"Happy Birthday, Echo!" Kiriko and a few of her fellow associates shouted in unison, while the cafe's supervisors broke open some party poppers and the manager brought out a big cake for everyone to share.
Asuna, Sophie and Mari were all sitting at a table at the cafe Kiriko worked at. Today, Echo was to be closed at six, and so once the doors were closed to the public, the team had decided to throw a party in honor of Echo's fifteenth anniversary. The team had originally planned to have only employees present at the party, but Kiriko really wanted the girls here too and insisted there was no way that the party would have been as much fun with only the cafe associates here to celebrate. She even made the argument that it wouldn't be likely that they could all finish a such a large cake by themselves.
"Wow, it feels like just yesterday that I got my job here at Echo!" Ayaru remarked as he took a slice of cake for himself," Time flies working here!"
"This is your third year at the cafe, right?" Kiriko asked, her mouth full of cake as Ayaru nodded in response,"Wow, that takes dedication."
Mari and Asuna were busy grabbing slices of cake and went back to their booth. Asuna slid a plate with a slice of cake to Sophie and the girls looked around the cafe and watched as the associates talked amongst each other.
"With Kiriko hanging out with her co-workers, it appears we've become the odd ones out." Sophie pointed out sheepishly as the girls watched Kiriko talk to Ayaru and another co-worker.
"This cafe is quite nice, I don't think I've ever been here." Mari stated as she took a bite from her slice," Have you two?"
Sophie shook her head and Asuna replied with," I went here a few months ago with my mom. They've got really good desserts."
Asuna's eyes were downcast as she gazed at her slice, thinking to herself," Come to think of it, this is the place where I met Kiriko."
Asuna returned her gaze back towards Mari, and then noticed that Sophie was staring at her with an incredulous look on her face. She looked uncomfortable with Sophie staring at her and asked out of irritation,
"What is it?"
"That's like cheating on cafes! Haven't you ever heard of brand loyalty?" Sophie chided as she took a slice of her cake.
"Hm, Soph does raise a good point. But, usually the term brand loyalty refers more to a product in an over-saturated market. Like sugar or chapstick." Mari explained sheepishly, though it didn't seem like Asuna and Sophie were paying much attention to her at the moment.
"I don't really see it that way since while they might both be called cafes, they offer very different choices. Rosewood specializes in desserts, while Echo more main entrees, so it'd feel demeaning to slump them together in the same category, you know?" Asuna explained, surprising both Mari and Sophie as they were expecting such a sophisticated response from her.
"By the way, I know this is unrelated but..." Asuna began as Kiriko walked over to their booth to take a seat," What was inside that pendant of yours?"
"Oh, um...it was magic that belonged to my mom. When she came to the human world, she decided it'd be best to live without her powers circulating around, so she sealed them up and placed it inside the pendant." Mari answered, playing with the necklace chain where the pendant once resided," I guess my mom would be pretty annoyed to see that her pendant is gone. But, what she doesn't know won't hurt her."
The girls nodded and then, a loud, jarring sound was heard that seemed to have come from the basement. Though it wasn't very loud, it was enough to startle Kiriko and have some other associates wonder what the sound was. It sounded like something heavy had dropped, but no one had a clue on what it could be. So, Kiriko, Ayaru, and a supervisor were nominated to go down to the basement and check things out.
The basement was poorly-lit and dirty, it wasn't often that the employees would need to come down here.
"It's so dark down here, what if the sound came from a burglar?" Ayaru asked nervously as he held a flashlight in front of himself while he hid behind Kiriko nervously. His hiding didn't do him much good since he was a lot taller than Kiriko.
"Well, it would've been a bust for them because we don't keep anything in the basement, right?" Kiriko asked as she turned around to the supervisor.
"Not usually, but...you never know what could be stowed away down here." The supervisor pointed out before he noticed a very large pan on the ground," I think this was the thing that fell down."
Ayaru shone his flashlight on the pan and then to the wall above it, taking note of the fact that the whole rack had fallen down. The three of them sighed in relief.
