Ichigo's Illness Chapter 19:
The New Plan
Kisshu teleported Ichigo to his room, and they sat down on his bed. "I hope this plan works," Ichigo said.
"I think it will," Kisshu said. "Don't worry, we'll get your parents back."
"Thanks, Kisshu," Ichigo said.
Kisshu smiled at her, then said, "It's getting late, should we go to bed?"
"Sure," Ichigo said. She and Kisshu took off their shoes, and curled up together on his bed.
The next morning they woke up, cleaned up, and went to get breakfast. Pai came into the kitchen soon after and said, "I got another call from Keiichiro; we should go to the Café after breakfast."
"Okay," Kisshu said. "Is something wrong?"
"I'm not sure, he didn't say," Pai said. "He looked scared though."
"That doesn't sound good," Ichigo said. She and Kisshu finished eating and then teleported to Café Mew Mew with Pai.
They were met by Keiichiro, who said, "We got another note. Come to the basement."
Ichigo, Kisshu, and Pai followed Keiichiro to the basement. The other Mews were there, as were the two police officers from before.
"Here's the note," Keiichiro said, handing it to Pai.
Pai took it and read aloud, "I know what you're planning. Any funny stuff, and Ichigo's parents die."
"So does that mean he was spying on us somehow?" Ichigo asked. "And he wrote 'Ichigo' instead of 'Mew Ichigo' this time."
"It would appear that way," Keiichiro said. "But this is a problem. If we don't do as he says, Ichigo's parents die. If we cooperate, we'll lose our two strongest fighters. And the week is almost up. What should we do?"
Even Pai was stumped by this. It seemed like a lose-lose situation. Either way, they'd lose someone.
"I don't suppose this is one of those 'sacrifice someone for the greater good' situations," Mint said.
"NO, it's not," Ichigo said. "I don't want my parents to die."
"None of us do, Ichigo," Zakuro said, giving Mint a stern look. Mint wilted.
"Where is the meeting place?" Officer Anko asked suddenly.
Keiichiro looked at the first note and said, "It says he'll bring Ichigo's parents here, and we'll exchange."
"I don't suppose we could wait in that alleyway and ambush him?" Officer Itou asked.
"He'll probably use Ichigo's parents as a shield," Kisshu said.
The others sat around in silence for a while, thinking. Suddenly Lettuce said, "We're pretty sure the Blue Knight can spy on us, right?"
"Yeah…." The others said.
"We need to find a way to come up with a plan that won't arouse suspicion," Lettuce said. "Is there anywhere we could go that he couldn't spy on us?"
"My lab might work," Pai said. "I made it spy proof after Kisshu cut a hole in the ceiling and snuck in to read my journal."
"Don't you mean 'diary', Pai?" Kisshu smirked. "Boy was that funny!"
"Um… can we get back on track?" Keiichiro asked. "We can talk about Pai's journal later."
"Right. Sorry," Kisshu said.
Pai sighed. "We might as well go to my lab, but no touching things, got it?"
"Hai," everyone else said.
It took a few trips, but finally everyone was gathered in Pai's lab. Keiichiro said, "Any ideas yet?"
"Maybe we should go along with the original plan, except Ichigo won't transform," Lettuce said. "We were going to tie them up for show, but make the knots easy to break out of, right?"
"Yeah," Keiichiro said. "But if Ichigo doesn't transform, how can she fight?"
"I don't necessarily need to transform to fight," Ichigo said. "I can use a sword. If we got one of those devices that Ryou had, I could put it in my pocket, and the Blue Knight wouldn't know."
"I think I have one of those," Keiichiro said. "Does everyone like this plan?"
"Well, it's all we've got, so I guess so," Pai said. The others nodded.
Then Kisshu, who had been wandering around while listening, said, "Pai, why do you have a whole bookcase on Finless Porpoises?"
Pai turned red and said, "None of YOUR business."
Kisshu smirked and snapped his fingers, and a small book appeared in his hand. "This might have some answers," he said evilly…
Cliffie! Except I'm posting again, so it's not as good a cliffie. Oh well. REVIEW!
