Chapter 3- Taking Care of Business

In the days that followed, Hazelnut became just as much a Mew Mew as everyone else. She mastered the arts of fighting aliens, searching for Mew Aqua, saving Tokyo, and eating as much cake as she wanted without gaining a pound.

However, her relationship with Ryou remained failed to improve. He only spoke to her as much as necessary, and, after some initial attempts to engage him in conversation, she returned the favor.

Pudding was insanely curious as to what had gone on between the two. Neither one though, was incredibly keen to talk about it.

This didn't stop her from trying to surprise it out of them.

"Hiya, Shirogane onii-sama!"

"Hello, Pudding."

"You know what I really like?"

Silence. Ryou didn't really care.

Regardless, the hyperactive girl ploughed on.

"What I really like are nuts!"

She rattled off a list. "Peanuts, pecans, almonds, Brazil nuts, yup, they're all really yummy. But do you want to know my favorite kind of nut, onii-sama?"

Still no response. But that had never stopped her before.

"It's hazelnuts, na no da!"

Finally, she sparked a reaction.

The prodigy turned around. "Pudding, why are you standing around chatting? We have customers waiting to be served."

"But-"

"Go." The tone of his voice told Pudding he was quite finished with conversation, thank you very much.

Disappointed, Pudding slouched off to fulfill her waitress duties.

She brightened as the obvious alternative hit her. "Maybe onee-chan will tell me!"

All the way on the other side of the café, Pudding discovered Hazelnut leaning against a wall, completely oblivious to the surrounding world.

Pudding wondered briefly why Shirogane didn't tell onee-chan to get back to work.

"Onee-chan, are you alright?"

The sight of Pudding's small face woke Hazelnut from her stupor.

She shook herself slightly. "Just haunted by the ghosts of things that have been."

"Thinking about Shirogane onii-sama?"

"What?!" Hazelnut was surprised at the accuracy with which the young girl could predict her feelings. "No, no, of course not, Pudding-chan, what would make you think that?"

Pudding wasn't convinced. "Onee-chan and onii-sama are acting very mysterious. The Great Detective Pudding will get to the bottom of this, na no da!" She struck a heroic pose.

"The only thing you're getting right now is a giant slice of Akasaka-san's delicious cake! Let's go take some from the kitchen!" Hazelnut suggested mischievously, distracting Pudding from her dangerous line of thought. Plus, she was hungry.

"Yay, cake!"

"Akasaka-san won't mind if we only take one, right? He's got lots!"

"Right!"

A few tables down, Mint took a dainty sip of tea. "Isn't it sad," she remarked to Zakuro, "how some people put their personal desires above their waitress duties?"

"Oh Edowara-san!"

Hazelnut hurriedly wiped the chocolate off her hands. "Yes, Akasaka-san?"

"Something terrible has happened. A cake that I worked dreadfully hard on has gone missing all of a sudden. It was going to go in the display window too…"

She widened her eyes as far as they would go. "That's horrible. What kind of person would be so evil?"

He raised an eyebrow. "You wouldn't happen to know anything about it, would you?"

"Me? I could never ever ever do something as vile as taking a cake without permission." She heaved a dramatic sigh. "How could you even think of such a thing?"

He waved it off. "I never suspected you. I am confident that such a kind and wonderful and virtuous person like Edowara-san wouldn't do anything like that. In fact, I know that being so kind and good and wonderful, she would stay after work and bake me another cake to replace the one that I lost."

"Um…"

"Splendid! I knew you wouldn't let me down. Here's a list of instructions. Good luck!"

Hazelnut could have sworn she heard evil chuckling as the man disappeared down the hallway.

She stared at the piece of paper in her hand.

"I wonder if this is revenge for the ponytail incident," she thought.

"I'm leaving the gang."

Hazelnut watched as a tremor ran through the group at her announcement. She had expected so much. She didn't really seem the type to up and leave like that. Especially since she was the leader. But the words of the boy she'd met three weeks ago still rang in her head.

"I wonder what you'd be doing if you weren't in that gang."

Finally, a girl in the back, one of her dissenters, spoke up.

"There are consequences for leaving, you know."

"I know there are consequences!" Hazelnut slammed her pipe on the ground. "I'm the one who set that rule in the first place!" She smirked, and cradled her weapon threateningly. "The question is: what are you going to do about it?"

Everyone stood stock still, not daring to challenge the leader who could beat up any five of them at once. And that was without the use of her hands.

"That's what I thought."

Her pipe and mask clattered to the ground as she left without looking back.

She hadn't really planned on it, but somehow, she ended up at Ryou's house.

A ponytailed man whom she'd never seen before answered the door.

"Oh, sorry, I was looking for Ryou Shirogane's house. Is he your neighbor?"

The ponytailed man smiled and beckoned her in. "No, no, this is the right house. Ryou's just in the basement."

"Oh, thanks. Who're you?"

"Keiichiro Akasaka."

"Hazelnut Edowara. Nice to meet you." Something about Ryou's companion disconcerted Hazelnut. He was just a little too nice.

When Hazelnut reached the basement, Ryou didn't even look up from the computer screen.

"I did it," she announced matter-of-factly.

"Did what?"

"I quit the gang! Isn't that what you wanted?"

"I merely mentioned that it was a waste of your time and talents."

Anger began to bubble up inside Hazelnut. "What is it with you? First you drag me here after I rescued you, then you yammer on about destiny, and now you act like you don't care at all! What do you want with me?"

He turned around again. "Listen, do you want a job?"

She was caught completely off guard. "What?"

He repeated it, more slowly. "Do you want a job? Keiichiro and I could use an assistant."

"What does that have to do with anything?"

He sighed. "Look, do you want it or not?"

"Well…" She pondered for a second. This guy was nuts, but some sort of morbid curiosity egged her on, giving her an irrational desire to get to know him better. "Okay. But it's only because I have nothing better to do."

"Whatever, you start tomorrow. Come at three."

Three hours later, Hazelnut was no closer to a cake then when she had started, but she was very busy cursing every piece of kitchen equipment.

"You!" she shouted at a mixer. "I curse the day your shiny steel frame was spawned from the mold in the demonic factory from whence you came!" She turned wrathfully toward the hapless oven, pointing an accusatory finger. "And you! May your heating coils and racks and…and… whatever else is inside an oven be forever accursed!"

She threw up her hands in despair. "What did I do to deserve this?"

A slight chuckle sounded behind her. "Well, you did steal a cake."

Ryou was standing in the doorway. "You really don't know how to cook, do you?"

She scowled, too frustrated to care that Ryou was actually talking to her. "It might be easier if some of this junk"-she gestured frantically at the utensils that had given her so much grief-"would cooperate."

"Keiichiro has top-of-the-line, state-of-the-art, contest-worthy equipment. Hardly classifiable as 'junk.'" He tied on an apron and picked up the abandoned mixer.

It took her a minute to realize what he was doing. "Hey," she said quietly. "I didn't ask for your help."

Piercing blue eyes met her honey colored ones. "Who said I was doing this for you?"

This chapter dedicated to Shanequa; thanks for giving me hope for the future.

Don't worry, the ponytail incident will show up in the next chapter. I couldn't quite fit it into this one. But it'll be good. At least I hope so.

If anyone's wondering what happened to Lettuce, your guess is as good as mine. If anyone has any suggestions for "The Amazing Lettuce Adventure Hour", please let me know. If not, then, we can pretend she's invisible as usual.

This week I was listening to seventies rock, hence, the title. The song's by Bachman-Turner Overdrive, in case you were wondering.