'll be even stronger if someone has your back." Inori didn't need to try and convince her of her abilities after that. Acknowledging Pine's argument without another word, Reika looked at her feet and the deep cuts she had left in the bridge.

"Lift your feet. You're poorly equipped if you want to come with me." The others were already in significant distance so going back and giving all of them the chance to come was more than likely wasted time. "It might be a little cold but please bear with it." Turning the soles of Inori's boots into ice skates, both of them continued.

"Halt." Reika stopped on the point, Inori managing to come to a full stop a few meters in front. They were close enough to witness the replication first hand. Looking around, Reika knelt on the glacier road and looked down. Below them were piles upon piles of blocks, all of them in various shades of gray, red and blue.

Watching the blocks disperse and re-assemble it was became clear very rapidly what was happening. "Transmutation." Reika was fascinated by the process. She was seeing something that was always only speculated at in science fiction. Instantaneous molecular re-assembling, transmutation.

Leading the road around the blocks and to the end of the enormous hole, Reika touched one of the walls, taking off her left glove. "Did this area transmute already? It looks different from the other side."

"It's still spreading." Inori had caught up again and pointed at the solid wall. There was no sign of it not being made of a single large fragment and still part of it was just slowly changing color, like it was being rapidly infected by something.

"Why is it doing this?" Reika couldn't identify any of the materials. Their touch and hardness seemed different from any earthly material she knew.

"Your guess is as good as mine. I suspect it's trying to prevent large scale annihilation like this from happening again." Inori tried to cut into the changed material, with less than little success. It was too hard even for her energy blades. Turning around, she found herself facing a wall that had not been there before a few seconds ago. Looking around a bad hunch became immediate reason for concern. The entire walls was encroaching towards them. "Beauty, we need to go." And it was rapidly gaining speed. "Now!"

Going back the same way she came, Inori was quickly passed by Beauty who created a separate road, jumping over to it with a single serene motion. Looking over her shoulder for just a moment, she realized that they had spent too much time in dangerous territory. Just speed wouldn't get them out of there. Stopping by freezing herself in place, Reika focused on extending the road far enough for her ally to go ahead.

Watching the rapidly encroaching wall, Reika felt a rush of being powerless. No matter what, at best she would be able to slow it down. Taking a deep breath, the temperature fell so far that her breath turned into white clouds. "Zero Celsius - " Creating her signature dual wielded blades, Reika threw one to her left and one to her right, both of them leaving a trail of bitter cold air behind. "Glacier Break!" The cold air left behind the weapons rapidly solidifying and turning into solid ice, each side expanded at an abnormal speed in every direction. Within ten seconds, a thin line of ice had turned into a dozens of meter thick barricade of frost, over a hundred meter in every direction. An artificial ice-stream.

The sound of the encroaching and multiplying wall hitting her barricade was something that reached the Cures waiting for the return of the other two. Inori had reached the literal end of the road and she was still too far away from everyone else.

Looking behind her, the wall was having trouble passing a massive ice barricade but it was only a matter of time until it would pass it. Seeing a blue speck rapidly catch up, Inori was ready to run for her life. No matter how fast or strong they were, it was impossible to fight a wall that extended itself.

Inori almost felt her arm rip off when Beauty rushed past and grabbed her. Using her Zero Celsius skills was taxing and not something she like to do if it could be avoided. So running away was a very viable and justified decision to make.

Looking back and realizing that even running wasn't going to let them get out safely, Reika changed plan. "Hold your breath!" Giving just that one command to Pine, Reika took as deep a breath as she could herself, held out both of her hands and created layer upon layer of ice around them, a thick sphere designed to protect them.

And they felt the impact. Unable to hold on to anything but each other, Pine and Beauty were thrown around like a pinball, the sphere just barely holding together with Reika's continued concentration. The next impact was strong enough to almost destroy their protective prison. Inori was desperately trying not to breathe, the temperature inside their little prison far below zero.

The outside was no less chaotic than that. Lemonade and Muse were combining their efforts to create a makeshift safety zone to protect them from the literally crushing threat that had already swallowed up Beauty and Pine. "Ako, are you gonna hold out?" Urara's golden chains kept the encroaching wall itself at back but the transmuting stone had already infected the ground below them.

Using her powers to create both a floor and a ceiling above them, essentially sandwiching six Cures between two layers of protection, Ako had trouble keeping all of it sustained with energy. None of them were really in fighting condition and much less ready for a life or death situation.

"I hope Mai makes it to the base in time." Michiru wasn't sure if they were safe there. At least the odds were highly against them.

"Will you stop standing around like an idiot and help out? We're not doing this because it's fun, you know?" Urara was shouting at Bright, the encroaching wall slowly pushing them in.

"Windy, how much longer?" Honoka was already preparing to help out Lemonade and Muse.

"The ground is already... I will need to keep this active. Do it as soon as you're ready." Focusing all her attention on her energy manipulation and going completely silent, sweat appeared on her forehead, the concentrating needed to keep the no more than finger thick tunnel system she was creating with super high pressure wind.

"Whitelight Pillar Formation!" Using the single hole that was right in front of her, Honoka pushed the entire force of several Illumination attacks into it. "Everyone cover yourself as well as you can!"

Karen took the cue and stood up, dispatching a wall of water right around where Urara's chains were, creating a sphere of chains, water, and Muse's barricades. With an ear deafening shrieking sound, the entire area around them burst with White's energy, the tunnels too small and not exiting anywhere to contain the energy. A temporary breather for both Lemonade and Muse.

"Again!" The ground was regenerating at an tremendous rate. Honoka had to wait for Windy to blast the area around them to bits. Aqua's water shield robbed the fragments of all their speed and served as filling for the holes Lemonade's chains left.

Mai had reached the base in record time, deploying her Wings of Heaven the entire time. Shouting as loud as she could, most of the Cures were already assembled near the one and only entrance to the base. "The system and this entire place undergoing a major change! We don't know in what way or form this area will change! Gather everyone that isn't already here and if necessary drag them to the garden!" The rooms were not safe. Nightmare had been able to penetrate them and there was also the issue of the mirrors still being there. The mirrors... Moonlight!

"Two physically aligned Cures to me and follow!" Taking charge of the situation the best she could, they should have thought of splitting the commanding team in half, leaving enough behind to actually issue orders.

Itsuki and Hibiki were quick to volunteer, trying to help in whatever way they could. "Peach, Passion, Beat, you three make sure that everyone gets to the garden! Don't forget the new girls!"

Not waiting for any confirmation, Mai continued and managed to grab Rouge, who was with Rhythm. "Go and get Dream. The contracts should be all terminated by now. Rhythm, you go and get Berry. She's likely still unconscious in her room."

"Rose!" Seeing the purple Cure approach from a distance together with Luminous, Mai waved her over. "Luminous, you go to the garden. Rose, I need you to help me." The group of four, three of them following Egret without bothering to ask any questions, headed to Mint's room, finding both Yuri and her reflection there. "Melody, get her reflection. I'll carry Moonlight."

"What do we do?" Itsuki realized why Egret needed one other person but what were she and Rose gonna do?

"Rip that mirror out of the ground and take it with us. If everything goes wrong, it could break during whatever the system is changing. And we still need it to get Moonlight back." Throwing Yuri over her shoulder, Mai was a little worried by how light she was. Melody was ready as well. "We're going to come back if you aren't there by the time we put them under Peach's care."

"Ready to do this?" Kurumi wasn't exactly the strongest Cure around but she was more physically able than most.

"She should have picked Bloom and Black to do this. They're the monsters. Ready." Grabbing the frame of the mirror, she felt a slight chill on her hands.

"That's not a nice thing to say. On three. One... two... three!" Both of them tried to pull as hard as they could when Kurumi finished counting but the object wouldn't budge at all. Gritting teeth, they kept trying until their muscles were screaming for them to stop.

"How on earth is this thing not moving?" Itsuki tried to shake it but that too didn't do anything.

"If we can't pull it off the ground we're just gonna take that too." Kurumi focused and even though she knew it would hurt like hell later, she used an incomplete ability. "Adamant Blade!" Creating a massive hand blade attached to the top of her right hand, Kurumi cut right through the stone ground. Thankfully it wasn't of the same material as the transmuted one yet.

"I guess demolishing Mint's room isn't that high a price in exchange from keeping Moonlight turning into a complete vegetable." Waiting for Rose to finish cutting through it, she noticed the painful expression on her face. "Are you okay?"

"This weapon isn't really ready for use yet. Maybe halfway complete. Done." Retracting the blade was more difficult than creating it. Screaming out in pain briefly, Kurumi bend over slightly. "I knew it would hurt... I'm fine. Lets get this thing out of there."

Now that they had essentially cut the mirror out of the room's frame, it was relatively easy to carry if too big for the door. "Sun petal pierce!" Hitting the entrance to the room with her full power, the resulting hole was more than big enough. They were just passing through it when Egret and Melody returned to them.

A quick glance to the entrance made clear that they were late. The stone was rapidly changing color. They wouldn't make it through if they kept the mirror but abandoning it meant to abandon Moonlight and any hope of returning her to normal.

"Shut up and do it!" They heard shouting from nearby, likely the entrance to the garden. "I know you can hear me Egret! You and everyone that's with you, get your asses over here as fast as you can! Lantern here and I will buy you some time!"

"Who da hell ya callin' Lantern you walking oven!" More yelling. "Don't lag behind old-timer! Solar Rain!"

"Who the hell are you calling old-timer?! Meltdown!"

There was no mistaking that rivalry. Sunny and Rouge were devastating the entrance, stalling the transmutation the best they could. "Move!" Using her ability wouldn't help. Instead, Mai shoved the injured Kurumi away. "Melody, you take over. I'm gonna check if someone was left behind! Wings of Heaven!"

How in the world did they get into a situation this bad? Almost flying through the corridor, she simply bombarded the doors with wind bullets, heading right into the dinner hall and from there into the shower, returning the way she came, not finding anyone at all.

"Egret, where the hell are you? This are getting hairy here!" Rin was shouting loudly, noticing a whirl of white passing right past her a second later. Stopping her ability, grabbing Sunny by her collar and retreating as fast as she could, she ignored the complaints of the other red Cure.

Focused in front of the flower hill, nineteen Cures were worried about what was happening. The three remaining were Egret, who was just coming to a stand still near the entrance, waiting for Rouge and Sunny. Intensely watching the wall, Mai noticed that it was changing colors but not shape.

It was too early to relax though. "Everyone but eight are accounted for." Love had quickly approached Egret. "What is going on? Everyone left earlier at dinner and now we're suddenly in a state of emergency?"

"The destruction Nightmare and Dream caused seems to have triggered some kind of reaction from this place. We're not entirely sure either but either way it doesn't hurt to be careful." Mai wasn't exactly someone who liked to take charge in situations like these, at least not with that many people.

"Love, Miki is coming to." Setsuna, Ellen right behind her, had finished checking on everyone. "Everyone is pretty worried about this."

Further back at the flower hill, the tall blue Cure was moaning in anguish. Her head felt like an oil tanker on fire. "Where... am I?" Miki felt grass tickle her all over her body. Her last thought from before she had fallen unconscious was coming back. "Yuri!" Trying to sit up abruptly, pain that was not from this world hit her.

"Don't rush, Berry." She couldn't quite place the voice.

"Is that Mint?" Still trying to sit up, someone pushed her down.

"Yes. You're probably really badly dehydrated so you shouldn't try to get up. If you're worried about Moonlight, she and her reflection are both here. Although one of them is unconscious and the other one... well you know."

Laying back down, Miki was disappointed. "She didn't go back to normal after you got Eclipse to her?"

"Blossom found you, Moonlight and her reflection. We only got back to our base a few hours ago at best. Everyone had to turn in their contracts with Dream and there were also five new Cures that had shown up."

"New Cures?" Miki wasn't sure if she was still in delirium or not.

"Rest for now. I'll see if we can get you something to drink." Leaving the tired Miki for a moment, not without whispering to Melody that she should keep a close eye on Berry.

"If only Karen was here..." Water from the pond was likely not going to be drinkable. Looking around, she found Marine with Blossom not too far away, curiously inspecting the changing walls. "Marine!" Calling for her, Komachi was either ignored or not heard. She didn't like shouting so she walked over to them.

"It turned from gray to this kind of reddish color. Is it clay now?" Erika knew a lot about colors and the walls looked exactly like a bright shade of of the naturally soft material.

Komachi had barely reached the blue Cure when a series of strong quake started to shake the room, forcing those that weren't sitting already on their knee or flat on the ground. Trying to balance herself, Komachi had to give up within seconds, falling flat on her butt. "What now?"

The quakes ended as suddenly as they had come and the air started to smell strongly of iron, just like what had happened when the mirrors had shown up. It was already feeling like the smell of impeding doom. "Marine. Could you go over to the flower hill base and create some water for Berry? She looks badly dehydrated." Komachi wasn't sure how long they would be here and she was worried about Karen as well. Looking around, a few Cures, namely Peach, Passion, Beat and Egret, were running around trying to calm down people. What was going on?

"First the quiet call to arms, then the sudden emergency, now quakes... this place isn't very safe, is it?" Nao was complaining a little. For some reason, Akane had returned together with Rouge and a white Cure that was introduced as Rhythm, who seemed really attached to her.

"All our brains went out to check what is going on and it looks like they didn't manage to come back in time. I can't think of anything short of Nightmare being back in full power that could take them out so they're likely all fine." Rin wasn't entirely without worry. They had no idea whatsoever how this place really worked and that bugged her. A lot.

"We're not going to have to sleep here, right?" Miyuki was looking around and the thing that most closely resembled a bed was a wooden bench, and that was far from comfortable.

"Can't say. Could be worse. You could be sleeping forever." Rin wasn't in a good mod and someone being worried about where they slept kind of rubbed her in the wrong way.

"Rin! You don't need to scare them for no reason. Nobody is gonna die or get hurt." Kanade complained and held on to Rin's arm extra tightly.

"There aren't any... bugs here, right?" Looking at the grass around her legs, Nao suddenly remembered a very frightening incident with a very odd gadget created by one of their adversaries, making her feel a chill.

"Of course there are bugs. I assume. I haven't actually seen them. Don't tell me a grown woman is afraid of some insects." Rin felt Kanade tighten um her grasp, a clear sign she was going too far and becoming insulting again.

"Nao is our queen of fright!" Yayoi proclaimed with a big smile on her face, causing everyone else, except Nao, to laugh.

"Yayoi!" Blushing and trying to grab the yellow Cure, Nao fell flat on her face. Feeling grass on her face, she almost ricocheted off the ground like a rubber ball, hastily cleaning her face.

"If you're going to harass her just for having a little fear of bugs I'm seriously going to punch you." Akane didn't take kindly to that and while she had done her part in teasing Nao in the past, she didn't appreciate someone genuinely being mean about it.

"Yeah, yeah, don't get your panties in a knot. I realize I got a bit of an attitude problem at times. No hard feelings." A little annoyed, mostly with herself, Rin couldn't believe she let her mean streak get the better of her right away.

"You two saw what was happening, right?" Miyuki somehow doubted she should be sitting around doing nothing. "Why is nobody going out to look for the missing people?"

"If it was safe to be out there, we wouldn't be here like this." Rin looked around. "If you go out there and you're just a bit unlucky you could end up as pancake. That's why everyone is staying here. And I'm not heartless enough to tell you it's okay to go and check." Rin had her own way to show she cared, even though it was rather rough.

"So we just wait here for something to happen?" Yayoi didn't mind being in the garden was it was a really beautiful place and remained calm despite the earlier quakes. "How can this be here anyway?"

"We don't know either. At one point, people agreed to let Blossom wish for a garden and this is what we got. It's been here ever since."

"That... favor thing Nagisa was mentioning, right?" Miyuki wasn't terrible at memorizing things but she wasn't Reika and it had been a long day.

"Think of the battling like an arena. You go in, get paid for your effort and if you win, your team gets a nice bonus to boot. The arena docs take care of afterwards and there is only one battle every day."

"Isn't that taking it a little to lightly? You're still fighting other Cures!" Miyuki didn't like the way Rouge was talking about their situation.