"Well, at least we know what made that sound." Kiriko said as she leaned against the wall beside her. Her eyes then grew wide as she felt a doorknob. She then turned around and motioned Ayaru to flash the light towards her and they discovered a door behind Kiriko. Kiriko then nervously turned the doorknob and opened the door, much to her own surprise.
Kiriko went inside curiously, with Ayaru following after her to make sure she wouldn't get hurt.
"What is this, some kinda old storage room?" Kiriko asked uneasily as she swiped her finger against a small table in the room, inspecting the amount of dust her finger collected.
"This place is giving me the creeps Kiriko! Let's just leave and act like nothing ever happened!" Ayaru begged, his eyes squeezed shut as he unintentionally shone light onto a large book on the table.
"What's this?" Kiriko asked as she blew dust off from the cover," Mankai? What is that?"
Ayaru stopped being scared for a moment and answered with," Oh, Mankai was the name of the diner that was here before it closed down and became Echo! This must be a photo album from back in the day!"
Kiriko opened the book and the two of them found out that Ayaru was correct as the pages were filled to the brim with photos from decades past.
"I heard Mankai was crazy popular back in the day, but I guess as times started to change, the diner couldn't or rather, refused to keep up and made a decision to close down once they realized they weren't going to bring business back." Ayaru explained as Kiriko flipped through the pages.
Kiriko stopped on a page and carefully inspected a photo of two girls wearing a pair of red aprons and off-white button up shirts. One girl was slightly taller and had dark hair arranged into a high ponytail, the shorter girl appeared to be a brunette (it was hard to tell since the photo was in black and white) with her hair styled into braids. The two girls had their arms around each with very large grins on their faces. Kiriko liked looking at the picture and the girls looked awfully familiar. Kiriko then took a closer look at the name-tags on each of the girls aprons and was surprised as she read the name of the taller girl.
"Ryoko?" Kiriko read aloud, coughing from the amount of dust she inhaled.
Kiriko and Ayaru brought the photo album upstairs for everyone to see and for Kiriko to get a better look at the photo of the two girls.
"That has to be my grandma!" Kiriko exclaimed excitedly as she pointed to the girl with the Ryoko name-tag.
"Wow, that's so cool that your grandma worked here! It must be fate that you got the job here at Echo." A coworker said to Kiriko, giving her an elbow nudge.
Kiriko nodded in response as she said," I bet she'd like to see what Mankai looks like today, maybe it'd make her feel all nostalgic. Can I ask her to come to the party?"
The manager nodded and Kiriko dialed up her grandma and waited for her to pick up before she noticed Asuna was also staring at the photo, as if she was trying to recognize one of the girls.
"Do you recognize her?" Kiriko asked Asuna, who seemed hesitant in responding.
"I don't really want to steal your thunder but..." Asuna began as her gaze shifted to the side for a moment before she pointed to the shorter girl with the braids named Aika,"I think this is my grandma."
"Really?!" Kiriko asked excitedly, with Asuna nodding in response," Go call her up and see if she can make it!"
Asuna did as instructed to and just then, Kiriko's grandmother picked up the call.
"Hey grandma! I'm really sorry I haven't made the time to go see you, but I saw an old photo of you at the Mankai diner and I wanted to know if you'd like to come and see what it looks like now." Kiriko offered as a smile of excitement made its way onto her face.
"What Mankai looks like now? I'm not sure if I can make it today, I had a lot of chores I needed to finish." Ryoko reasoned, though Kiriko wasn't ready to give up.
Kiriko reasoned with, "Come on, you can do chores any other day! You can eat cake, finally get to see the cafe I work at and maybe even reunite with your old friend Aika!"
"Aika? You mean to tell me Aika will be making an appearance at this function?" Ryoko questioned, her tone turning sour.
Kiriko seemed confused by this change in tone from her grandmother and said," Yeah, hopefully. Isn't Aika an old friend of yours?"
Ryoko then said vehemently, "I don't want to see Aika, she's, she's annoying and stuck-up and-!"
"-Hi granny, what are you up to?" Asuna asked into her phone," Would you like to stop by the new and improved Mankai and meet your old pal Ryoko?"
"Ryoko? You mean that insufferable witch from the diner? No thank you, I rather stay at home and not get yelled at by a spoiled brat." Aika said over the phone.
