(A.N./
'What's that I see, captain?'
'Why, I know what that is, me matey! Chapter seven ahoy!'
'Right-o! Meet at bottom deck for some fresh-brewed honey ale!')
--
"I'm leaving the teleportation sensors unlocked, and tracking devices off. Feel free to wander, but don't get into any trouble. Ah yes, and I want you back by the time we are, and if we find you out of this room by then, there will be consequences, do you hear me?"
"Yes, mother." Kisshu said snidely. Pai ignored him and nodded,
"Alright." he motioned to Taruto, and they both teleported from the room.
Kisshu, however, was still trying to recall what exactly they were doing. He got up from his place and glided over to Pai's computer. Pushing in a few codes, the last open page appeared on the screen; they were of Pai's battle plans.
Hm. Interesting.
It seemed like Pai had had success with his experiment of the sun, judging by the vast amount of data related to it inscribed on the spreadsheet. Pictures, words, mathematical equations were all based on his studies of the sun's effectiveness to humans.
Tapping in a few more codes, Kish brought up another page or two on the chimera animal Pai had specifically designed. Its skin was designed to reflect and amplify the intensity of the sun's rays off its glittering scales, which were made from a diamond imitation. If the Mews didn't burn their skin fighting it, then they'd burn their eyes trying.
Kish raised an eyebrow at his plan.
Foolproof. What else do you expect from Pai?
Of course, some way, somehow, the Mews would find a way to defeat this thing; defy some kind of logic. It always happened, it was what to expect.
Or…
Maybe he would.
As his mouth curled into a smirk, he got up from the control panel and teleported.
He landed in a dark, dimly-lit room, various machines and mechanics lining the walls. Pai's private study room.
Apparently, Pai had put down all of the teleportation barriers.
Kish strode through the room, his feet lightly tapping on the concrete tile, to the end of the room, where there sat a huge tube-like container, reaching from floor to ceiling. He peered inside to see hundreds of little jelly-like parasites floating idly in the tank.
I should've known, he thought to himself, Where else would he keep these things?
He then teleported again, this time, landing on polished, maple floorboards. Ichigo's room. So many times had he been here, without permission, mind you, that he knew his way around.
Assuming Ichigo was at school, he paid no heed to concealing himself in the tree outside until he was sure the coast was clear.
He waited a bit. Any minute now…
"Alien alert! Alien alert!"
There we are.
He snatched the squealing, pink ball of fluff they call Masha out of the air and brought it close to his face,
"I wonder where all of those parasites you swallow go anyways. Ah, well. None of my concern, ne?" Masha struggled in irritation,
"Masha needs to tell Ryou! Tell Ryou! Masha is sending transmission!"
Kisshu rolled his eyes and teleported out of the room.
Ten seconds later Mrs. Momomiya opened the door to her daughters room, peering inside curiously,
"That's strange…" she said to herself, "I could've sword I heard people in here." She sighed and shut the door,
"These ears are failing me in my aging."
--
"Keiichiro! We just received a distress call from Masha!"
"Oh no." Keiichiro came to the computer hastily, studying the screen, "I hope the aliens aren't trying to fish information out of him again."
"His signal is unclear, the data readings match those of the incident way back when Ichigo had her weapon upgraded rescuing him. It's highly possible that the same method is being used right now, but we can't be sure. I'm not getting any readings of information drain or power loss, so I will keep monitoring the screen in the meantime." Keiichiro nodded,
"Thank you. Warn me if there is any changes in his status."
--
"Masha's getting help! Masha's getting help!"
The little pink puff was beginning to get on Kisshu's nerves. He swung it around by its tail casually as he walked over to the control pad. Tapping a few buttons, a message flooded the screen,
'Password:'
Kisshu furrowed his brow and thought,
What would Pai use for a password here…
He pressed a few numbers on the appearing keypad.
'Access Denied'
"Lets try that again…" Still swinging around the squealing Masha, he typed in a few more digits. A small beep emitted from the control pad,
'Password Accepted'
A little green light lit up on the container with all of the parasites. Kisshu grinned,
"I should've known Pai would use his birthday as a password…I guess he does have his dim-witted momen- OUCH!"
His snide remark was interrupted by a sharp pain on his arm, courtesy of Masha.
"Masha attack! Masha attack!" It squealed. Kisshu wrenched the little robot off his arm forcefully,
"Geez, what kind of robot are you anyways?! You're pink, fluffy, and sharp enough in the jaw to be an overstuffed guinea pig!" Masha just glared at him,
"Elf is mean! Elf is mean!" Kisshu narrowed his eyes,
"Why you little…" his voice trailed off when he remembered why exactly he had the little, pink, furry excuse for a robot in his possession in the first place. He relaxed the tension on his face and turned to the parasite container. Peering in, he pressed a button on the machine and the door opened. Instantly hundreds of the little parasites flooded the room, flying around in a confused cloud. Masha instantly went wild,
"Collect! Collect! Collect!" Kisshu released his grasp from it and it dove into the cloud, continually repeating, "Collect! Collect!" Kisshu smirked,
"That's right. Eat as much as you want. In fact, help yourself to all of them, if you'd like!"
--
"Keiichiro! Come here quickly!" Ryou called to the room above him. Within moments following, Keiichiro was dashing down the stairs,
"What is it, Ryou?"