"When you really think about it, I'm not. I actually like the battles. It's a lot like sparring. You get serious, fight and then get healed. I think the worst I ever got was still feeling sore the next day. Can you really call that something you have to be worried about?"

"I'm kinda sore every time they assign students new topics for a thesis... Carrying all those books around is really tiring." Being a librarian wasn't just about knowing and loving books. There was a lot more to it and Miyuki was still getting used to that.

"What about injuries during battle? The way Black described it, you really go seriously at each other."

"Hm, that's hard to say really. You feel some level of pain but the battle drive is overwhelming it, mostly." Holding up her left hand, Rin created a fire claw. "If I slashed you with this, you would likely feel no more pain than when you hold a match too long and it burns your finger. Of course, if I did it now, you'd be on the ground. But the same is true for me."

"Getting beaten up and healed can't be good for your body." Nao was now wondering if there were any long time drawbacks to this whole thing.

"I'm actually surprised I'm still this fit. I play soccer professionally and I need to train pretty hard to keep in shape. But I haven't really noticed my performance dropping. On the contrary, I've gotten more used to using my Cure powers since I'm almost always in this form."

"At least you don't sleep as Cure." Kanade had been quiet so far, not really eager to get into much of a conversation with the new girls. After her outburst earlier, she just wanted some alone time with Rin.

"How do you know this isn't just a setup by some great new enemy?" Keeping up with the questions, Nao had carried around doubt about the legitimacy of this whole scenario.

"An enemy that keeps us entertained, fed, heals us and then repeats the process? I don't know what you were fighting or are fighting but I don't think that's really a likely thing. Now... don't go running out. I need a break." Getting up, Kanade still right by her side, Rin left together with the white Cure.

"They all have different views on how it all works, don't they?" Miyuki looked to Yayoi, who had been awfully quiet.

"I believe them though. They really have no reason to lie to us." The yellow Cure didn't trust people without reason, she had met too many people that just wanted part of her limited fame. "If she wanted to lie to us she wouldn't have been so crude."

"Well, you're right about that but... it doesn't sit well with me. Maybe it won't be as bad when I'm experiencing it." Nao was giving it the benefit of a doubt, for now.

"Nao, are you seriously going to try fighting other Cures?" Miyuki couldn't believe what she was hearing.

"If it's like they said, there isn't really any harm in it. I mean, feeling sore? I'm happy when I get all the crayon off my hands after work." Grinning, Nao remembered her work. It was fun dealing with the kids but also very tiring.

"That's true but... doesn't that sound too easy?" Miyuki sighed, not knowing if it was worth to continue to argue this. Even Nao seemed to be leaning towards just trying it now.

"Compared to what we were expecting, yes, but I don't think it'll be easy the way you think." Akane had been on the wait and see route from the start and that still hadn't changed. Leaning against Nao, the red Cure found her partner to be unusually tense. "Worried about Reika that much? You know how strong she is, Nao."

"Of course I'm worried. If you were gone I'd be worried just as much." Putting her arm around the shorter girls shoulder, she sighed. "Akane, do you know what they're doing with that huge mirror?" Nao had seen it a few times from the corner of her eyes but until Rouge had left, she hadn't paid any attention to it.

"They came running in with two identical looking Cures just before they brought that huge thing." Miyuki got up and tried to get a better look at it. "Yayoi, lets go and take a look."

"Sure. Letting Nao and Akane have some alone time is probably appreciate." Giggling, Yayoi enjoyed the red flush on Nao's face.

"Yayoi reads too many comics..." Akane sighed and squeezed Nao's hand. "Right?"

"You're not very convincing."

On the other side of the garden, just in front of the pond, Mai was wondering what exactly to do with Moonlight. The plan had been to somehow take her reflections memories and just that but how would they do that. Luckily for her, Dream had finally recovered enough to walk around.

"Are they okay?" Nozomi was still feeling a little dizzy but not bad enough to stay down and do nothing. She was likely the only one that had any idea how to use the mirror at this point.

"The reflection is unconscious and I'm having Black and Bloom keep an eye on her. I don't want another Poison running around. Moonlight is... well, unchanged from before. I'm not sure if she is just sleeping or unconscious or just has her eyes closed."

"What happened to her?" Nozomi knelt down next to the silver Cure, taking a close look. She seemed physically fine but... only physically.

"She was stuck in exile for a long time. You know what that place does to you. Just look at Rose, Passion and Beat. I can only think that whatever she was confronted with was so bad that her mind shut down. You asking me about her means you have some idea how to help her, right?"

"Not in the way I want to..." Being connected to Nightmare, fighting her and finally killing her... at the end, Nozomi had gained the same knowledge of the mirrors that her reflection had. Maybe it was because of the way she had died or that her corpse couldn't go back into the mirrors. But she also had the other memories of her. Memories she was working hard to forget.

"What do you mean?"

"I know what Nightmare knew but... Poison as well as the Dusk and Dawn group came up with a way to let a reflection take over the mind of an original, each of their own means. There is an additional way but... I can't say I'm not surprised they didn't even mention that."

"Dream, I'm grateful you got rid of Nightmare but we're not exactly in the best situation here and I don't want her to stay like this or die." Mai didn't know Moonlight very well but she was still one of them.

"Hey, what are you doing?" Miyuki and Yayoi had now shown up, interested in what the big mirror was all about. "Are they twins?" Looking at Moonlight and the other silver Cure, that was the first thought that came to mind.

"Not quite. One of those two is a leftover from the copies that used to run around the last few days. Some of them were quite vile but.. in general they were us but with our personality turned around." Mai found it difficult to explain the reflections in few words.

"I'm not sure I get it..." Miyuki walked over to Eclipse, greeting the first friend she made among the other Cures. "Nagisa!"

The black Cure had been talking with Saki about Mai and how she and Dream kept the discussion awfully quiet as if they were talking about something bad. Watching a passed out reflection that was likely to have a really carefree attitude seemed like a waste but then it was not a risk she wanted to take. "Miyuki. Got bored of just sitting around?"

"You could say that. Are you a friend of hers?" Pointing at the unconscious Eclipse. Noticing that Yayoi had vanished from her side, Miyuki looked around only to find her examining the big mirror.

"She's not really one of us." Saki answered for Nagisa. "I think you're better off not knowing what happened with all of them but if you really want to know I'll tell you."

In the meantime, Egret had finished listening to Dream, who had just explained the third method. "I'm not going to decide that. Her teammates should make that decision."

"What... decision?" Miki had, despite Komachi's warning and Melody trying to keep her down, gotten up and walked all the way over to where Yuri was.

Sighing, a little exhausted by how complicated the situation was getting, Mai figured that she might as well let others know if they were going to have Moonlight's team decide. "I'm going to get Blossom, Marine and... well I guess Sunshine just got here." Looking behind Berry, both Melody and Sunshine came running, seemingly arguing over something while doing so.

"Berry, you shouldn't walk around!" Hibiki was concerned about her condition. She had just looked away for a few minutes and then she was gone.

"And Yuri shouldn't still be laying around like a vegetable. If I'm going to rest somewhere I'm going to rest right next to her."

"Give it up Hibiki. I would do the same, no matter what condition I was in, if you were in Moonlight's place." Itsuki wondered why they didn't leave Berry with her to begin with.

"Dream, what decision was Egret talking about?" Miki wouldn't have a single calm minute without knowing that Yuri was going to be okay.

"I'll tell you when Blossom and Marine get here. Sunshine, you and those two are the rest of her team, right?"

"Yes, but why are you asking? Is she off so badly that we need to make some life or death decision?" The thought kind of frightened Itsuki. Yuri was a dear friend she had known for years now.

Nozomi didn't want to say anything else. Telling her team was going to be hard enough. But she didn't know any alternatives.

The moment Tsubomi and Erika came back with Mai, the two blue Cures started to glare at each other. They hadn't forgotten even though the point was a little moot right now. "What is she doing here?" Erika's maturity went a little out the window when someone accused her friends of things she didn't like.

"I have every right to be here as you. I saved Yuri's life." Miki showed no signs of keeping her own hostility towards Erika in check.

"So you can try to steal her from her real partner?" Trying to walk towards Berry, Erika was held back by Tsubomi. "Tsubomi, let go, I'm going to show her what it means to mess with my friends!"

"Stop acting like a child!" Tsubomi seldom got loud and shouted, even more rarely at Erika. "I know Momoka is your sister and she loves Yuri, but it's still not your decision to make if they belong or not and whether Yuri can go and date someone else."

Erika was about to shout back, thinking that Tsubomi was taking Berry's side for some reason, when Tsubomi started to shout at the tall blue Cure next. "And you. There is no need to act self-entitled about this! If Yuri decides to be with you, that is one thing, but if you brag about it and make the sister of the partner she will leave to do that feel miserable, you're going to have to deal with the consequences!"

Taking a deep breath, everyone was looking in amazement at Tsubomi, who just after her outburst realized that she had shouted at people in front of so many others. Her face turning slightly crimson, she looked to Egret. "What are we gonna decide?"

"Dream." Mai waved to her and Nozomi tried to find the right words before she started.

"Before I start... was there anything exceptionally traumatizing in her past? Something that would cause her to shut away her mind in fear of losing it? She was a long time in exile so..."

Looking at each other, the rest of her team started to have depressed expressions. "There are a handful. I'd usually not talk about this without her permission, but..." Itsuki started and looked to Erika, who knew Yuri slightly better.

"She had to kill someone that might have been her sister in another life. And she watched her father die right after that. Those are the same people that beat her up to the point of her not being able to become a Cure anymore and killed her fairy partner. Those are the worst parts I think."

"I feel bad for asking. I'm sorry. But this makes it clear that she is still somewhere inside of that body."

"So why is she not recovering? She isn't in exile anymore!" Miki didn't exactly have a long line of patience at the time.

"She shut herself away so tightly that the world around her doesn't matter anymore." For Itsuki, that was the logical conclusion.

"That's too sad... Poor Yuri..." Tsubomi really felt for her. Why did the bad streak for Yuri never end?

"I don't think any physical influence could get her out of there. It's like a coma. And the only way to get her out of there I know might have some really serious side effects. She might not be the same person anymore when she wakes up."

"You're not going to tell us you want to use her reflection to take over her body, right?" Itsuki was worried that the conversation was heading straight to that conclusion. But before anyone else could react, Dream quickly denied it.

"No. We will use put both of them into their mirror. Reflections are really just part of us and the mirror connects us. With both of them in there, Eclipse should become part of Moonlight. The connection will wake up Moonlight, I'm certain of that. What remains is to see if Moonlight rejects whatever Eclipse's personality is or..."

"Or what? She turns into a psychotic murderer? That's not a solution!" Miki walked up to Dream and grabbed her by her collar. "There has to be a way without that risk!"

"Calm down Berry. You two, too." Itsuki looked at Erika and Tsubomi, both of them looking rather upset. "Think about it. Yuri was in exile when Nightmare showed up. And we didn't see Eclipse anywhere during the whole thing. Erika, she wasn't at the other base, right?"

"If she was, nobody knew. I don't remember hearing her name before now." Being the only that had experienced the situation inside the enemy camp, Erika had already a good idea what Eclipse had to be like. "If she was made like all the other reflections, she's the complete opposite of Yuri. Easygoing, without a care in the world, an airhead."

"That is what I believe, too. If she has been unconscious the entire time, her personality would have had no chance to change. That means she would still be like that."

"I prefer Yuri levelheaded and calm." Miki's image of what Marine described was basically that of Marine. A lot taller but otherwise the same. She didn't like that.

"This isn't about preferences. It will be up to Yuri and Eclipse what remains. In the worst case, we'll have someone very carefree at our hands. I called you three because I think you know her best and it should be your decision. I just... can't think of anything else that would get her to come out of her shell."

"A kiss of true love!" Miyuki had joined up back with the larger group and Yayoi, curious of what was happening.

Marine almost lost her composure hearing that, knowing Berry would jump at it right away. But despite her expectations, the tall blue Cure didn't say anything. "The only one that would apply to isn't here." Erika flinched when she felt Tsubomi pinch her, clearly having noticed that the short Cure worded it as offensively as she could.

"Miyuki, this isn't fairy tales... I think you shouldn't say those things so easily." Whispering to her friend, Yayoi had long figured out that there was very little room for careless statements in this discussion, the reason she had been so quiet.

"I'm in favor of trying to get Yuri back together. Even if she ends up as Eclipse or with part of her personality, that is better than having an empty shell around." Itsuki dared to say that out loud, knowing that there would be likely some resistance from Erika.

"I think so too. To be honest... I think Yuri could really use a bit more happiness in her life. If she was more carefree..."

Erika didn't say anything, already outvoted. She felt for her sister, but Momoka would be devastated if Yuri didn't come back or remained in a coma. If she came back with a changed personality, she was at least still there and they could work on it.

"How are you going to get them into the mirror? Don't tell me you want to kill them to do that!" Miki wouldn't stand by and let that happen.

"There is no need for that. If both sides look into the mirror at once, the reflection can pass through it and even pull others in. But neither side can tell when the other one is looking so they would have to constantly push against it and try to enter."

"Explains why they haven't used it to attack us." Itsuki was surprised that Dream knew so much about it. "How do you know about all of this? Because of the contracts it is clear you're Dream but..."

"Nightmare's memories and knowledge was forced on me when I killed her." Nozomi turned away slightly saying that, everyone but Miyuki and Yayoi quite aware of the burden that must be.

"They need to be on opposing sides. Sunshine, can you carry Moonlight? I'll take Eclipse." Dream had heard no opposition to the plan, which might very well be their only shot at getting Moonlight back to normal or at least something like normal.

Grabbing the reflection under her arms, Dream lifted her up. It was similar to holding a test dummy if only much lighter. Standing in front of the mirror, Nozomi waited for Itsuki to do her part. "Slowly move her towards it. If you see her starting to go through the glass, just shove her in. There is no gravity or anything in there, she won't get hurt."

Eclipse's hair was the first thing to pass through the glass, looking almost as if the mirror was an open gateway to another world. Giving her one decisive push, Nozomi watched her float inside the object, slowly rotating around her own axis. "Now we... wait." Staggering a little, still feeling the exhaustion, Nozomi managed to get a hold of herself before any of the others had to catch her. The situation didn't allow them to do much.

=== Dissonance ===

Smashing a hole into the sphere with a brutal kick, Reika didn't bother to hesitate and threw Pine right out, jumping after her, gasping for air the second she got away. The far beyond zero temperature inside the sphere was the large drawback to that technique. Pine had lost consciousness a few seconds ago and she had been close.

Creating a small glowing crystal, Reika looked around. They were surrounded by solid... rock? Or something kind of reddish material that closely resembled it. It would be tough to get through there. "Pine!" Shouting and hitting both her cheeks in turns, Reika tried to wake her up. It took a few tries before Inori reacted.

"I thought I was a goner..." Greedily sucking up air, she regained her senses quickly. "Where are we?"

"That is impossible to say for certain. My sphere protected us from being crushed but we got swept away by the expanding structure."

Getting up and looking at the room they were in, Inori didn't feel very optimistic. Creating her diamond blades, she tried to cut through the material, without success. "It's a lot sturdier than the old one." Seeing that Beauty's crystal was about to go out, Inori created a small sphere of energy, quietly floating in front of her, enough to keep the space dimly lit.

"Let me try." Walking along the wall, Reika tried to find a point that was thinner than others but she had to settle for just going by her gut feeling. "Stay away from me as far as you can. It's about to get quite cold." Focusing, Reika knew that few materials remained sturdy when cooled down to several dozen degree. "Zero Celsius, Frost Brand."

Inori almost felt like retreating back into the ice sphere. From the spot Beauty was touching with her hand emitted an ice cold wind. It wasn't comparable to the air-tight freezing inside the sphere but it was considerably uncomfortable. She knew exactly what Beauty was doing. If it was cooled down far enough and then hit by a strong impact, chances were it would shatter.

"Thank you for saving me."

"I would die before abandoning one of my own."

"Please don't talk about dying. At least not while we're in the middle of nowhere."

"This is as far as I can cool it down. I need to keep the Frost Brand active so please it it with everything you have." Trusting in Pine, Reika stepped aside without letting go of the wall.