"A spoiled brat? As if you're calling me that!" Ryoko shouted over the phone, forgetting that Kiriko was holding the phone up close to her ear.
"Is that Ryoko? Make this a three-way call and so I can give her a piece of my mind!" Aika demanded, though Asuna didn't seem impressed and impatiently shook her head and rolled her eyes.
"Grandma, that's not how phone calls work." Asuna reminded her with a sigh," But...I guess I can put you on speaker?"
Asuna gingerly placed her phone on the table and Kiriko followed suite as she put her phone on the table, also putting her grandma on speaker.
"Is Aika on the other line? I already said I don't want to speak with her!" Ryoko clamored furiously.
"Are you just gonna try play the victim again? You've got some nerve talking to me like that, considering I'm the one who kept you safe from Urokawa all these years." Aika pointed out in an angered voice," If it wasn't for me, you would've been living the rest of your life in-!"
"I am so sick of hearing you say that over and over again! You aren't even going to finish that sentence anyways, so I don't know why I still bother listening to you." Ryoko said before she hung up on the call.
"That hot-headed fool! That's it, I don't ever want to speak to her again, not for the rest of my life." Aika declared in frustration," Asuna, how did you get a hold of Ryoko?"
"Oh, well... me and my friend Kiriko found an old photo of you two. You see, Kiriko's her granddaughter and-"
"-Ryoko's granddaughter? No, you're not allowed to be around that girl. If she's anything like Ryoko, her temper and impatience will only cause you misery. Stay away from that family and keep away from this Kiriko girl!" Aika demanded before she hung up.
The cafe fell silent, and everyone was staring at Kiriko and Asuna. Most people were stunned to find that their grandmothers were actually quite bitter towards each other, others were just surprised they just saw an argument happen through two phones on speaker. Kiriko took a seat and just took her phone into her hands, wearing a frustrated look on her face.
"It seems like there's some sorta misunderstanding between them..." Kiriko pointed out as she looked at the phone's blank screen," Maybe we should find out what it was!"
"But that was over forty years ago, how are we supposed to find out what happened between them?" Ayaru pointed out.
"I can call my grandma to hear her explanation, and then maybe we can call Asuna's grandma to and see what isn't aligning with their sides of the story." Kiriko suggested, with the group seeming to agree with her," Maybe there are more photo albums downstairs as well, if we're lucky there might be some kinda clue in one of them. Sophie and Mari, do you guys think you could check downstairs for them?"
The girls nodded and went downstairs to look for them. The basement was just as dark as before, so Mari used her phone's flashlight to help them navigate through the basement, while Sophie stood behind her.
"Mari, this place is too cold~! We gotta crank up the heat in here." Sophie said as she tried warming up her goose-bump covered arms.
"Don't worry, I doubt we'll be here for long." Mari reassured in a gentle voice as they entered the room where Kiriko found the photo album. Mari flashed her phone light towards the table and saw another photo album there. The brunette opened the book and found a photo of Ryoko and Aika, accompanied by another girl.
"She's not wearing a name-tag..." Mari commented, before the door to the storage room suddenly slammed shut on them.
Sophie squealed and clung onto Mari's arm as she shouted," What the heck is going in here?! Are we stuck inside?"
Mari then walked over to the door, almost certain that it would open again, but as she turned the doorknob, she found herself experiencing some difficulty in getting the door to open again. Mari tried again and again and the longer she took in trying to open the door, the more panicked Sophie became.
"We're trapped inside!" Sophie clamored, before Mari motioned her over to help with the door. The girls tried pulling it open, with no avail, and then, the two of them felt a tremor so strong that they near fell to their feet. The two of them were on the knees and exchanged looks wondering just what was going on.
Just then, the door swung open and the basement was no longer dark or filled with dust. Sophie and Mari exited the storage room, before not before Mari pocketed the picture from the album.
The girls could hear music that sounded like it came from the sixties playing from upstairs and it sounded as if it had gotten a lot busier up there too. They could hear chatter from dozens of people, and brighter lights seemed to have been coming from upstairs.
"Are we still at Echo?" Sophie asked as the girls walked up the stairs.