"Take a look at these readings!" Keiichiro narrowed his eyes at the screen, only to have them widen once again,
"This is crazy! What exactly are they trying to do to Masha?!" Ryou shook his head,
"I…I don't know! Whatever it is, he's swallowing dozens more parasites by the minute!"
Suddenly a siren erupted from the system, and a red alert flashed onto Ryou's screen. He typed in a flurry of codes, bringing up his map of the city and tracker,
"Hold on, the aliens are attacking a park on the west side of the Kanto region! This doesn't make any sense!" Keiichiro nodded,
"But there might be an explanation as to what they're doing." Ryou turned to him as he continued, "Think about it, without Masha, the parasites that they release will only go into one animal after the next, and they can infuse them with constant human spirits for as long as they can. The parasites will never be stopped without Masha, and we don't have a backup robot ready!" Ryou nodded,
"Good point. By why, then, are they feeding him parasites?" Keiichiro shook his head,
"I don't know." Ryou ran a hand through his hair and closed his eyes, thinking hard for a solution,
"Regardless, we need to send the girls." Keiichiro nodded,
"Right."
--
Pai and Taurto came to a stop at a wide-open, busy park amongst a small forest of trees. Families sat on the benches and were taking strolls on its cobblestone paths, enjoying the fair weather. Pai eyed the place and said quietly,
"This will do nicely."
He gazed up into the sky, shielding his eyes from the light of the sun that would aid him in his plans. Taruto nodded,
"This place looks good. Let's start, shall we?"
--
"That's it, little fur ball, eat as much as you like! I'm not going to stop you!" Kisshu called to the little robot. It had sized the cloud of parasites into about half its previous size. That's when Kisshu spotted something suspicious.
On the other side of the room, in its own, special little tank, was a, oversized monster of a parasite, its colors consisting of a golden-tinted copper and rust red. Kisshu flew over to it and lifted off the lid of the tank, setting it free.
He turned to Masha and pulled it out of the cloud of parasites by its tail and turned it to face the parastie.
"Eat." he spoke simply, but demanding. Masha opened its mouth, sucking the parasite in,
"Collect!" It then turned back to its devouring of the rest of the parasites. Kisshu smirked,
All is going according to plan…
--
"Not you guys again!"
The high-pitched voice of Mew Ichigo reached Pai's ears as he turned to see her, and the rest of the mews, approaching,
"For the future of the Earth, I'll be of service, Nya!" Ichigo said, finishing off her catchphrase with a small tinkle of her bell on her furry, black cat tail. By now, a crowd of onlookers were gathering at a safe distance.
"Now," Ichigo continued, pointing an angry finger at the two aliens above her, "What are you here for this time?!" Taruto grinned,
"Nothing really. Just our best plan yet! Prepare to die, Tokyo Zoo Crew!" Mew Pudding raised a fist in protest,
"Taru-taru, that's not very nice, na do da!" Taruto recoiled at the nickname,
"I told you not to call me that!" Pai groaned,
"Will you stop your petty arguing, please? I would like to get on with the mission." Taruto nodded and let the argument slide.
Pai lifted his hand as to summon a parasite, but nothing happened. He furrowed his brow and tightened the muscles in his hand.
Nothing.
His knuckles were turning white from the strain.
Still nothing was happening.
He growled,
"Taruto, there has been some interference. Back to the base." Taruto looked from Pai, to his hand, and back up to Pai before nodding slowly and teleporting with Pai.
The Mews just looked upward curiously.
"Well, that was rather…strange." Lettuce remarked, fiddling with a strand of her hair.
"I agree. Something must have been wrong with their plans, so they abandoned the mission." Zakuro stated. Minto nodded,
"I think Onii-sama is right." Ichigo was about to add to the conversation before she had a microphone and a camera stuffed in her face,
"Mew Mews! Who are you, really? Where do you come from? What are you doing? Who were the flying people?!" Ichigo stuttered, pushing away the broadcasting equipment and turning to her friends,
"We've got to get out of here, fast!" The others nodded and they sprinted in the direction of Café Mew Mew, leaving the confused cameramen in their dust.
--
"Keiichiro! Take a look at this!" Ryou said, motioning to the screen. The readings on Masha had ceased to rise in numbers.
"Ninety-five parasites! I didn't know Masha had that kind of capacity!" he exclaimed. Ryou nodded,
"I sort of knew, but I never would have thought that he would need to have that many digested at one time. I wonder what they're doing in the first place though…" his voice trailed off as he glanced back at the screen, "Speaking of which, it looks like the aliens have disappeared from the park, and the Mews have just de-transformed on their way back here." Keiichiro mused,
"But we didn't get any signal of a chimera animal!" Ryou nodded,
"That's what's so strange about this situation."
--
Masha was becoming quite accustomed to being pulled around roughly by its tail, so it made no protest to Kisshu, once again, grabbing it out of the air by its tail.
"Good work, little pink guinea pig!" he said cheekily as he swung it around some more, "You did your job well! Will you find your way back home if I send you back right now?" Masha wriggled back and forth,
"Masha will, Masha will!"
"And will you promise not to tell the blonde one about your special treat?"
"Masha will! Masha will!" Kisshu grinned,
"That's a good rodent." He opened up a teleporting hole and flicked Masha in, calling in after it, "See ya!"
Completely satisfied with himself, Kisshu closed his eyes and sighed happily,
"Needless to say, it went perfectly…" he grinned and put his hands behind his head, only to feel them meeting the cold skin of a large hand,
"What went perfectly, Kisshu?"
--