"I'll show you that I'm no burden to you. I don't like using this technique but it's practically made for this. Diamond Pulse!" Hitting the frozen wall with what looked like a weak punch, Beauty seemed to notice that there was a noticeable amount of energy manipulation involved.

With a horrifying sound, enormous cracks appeared in the frozen wall. A second hit and several cubic meters of the foreign material shattered, leaving a fine ice dust in the air. "I know you are sending a type of energy into the structure, but how do you control it's dissipation from there?"

"Imagine the roots of a flower. The impact zone is where all the roots converge and the stem of the flower leaves the earth. I just inject the energy and replace the matter in it's place. It's a brutal technique to cause inside damage to something. There is a big drawback to it though." Moving her fingers and massaging her own hand, Inori believed she didn't need to explain it.

"The energy has to travel through your arm first and at the point it travels through your hand it is already slightly destructive."

"It doesn't cause nerve damage but it really strains muscles. But I can keep going. We need to get out of here."

"I agree."

=== Dissonance ===

"I wonder if we're going to run out of air or energy first." Urara and the rest of the vanguard, minus Beauty and Pine, were stuck just like they were. Windy and White, as well as Aqua and Bright, were working to get back into the direction of the base. They couldn't afford to worry about saving Beauty and Pine when they were in danger themselves. "Ako, can't you use whatever Silence used to blast through this?" Urara herself was busy keeping the place lit. Chains were spanning all across the ceiling and parts of the ground.

"If you want me to die, sure."

"That's a no the size of the fucking ocean then. I hate being useless." Looking to White, who was taking a break, the older Cure didn't look good. "White, you're doing okay?"

"It takes a lot out of me to keep doing this... Karen, how are you holding up?" While her own combination worked with extremely thin tunnels and energy bursts to expand their breathing room, Karen and Bright weakened the material with constant water exposure and water pressure drilling and massive physical force.

"About to take a break myself. Who knows how many tons of material we need to go through before we get back to the base. I just hope everyone is fine." Extremely worried about Komachi, she found it hard to concentrate on what she was doing.

"How many meters have we passed now?" Looking back, it didn't seem like much.

"About twenty. It's more than it looks. That still leaves a lot more to go. I didn't pay much attention to it when we came here but we must have walked at least a kilometer."

"So fifty times what we got past, minimum. Excuse me if I don't sound optimistic enough." Urara was thankful that was with Ako at least. Bright and Windy may count as partners but both White and Karen didn't have theirs with them. She could imagine well how worried they must have been.

"What happened anyway? Did this whole place just go berserk?" Keeping the conversation going she tried to focus it on something that was not the near endless way ahead.

"Your guess really is as good as mine as this point. Considering Dream and Nightmare blew a hole the size easily the size of a stadium in the middle of this complex, could be anything." Honoka wasn't really in any mood to be speculative about what had hit them.

"It's likely that whatever is running this place restored functionality the only way it could." Ako helped out a little, knowing what Urara was doing.

"I don't think it is just restoring things. There was no need to change gray rocks into red rocks for that. I think they saw us screwing with everything and increased security. And we just happened to get stuck here." Urara wasn't entirely sure about that but it was the best guess she had.

"You think everyone getting back to the base triggered it, thinking that we wouldn't leave, and then we did leave and got caught in it? It makes sense but... what did it change?" Honoka found herself distracted from thinking about Nagisa now, her scientific curiosity piqued.

"We'll know when we get out. I sure hope we still get free showers and healthcare. I'd rather not walk around like a mummy." Lowering her voice and getting closer to Ako, who sat right next to her, Urara figured that there were some things she shouldn't say out too loud right now. "It would be better if we met up with, whats her name, and Pine. The new one controls ice, that should be really damn useful."

"But going in the other direction means it'll take away their drive of going towards their partners. You can't say tell them that." Ako understood that Urara wasn't as careless and hardhearted as she led others to believe. "Do you think they're still alive? By the way, her name is Beauty."

"I hope so. We made it through all of Poison's and Nightmare's bullshit so it would really suck if someone got killed now. Pine isn't really that great a defensive fighter if I remember correctly. Lets hope that... what, are you serious? Happy and Beauty? What are the names of the rest?"

"I don't know and now is not the time to make fun of their names. And don't think I forgot about you making fun of Happy, Fanta."

"Give me a break." Looking at Windy's back, she and White were back at work, demolishing another set of several meters of wall. The main issue was that it didn't create more air. It just dispersed the existing one. "Stop! If you keep going like this, we're going to run out of air sooner than later. We need to find a room or something like that and break through there. At least we'll have room to breathe."

"And how do you suppose we do that?" The thinning air was starting to affect Honoka. Of course she noticed that but knowing about it didn't make it any better.

"I think our problem just solved itself. Can't you feel this? It's getting really cold!" Ako got up and backed away from the direction they had come from as far as she could. "One thing none of us thought of... what if there are reflections of the new girls on the loose?"

"Great work Ako, now I'm genuinely about to just say screw all of this." The idea wasn't that far-fetched. "If that isn't Beauty and Pine freezing that wall back there, I'm going to choke whatever does."

"Be my guest, I've had enough of reflections for the rest of my life." Honoka vividly remembered being killed by one.

With a horrible creaking sound, the most of the wall collapsed. "There is a tunnel beyond. Can you see anyone, Pine?" Hearing that, Urara relaxed only enough to still be on guard but no longer paranoid.

A loud crash and part of the wall collapsed under Inori's punch. "We found them!" Looking quite relieved, Inori immediately sunk to her knees, exhausted. "Thank god. I don't know if I could have gone on for much longer." Seeing that Lemonade's chains were keeping the area lit, she let her sphere disperse.

Reika stepped through the hole right after that, seeing the others. "I see you all had the same idea. Are any of you injured?" Quite tired herself, Reika walked only slowly, helping Pine up. The other six quickly approached the two, Urara and Ako passing them and checking the tunnel they had left.

"I can't even see the end of it. How far did you go?" Urara didn't like to admit it but she was very impressed by the distance.

"A rough estimate would be about four or five hundred meters. I am excluding the initial room in that estimate." Turning to White and the others, Reika realized how bad the air was. "We might need to hurry with progressing. The air is getting very thin and we did not find any air pockets during our progress."

Time was running.

=== Dissonance ===

Having convinced Mai and Dream to send out a recon group,they had picked the fastest runners. Rin and Nao stood side by side near the entrance of the garden, spying into the darkness beyond. While Akane was very good at energy manipulation and attacking, in speed she clearly lost to Rin. "So why exactly is it pitch black just one step out this door? You know, since there is some kind of light inside here, shouldn't there also be some in the hallway?" Nao wasn't very good with places like this. Not directly afraid of it, but the things she was afraid of did tend to lurk right there.

"I'm more worried about the whole thing flattening us like pancakes." Using her power to create a blazing flame in the palm of her hand, she acted as vanguard. It took just one step and she was already being saved by Nao's attention to detail. Trying to step where there was nothing, Rin hadn't realized that the old hallway was replaced by a stairway. If not for the green Cure grabbing her arm and holding her back, she would have fallen down. "Uh... thanks. That would have hurt."

"Are we seriously gonna go down there?" The prospect of wandering around in an unknown place with god knows what possibly lurking in the dark, Nao wasn't so eager to go.

"Stop being a wimp and follow me." Going further down, the stairway was rather narrow, maybe enough for two people to walk next to each other, ending in a small balcony like platform that led to a second stairway. This repeated itself twice more for a total of four stairs. By the time they finally reached flat ground again and found another gate, Nao was rather nervous, unconsciously sticking to Rouge as close as she could.

Spying didn't help for it was all completely dark. Where had the convenient lighting from before gone? "I'm gonna put some lights on. Stand back. Blaze Sphere!" Throwing numerous small fiery spheres into the distance, they could see now. The hallway was completely different from before. To their left was another gate that led to more stairs, and the hallway in yet another gate, two rooms to one side and two to the other.

Walking up to the doors, they were made of fine wood, almost as if they were luxury goods. The handle to open it was smooth metal. But no matter how hard she tried, the handle didn't budge at all. "Are the doors on your side opening?" Looking over her shoulder, she saw an open door and no March so she took that as a yes.

Following her, she didn't need much light to recognize what a bathroom was. And it was quite a high class one. Not just a big shower, a sink, a toilet, a small mirror at the wall and an enormous bathtub, easily big enough for two people, there was also some weird kind of machine in the back. Getting closer to it, Rin felt that it was giving off heat. A heater! It was some kind of high class bath, completely different from the showers they had.

"Thinking of taking a dip?" Seeing March looking at the bathtub with big eyes, the green Cure instantly stepped away.

"Not now." Leaving, thankful that Rouge couldn't see her nervous face in the dim light, Nao went into the next room. It was exactly the same thing. Two baths for four rooms apparently. "It's the same in here!" Shouting, Nao figured that if bathtubs was the only thing they were gonna find, it wasn't scary at all.

"I'm going downstairs, taking the stairs at the back end." Not waiting for any answer, Rin took a few steps, only to hear March catch up with her in a frenzy. "I'm not in the mood to make fun of you for being afraid alone but if you're going to stick with me, at least stay with me all the time."

"I'm not afrai-" Nao almost shrieked when Rin suddenly put out her flames. "Okay, I might be a little bad with ghosts and stuff that lurks in dark places, so turn the light back on." She didn't like Rouge.

Doing so and walking further down without any other comment, Rin repeated the process from earlier, spreading fire all over the place. "Now it's four and two rooms. And more stairs. Go check if the stairs at the other end lead up to where we came from. I'm going to check the rooms." The doors were slightly different, not quite as well made. She couldn't say anything about the inside since the doors refused to budge. Already suspecting another bathroom, Rin was proven right.

It was still similar to the ones from above but everything was smaller. The shower was still larger than the ones they had used before and there was a normally sized bathtub, but there was no heater. Sink, mirror and toilet were present and looked largely the same.

"The stairs lead exactly to where we came from." Nao had come back from scouting and was quite relieved to find no monsters or anything alive even."

"I'm willing to bet we'll find more rooms and bathrooms downstairs, complete with another set of stairs down." Not even bothering to check the second room, it was almost guaranteed the same anyway, Rin grabbed March by her hand and pulled her along. Quickly descending the stairs, Rin was half off.

"Two and one, and this time they're pretty far apart. Bigger ones? No stairs, though. Gateways instead. Wanna check the one room there or the gateways?" Not even bothering to think about opening the doors on the left, the side where all the closed rooms above were, Rin focused on mapping out this place.

"Taking the room." Deciding within a heartbeat, Nao wasn't thrilled to check out pitch black gateways.

"See you in a bit. If I don't come back, just run."

"Don't say things like that!" That didn't help making Nao feel any more secure. The few flame spheres Rouge had left on the ground were no brighter than a small campfire each so it was a continuous courage test for Nao.

Rin ignored her complaint and found that one gateway lead in a room with three more. And she felt a little ridiculed just looking around. The not quite familiar stone plate was there, all three of them, spread out. The gateway behind her led back to the rooms. To her right rested one of the smaller stone plates, directly on top of a large black door.

The door in the gateway ahead was red, showing the largest stone plate. To her left was a blue door. None of the stone plates had any carvings on them. But she did notice that there were more than before, fifteen flat. "Guess Lantern and the others were expected after all."

Unable to make any of the doors budge at all, Rin returned to where she had left March, who just left the single door to the right. "It's the shower room. The same one everyone was racing for earlier. It's smaller, only four cabins, but it's the same, I can tell."

"So we got poor people bathroom, middle class bathroom and rich people bathroom, conveniently all on different levels. I refuse to believe some mighty entity designed this. That is clearly someone's doing that understands people. Can't say I don't like it though."

"What about the gateway on the other end?" Nao pointed to the far end in front of her.

"Let's go." Pushing March in front of her, Rin already had a pretty good guess what was waiting for them.

"Should have bet on it. Three gateways. Left one is the dinner room plus kitchen, middle goes straight into nirvana, that means the labyrinth of rooms, and right... actually I have no idea." Right was the only side that led up some stairs. Following them, they walked at least five minutes before they both suspected an infinite stairway and a trap. Pushing ahead just a little more they finally emerged into what looked like a large dome, the whole place dimly lit by a very faintly yellow energy barrier cutting the dome in half. "I have no idea what this is for but we'll find out eventually. With all this walking around I think it's pretty safe to say we're out of trouble."

=== Dissonance ===

"Thank god we... found this room..." Urara was not the only one that was breathing hard. Luck was on their side. If not for that, they might have suffocated under the limitless tons of stone. The room wasn't sealed and seemingly connected to other places but it was difficult to tell without making someone go and look. "Everyone alive?"

"I am managing." Reika had overexerted herself on the last bit, hoping for a miracle. Ten minutes more and they might have been done for.

Nobody else bothered to answer, leaned against big rocks or pillars. A full five minutes passed in absolute silence, only huffing and puffing to be heard.

"This room... it should connect to the labyrinth. There should be a way to the base." Honoka was still recovering but forced herself up. She needed to see Nagisa, know that she was okay.

"We collapsed the entry point to the labyrinth. But I suppose we'll get through there quick enough with Beauty." Karen was impressed by her power.

"We don't know what the situation will be like at the base. Lemonade, can you take care of marking our trail?" Michiru was hoping that Mai and Saki were fine. She didn't know what to do if something had happened to them.

"If it's just that. Let's stop standing around and get going. We don't need to run so we can catch up on breathing on the way." Pulling Ako from her improvised bench, a broken pillar, Urara walked the back of the room where several sets of stairs converged.

Creating a never ending chain as she went on, the name labyrinth really was fitting. An endless array of rooms, hallways and stairs, much like what Rin and Marine must have seen when they did the first recon run two weeks ago. "Anyone else thinking that there has got to be some purpose to all of this?"

"From what Pine has told me, there seems to be a system in place that splits the present Cures into two equal teams, is that correct?" Reika had never let go of speaking incredibly formally and almost stoic when the topic was a serious affair.

"You sound like a robot. But yeah, that's right. We get split into two teams and duke it out in battles." Urara wasn't a fan of stoic types. Not purely stoic types that was.

"I suspect that our arrival has thrown this system in disarray. Out number has increased and so it will need to adjust. Could that not be the reason it underwent such a dramatic transmutation?" Reika looked around as she spoke, but there really was nothing to see.

"Sound theory. But there are some issues that prevent it from making it more than just a theory. For one, we are still together. We haven't been split up." Kaoru kept the theory in mind, considering that it was the closest thing to an explanation they had.

"Great job jinxing us." Urara wasn't in the best mood and that really started to show.

"There is no such thing as a jinx." Reika didn't believe in ghosts, especially not after a very annoying episode back when she was in middle school.

"Keep telling yourself that. And maybe you'll want to stop believing in magic too." Urara was hit hard on the back of her head. "Seriously, can you stop hitting me?"

"If you stop venting your bad mood on people that aren't in the least responsible and on top of that saved your life." Ako didn't like the yellow Cure when she was like this. It was the bottom of the barrel of her personality.

Unable to argue with that, Urara shut up and walked in silence. Karen was surprised that the tall black Cure had so much influence over her. Was it a unique type of charm? Or just physical attraction? Muse was quite good looking after all. But there was something bugging her. She couldn't quite place her finger on it, but there was something odd about Muse. But there were more important things to worry about.

"Down there." They had just passed a narrow hallway with multiple openings in the wall, both sides leading into complete darkness and potentially bottomless pits. Honoka had noticed the light source far in the distance, way below them. "I think it's worth the risk and go down there to check."

"Feels like I'm turning into public transportation. One lift, coming right up." Getting to the edge, Urara was overtaken by Reika, who simply created her unique road and started to slide down at breakneck speed. "I'm so pissed off right now." Lowering the chain, Urara contemplated just throwing one at Beauty, but Ako would be seriously pissed at her, so that wasn't really a good idea.

Using one of the walls between the openings as anchor, Urara proved that the chain was a secure way to get down by going ahead. "Goes down pretty damn far!" Shouting as loud as she could, she couldn't even see the upper most point where the chain vanished. "Damn, over fifty meters minimum. Pity Ako doesn't wear a skirt. This position..."