When the girls exited the basement, they found the cafe was open to the public, but things looked a lot different from before. The floors now featured a checkered pattern, there were bright red and blue booths lined up by the windows and there was a jukebox blasting music. Many waitresses on duty, but only two of them seem to catch Mari's eye. The two of them greatly resembled Kiriko and Asuna and wore the name-tags 'Ryoko' and 'Aika'.
"This isn't Echo. Or at least, it isn't Echo yet." Mari concluded as they watched the two waitresses serve different tables.
Mari and Sophie were now sitting at a booth and looking at a pair of menus. The two of them held the menus close to their faces in hopes of not making eye-contact with anyone at the diner. They had already garnered enough attention with their clothing.
"This is impossible, how did we time-travel back to the sixties?" Sophie questioned as she held her menu close to her face.
"Beats me." Mari answered as she put her menu down," But, we might have a good chance of finding out what happened between Ryoko and Aika now."
Sophie shrugged and moments later, a server came to their table. Unfortunately for them, it wasn't Ryoko or Aika, but rather a lanky boy in his mid-teens who bore some resemblance to Asuna's older brother Tadashi. Except he seemed a lot less confident and had braces.
"Welcome to Mankai, I'm Kyohei and I'll be your server for the afternoon." The server greeted nervously," Have you girls decided on what you'll be ordering?"
"Yeah, but before we order...can we just say you guys have some amazing customer service?" Mari remarked, receiving a look of question from Sophie," This place feels like home, you guys sure know how to make your guests feel welcome. Those two in particular are also doing a fine job."
"Ah, Ryoko and Aika?" Kyohei asked as he turned to see who Mari was pointing to," Yeah, they're good at this job. They're very lively and energetic, they'd probably make a good stand-up act too. Not to mention they're really pretty."
"Ooh, are trying to make your move on one of them?" Sophie interrogated, only making the server even more nervous.
"W-well, Aika's single, but Ryoko isn't. Which is fine by me because I like Aika more..." Kyohei stammered out, hiding his face behind his notepad," I've been hearing rumors that Ryoko's been dating that gang leader Urokawa, but if you ask me-"
"Kyohei, are you bothering these girls for their number?" Ryoko teased as she gave him a light elbow nudge. Kyohei shook his head vigorously in response.
"She even sounds like Kiriko!" Sophie and Mari thought.
"N-n-no Ryoko! I was just telling them how you and Aika were such good servers..." Kyohei said in his defense, slowly removing his face away from the notepad. Ryoko then turned around to see what Aika was doing. Aika, who was a dead ringer for Asuna, had been helping out a table on the other side of the diner, twirling her braids around as she talked to a group of boys.
"I see. Well, Aika doesn't have long until she leaves for her studies in America. So our unit will be missing an integral member." Ryoko said in a wistful voice as she drew her gaze away from Aika," So that means you gotta make your move soon if you want her to notice you Kyohei!"
"So Kyohei, have you got these girls numbers yet?" Aika asked in a somewhat bored voice as she approached them with a set of empty plates in hand.
"I already used that joke you ditz." Ryoko chided before noticing that Aika was chewing gum," And you're not allowed to chew gum on the job!"
"I'll chew gum whenever I want, think you're gonna stop me?" Aika teased as she blew a bubble in Ryoko's face before she ran away.
"Come back here you scamp!" Ryoko shouted as she chased after Aika.
After Kyohei took the girls orders, he left the girls and so they tried to piece together what happened. Ryoko and Aika still seemed to be very close to each other, did that mean they went back too far?
"Hey Mari, how do you suppose we get back to our time?" Sophie asked worriedly as she almost reached for her phone in her pocket, but decided against taking it out.
"I guess we just, go back to the storage room and hope for the best?" Mari suggested, though her voice sounded rather uncertain," But, let's not focus on that. We need to figure out what made those two split up! Do you think it had something to do with Aika moving?"
Sophie shrugged and then replied with," It's possible but...I don't feel like that was the reason. I'm gonna go the washroom, I'll be right back, ok?"
Mari nodded and Sophie stood up to go to the washroom. When she walked to the washroom, she walked past the very small break room for the servers and saw Ryoko talking on the phone in the room.
"You can't be serious! But I would never do that to you!" Ryoko said into the phone in a desperate voice," Who told you I did that, Haru?"
"My source said I wasn't allowed to tell you, just like how you weren't allowed to tell anyone about my fight behind the school tomorrow!" The voice on the other line, Haru, said.
"You are so stupid! I thought we were friends, I thought you would never believe someone else over me!" Ryoko chastised before she muttered to herself while pressing her hand over the phone," Some boyfriend you are."
"Whatever, I'm done with you." Haru said before he hung up.
Ryoko was furious as she hung up the phone and angrily said to herself," I'm gonna get to the bottom of this."
Ryoko then stormed out of the room, not even noticing Sophie next to the doorway. Sophie double-blinked in surprise as she watched Ryoko walk into the main floor of the diner.
Standing at the roof top of the diner was a man with dark green and black hair styled into pompadour. He dressed in a dark green and black jacket embellished with studs and matching pants. He was rather tall and had sharp teeth but his most unusual feature was his bright red eyes.
He smelt the food being cooked in the diner and said to himself," This is going to be outta sight!"
Sophie was running back to the booth where she left Mari, who now had a pair of entrees before her. Sophie was trying to piece her thoughts together as she approached the booth but then, a loud roar that sounded like a Defective filled the restaurant and everyone looked around, only to find that the jukebox had been turned into a monster.
"We gotta get out of here!" One of the guests shouted as they all ran out of the restaurant.
"Where are the Pretty Cure?" Kyohei shouted before he ran out of the restaurant.
Sophie and Mari hid under their table, and exchanged looks after hearing the Pretty Cure mention. Once the entire restaurant had been cleared out, the girls stepped out of their hiding place and found the tall man from before standing with the Jukebox monster. The tall man then went over the counter and started to ravage through the to-go bags lined up near the register.
"Man, that hits the spot!" He said as he took a bite of a burger and a large sip from a milkshake glass," I'm gonna bring these back as a souvenir for sure! Everyone will be saying 'Oh Durian, you're so boss for getting us all this stuff!' "
"Who the heck is that supposed to be?" Sophie asked, her eyes narrowed at the sight of Durian devouring the burger. Mari simply shook her head and took out her Playpact, with Sophie following suite.
"Pretty Cure, it's Playtime!" The girls shouted in unison as an array of blue and white appeared out of their Playpacts.
"The sailor of justice, Cure Bubbly!" Bubbly introduced.
"The creator of dreams, Cure Fantasy!" Fantasy introduced.
"When evil is near, playtime is here! Together we are..." The girls said in unison," Toychest Pretty Cure!"
Once Durian finished eating the burger, he finally noticed the Pretty Cure in the room and stared at them with a confused look on his face as he squinted at the girls.
"Who are you two?" Durian asked plainly before he started to drink the milkshake again.
Fantasy seemed slightly irritated and simply said in response," Uh, we're the Toychest Pretty Cure?"
"The what? The only Pretty Cure team I've ever heard of is the Fruits Pop Pretty Cure." Durian explained as he took a large sip from the milkshake glass," Oh well, it doesn't matter to me. Rottenio, sock it to 'em!"
The Rottenio started running towards the cures and tried to attack them. The cures had no trouble in dodging and were thankful that the Rottenio didn't grow to a ridiculous size. Though, the Rottenio was rather quick in comparison to a normal Defective. The cures jumped back quite a few times, unable to land a hit on the Rottenio just yet.
Bubbly jumped onto one of the booth tables and tried preforming a dive-kick from there. The attack worked, hitting the Rottenio square in it's core but as soon as Bubbly hit it, the Rottenio produced a very harsh, pain-inducing sound from it's speaker.
"Hey, that wasn't necessary you know!" Bubbly shouted as she clamped her ears shut with her hands, leaving her open and defenseless. The Rottenio then produced as sound wave so powerful, it threw Bubbly back to the other side of the diner. She fell onto a table lined up against the wall and the table legs buckled from her fall.
"Yeah, that's how it's done! Keep going and drain them of all their Sweet count!" Durian exclaimed, now reaching for the box of fries next to him," Wow, and to think for a second I was really scared there, turns out you two are just all show and no go!"