"Can you stop being fixated on my butt until we're somewhere private?" Trusting her partner, Ako had followed her right away instead of waiting for confirmation.

"I'll think about it." Seeing Ako's glare, Urara grinned. "Sorry, I don't think I'll be able to do it. It's too tempting." Dodging a purposely badly aimed slap, she grabbed her partners arm and pulled her back a few steps, just far enough for them to vanish in the dark, away from the chains dim light. "They can't see us and they're gonna be down here in a bit. Doesn't that excite you?"

Ako knew that denying it, lying, wasn't going to just go unnoticed but she still couldn't admit being a bit thrilled by the prospect of being found kissing or worse. "You know the answer to that."

Pulling her around, knowing exactly how much taller Ako was, the yellow Cure placed a fierce kiss on the girls lips. It lasted a few seconds before the black Cure resisted and pushed her away. It was impossible to tell but she just knew that Ako was blushing. "Stop making me repeat myself." Her voice was clearly a little shaken, as if she really had to convince herself that what she was saying was something she really meant.

A smug grin on her face, Urara licked over her lips. "Thanks for the meal." It was high time she got rid of her bad mood. And there was no better method than this.

"Are you some kind of harassment sucking vampire now?" Ako couldn't tell if she was playing along with it because she knew Urara was trying to improve her mood or if she was just doing it out of habit now.

Both of them stopped talking when White jumped down the last few meters. Using a chain to get down was safer than just jumping. Regardless of how strong they were, landing in some kind of abysmal pit wasn't going to be good for them and a big waste of time.

"The light is coming from that direction."

=== Dissonance ===

Rin and Nao had returned to the garden, telling everyone that it was safe outside. The complex and the entire base had changed drastically, rooms were locked and there was a mysterious dome connected to it now.

Next to the mirror that contained both Eclipse and Moonlight, both her team and Berry refused to budge even one centimeter. Erika was curious about the new base but no amount of curiosity would win over the friendship that connected her to Yuri.

Nozomi was nearby as well, staying there just in case something happened. Even though she was there for that purpose, it was incredibly difficult to say if she could even do anything if something really did happen. She knew what Nightmare had known but even the reflections had no idea what could happen in this scenario.

"Why do you meddle in the relationship Yuri has with my sister?" Erika couldn't stand letting things go unresolved. Ignoring the stern look on Tsubomi's face, Erika tried to be as peaceful as she could be, given the circumstances.

"Do you have any idea how lucky you are to find someone that matches you? Most people have to settle for less, some for much less. I can't do that, it's not in my character. And Yuri matches me."

"Look at you talking like you know everything about her. Yuri loves Momoka. Does she love you?"

"She loves someone who is going to get really hurt if she is ever attacked by an enemy of us Cures. You and Yuri can take a hit to the face from someone that breaks brick walls like they're made of cardboard. Can your sister?"

"Is that was this is all about? Her being worried about pulling Momoka into some sort of fight?" Erika was a little puzzled. The worry wasn't baseless but still...

"She lost her father, her fairy and even being a Cure for a time. You just told that Dream. It's really not that unusual for someone like that to worry about suffering even more losses."

"Yuri was often worried about her mother, even before she returned to being a Cure..." Tsubomi tried to keep her voice down, so only Erika could hear it.

"I know that!" Unintentionally shouting at her partner, Erika had problems keeping her temper in check. It had taken her time to really get along with Momoka and appreciate her as a loving sister. She didn't want her heart broken. "So what if she's worried about that! She can just protect her, and we're there too!"

"Who is there right now? Who protects her right now? Who guarantees you there isn't an enemy waiting for a moment to lay his hands on her? Can you protect her around the clock? What if the enemy is stronger than Yuri?"

Erika opened her mouth, closed it and opened it again but no words came out. Berry was making some valid points and she hated not being able to argue them. "That still doesn't mean you should steal Yuri away from Momoka!"

"Look, I understand if you hate me for taking Yuri away from your sister, but that isn't going to make me stop. For the first time I'm thinking about something that isn't my work more than anything else."

"I didn't take you for someone to believe in love at first sight."

"Who said anything about that? I'm not arrogant enough to think I know enough about her to say I love her. She's attractive, elegant, graceful, so she's physically desirable but that isn't enough for love. What I want is to be with her so I can love someone. Because I don't think I'm ever going to find someone like her again." Miki wasn't going to give up. This wasn't the first time there were big obstacles in her way. And she always pulled through.

"That sure is selfish of you, ruining the happiness of two others for your own."

"Your sister may be happy but what about Yuri? She might love her, so much even that she wants to give up her own happiness for a time to protect her. Look around you and tell me, how many of us Cures are in relationships with normal people? I can't think of anyone but Yuri and it shows. She is dealing with a lot. What do you think she feels like when she has to lie to your sister about where she was whenever she does something as Moonlight? I can't imagine it's a nice feeling. Trying to keep them together with considering what Yuri is really feeling isn't any less selfish!"

Glaring at each other and seemingly about to have a go at it, Tsubomi defused the situation by holding up her hand. "That's enough you two. It's up to Yuri in the end, right? Both of you have to accept whatever she decides."

"Tsubomi!" Erika was surprised that her partner wouldn't support her cause.

"Erika, I love you but I think you're being a bit overprotective of Momoka. She's an adult. We all are. Even if Yuri won't be with her anymore doesn't mean she'll be depressed and sad forever."

Lowering her head and facing the ground, Erika resolved herself to try and accept what would happen. Some things couldn't be solved by just effort and talent. "I give up. Just don't expect me to be all friendly with you if Yuri decides to date you!" Sticking out her tongue and getting up, Erika needed some time to cool off. Tsubomi quickly followed her, but not without bowing to Berry once.

"She just really loves her sister. She'll stop being hostile at some point, she isn't the type to hold grudges." Itsuki had been quiet for the entire discussion, not wanting to meddle in what looked like a rather personal argument.

"I would have preferred Yuri not to have a girlfriend already. It would save all of us a lot of trouble. It doesn't feel good taking Yuri from Marine's sister but I think she would have made that decision even without me eventually. Just don't tell her that."

"How did you grab Eclipse in all that chaos anyway?" Itsuki had yet not understood how Berry had managed that.

"When everything went to hell during Nightmare's attack I somehow managed to get away with Yuri. Maybe it was luck or maybe I was subconsciously drawn there but I ran right across Eclipse some distance away from the base. I understand why they left her there, probably under attack. It was pretty difficult to get away carrying both of them. They're as tall as I am after all."

"If you hadn't found her, she would've been absorbed by Nightmare. Did you fight off all the roots that came for her?"

"When I ran into a dead end with the roots right behind me, I just put them in the corner and destroyed those tentacles as many times as I had to. I don't know how many I destroyed but I knew I wouldn't last forever. So I destroyed part of the ceiling, grabbed them and hid. I don't know if it was luck or Dream but the roots stopped trying to get to her."

"I wonder how long she is going to be like that?" Hibiki felt the conversation go into a rather gloomy direction but she didn't quite know how to get it away from that. The situation was gloomy after all.

As if it was a command for Yuri to come out, an enormous crack sprung through the mirror, top to bottom, a screeching noise so loud and intense that it forced them on the ground, desperately trying to shield their ears. The air smelled of molten iron and fire, different to earlier and when the mirrors had first shown up.

"What the hell?!" Miki couldn't move, the noise reaching all the way to her core, shaking her mind and body. She had never experienced pain quite like that. The sound was ringing inside her head, her eyes starting to turn read. That wasn't just any noise, it was physically damaging her.

A second crack appeared and the noise skipped for half a second, only to return with double the force and added physical backlash. The mirror was now emitting an almost storm like wind, pushing the Cures away. The entire garden was shaken by the wind, trees bending, grass pushed to the ground, the water shaking and the Cures unable to stay even close to the object.

Several smaller cracks followed, the screeching noise turning into a horrible wail of terror, something that seemed to come straight out of a gate to the worst hell they could imagine. Silence that was no more real than the sudden silence a big bomb caused reached through the garden, vanquishing the wail for no more than a second.

With one last horrendous, inhuman noise that lasted several seconds, the mirror burst into thousands of shards violently enough to spread the glass more than a dozen meters in every direction, Moonlight or Eclipse falling out of the space in-between, weak but conscious, scratches and small cuts all over her arms and legs.

Miki could barely see through the red haze her eyes were showing her, but she recognized Yuri just about twenty meters away. Trying to get up was completely futile, her body refusing to do anything that resembled movement. "Yuri..."

Standing only for a brief moment, the silver Cure fell to her knees, unable to keep standing. She wasn't injured that badly physically but extremely exhausted. "My head..." Grabbing her forehead, Yuri's expression was quite a painful one. "What... what happened?"

"Yuri... it's you, right?" Miki was dragged herself over, holding her arm and limping a little. Forcing herself to walk, no matter how slowly, and ignore the dangerous warnings her muscles were trying to give, she still couldn't see very well through the red haze.

"Miki?" She was completely disorientated. "Where... am I? When is this? I..." Remembering the last thing from before her mind had sealed itself away out of fear, her eyes opened wide and she covered on the ground. For the blue Cure it was a shocking thing to see the proud and strong Yuri act like that. "No... I didn't kill them... I didn't kill them..." Repeating those four words over and over, she would not stop even when Miki knelt down next to her, grabbing and then holding her.

When shaking and talking did not work, Miki collected the last bit of strength she had left and slapped Yuri. The shock of suddenly being hit was enough to snap her out of her lingering delusion. "Miki?" It was always as if her mind was reset to the state of a minute ago. "How did I... get here?"

Fainting right after she asked that, Yuri still seemed far from fine. But she had recognized her. It was definitely not Eclipse. Relieved, the adrenaline faded and so did her consciousness. The red haze thickened and she passed out just sitting there, slowly rocking from one side to the other.

=== Dissonance ===

"See, I told you about jinxes." Urara slammed her fist against the energy barrier. They had come out in a huge dome. It was an empty space, like a upturned bowl with nothing inside. And someone shoved a large board inside the middle.

"Don't be ridiculous. We just have to go around or break through one of the walls." Kaoru wouldn't concede on the existence of something like jinxes from one coincidence.

"And collapse the whole dome. You heard it from me first." Urara shrugged and pointed at a few random spots at the walls. "Let's blast through there and there and there. To make sure we'll collapse the whole thing in one go."

Kaoru was really starting to feel pissed off now. And to make it even worse, doubt that it really would happen now, after that stupid woman said so, was popping up in the back of her mind. "So what would you have us do?"

"To use your ears." Pointing over her shoulder, towards the other side of the barrier, Urara hadn't missed it. The noise of people talking in the distance and running around. It was no more than faint echos and if not specifically looking for that, it was too easy to miss. "The others are on the other side of this thing."

"I am surprised you managed to notice that. I am trying to hear them and I still cannot make out anything out of the ordinary." Reika's hearing wasn't bad by any means but it was not exceptional either.

Only Ako and Karen seemed to be able to hear the noises, both of them giving each other a meaningful look. They knew Urara well enough to realize that she would use this to brag for a while. "So how do we get over there?"

"The easy way. We go back to where we came from. It's easy to break a couple walls and come out on the other side." Sometimes simple solutions were best. Judging by the distance they traveled and the directions they took they walked past the dome and almost around it from where they had started.

"It's worth a try. In the worst case scenario we just lose time." Inori was with Lemonade this time. Forcefully breaking through in a place like this should be their last resort.

"Speak of the devil, someone is coming up." Impatiently waiting for whoever was ascending the stairs to reach the top, Urara got as close to the barrier as she could.

Sighing the moment she saw who it was, Urara was at least thankful that Ako wasn't crazy in the same way as Rhythm. That Marine would show up wasn't exactly optimal. "Look who's here." Trying to be as nonchalant as possible, Urara enjoyed the surprised look on Erika's face.

"How did you get over there?"

"That's the first thing you ask? No 'you're alright!' or 'Thank god you're all okay'?" A little disappointed that her reaction, the situation got more bothersome when Blossom showed up as well, apparently chasing after her partner.

"I knew you would be alright. Can't think of anything but another Nightmare that would take you all down."

"Erika, wait for... everyone! You're alright!" Tsubomi didn't quite understand why Urara started laughing and several others showed at least smiles, one or two giggling. "What, what, did I say something weird?"

"No, just... anyway, I'm going out on a limb here and say you came here through the labyrinth, right?"

"Miss. The base was completely remodeled and that stairway connects right to the lowest floor. I think there is another path that goes straight into the labyrinth though." Forgetting why she was even here in the first place, to cool down from fighting with Berry, Erika felt quite relieved to see them all alive.

"The base was remodeled? Like, restructured?" Urara didn't quite know what iteration of remodeled Marine was using.

"The garden is on the fourth floor now. Below that are three floors of locked rooms and bathrooms. Kitchen and stuff is all on the first floor."

"Sounds like the designers of this place went and had a touch up course in architecture. What do you mean, locked rooms? We can't get into our own rooms?"

"I'm not sure those are even our rooms. They're locked but it would make sense I guess. What's on the other side of this?"

"Pointless labyrinth." Michiru didn't really feel like walking all the way back but it sure beat risking another cave in. Suffocating once a day was more than plenty for her.

"Not anymore." Honoka pointed to where the entrance had been. It didn't look any different until the white Cure threw a sphere of energy in the direction, revealing a stairway where there had been just a hallway before. "I don't believe an explanation is necessary."

"Wonderful, just wonderful. 'nother base, no doubt. So we're back to the two teams thing. Who was it that was talking about splitting us up again? Because I sure would like to teach that person about the influence of jinxes." Clenching her fist, Urara stepped towards Kaoru, ready to blow off some steam.

"We're six over here and they're twenty-five over there." Michiru quickly added up numbers, counting Moonlight and Eclipse as separate entities, not knowing that one of them had ceased to be.

"Do you two just not realize that spelling out the problems that stop us from being split up into two teams again is going to make exactly that happen? Are you doing it on purpose? Tell me, it's driving me nuts!" Urara's patience was quickly running out.

Her words didn't go unheard and within five seconds of her outburst, a brief painful sting hit the right hand of everyone present. Covering her eyes with the same hand, Urara became quiet for a few seconds, slowly starting to laugh, her voice getting louder and louder.

Grabbing her partners hand and quickly pulling her away from Bright and Windy, avoiding having her jump at them. Urara was not very pleased with that idea. "Let me go Ako! I'm going to stuff their big mouths with fist!"

"Don't be stupid. We're all exhausted as is, I don't need you to start a fight." Not letting go of Urara's hand, Ako held her right hand next to Urara's. "Different ones. If we are getting split up again I... want to spend the time we have until then together."

"Always playing hard to get and when-" Urara didn't even get to finish teasing her before the black Cure turned away in annoyance and let go of her.

"You know what, forget it. I must be crazy to think you would be serious for a moment." Whatever she was thinking of saying next became irrelevant to her the moment her partner embraced her from behind, both of Urara's arms tightly wrapped around her waist, her hair tickling Ako's neck.

A little distance away from those two, the remainder of the group had split into two, all those with the same symbols grouping together. Honoka, Inori and Reika formed the smaller group, the three of them a faintly glowing sun symbol on the back of their right hands.

"I don't think there is any doubt as to what is going on here." Honoka sighed and held her hand up so Karen, a few meters away, could see it. "Those with the sun symbol are likely the light team."

Holding up her own hand, Karen showed Honoka the equally faintly glowing crescent moon symbol on the backside of her own hand. "That makes those with the moon symbol the dark team."

They had barely finished talking when the barrier in the middle of the room flashed briefly and separated, now covering only both of the entrance points to the dome. "The odds of all of this being coincidence are minuscule. It appears that someone or something is observing us and acting accordingly." Reika looked towards the entrance they had come from. The moon symbol was shining brightly over the exit. "And that appears to be the side we will belong to. It seems likely that we will find a base beyond the exit."

"Honoka, try to leave through the moon gate. I bet it won't let you." Karen wasn't too happy with being split up again, especially if it meant being apart from Komachi.

"Is that really something we need to confirm? It's pretty obvious at this point." Honoka didn't want to walk into any incinerating barriers or something, even though it was unlikely to do anything but block her path.