Fantasy rushed over to help Bubbly back onto her feet. Bubbly seemed ok for the most part thankfully, but unfortunately, so did the Rottenio. The Rottenio impatiently waited for the cures to make their next move and so, Fantasy took a step forward.
"This is only my second battle, so I can't really figure out how to apply my powers to this fight as quickly as I'd like..." Fantasy thought to herself before the Rottenio blasted another sound wave. The sound wave was just about to hit Fantasy, and so she leapt up as high as she could and clung onto one of the suspended ceiling lights. The Rottenio then looked around for Fantasy, unsure of where she went.
"Now's my chance!" Fantasy said to herself quietly before she jumped off of the ceiling light.
"Rottenio, she's above you! Hurry up and get out of the way!" Durian commanded with his mouth full.
The Rottenio dodged Fantasy's attack, but wasn't quickly enough to dodge Bubbly's. From the corner of it's eye, the Rottenio saw a flashing blue light and knew it was in trouble.
"Pretty Cure, Whirlpool of Justice!" Bubbly shouted, hitting the Rottenio dead on. The Rottenio was pushed back a few feet by the impact of the hit and Durian seemed rather unpleased at the sight.
"Alright, now you two have done it." Durian declared in frustration as he created a spiky dark green band around his finger. Durian snapped and the band gravitated towards the cures and once it was just above them, it turned into some kind of barrier and trapped the cures inside of it.
The cures tried physically breaking free from the barrier but with no avail. Durian then walked towards them, snickering at the sight of the cures trapped inside. Durian then placed his hand on the barrier and continued to watch the duo.
"What's this? You girls don't know how to escape from one of my barrier seeds?" Durian questioned as he tapped his fingers against the barrier," I thought you two said you were Pretty Cure."
Fantasy was just about to respond when suddenly, the door broke open and in came a pair of girls who seemed to be about Bubbly and Fantasy's age. One girl was dressed in bright green, the other was wearing red. Even if it was the sixties, the girl's had on unusual outfits and they had bright, unnatural hair colours, which could've only meant one thing.
"Durian, you skuzzbucket! Trapping innocent girls like that is totally uncalled for!" The girl in red hollered.
"You're gonna be a dead man by the time we're through with you!" The girl in green declared.
Bubbly and Fantasy were speechless and couldn't stop staring at the two girls. Durian however, simply laughed at the two of them until his sides started to hurt.
"Geez, first you show up late and then you start spewing some lame threats? I can't get enough of you Pretty Cure." Durian claimed as he leaned against the barrier.
The girl in green gnashed her teeth together and then held her arms high as she shouted," Pretty Cure, citrus spike!"
A bright green beam of light emerged from out of her palms, but the attack wasn't aimed to the Rottenio but rather, the barrier that was holding Fantasy and Bubbly.
"What is she doing?" Bubbly and Fantasy asked in unison as they watched the attack come straight for them.
"Duck!" The girl in red shouted to them. Bubbly and Fantasy did as told and ducked for cover as fast as they could. The attack was strong enough to break the barrier, much to their surprise and then the diner began to smell of rotten fruits.
"This is so gross! Why did it have to be in the diner?" The girl in red lamented as she stomped her foot and plugged her nose while her teammate ran over to Bubbly and Fantasy.
"Are you two ok? Nothing's broken, right?" She asked in a concern voice as she helped up Bubbly. Bubbly nodded in response and continued to stare at the girl clad in green. Was this girl unable to tell that she and Fantasy were Pretty Cure? It was beyond her.
The Rottenio then finally recovered from Bubbly's attack and returned to fighting against the Pretty Cure. The two new girls stood in front of Bubbly and Fantasy, as if they were trying to protect them.
"Tormenting defenseless young girls and stealing food from a diner is absolutely unforgivable!" The green girl shouted angrily as she pointed her finger in front of Durian," We, the Fruits Pop Pretty Cure are going to put an end to you!"
"I'd sure like to see you try, Cure Lime and Cure Cherry!" Durian remarked as he took a seat on one of the bar stools.
The Rottenio charged towards the Pretty Cure and Cure Cherry started to run towards it without a second thought. She was quite fast and it didn't appear that she was using magic to enhance her speed. It was hard to tell who was faster though.