Inori had walked over to Blossom and Marine in the mean time, the pink Cure clinging to her partner and making an annoyed face. "Different teams?" Walking up to them and starting a brief conversation, Inori figured that they all would be stuck in this quasi prison until the teams fully separated. That meant sending someone from the light team down and gathering all those with a moon symbol.

"I don't want to be separated from Erika!" She had finally gotten Erika back from Ember and now they were to be separated again? What did she do to deserve that?

"We don't know what this is going to be like now. It's no longer as simple as before so you might be able to get back together soon. Blossom, the others are all in the light base, right?"

"I don't think anyone wandered off into the labyrinth so they should be all there."

"We're not getting anywhere until we sorted this out. At least I believe so. I'm thankful it's not forcibly separating us without giving us some time."

Leaving the two, Tsubomi remembered why they were out here to begin with. "Should I go back and see if Yuri is doing okay?"

"No, stay with me. If we're going to be separated I want to spend the time until then with you." Grinning and kissing Tsubomi fiercely, Erika wasn't bothered at all by the fact that the others could see them.

=== Dissonance ===

"What about Berry and Yuri? They're out cold." All of the others had already noticed the two symbols that had appeared on their hands. Itsuki was talking to Inori while Hibiki was pouting a few meters away. She would end up on the other team. How unfair was that?

"Miki belongs to this side so we only need to take Moonlight. Miki won't like it but there isn't much we can do. She will have to switch teams first chance she gets."

"I'll take her then. Hibiki, are you coming?" Looking at her partner, Itsuki wasn't really worried. Hibiki got less credit than she deserved for being able to take care of herself. A few days on a different team wasn't going to kill her.

"It's stupid. Why do we have to get separated?"

"Just think about the time right after we get back together. You know what I'm talking about, right?" Ignoring the slightly funny look Inori was giving her, Itsuki enjoyed the blushing face of the younger girl.

"You're like a dirty old man." Complaining while smiling, Hibiki left with the yellow Cure without another complaint.

Checking the garden, nobody but Miki was left. Because of the lack of being able to enter rooms, she was sleeping on one of the benches. She'd be sore later but it beat sleeping on the ground.

Everyone else had moved to the dome already and it was high time she went there as well. Passing all three stairs and ascending the one that led to the dome, the atmosphere was quite heated. A lot of people were really annoyed that they were being split from their partner. But Inori was looking for someone as well. And it didn't take her long to find her.

"Love." In the quasi dark of the dome, it became relatively obvious who belonged to which side. A few minutes after the first Cures had gone to the dome, the moon symbol changed its color into a faint blue, the sun symbol a bright red. "What are you doing?" Finding her close friend tickling Setsuna, she figured that being apart was not going to make either of them all depressed.

"Setsuna and Ellen are going to the moon team so we're having fun for a bit before it's time." Switching from calling it the light and dark team, the reason they were in this place to begin with the origin of those names, to the sun and moon team seemed just more fitting, considering they were being separated based on those symbols.

"Miki and me are on the sun team too, so if you get too lonely we'll play with you." Noticing Ellen's surprised look, she quickly clarified things. "I didn't mean it like that, don't worry." Unable to stop herself from grinning at Ellen's habit of misunderstanding things.

Not too far behind her was the mood not quite as good. Akane was arguing with Nao while Reika tried to mediate between the two. Yayoi was with Miyuki, the two of them exchanging comments on everyone else around them. "This is going to be a great place to gather material." Pretending to laugh quietly like a villain, Yayoi received a scolding look from her assistant.

"You really shouldn't always use people you know as doujinshi material." Miyuki would never refuse to help with Yayoi's work but she felt a bit awkward when she looked over pages that clearly depicted characters, looking very much like her best friends, having sex.

"It makes it more real, Miyuki. Look over there, at Peach and her miniature harem! Don't you think they would make for a great work?" Saying those things with starry eyes always made Miyuki feel a bit embarrassed. She still remembered the always crying Yayoi from when she first transferred to their school and now...

"And over there, that white Cure with the red one? The white looks younger and she's totally clinging to her. I bet she's a yandere." Yayoi threw mangaka specific terms around like everyone in the world had to know them. Miyuki knew a lot, due to her working with Yayoi often, but she still didn't think it was a good idea to use them to actually talk about real people.

"Yandere are really crazy people, Yayoi. You shouldn't assume she's like that." Miyuki had read about them a little bit but since Yayoi rarely drew characters like that, she had little exposure to them.

Both of them looked up in confusion when something like a bell rung three times from the ceiling. There was no visible source of the sound though. "What was-" Miyuki didn't finish her sentence before the ground in the center of the area started to rise, everyone quickly backing away from it. The noise of stone moving made any attempt to talk, short of shouting in someone's ear, useless.

Rising up more than ten meters, the sides of the small elevated spot started to change again, transforming rough wall into neat and smooth stairs. Not quite finished yet, the elevation created a small table and two chairs on either side of the table, all made of the stone like material. As everyone had their attention focused on it, it was easy to notice two thick, identical books dropping from the ceiling and landing on the table.

Confusion was wide spread among the Cures until Honoka, for the sun team, and Karen, for the moon team, ascended either side of the elevation. Considering the events up until now, they thought it natural that this was meant for one representative of each side. The stairs bode no danger or trap and both girls arrived safely at the top. It was more spacious than they had assumed. Looking at the book, it had the word 'Guide' written in thick golden letters on a red leather like binding.

"I'm starting to feel like I'm being made fun of." Honoka opened the book and was greeted by an actual index of contents. "This was definitely made by someone who knows human civilization."

"Organization of rooms... negotiation options... battle instructions..." Karen read the first three lines of the index. Quickly flipping ahead twenty pages to the negotiation options, she was greeted by a thorough explanation of what she assumed was the system that ran this place. The first two paragraphs alone mentioned many things she was sure they could not influence before. Trying to pick the book up, Karen was unable to remove it from the table. She could move it across the surface fine, open and close it easily but trying to take it seemed impossible.

"Honoka! Everything alright? What's with the books?!" Nagisa was shouting from below.

"Look." Taking a step back, Karen watched the center part of the table morph again, rising slowly until it appeared like a small wall, just high enough to prevent them from seeing each other should they sit down. But that was not all. What had been suspicious and theory was now proof. Words appeared on the small walls, slowly, as if someone carved them in by hand. There was something sentient, someone that understood humans and their minds, controlling the complex.

"Familiarize yourself with the Guide. In one human hour, you will be put to use the knowledge you have gathered." The words remained for roughly twenty seconds, more than enough to read them twice or thrice even. "The time to separate is now. Gather all of your kind at the doorstop to your home. This place, the Audience Hall, will be meeting ground for all." Another twenty seconds passed before the words erased themselves again.

Having messed with the system once and that resulting in a horrible battle that might well have cost some their lives, both Honoka and Karen were sure that it was not a good idea to resist the command, even though no threat had been mentioned.

"I know this is sudden but we need to hurry up with the team split. It is pretty clear now that someone is controlling this environment and it asked us separate. In one hour, something is going to happen and we need to know what we're dealing with then. I'm staying here with Aqua to read this book, which is a guide to everything around here."

Honoka could be quite loud when she needed to and there was little doubt that what she said was the truth. Despite a lot of complaints and general unhappiness, the Cures separated and went to their respective exit.

"Isn't Black on a different team? Shouldn't you go down?" Karen looked down and waved to Komachi, who had a gentle look on her face. A week ago she might have fretted about leaving Karen's side, but she knew that being separated for a while would only make her appreciate the blue Cure even more when they got back together.

"Nagisa often acts like a teenager but in situations like this she knows what to do. I can count on her. She'll be really clingy when she or I changed teams, though." Sitting down, Honoka started to read the guidebook.

Karen followed her example. They had one hour to learn as much as possible. It was well within reason to read the whole thing during that time. "It's quite different from the breakneck explanation we got when we first arrived, isn't it?" Karen tried to memorize everything she read. Considering the book could not be removed, if she had to come to the dome every time she needed to look something up, it would be quite bothersome. If she could even come back.

"I just hope things like Nightmare won't happen again." Honoka really had no intention of ever seeing something like that again.

=== Dissonance ===

Nagisa found herself a little depressed and pretty annoyed. After the whole mess with Saki and Mai, the reflections and everything, she ended up on a different team than Honoka. Looking around the base, Nagisa was the first to run into one of the new mechanisms. Having walked past most of the doors and just on her way to the garden, one of the doors on the third level reacted to her. Standing in front of the door that was further away from the stairway connecting the third level to the garden caused a symbol on the wall to lit up, right next to the wooden frame of the door. Glowing in a faint black light, it was an upturned heart inside a circle. It only appeared when she stood right in front of the door so she knew it had to belong to her.

Cautiously trying to open the door, she found herself actually able to do so. Without a creak, the door swung open and revealed a very comfortable room, completely unlike those she had before.

Easily four times as big as the previous rooms, a thick and fluffy carpet with a simple pattern covered the floor. Two beds, one at each far corner of the room, with a large but thin wooden screen between them, likely to grant privacy. Each bed had a reasonably sized drawer next to it, a chest at the foot end, and a large closet roughly at the middle point of the wall. The close corner of the room each had a chair and a small table in front of a big mirror. It was, by her standards, a luxurious room.

The same symbol she had seen on the outside was carved into the large wooden frame of the bed multiple times. It was her mark, definitely. An upturned heart wasn't that bad. At least it wasn't tacky.

Checking the other bed, Nagisa felt like she should recognize the other symbol. But more pressing than that was the room was clearly designed for two people, and not a couple at that. If she ended up sharing a room with someone she didn't know well... that would be really awkward.

Laying down on her bed, it was so incredibly comfortable, she could have just fallen asleep right away. The mattress was big and soft and even smelled nicely clean. The pillow was almost too big for just herself. "This is heaven."

The reaction of the Cure occupying the room directly below her wasn't all that different. Setsuna had found her room, a four-leaf clover with the card suit icon of the club being her mark. It was still at least one and a half times as big as the room she had before, the bed was much more comfortable and a bit bigger, she had a small closet and drawer. There was a nice, but small, carpet in front of her bed as well. Ellen wasn't with her, still trying to find her own room.

Judging by the number of rooms available it was pretty obvious that at least some of the rooms were designed for more than one person. Did the system simply anticipate that many Cures were in intimate relationships and thus slept in the same room? Or was there something else to it?

Putting the pillow, whose softness she very much liked, back on the bed, she left her room, noticing that the door closed automatically and her mark started to glow above the frame. Going to the upper level, she found Marine coming out of the room closest to the garden, a mark glowing brightly to the left of the frame as she left. Did the mark mean that the person living in the room was not home? That was certainly an obvious way to tell if someone slept in their own room.

Reaching the bottom floor, there was quite the turmoil. Spotting Ellen behind a group of arguing Cures, Setsuna could already guess what had happened there. Getting closer, the loudest Cure by far was Rouge, who was shouting at Sunshine. "And you don't find it awkward at all to sleep in the same room as me? Are you serious?"

Rin knew what had happened between Melody and Kanade and even though it was Kanade's own fault for being really stupid, she couldn't help but want to defend her in front of Melody's girlfriend. She was more annoyed at herself than anything else.

"Look, I don't care what you do with Kanade. It's none of my business. We just sleep in the same room. It's not like we have our partners with us." Itsuki couldn't care less about having to share a room with Rouge. Being separated from Hibiki did annoy her somewhat but there were some things that couldn't be helped. If anything, it was a good test of how much she longed to be with her.

"You are both behaving like children. Based on the marks, we have to share this room for sleep and other matters. Aqua has not returned from the dome so we do not know how to change rooms. You need to stop making an issue out of nothing." Michiru was quite annoyed that Kaoru had gotten her own room while she was stuck with those two.

Sneaking up to Ellen and quietly pulling her away from the mess, Setsuna wondered what that was all about. "What are they arguing about?"

"There are only two rooms down here. One for three and one for four. They're... well, they're quite simple." Ellen didn't want to be rude but the rooms really were very plain. The room for three resembled the rooms from before very closely. There was one normal bed and one bunk bed, accommodating two Cures. The room was at least twice as big as the rooms before though so it was not completely horrible. Beyond the beds and a very small table, there was nothing of note. The beds were plain but moderately comfortable.

The other room was truly bad on the other hand. Two bunk beds and the room was not any bigger than the room for three, possibly even smaller. The beds were not exactly comfortable and the ground was rougher than next door over. Compared to the rooms of the second level, the ones down on the bottom floor looked quite poor indeed.

Ellen opened the room she was supposed to live in and it was even worse than what Setsuna imagined. There was no way she could let Ellen sleep in a place like that. Not only was it cramped, but there was hardly any space. It was almost like a prison cell. "You're sleeping in my room." Grabbing her partners hand, Setsuna took her away from the argument that was being cooled by Muse's presence now. They had all seen what Silence did during the attack led by Poison. They had a certain respect of her now.

Nao and Yayoi both watched from a fair distance, the latter finally getting the courage together to walk past the doors and see if they reacted to her in some way. And just like she expected, as the new girls, she ended up in the worst room. Her mark, two lips forming a smile with a lightning bolt striking through them, was on the lower left side of the room. Disappointed that she was going to start out in the poor people room, Yayoi waved Nao over.

The green Cure's mark was also two lips forming a smile, with a tornado striking through them. Both of their marks were glowing in black light as they stood in front of it. Nao's symbol was the lower right. Going inside, they tried to have the mindset of making the most of it, but it was really hard to keep that up when confronted with a situation like that. "I wonder if the others had more luck." Nao didn't like the thought of Reika and Akane having to sleep in such a room. Miyuki had proven time and time again that she could sleep anywhere so that wasn't that big a problem.

"We just got here and haven't done anything useful so I think they're going to be all in the same boat as us." Yayoi was basing that on manga logic, since a lot of other things had already fallen in place with that.

The door that had closed behind them opened and a purple Cure they had seen only briefly before stepped into the room. "You two also got the short straw?" Kurumi already missed her own room. At least she had some privacy there.

"It could be worse. We could be sleeping in the garden." Yayoi thought about that for a few seconds. "Actually, depending on how cold it gets there that might not really be any worse."

"I'm March, she's Peace." Introducing herself and her teammate, Nao tried to be polite.

"Milky Rose, just call me Rose or Kurumi." Looking at the beds, Kurumi found her mark, a blade emerging from a rose, on the left upper bunk. "I hope I don't fall..."

"You've been here for a while, right? I totally forgot asking Nagisa this but... what do you do when you're not... uh, doing what you need to do?" Yayoi wasn't keen on just laying around all day.

"Until before we got into the mess with the reflections and Nightmare, we used to pass time by playing cards, enjoying the garden or playing other stuff. There is no TV or electricity here... although I think you could buy batteries."

"You buy things with... what was it called?" Nao had something specific she wanted as soon as possible.

"Favor. You get some after a battle. I only have about twenty left. I guess since both of you are completely new, you don't have any."

"Say... what do you do about clothes? I've only seen everyone walk around as Cure so far but that's not normally the case, right?" She wanted a change of clothes, especially a change of underwear. Best, six changes. And a washing machine. Nao was quite clean when it came to those things.

"We really do walk around as Cures all day. You get used to it really quickly since everyone does it. Clothes probably cut into your favor pool pretty badly so I haven't seen anyone do it."

"Nagisa or Peach sure won't need clothes. I bet they sleep naked, they got partners after all." Yayoi had a smug grin on her face. It made perfect doujinshi material.

Nao wanted to retort by saying that she didn't sleep naked with Reika or Akane but the more she thought about it the more she realized that she did sleep naked after having sex with either. Not saying anything, Nao just let her head hang.

=== Dissonance ===

"You're supposed to live in this piece of shit room? Wow Nozomi, you really pulled through there." Urara had already found her room, the one closest to the garden on the uppermost level. And she was sharing it with Luminous. Egret was one of the two in the room next door and she didn't know the other one yet.

"Don't say it like that. I didn't pick this!" A little devastated that she was going to spend the night in such a crammed and hopeless place, Nozomi took a little comfort in being able to meet three of the new Cures. They were all stuck in the four bed room as well.