"Pretty Cure, Cherry dynamo rhapsody!" Cure Cherry shouted as she halted to a stop, swirled around and sent a kick right onto the Rottenio.
The cures were rather impressed with Cure Cherry, would stood gallantly with her arms at her hips. Just then, the Rottenio created a sound wave, possibly the loudest one yet and projected it straight to Cherry. Cherry was blasted up into the air and then the Rottenio leapt up and kicked her in her stomach. She was sent flying and her fall was broken by Bubbly and Fantasy.
Lime was infuriated and turned her attention to the Rottenio as she shouted," Nobody treats my best friend like that!"
Lime then darted towards the Rottenio with Bubbly and Fantasy right behind her. The three of them began to fight together against the Rottenio, with Cherry joining in shortly after. The way that Lime and Cherry fought was awfully similar to Dolly and Teddy's fighting style. It felt like more than just a coincidence, but the cures didn't have time to focus on that. It didn't take to drain the Rottenio of it's energy and soon enough, the Rottenio was defeated.
"You girls are pretty good fighters, where did you learn moves like that?" Lime questioned as she dusted off her dress.
Fantasy drew out a sigh and then said, "Uh, you know we're actually Pre-"
"-My Rottenio! That was my strongest one yet! You girls are paying big time for what you did today." Durian declared before he vanished.
"He left before it was purified..." Bubbly remarked in surprise, staring at the bar stool once vacated by Durian.
Lime and Cherry walked up to the Rottenio and high-fived each other. Bubbly looked somewhat restless as she took a seat on one of the chairs lined up at the wall, under the belief that she and Fantasy should've been the ones purifying the Rottenio.
"Shouldn't purification be our job?" Bubbly pointed out, pouting as she folded her arms on top of the chair.
Fantasy put a hand on her teammates shoulder and gave her a look of sympathy saying," It's fine, we'll get way more chances for that once we get back home."
Lime and Cherry then joined hands as they shouted in unison," Pretty Cure, Fruity bursting rejuvenation!"
The surrounding atmosphere turned into a blinding neon green and red and enveloped the entire diner. The light was so strong that Bubbly and Fantasy had to shield their eyes. Somehow, it felt as if they too were getting hit with the attack.
"It's on us!" Lime and Cherry declared in unison before they struck a pose.
"What do you think is going on?"Bubbly shouted as she used her arms to shield her eyes.
"I think we're getting sent back to our own time!" Fantasy responded, her eyes squeezed shut as she tried to stand her ground.
The light soon dissipated and before the girls knew it, they were back in the storage room, their transformations reversed and seemingly back in their own time. Sophie and Mari looked at each other, giving the other a confused look. Things were quiet again, no loud music from upstairs, the storage room was as dusty and dark as before and, the girls couldn't hear much, if not any talking from upstairs.
"Mari, do you think everyone left without us?" Sophie questioned in a near frantic voice as she sprung to her feet," I don't wanna get locked up in here!"
Mari shook her head slowly and the girls began to walk back upstairs. The door to the main floor was open thankfully, and the girls found that quite a few employees had already left. The only people that were still here were Kiriko, Asuna, Ayaru and a few supervisors along with the manager.
To Mari and Sophie's surprise, nobody seemed even the slightest bit relieved that they had finally returned after being away for a good couple of hours. Instead, they were all kind of doing their own thing now. Kiriko was looking through the album, Asuna was playing a game on her PSP and Ayaru was doing homework. When they saw Sophie and Mari, they just waved to them casually.
"Find anything?" Kiriko asked them as they walked over to the booth.
"Wha? We've been for hours and all you want to ask us 'find anything?' " Sophie asked incredulously as she took a seat at the booth.
Kiriko and Asuna looked at the two of them in question with the latter saying," You two were only gone for like fifteen minutes."
"Well, if it's only been fifteen minutes, where did everyone go?" Sophie pointed out as she waved her arms towards the empty cafe to punctuate her sentence.
"They went to the store down the street to get some board games to play here." Kiriko explained sheepishly," Anyways, so you guys didn't happen to find another album down there?"