"Oh my, it seems we've been put at the bottom of the comfort hierarchy." Reika was used to rough living standards. She couldn't count the instances of when she had slept just simply on the ground after being exhausted from chasing after criminals all day.

"This ain't funny Reika! Nao's gone 'n we're stuck in this room that smells like poverty!" Akane already longed for her soft bed at home. Having the top bunk over Reika, she felt like it was going to be really annoying to sleep with so many others in the same room. Not that she minded Miyuki or Reika, but that other pink Cure...

Leaving the room, trying to calm down a bit, Akane was followed by Miyuki. "You glanced at Dream a whole lot. You don't trust her?" Miyuki could be pretty sensible. She talked quietly enough to not let Dream hear her either.

"Ya saw her wreck everythin' didn't ya? She healed Yayoi's arm like that's the easiest thing in the world, too! Don't ye think she's a lil' too strong?"

"She doesn't look intimidating at all now, though."

"That's true but..."

"You should give her a chance. She seems like a really good person."

"That's only because you have rose colored glasses on, Miyuki."

"Meanie!" Turning around, she saw White come down the stairs from the dome. Judging by the speed of her walking, she was in a hurry.

Seeing the two of them, Honoka didn't bother to stop but instead shouted what she needed to say. "Happy, Sunny, get everyone you can find and tell them to come to the dinning room.

Time had flown by and little more than ten or fifteen minutes remained before the announced hour was over. At least her sense of time was telling her that. She really needed to trade some favor in for a clock.

Going around and rounding up everyone she found, it took no more than a few minutes to gather everyone together in the dinning hall. Up in front, some Cures sitting in the chairs, a few others standing, Honoka started to address everyone. "I'll start with a very important thing first. Most of what we got used to no longer applies. The entire system has been rebuilt which is what some of us experienced earlier."

"Who rebuilt it?" Urara wanted to kick the ass of whoever was responsible for this mess.

"We don't know. But it is something or someone that understands humans. I'll explain the system that governs who lives in which room first. The total count of favor ever earned in battle determines the quality of the rooms we live in. As some of you might have noticed, the bowls with favor are not in our rooms." Holding out her hand, her palm towards the ceiling, Honoka demonstrated the new process. A small leather bag materialized in her hand. "You simply think about wanting to hold your favor and the bag will appear. There are two values inscribed on the bag." Holding the bag up and showing two identical numbers, Honoka's bag dematerialized. "If you no longer need it, you simply think about that. The two numbers update upon summoning it and represent both current favor and favor accumulated in total."

"So the more someone fights, the better someone fights the more favor she gets and the better the room she gets. It's a giant rig to make us compete with each other over the best rooms, isn't it?" Urara was one of the few that were standing, her arms crossed and her expression annoyed.

"In essence, yes. However, the housing only updates every three battles and when someone changes teams. However, the housing only changes for those that change teams unless it is also the day the housing changes. There is no longer any restriction to fighting battles in a row. There is also the option to volunteer for a fight, however, that is restricted to one time every two days."

"It is trying to keep things fair." Mai was sitting close to Honoka, not too happy about this new turn of developments.

"The biggest in housing is that it is impossible to enter someone's room without their permission. Unless the Cure occupying the room unlocks the door, to which we are the keys ourselves, there is no way to break through."

"How come my total favor is equal to what I got now? I know I made more than this." Urara had already gotten the hang of making the bag appear and disappear at will.

"The total favor earned was likely initialized when the system was rebuilt. That covers the big changes regarding the housing. The next big change is regarding the negotiations. There are no restrictions as to who can hold them. One specific person could handle negotiations for the entirety of our stay here. Whoever holds negotiations will have their mark lit up on the stone tablet in front of the blue door."

"So where is the big change? Doesn't sound any different than usual." Urara kept asking, not patient enough to just sit around and wait for White to get to the point.

"In the options. According to the guide, we can negotiate many more details of how the battle is setup. Number of combatants, the battle area itself, a time limit, special rules and options. The guidebook contained a full list of options available and it filled over ten pages. Depending on what we chose, the favor earned will increase or decrease. A battle with the special rule 'Heightened Power' will give everyone participating a ten percent bonus on favor gain. A battle with the special rule 'Heightened Defense' will decrease the favor gained."

"So they exist to make us generate even more energy. How many of those special rules and options are there?" Inori was curious about the full extend. It did sound like it was going to be very complicated.

"There are over sixty. I was unable to memorize them all for now. One of the most important parts of the negotiation and battle changes is that there is an option to make a battle go through multiple rounds and the ability to substitute one participant for another by relinquishing the right to earn favor. It allows someone to take the place of a fighter, however, they will not be able to earn any favor. This can only be done once per non-combatant every three days."

"The winner being whoever wins two of three first or three of five? Something like that?" Love was just guessing at this point.

"Exactly like that. There are three options for this, two out of three, three out of five and five out of nine. That about covers the changes to the battle system. The last part is the exile and the exchange of team members."

"I have heard this mentioned before, but what specifically is 'the exile'?" Reika figured that she had not been told the full truth.

"A punishment room of sorts. You're haunted by your worst nightmares if you get stuck outside the bases during an exchange. At least that is what it used to be." Inori had not experienced it herself but there was no real need to.

"That no longer applies as it was. The current teams are an even number so the exile as is has been abolished. The exchange of members is now handled inside the big dome. In the case of multiple people that want to go, they have to pass through the labyrinth and only the first to reach the goal will change teams. In the case of no volunteers, a reverse of the race is held, the one to pass the goal last having to change teams. This applies independently of what the other team does."

Taking a quick break, Honoka knew that the next point would be an uncomfortable one. "The exile as it was before no longer exists. The exile will always be the one person that has gained the least amount of favor. The battles always start in the afternoon of a day and after being healed, the Cure that has gained the least amount of favor will be locked in exile until the next day starts. I imagine this to be roughly eight to ten hours as opposed to a full day as it was before. I'm sure we all feel this is unnecessary but whoever rebuilt this place thought otherwise. We can do little about it. While someone is in exile, their room remains with their team and they also remain part of their team. They are returned to their room after midnight."

Despite her expectations, there were not a lot of complaints. It was considerably shorter than before and it did instill the motivation to fight as hard as possible. "The dome will remain accessible. While the barrier has reappeared in the center of it, it is possible to go there and talk and see the members of the other team. Passing the barrier is impossible, though. There is one last thing that needs explaining and that is the option of alternative favor gain. It was a fairly complex system so I'll try to keep it as simple as possible.

"If both teams unanimously agree to enter a state of alternative favor gain, the entire complex will be converted for a unspecified period of time. In theory, it is impossible to say what exactly will happen but the guide implied that we will be going through notions that are not battling to generate energy and favor. It costs both teams and every member three quarters of their favor to initiate this and we won't be able to return to normal unless we do whatever is required to clear the initiated conversion. There is also a limit of doing this only once after every seven fights."

Miyuki was trying really hard to wrap her head around what White just said but she had trouble putting things together. Akane's confused expression told her that she was experiencing the same problem. It didn't come as a surprise that Reika seemed completely fine.

"To demonstrate this new system, Aqua and I will be holding the first negotiation. We were given small restrictions on what we can use. The combat participants are already decided. It is a seven versus seven battle. Those of you who occupy the rooms on the lowest floors, please prepare yourself."

"There is a problem with this, White. Miki is one of the people down here and so is Dream. Neither of them are in condition to fight." Love quickly put that out there, not wanting to see Miki get hurt even more.

"We will need two substitutes for them. Any volunteers?"

"I'll take Nozomi's place." Komachi, despite disliking the fighting, felt indebted to Nozomi for many things. One battle wasn't going to be any problem.

"Guess I'll take Miki's place then." Love was looking forward to fighting side by side with Inori again. It had been a while.

"That settles that." Honoka felt relieved that everything went over that easily. She had expected the new girls to make a big fuss upon learning of the exile but apparently they didn't quite understand what it was like. "I'm heading to the negotiation shortly. Considering that those who battle have very little favor to begin with, I will try to find conditions that improve the final gain."

"Don't turn it into a smash 'n mash fest." Urara threw that out before she turned around and headed towards the dome. If she could see Ako, maybe her mood would improve. Considering that she couldn't touch her, though, maybe it would also worsen it.

With little time left, Honoka left the other Cures to themselves, some returning to look at their rooms some more, others going to the dome or the garden, and proceeded to the blue gate. Her mark, a heart glowing in a gentle light, was illuminated on the stone plate, signaling that she was the one to handle negotiations next.

The different types of mist had been explained in the book as well. They could be summarized as battle enhancer, improved reasoning and heightened sense of urgency for red, blue and yellow, the last one present in the labyrinth runs to determine the people who had to switch teams.

Even the way to open the gate was outlined in the book. Putting her hand on the massive door, a bigger version of her mark appeared on it's center and vanished a few seconds later. The heavy wings of the door opening, Honoka could already feel the first touches of the blue mist in the air.

As if she had been teleported, and in fact she might have really been, Honoka found herself inside a small room that had looked very much like a generic meeting room for a directors board at any given company. A large table, several chairs. Only the energy barrier cutting through the table's middle was a little out of place.

As there was no sign of Karen yet, Honoka sat down in one of the surprisingly comfy chairs. Just as she did so, a large piece of the table's surface moved and revealed a small console, displaying many statistics. Despite that, they were fairly obvious.

It was all the data necessary for negotiation and the next battle. Trying to see if there was any wiring to the console, Honoka couldn't see anything. If there was something, it must run through the tables legs and into the ground. Considering it was possible to create a magical garden from nothing, a simple console powered by electricity or something else wasn't that much of a stretch.

A good five minutes passed before Karen showed up, looking slightly distressed. "One of the new Cures made a fuss just about after I explained the new exile. The green one."

"March. I was surprised that Sunny and Happy didn't. In general, everyone seemed to take the news pretty well."

"I wonder about that. It'll take time to sink in and when it does, I think a few will definitely complain and make a ruckus."

"Not if they're smart. There is nothing we can do about it anyway. Sit down, a console will pop up and show you the relevant data for the next negotiation."

Doing exactly what Honoka asked her to, Karen found the console to be slightly unintuitive and hard to use. "This lists the participants for each team... there is no data regarding terrain, rounds or special rules yet. A lot of things are grayed out, too. Why?"

"It is likely that those are advanced rules that require us being used to some of the less drastic ones. The way I understand the terrain data, we specify a handful of things and it will generate the battlefield for us."

"I'm starting to get some virtual reality vibes from this. Don't you?"

"Maybe. Even so, I much prefer this over being fed random battlefields, one more dangerous and absurd than the previous one."

"What should we do for the terrain?"

"We can't see what the final result will be, likely to avoid abuse of the substitute system, so let's use some of the increasing multipliers. If we pick swamp, ancient, natural hazard, and rain, it results in a twenty percent bonus just from the terrain."

"Natural hazard?"

"It is likely something like gas bubbles, oil, or tar."

"Might as well. I'm not sure what half of these special rules actually do. 'Arbitrary Dislocation of Fighters'? What does that mean?"

"The book did cover these. I remember reading about this one. It means that at random time intervals, people are teleported to random locations in the area. Considering we're using natural hazard and swamp, we shouldn't use this."

"I have the bad feeling that we're going to be yelled at after this."

"Let them yell, we'll be in the same boat eventually."

"Rose is fighting and she has some really nasty area attacks. Taking immunity to friendly fire sounds worthwhile."

"That puts us back down at five percent bonus."

"If we add proximity feedback damage, it adds up to plus twenty five."

"Lets pick 'Unlucky' as well to make that thirty." Honoka wanted to give them a decent chance to catch up with everyone else.

"I can see why this is called negotiation. Right now we're not considering that after today, we will both be trying to make our team win and as such pick conditions that suit those who volunteer to fight."

"Things like 'No Projectile Attacks' will make things very easy for Nagisa and Saki."

"They're deadly up close, that is almost cheating."

"Everything is fair in love and war. Well, jokes aside, anything else you want to add? Or should we leave things like this?"

"I think this is fine."

"We're done here then." Getting up, Honoka watched the console vanish back into the table. On each side of the wall was now a door, part of the wall having morphed during the talks. "If you find time, I'll see you later in the dome."

"Should I tell Black to come and see you? I'd appreciate it if you could ask Komachi the same."

"Thanks. She is probably moping right about now because I'm not around. But you'd never get her to admit that."

"Komachi probably misses me already as well." With a smile, the two Cures left, each heading back to their team.

=== Dissonance ===

"I'm not mentally ready for this!" Akane was trying to walk away from the battle but nobody was willing to substitute for her. She had Reika on her side, but given what White had told everyone, Nao was going to be on the other.

"You'll be fine." Komachi was taking Nozomi's part, who had complained that she was fit enough to fight herself only to have Lemonade ask her if she wanted to put that to the test and quickly change her mind, and was trying to calm the others down a little. White had just returned from the negotiation and told the fighters about the conditions.

"Are you okay, Miyuki?" Reika was a little worried that the kind spirited girl would be in trouble but that didn't seem to be the case. If anything, she seemed to take it reasonably well.

"Hm, yeah. It took a while to sink in but... everyone here is doing their best to adapt and get out of here soon. I don't want to be in the way. And I trust Nagisa. The way she talked about this, it's not really all bad."

"It always surprises me to see you act like this, mature and thoughtful."

"Excuse me for not being a child anymore!" Pretending to be offended, Miyuki watched the last two of their group join them at the middle gate, five marks already glowing brightly on the door.

Peach and another pink Cure, whose name she had learned just a few minutes ago, Blossom. A yellow Cure, Pine, clapped twice, trying to get everyone's attention. "Both Peach and I specialize in melee. I know Blossom utilizes both melee and ranged fighting while Mint specializes in defense. What do you three do best?"

Reika did not move even a single centimeter and created two large swords, one in each hand. "I specialize in armed combat. This includes both close range-" Making a brief break, dropping her swords and creating a long halberd, holding it with both hands. "and long range." Crushing the halberd, she created a long bow next, followed by a crossbow. "However, extremely long ranges such as a hundred meters and more are difficult."

"How about you two?" Inori wanted to get a good grasp of their battle styles to avoid chaos.

"Bombardment." Akane held her right hand up and created several small fireballs. "I can hit ya pretty hard too 'n getting' too close and I'll burn ya bad!" If she was going to do this, she was going to do it with a bang!

"I... don't really have any specific style. I can do a bit of everything." Miyuki had never found anything she was exceptionally good at.

"What'cha saying? Your ability is really unfair!" Akane complained right away, knowing how strong Miyuki's abilities were.

"But... it's only to pacify, not to beat someone."

"What does your ability do?" Inori usually didn't ask but since it was a reason to argue amongst friends, it had to be really unorthodox.

"Once upon a Time." Akane shrugged. "She's trappin' ya mind in a fairy tale. It ain't workin' if she wants to beat ya but justa stall time, there's no way outta it. But ya wake up right 'way if ye get hit or anythin'."

"We'll have to see how it goes." Inori couldn't quite imagine what Happy was really doing. It did sound similar to Miki's ability. Turning around and facing the door for a moment, it started to open, revealing a black hallway, traces of red mist leaking from the entrance. "Let's go."

Stepping through the gate into the hallway, Inori only had to walk a few meters before a second gate opened. The stench of sulfur and oil hit her like a fist to the face. Covering her mouth and passing through the second door, she was immediately drenched in cold rain. Looking up, she couldn't make out where the room ended but it looked like up above was just sky. A sky filled with clouds so dark that the rain coming down was as cold as ice.

The ground was sticky and slippery. The sulfur stench originated from several large bodies of tar and other substances often found in swamps. She hadn't expected the terrain to be that much like the specifications. And not only that, the natural hazards were likely bottomless pits of tar and marsh.

And she was reminded painfully that the battle had already started. With a single maneuver, Rouge had closed the distance between herself and Pine, able to spot the yellow Cure through the rain. "Flame Drill!" Combining her claws into one gigantic spike, Rin jumped above Pine, ready to toast her.

But luck wasn't on the side of the red Cure. Hitting Mint's shield with full force, her attack was repelled. Worse yet, a stinging pain was running through her entire body. But she could tell from their faces that Pine and Komachi experienced the same.

"Down!" Reika shouted a single order with such intensity that nobody dared question it. Kneeling in the mud, they first thought an enormous lightning bolt had struck the ground and ran it's course, but it was distinctively moving towards them. With a horrible sizzling sound, an enormous Chinese dragon rushed over their heads, incinerating all trees or boulders it touched. "Yayoi seems to be going all out from the get go. Akane, cover fire."

And the fire part was meant literally. Creating her glacier road, Reika immediately ascended far up into the clouds, unable to see anything. She could tell Yayoi's rough location from the origin point of the dragon though. Trying to listen for the sound of Akane's bombardment starting, she failed to notice that someone else had the idea of moving through the cloud cover.

Taking a powerful kick directly to her stomach, Reika was thrown off her road and ended up in free fall. She recognized the impact of that hit. Nao had anticipated her desire to act tactical and used her speed to get all the way up there.

"Celsius Emission!" Focusing both her hands towards the ground, Reika created a thin pillar of ice with such incredible speed that her fall was halted only seconds after being hit. Using the momentum of descending to her advantage, she created a second road off the pillar. "Frozen Valkyrie!" Shifting gears, Reika created an bulletproof armor made of extremely sturdy and durable ice, a round shield included. Sensing the movement in the clouds, she knew that Nao was using the old glacier road to get around. There was no competing with the green Cure when it came to speed. For just a split second, Reika was perplexed how little she cared about being Nao's lover at the time. All that was important was winning, beating the other team. A respectable influence she admitted.

"Needle Array!" Lifting the hand with the shield attached to it, Reika created several floating orbs that closely resembled a mass of spikes. "Array Burst!" Without a sound the orbs burst into dozens of needles, shooting through the dark clouds. Still unable to see anything, she listened intently for impact or deflection of the ice needles.

What she heard instead was an attack. Increasing her shield tenfold in size, Reika protected herself against a thunder blast that ripped apart the clouds below her. Looking through the temporary hole, she could see Yayoi, who was sizzling with energy.

Noticing the faint change in the clouds behind her, Reika turned and managed to block Nao's next kick with her free hand, able to grab the bare skin of the Cure. Whirling her around and throwing her upwards, Reika created six daggers, three in each hand, and threw them after her. While all but one missed, the last hit the shoulder of the green Cure, cutting deep into flesh.

The battle below those that was much more brutal and direct. Yayoi was faced with Akane, who kept pursuing her, turning the battlefield into a sea of flames. Jumping every few seconds and aiming at the yellow Cure, she launched multiplying fireballs that set everything they touched ablaze. Just about to corner her, Akane made contact with the physically strongest Cure she had ever met. Unable to block any better than simply hold her right arm in front of her face, Bright hit her with her full power. "Planet Shaker!"

As if the attack was executed in slow motion, it took half a second before Akane was sent flying by the all crushing impact of the punch. Smashed against a dead tree, the wooden construct was destroyed as Akane bounced off it.

Michiru was going after Sunny despite landing a direct hit already but was stopped short by Happy. Several pink energy circles acted as binds, locking her in place, unable to move more than fingers and toes. But she could tell that Happy was struggling to keep her in place.

The two of them in a temporary stale mate, Blossom and Beat were circling and chasing each other, unable to close the distance. Getting closer than a few meters caused unbelievable physical pain, like their muscles were going to be torn apart.

Blossom got the upper hand when Ellen was forced to change her route because of hazardous tar pits right in front of her. Jumping above the natural trap, Blossom had expected her, standing still on the ground, aiming at her. "Beat Barrier!" Creating a sphere of notes around her, Ellen was confused by the lack of impact. Had Blossom called her attack off?

Far from that, Tsubomi shot several projectiles high into the air above Ellen. If she could trap the Cure in the tar, she wasn't going to be a problem anymore. "Sakura Descent!" Changing herself a little to take on some of Ember's good qualities showed in her battle style as well.

Looking up too late, the blue Cure was already out of momentum to get away from the impeding smack down. With a tremendous impact, something hit her back, broke her barrier and threw her right towards Blossom. Looking back, she could only make out a pink costume and blond hair. Smashing into her enemy at full speed, both of them went down, the soaked ground acting like a well waxed slide.

Love had not seen Blossom on the other side of the tar pit but Beat's sphere was shinning through the rain, giving her all the visibility that she needed. With a dangerous terrain like this, the main issue became finding the enemy instead of breaking their defenses.

Whirling around the instant she felt her muscles scream out in pain and raising her leg, Peach blocked an incoming kick from Sunshine, who was head to toe covered in mud, giving her perfect camouflage in this weather. Forced back by the power of it, Love slightly moved to the side, escaping a follow-up punch targeted towards her chest. Grabbing the enemy's arm, using their own momentum against them, she tried to throw the yellow Cure. But it wasn't that easy.

Sunshine utilized her experience in martial arts, formed a hold on Peach's neck, trying to withstand the intense pain from being this close, and attempted to wrestle her down. She underestimated both power and skill of the pink Cure however, losing her footing when Peach kicked her ankle.

Both of them separated quickly, realizing that staying that close together was going to be much more dangerous than any Cure could be. Looking at her own hands, Love was bleeding from several small points, like she had stung herself with big needles. Trying to focus her attention back on Sunshine, she had lost track of her.

That became a secondary issue the moment the moment a massive fireball descended from the clouds, crashing into some kind of swamp and setting it ablaze. At the origin point of the fireball were Akane and Rin, surrounded by a sea of flames and steam. Akane was not used to fighting other Cures and Rin was having trouble getting close enough to cause damage without suffering from the proximity feedback damage.

"Meltdown!" Launching a single large projectile towards the new Cure, Akane escaped right through the blazing fire, unstressed by the heat and flames. She had experienced much worse in rush hour at her restaurant! Hiding behind a wall of fire, she could feel the temperature rise tremendously all of a sudden, most of the rain evaporating long before it hit the ground. With a loud scream, Rouge followed Sunny through the fire, spinning around her own axis in mid-air, creating a whirlwind of fire claws and downright blast furnace level temperatures.

Unable to react fast enough, Akane took several hits, each causing severe burning of her skin. Driving in a corner, the flames having obscured the way out, Akane was ready to defend herself until she could no longer stand. But Rin had other plans.

Jumping high above Sunny, Rin focused the ability she herself was the center of into one tiny point, forcibly extracting most of her energy. Both her claws and Hell breaking down, she held a single sphere, almost exactly the same size as a volleyball ball. "Receive this!"

Throwing it with her full might towards the enemy, Rin grabbed the branch of an old, dead tree to keep herself out of harms way. Akane, playing volleyball for many years, instinctively posed to receive the ball and return it. The warning signals her body was sending arrived in her head too late. The second the sphere touched her, she was enveloped and trapped into a ten meter radius sphere of intense flames and fire, similar to being thrown into a furnace.

Only lasting a few seconds, it was enough to completely knock out Akane. Her hair, skin and costume scorched, she was down for the count, laying on the ground completely unconscious, the smell of burning skin reaching all the way up to Rin.

The other red Cure was in trouble herself. Using an ability like that, she had become the target for everyone from the enemy team. And the first to arrive, of all people, was the ice controlling Cure, Beauty. Trying to use her ability again, she lacked the necessary energy reserves. Falling and trying to get away by pushing herself off the trunk of the tree, Rin was in a vastly inferior position to out-maneuver Reika.

Reaching the red Cure a few seconds before she could hit the ground and escape, Reika showed no mercy at all. "Freeze Lock!" Firing a single large bullet towards the ground, the emerging ice pillar partially encased Rouge, trapping her for just long enough to execute one of her stronger moves. Driving her glacier road, which was in dire condition having it's strength leeched away by the remainder of Akane's and Rin's battle, around Rouge once, Reika stopped and focused a few meters away. "Zero Celsius Armory!" Lifting her hand, the ice bridge around Rin broke into dozens of smaller parts, each morphing nearly instantly into some kind of weapons. Dozens of swords, lances, axes and other weapons were all pointing towards Rin, a sphere of weapons surrounding the red Cure. "Punishment!"

The power of Rin's scream from being impaled by dozens of blades reached even the furthest edge of the battlefield. Reika turned instantly when she felt the physical pain return but she could not put up any sort of defense. Being grabbed by her long hair, someone pulled her off her road. Unable to identify who it was based on their looks, she could tell by the touch of the hand that it was Nao.

Reika's breath escaped violently from her lungs when she was smashing against a rock formation with such speed that she left a deep imprint on it. And that was not the end of it. "Mach Drive, Colossus!" Unable to breathe, Reika couldn't move or defend herself under the barrage of hits, each amounting to little more than any normal punch would yet the sheer number causing great damage as a whole.

Nao's ability wasn't limited to just running fast. Given momentum she could create any kind of movement at high speed, including punching. The feedback of being so close to Reika was painful but she had to be feeling it too.

With the added stress of the proximity damage, Nao retreated earlier than she had wanted to, leaving a breathless Beauty pressed into the rock. Catching her breath for just one moment, March tensed up instantly, feeling an intense malice right behind her. Turning around, she was just in time to see the fist of a purple Cure approach. Even Nao could not escape something like that from a total standstill after being surprised.

"Adamant Crush!" Missing March's head by a slight margin, Kurumi still managed to hit her shoulder, the force enough to dislocate the green Cure's arm, making her scream out in pain. "Adamant Hammer!" Focusing her power into both arms, she had expected March to try and get away, hitting her in the back full force.

Nao could feel several bones break as she was literally smashed into the ground and bounced off it. Unable to breathe or even gasp, she felt Rose grab her right ankle and start to whirl her. The area turned into a blur, the purple Cure completely in control of her health now. No special technique used, Nao was sent flying towards the same rock formation Reika was at, hitting the blue Cure with her own body, the impact enough to break the sturdy boulder, both Cures flatly knocked out.

For all the skills they had, experienced was king in cross Cure battles. And Happy was about to learn that the hard way as well. Still chaining down Bright, Miyuki didn't know how to attack to beat someone who was so obviously much, much stronger physically than her.

Michiru was about fed up with the pink Cure, violently resisting the chains and finally breaking one around her leg. "Planet Stomp!" Hitting the ground so hard that the earth below her broke apart, the shock wave causing the entire landmass around her to shift like in a tectonic catastrophe, Happy was thrown off balance, her binds vanishing.

She lacked speed and finesse but she didn't need those things. Raw power could solve a great many things in battle. Instead of carefully plotting her path across the shifting pieces of land, Michiru simply smashed everything in her path to pieces, the weak mud no challenge to her power.

Miyuki had just regained her balance when she realized that Bright was about to reach her. "Happiness Bind!" Creating the binds as quickly as she could, they didn't work. Bright had too much momentum and destroyed the binds placed around her arms easily. Miyuki took a hit straight to the stomach, more than enough power behind it to lift her up in the air and sent her literally flying into the clouds.

Michiru paid the ultimate price for her victory. Turning around, she had barely enough time to raise her arms before a giant robot, a corporal construct made of electricity, simply stomped on her, the weight and power of the attack beyond anything she had ever suffered. Barely able to hold back the robot, she was double teamed by Peach.

"Heart Blast!" She wasn't as excellent with energy manipulation as her team mates, but it was still enough to cause significant damage. The burst of raw energy hit Bright and destroyed her balance, the giant robot crushing her into the ground. Not moving anymore, Michiru was knocked out, several bones broken.

Eager to end a battle in such horrible conditions, Love found herself on the receiving end of that ploy. Noticing the purple Cure behind her too late to dodge completely, the pink Cure let herself fall to the ground instantly, the powerful kick only strafing her shoulder instead of shattering her arm. Using both her hands to push herself up, Love used a low kick to push Rose off balance.

She was good at hand to hand combat, but fighting with someone that had bone breaking attacks wasn't going to be easy, especially not when visibility was at an all-time low, the footing was horrible and a giant electric robot was stomping around, attacking everything in sight.

The purple Cure couldn't stabilize her footing in time to avoid Peach's counter. Seeing no other choice, and already under the influence of the proximity damage, she decided to take Peach out even if it meant to go down herself. "Metal Temptation!" Similar to Abaddon, Milky Rose created innumerable metal fragments, these swirling around the two Cures like a slowly closing maelstrom, leaving no way out.

Love was already on course to enter hand to hand combat with the purple Cure, unable to change that in the tiny time frame she was allowed. "Heart..."

"Slash!" Kurumi was faster than Peach. Clapping her hands together as if she was smashing a fly, the fragments stopped and then started to act like short range blades, flying from one side to another. No cut was any worse than that of a moderately sharpened blade but the great number was devastating, both of them taking major damage. Falling flat on her face, Love could see that Kurumi was not any different, bleeding heavily and seemingly unconscious.

The battle was nearing it's end, despite quite a few Cures still being able to fight. Something that was about to change drastically. Controlling her greatest creation, something she had painstakingly drawn after watching too many episodes of a certain Gundam series, Yayoi was riding on top of it, feeling great. She had little chance to every give life to her bigger creations and even then she never got to see them in action.

Spotting Beat fighting two versus one, against a green and pink Cure, Yayoi remembered that one of the rules gave them immunity to friendly fire. It was a one-shot thing and she would be all out of steam after that, but... it would be incredibly cool. Yayoi's dedication to mecha rivaled those of hardcore fans with ease. "Double OO Raiser, Legend! Twin Lightning Particle Storm Exceed Overdrive!"

The robot, looking astonishingly like it's anime counterpart, came to a standstill, emitting golden particles from the engines attached to it's shoulders. The density of the particles quickly reaching dangerous levels, Yayoi had no problem where a normal person would've been electrocuted instantly.

Ellen noticed the impeding storm first but was tied down by Mint and Blossom tag teaming her, blocking her path with barriers and firing energy blasts and beams at her. To make matters worse, the second she found a way to escape, Sunshine and Pine showed up, Inori so overly dominating the fight that it looked like Sunshine was purposefully losing and luring her somewhere.

The short moment of when her attention had been focused on Sunshine, Ellen had maneuvered herself into a corner from which there was no escaping. Jumping up and trying to get past the barriers would make her a welcome target for Mint to lock her up completely and simply deprive her of oxygen until she collapsed.

Ready to blast her way free, even if it meant suffering the backlash of destroying the barriers, the blue Cure received a helping hand from Peace. An unshapely mass of electricity was floating high above them and they could hear the yellow Cure yell something.

The effect of the attack was completely out of the world. Enormous lightning bolts sizzled over the ground, destroying rocks, trees, electrocuting everything in a hundred meter radius like an enormous and unstoppable bomb that just went off. Unlike regular electricity the attack didn't dissipate after a second or two, it kept going for almost ten seconds. Ellen watched with slight worry as Pine, Blossom and Mint got hit by the bolts over and over again until it was finally over. The three Cures were on the ground, their bodies twitching from the overload, none of them moving. The air was full of the smell of burned flesh, a horrible stench.

With one final, catastrophic attack, Peace had decimated the the entire remainder of the enemy team. Underestimating her capabilities and power, none of them had thought her to be that strong and most of all merciless.

Yayoi was looking over the devastated area from atop a high rock, impressed and a little shocked. "I... overdid it a little... maybe?" Smiling awkwardly, Yayoi felt her consciousness slip for a moment. Blinking once, the area around her had changed drastically. She was looking at the bottom of a wooden frame. "Eh... what?" Feeling a somewhat uncomfortable bed below her, Yayoi was confused. She wasn't soaking wet anymore but she felt extremely exhausted. A raging headache was slowly making it's way to her forehead. "Where..." Slowly getting up, fighting the desire to lie back down as her whole body was aching the same way it did when she didn't sleep for three days because of deadlines, Yayoi realized that she was back in the shoddy room she was supposed to sleep in. "Nao?"

Peeking in the bed below her, she caught Nao with the shoulder part of her costume slipped off. Yayoi had an excellent view of Nao's quite copious cleavage. "Nao." Making her presence known one more time, she started to climb down, unable to take the punishment of hanging off the bed.

"Yayoi? My head still hurts... or rather, my whole body does... I don't know how... I'm even able to move. I remember taking an attack from that purple Cure and everything went dark..." Nao was completely confused. "I only got a small skin irritation where Reika... hit me with... a dagger..." Nao finally realized that she had put Reika quite through something.