Mari then remembered the photo she pocketed earlier of Ryoko, Aika and the unnamed girl and showed it to the girls. The girls all looked at the photo, confused and unsure of whom the third girl could be.
"Maybe...that girl knows something about this?" Kiriko suggested as she took her phone and dialed a number," Hey grandma, are you able to come to Echo? I have something I really need to show you here. I promise Aika isn't going to be there, and neither will her granddaughter. Ok, I'll see you soon."
Asuna then shot her a look just as soon as Kiriko hung up.
"What? It's not like she'd recognize you." Kiriko claimed, though Asuna, Sophie and Mari seemed to be thinking otherwise. Asuna then tied her hair up into a ponytail and threw on a pair of sunglasses she had in her bag and flashed a thumbs-up to Kiriko.
"That's a bit extreme..." Kiriko said under her breath," You should call your grandma up too, I feel like we can figure this out if both of them are here."
"But how are we going to have them both here without them trying to kill each other?" Asuna questioned.
"We'll just make copies of the photo and show it to each of them from opposite ends of the cafe." Kiriko suggested as she ran to the back room to make copies of the picture.
Later, Ryoko and Aika had arrived at the cafe, with each of them sitting with their granddaughter at a booth in front of the picture. It didn't take any time at all for the two of them to recognize the third girl, much to Kiriko and Asuna's surprise.
"That's Hiyori! She was always a very good friend to me, up until she moved away. Then we simply lost touch." Ryoko explained as she pointed to the third girl in the photo," Yes, she was such a pleasant girl."
Aika however, didn't remember Hiyori as fondly as Ryoko did as simply shook her head at the sight of her saying," That Hiyori was the most despicable girl I've ever met. She used to be our friend but she went behind Ryoko's back and starting seeing her boyfriend. But, she did at least manage to keep Ryoko safe from that awful gang-leader. I had planned to talk to him in order to keep him away from Ryoko but.. I didn't have to. There was this one time when Hiyori couldn't keep her big mouth shut and she told everyone about the fight that Ryoko's boyfriend was going to have behind the school. But no one caught her and Hiyori pinned the blame on me. Ryoko didn't even believe me when I told her that Hiyori was involved with her man."
"So then what happened to Hiyori?" Asuna asked her.
"I had to leave for America, so I don't know what exactly became of them. I heard rumors that Hiyori and Ryoko's ex-boyfriend skipped town months later. I always thought that Ryoko would get over it but she was stubborn and had her heart set on him in spite of the fact that he wasn't a good person."
Aika's gaze then fell to the photo of her and Ryoko that didn't have Hiyori in it. She looked at it wistfully but then, she narrowed her eyes on something in the background.
"That's...Hiyori and Urokawa!" Aika shouted as she pointed to a pair outside in view of the window. Urokawa had his arms around her waist and the two were gazing into each other's eyes.
"This is my proof! I have to show it to Ryoko!" Aika exclaimed as she took a hold of the photo. Aika then stood up from her seat at the booth and then saw Ryoko and Kiriko at the other end of the cafe.
"Ryoko!" Aika said with a gasp as she walked over to the booth. Aika placed the photo of her Ryoko and pointed out Hiyori in the background. Everyone gathered around to see what Aika was pointing to. There were mixed reactions from the group. Sophie, Kiriko and Ayaru were surprised, Mari felt pity for Aika and Ryoko was just looking regretful. Ryoko pushed the photo away with a strained smile on her face.
"So it really was Hiyori..." Ryoko remarked as she looked at the photo," I have to confess something, take a seat Aika."
Aika did as told and so, Ryoko hesitantly began to speak," I didn't stop talking to you because I thought you broke me and Haru up. I did it because I felt ashamed for believing that you would go behind my back. I didn't think I deserved a friend like you after what I did and I felt guilty about it for a long time. I may have said some mean things earlier, but please know I didn't mean it. I'm sorry for telling you this after all this time."
Aika remained quiet for a while and only stared at the photo for a long period time," I don't want to accept your apology, I'd much prefer to pretend like none of this ever happened. Can we do that instead?"
"Sounds good to me!" Ryoko beamed as she put her arm around Aika's shoulder.