Yayoi decided not to mention that she was likely going to be responsible for a lot of hair combing on the other team in the very near future. Making a groaning noise, Ellen got up as well. Her hair was a complete mess, standing away from her head in every direction. She might have been immune to the damage but the side effects were very vividly present. A single look at Beat told Nao all she needed to know about what Yayoi had done.

"That was horrible... Peace, you did that, right?" Looking at the yellow Cure, Ellen tried frantically to keep her hair down. "That thunder storm that crashed down. I bet the others are going to be really sore after that."

"I didn't want to believe you but I really can't find anything except a few bruises on me... is this how it always goes?" Nao would check under the show again when she had time. It seemed almost unreal. "I remember the fight but... when I was in there..."

"You didn't care about who those on the other team were to you, right?" Yayoi nodded. "I don't really feel bad either, it's kinda mysterious."

"At least based on those I was in, this was a pretty short battle. It didn't last much longer than ten minutes I think." Calling her favor bag, Ellen noticed that the values had gone up. "I got a hundred and thirty. That's... a lot. I didn't even fight that much."

Yayoi, impatient to find out how much she got, called her bag as well and looked at the number with slight confusion. "Is hundred and seventy-eight a lot?"

"I don't think anyone else ever got that much." Ellen was a little wary of Peace now, knowing that she definitely shouldn't underestimate her. "What was that... thing you made, anyway?"

"The Double OO Raiser Legend, a robot from an anime I like. Do you want to hear about it?" Getting into sparkly eyes mode again, Yayoi was quickly shot down.

"Maybe... maybe later." Rejecting the girl as carefully as she could, she didn't really care about anime and the likes. "But good work out there Peace, March." Getting up and thinking that even walking was a real chore after a battle, she just wanted to go back to sleep. "If you're hungry, there is likely dinner being made right now." With those parting words, she headed towards the dinning room herself, thinking she might find Setsuna there.

"Should we go?" The excitement having worn off, Yayoi was starting to feel pretty hungry. And very, very tired. "I wonder if all of them feel like this..."

"I'd think so. And yeah, let's get something to eat. I'll go to the dome after that and check if Reika or Akane are there."

Someone was already waiting for them outside their room. "Are you doing okay?" She had made it through the battle relatively unscathed, but Itsuki felt still exhausted. Leaving the influence of the red mist, it was always similar to coming off caffeine or a lot of sugar.

"I feel like I got run over." Nao thought that there were some really fearsome people around. She couldn't even imagine how strong some of them really were. She had only managed to take on Reika because she knew her weak point. The element of surprise.

"When you're beaten really badly you might be sleeping a bit longer and have an awful lot of bruises and pretty horridly sore muscles. But that is really an extreme case and I haven't seen anyone feel drained after a good night's rest. This place wants us to fight a lot. So it keeps us in top shape." Itsuki finished her explanation.

"I wasn't really believing it when I heard about it but... now that I went through it myself, I understand. Well, a bit." Nao still didn't like the fighting. But it wasn't something she would make an enormous fuss about.

"One last thing. You shouldn't hold it against someone if they beat you. It's... well I guess you could say it's a job of sorts. Something we need to do to go home at some point. I'm taking a shower, I still smell like swamp. I'll see you later or tomorrow." Waving them goodbye, Itsuki headed for the rather frugal shower rooms on the bottom level. She had the distinct feeling that trying to use one of the other rooms wasn't going to work out so well.

"They're all really looking out for us, right?" Yayoi could tell that her group was not unwelcome. If they were really going to be stuck there for a long time, a few new faces were always welcome.

"Makes me feel almost bad for not trusting them." The awkward atmosphere Nao created by saying that was removed right away by Yayoi's stomach growling. "Don't eat me."

"I won't! I just forget to eat pretty often!"

=== Dissonance ===

Akane was stuffing her face in an attempt to bury that memory of losing to Rouge under a lot of food and calories. Miyuki and Reika were sitting to either side of her, amused and a bit embarrassed at how riled up Akane was over losing. "I'll get her, I tell ya'll, I'll damn get her 'n pluck her damn grin from her face! Next time I'll win!"

"My, Akane, you really are eager to get back together with Rouge. I certainly hope nobody tells Nao about this or she might become jealous." Having returned to being a tease, Reika caused Akane to choke briefly on her food. The Cures sitting close, Luminous, Melody, Mint and Pine all laughed briefly, finding it pretty funny how caught up in her rivalry with Rin she had gotten.

"Don't ya have any pride? I can't letta show me up like that ! Ye don't want to get back at... who got you?"

"I will get back at the Cure that beat me in due time." Covering her mouth, Reika quietly added something that made Akane blush.

"Reika! That ain't funny!" Talking about cheating on Nao was something Akane couldn't forgive.

"Oh, but I'm sure Nao won't mind a little retribution."

"She'll sure mind if ye go 'n seduce some other girl! Who 's it 'nway?"

"I haven't mentioned any other girl." With a really daring smile, Reika pointed at her comrade. "Our girlfriend."

"What? Nao beat you? How did that happen?" Akane completely ignored the attention the others paid to her being toyed with by Beauty.

"She surprised me. I know Nao's strength well and so do you."

"How long did you train to be able to make weapons like that?" Inori was quite curious about the blue Cure. "I'd think weapons made of ice are very fragile."

"Ice can be very sturdy depending on it's composition." Reika felt too tired to explain in detail what she could do. "If you want me to tell you more about it, why don't we meet up for breakfast tomorrow. I think I'll go to bed early today, I'm awfully tired." The more tired and exhausted she was, the more her formal speech slipped towards the way she talked when teasing Akane or Miyuki.

"Too bad about losing your first battle." Inori still felt tingly all over from being hit by Peace's attack. "You could have warned us about Peace though."

"I... must say I was surprised to see that, too. And I must admit that I know very little about her ability." Reika couldn't decide if she regretted never asking or living happy with the knowledge that Yayoi would talk about it for hours without as much as taking a break.

"So what do you think of this place so far?" Hibiki liked to distract herself from thinking about Itsuki and she wasn't doing too badly.

"The rooms are a little... you know." Miyuki didn't want to say they sucked but the lower levels one definitely did. "But I get to sleep in the same room with my friends, so it's not bad." Miyuki always tried to find something positive about her situation.

"Before you joined up with us, everyone had their own room. They weren't really much better than the group rooms though, so, to be honest, I like this arrangement." Hikari figured that if she changed sides, or Kurumi did, they could still talk to each other without having to share a bed.

"Did couples just share a bed in one of their two rooms then?" Directing the question towards Hikari, Komachi answered for her, a little more familiar with that process. "The beds were big enough for two people if they slept close together, so yes, couples did sleep in one room. I think it might be a little problematic now since the only single rooms are the middle floor ones."

"The beds on the upper level are so big, I could probably fit Honoka and Nagisa in there next to me." Hikari was sharing a room with Lemonade, who hadn't said a single word to her since she found out.

"Hikari... you're given people weird ideas." Honoka looked rather awkward. Given her relationship with Nagisa and that she had never seen Hikari pursue any kind of romance on her own, she couldn't shake off the thought of a threesome. It was similar to when someone told someone else to not think about a specific thing. They would be unable to think about anything else.

"What ideas?" Looking completely innocent and a bit naive, Hikari simply had too pure a mind to immediately think of things like that.

"You got it rough, don'tcha?" Akane could sympathize with White a little. Miyuki wasn't quite as bad as Luminous, but there was also Yayoi and beware if she didn't know about her obsession with girls love. Everyone did. Keeping it a secret, that they knew about it, was at times pretty annoying. But Yayoi was the type to really freak out when her secrets were discovered.

The source of that knowledge was of course Miyuki, unable to keep her mouth shut. But that was part of what made her lovable. Yayoi on the other hand was lovable too but her obsession didn't contribute to that at all.

"You two get along a lot better than Rin and Karen used to." Taking Komachi's spot after she had gotten up, still plans for the evening, Nozomi wanted to get to know the new Cures a bit better. "Is it true that both of you date the blue Cure on your team? What was her name again? I can't remember."

"You're never going to stop being scatterbrained, do you, oh leader of mine?" Urara made no exceptions for Nozomi when it came to teasing people about their faults and quirks.

"Say, say... is she always that rude? She was making fun of me earlier, too..." Whispering to Nozomi, Miyuki had the feeling she would get along really well with her. They were both pink Cures after all!

"Most of the time. She seems to be in a really bad mood today, though."

"I guess all kinds of people can become Cures." Miyuki had always lived with the idea that only pure, nice and friendly people could become Cures. After all, those things all applied to her friends.

"She used to be really cute and trusting but a few years ago, she-" Nozomi stopped dead in her tracks when a hand grabbed the top of her head.

"Mind telling me what you're babbling about?" With a completely and obvious fake smile, one that radiated coldness, Urara stopped Nozomi from running her mouth again. The last thing she needed was Happy to go and have pity on her.

"Reika, she's scaring me..." Hiding behind the blue Cure, Miyuki felt a bit intimidated when Lemonade made a complete mess of Nozomi's hair, constantly scolding her not to tell others about people's pasts without their permission.

"Oh my. Maybe she'll open up to you if you try to make friends." Reika figured that while Urara might be not a friendly person, she wasn't violent. Nonetheless, she felt like she had just sent Miyuki on a suicide mission.

"You think so?" Miyuki was a little doubtful about it. She once believed everyone was a good person at their core, but after her run-in with transfer student from the Netherlands she wasn't so sure anymore.

"Of course. You just need to try." Reika didn't have a sadistic streak, it was more that she really believed that if anyone could befriend someone unfriendly, then it was Miyuki. There was just this overpowering feeling of sympathy towards the pink Cure.

Watching Miyuki approach Lemonade and try to the yellow Cure from scolding Dream was quite the sight. "Shouldn't we help her? Look, they're both squirming and looking for help now, one on each hand... you've really become devious Reika..." Akane watched her friend with a little bit of pity. She wasn't really being hurt and she should know better than to befriend just about anyone.

"I think she might actually get through to her. Look, she's being a bit gentler with Miyuki." Reika tried hard to hide her smile.

"You think so?" Looking at Reika, she could tell from her eyes. "Is what you wanted me to say, yes? I'm not falling for that again."

"I believe it is time for me to fall in my bed. I'd like to go and see Nao, but this wouldn't be the first time I don't see her for a day."

"We should keep you like this, tired and spend, at least you don't sound like a robot then."

"Is that so? I believe I'm just being polite."

"Don't force it, Reika. I know you almost as well as Nao does." That was one of the side effects of sharing a girlfriend. Akane knew that it worked both ways. Nao told Akane things about Reika and vice versa.

"My, you've become a spoilsport." Reika sighed briefly before she stood up and walked over to Lemonade to collect Miyuki. "Can we have you return her to us?"

"Just take her away! I don't need of her kind." Looking at Nozomi, Urara added with an annoyed expression. "One is enough work."

"Reika... you liar..." Miyuki was near tears when her friend finally got her out of Lemonade's clutches.

"She is already seeing you as someone equal to someone else that is part of her team. Shouldn't you be happy?"

"I'm not ultra happy." Pouting, even Miyuki had a limit of what she would believe.

Looking around, a few Cures had already left, having had a really long day and it was already deep in the night. Catching White before she left, Reika had one question she needed answered. "You said that there would be an exchange of team members after a battle, yes? And that someone would be trapped in exile."

"Yes. That is what would usually happen. However, this battle and the negotiation were a demonstration of how the system worked. We were told that the full system will only be ready tomorrow. Whoever scores lowest will be in exile and the team member exchange will begin tomorrow."

"I see."

"Anything else? I'm going back to my room. It's likely late in the night and I want to return to a normal schedule."

"No, have a good rest." Bowing slightly before turned away, Reika returned to Akane. "Miyuki, would you stop resting your head on the table? It's unbecoming of you."

"But... I tried really hard to be extra nice and she still ruined my hair."

"It takes time to befriend people. Not everyone opens up as easily when they're adults." Reika continued to remind Miyuki of this.

"I wish I had never become an adult." And Miyuki continued to pout.

Akane and Reika both sighed. "Akane, are you responsible for the light sources in the hallways?" Changing the topic, knowing that nothing useful would come out of Miyuki at this point.

"Oh, those orb thingy lamps? No, that ain't my work. I'm a chef, not a glassblower. They were already there when we got back from the dome. Ye didn't notice?"

"I noticed but didn't know if it was one of us who placed them. But it makes sense, the light in the hallways is dimming quickly. I expect them to turn off shortly."

"I'd like 'n go see Nao but... I'm really tired 'n I dunno how to contact her 'n everythin'. I just want to take a break now..." Yawning and quickly covering her mouth, she broke out in bashful laugh.

"Nao will be tired herself. Shall we take our Cinderella here and take her to the castle?"

"That's more of a shack than a castle. But yeah."

Each of them grabbing Miyuki by one arm, they carried her away, only two other Cures actually remaining behind them. Lemonade was getting herself comfortable with a drink and Dream was keeping her company. "She's acting like nothing happened..." Watching those two, Miyuki felt a little silly for getting angry over some hair ruffling. She would try harder next time.

=== Dissonance ===

"It hurts... why did I forget the door opens inwards..." Rubbing her forehead, Nao had left her room to go to the bathroom. It was almost pitch black in the hallway and she had trouble finding her way. Sleeping in underwear was one thing but leaving her room just in that was impossible. And dressing would wake up everyone else. Sneaking out in underwear and transforming right away, Nao was still uncomfortable, knowing that if she should transform back, she would be in just underwear.

Finding the bathroom with relative ease, but finding the approaching shadow not at all, Nao hit her head a second time and fell backwards. "Ouch... who?"

"Sunshine. You have a hard head." Itsuki was rubbing her forehead, just returning from the bathroom herself. "Bathroom too?"

"Had too many of the drinks at dinner."

"I know what you mean."

"Is it always this dark out here when everyone sleeps?"

"That hasn't changed." Getting up and holding her hand out to March, Itsuki wondered if her eyes had adjusted enough to even register her offer.

Noticing something in front of her, Nao tried to grab it, only upon contact realizing it was a hand. A warm glow started to emit from a different point, Sunshine's other hand. "I'll leave that here. It'll go out in five minutes or so." Dropping a small sphere that bathed just a bit of the hallway into a gentle light, Itsuki yawned loudly and scratched the back of her head. "Back to bed. Night, March."

"Night." Nao was grateful for the miniature lantern and headed into the bathroom.

Moments later, Yayoi almost woke Kurumi with her sleep talking. "No... not there... we can't..." Rolling over, trying to grab a big pillow that wasn't there, Yayoi rolled out of her bed and hit the ground hard. Just in time for Nao to come in through the door, already transformed back to avoid waking up her roommates with the light flash. "Yayoi?" Her eyes had gotten used to the darkness by now but it was still hard to see anything.

"My miracle peace body pillow...It's gone..." Still half asleep, the mangaka yawned, not bothering to cover her mouth at all. "Nao? Why are you in my room... and why is my floor so cold..."

"Just in your dream. Come, get up." Pulling Yayoi by her arm and shoving her in front of the small ladder, Nao really hoped Rose wouldn't wake up and see both of them in just underwear together. That would create a lot of misunderstandings for sure.

"Yes, yes..." Climbing the ladder and getting back into her bed the wrong way, her head rested directly on the mattress, the pillow pressed against her chest, tightly hugged.

"Night, Yayoi." Nao could have sworn that Yayoi replied something but it got lost in sleep drunken murmur. Getting back into bed and hoping that she didn't wake Rose, Nao did wonder where Beat had gone until she remembered that she was a couple with Passion, who was in one of the upper two levels.

Closing her eyes, she was almost fast asleep when Yayoi started to sleep talk briefly again.

"Miracle Peace... has arrived... sparkle sparkle justice..."

=== End of Event XXII ===

The dark of the unknown room, the uncomfortable bed, the breathing of people around her, all meant nothing. She knew who at fault. She knew who had caused the reflections to show up. Gritting her teeth so hard that it hurt, she promised herself to not let this go. She would make Dream pay for her stupidity.