June 20, 09.

Hellooo, Fictioners!

Yes, yes, yes. Hello again. I know that within about two days I've updated 2 stories and am beginning a third. Why? Because it's exam time, and that's when I get my most FF work done, because I practise the subtle art of procrastination.

As you can see, I have ninja skills in procrastinaton. In fact, I'm pretty sure I could be the heir to the Procrastinationtown throne XD.

Now, this is my entry for Tomahawk 3.0's 'Losing Love' competition. Check it out if you're interested. However, this might well also be my entry for another competition of Toma's; OC Idol. You'll see. I'm going to be extremely awesome and merge the two for one gigantic entry ;)

But I've taken a new approach to this story. See, I'm well known for my endless chapters and boundless description, so this time, I'm aiming at shorter chapters (this one is 7) with much less description and faster-paced plotlines.

So if my writing seems OOC for me, then IT IS!!! XD

Enjoy, people.

Disclaimer: I don't own TMM.

S.W.A.K -- Eins

"Mew Mew Lettuce, Metamorphosis!"

Mint watched on with tense, dark brown eyes as the tall, green-haired girl transformed into Mew Lettuce, her braids constricting into a thick tube down her back, her cafe uniform magically morphing into her bright green fighting costume.

Their foe – a fat, oversized cobra snake with scales shining a disgusting variety of fluorescent hues – loomed above them, its forked tongue flickering from between its bumpy lips. It hissed menacingly, and Mint sighed heavily. Time to put her life on the line for the greater good of the population of Tokyo.

"Mew Mew Mint!" she cried. "Metamorphosis!"

The pleasant, familiar feeling of the transformation process washed over her small, slender-limbed body, her stupidly frilly puffed skirt swirling into a tight-fitting micro-mini dress that clung to her figure. Her silky gloves materialised around her hands, her blue-black hair – by some unknown godly force of nature – suddenly shining vibrant, ocean blue.

"When will you learn that you're just wasting your time?" Ichigo jeered from across the field. The five Mews had the big, dangerous reptile surrounded, their eyes fixed firmly on its frighteningly long fangs. Or – more specifically – on the slick, clear fluid that dripped slowly down them, reminding them of how close they were standing to a quick, painful death, and causing shudders to tremble down their spines.

"Popular to contrary belief, my dear kitty cat," Kish purred from above, where he hovered like a mutant angel, smirking widely, "it's not a waste of time if we're furthering our knowledge of ways to destroy you."

"Each failure merely constitutes what we shall not do the next time we encounter you pesky mutants," Pie added, folding his arms across his chest. His steel eyes were emotionless. "By eliminating the most futile of our attempts, we are narrowing our future options down to a range of entirely potential successes."

"Ugh. Whatever," Mint finally snapped, sick of his confusing monologues. "No-one understands what you're talking about anyway."

"Exactly!" Ichigo agreed, stealing back the limelight, as usual. Mint rolled her eyes. "Which is why its time for us to exterminate your little bug!"

"Forgive my disputing you, Momomiya," Mint interrupted loftily. "But that lethal snake right there is not what I consider little."

The cat-Mew glared at her, her vivid pink hair shaking around her shoulders as she fought to contain her rising pressure-gage. Any second now, she would explode, and Mint would mentally tick off another box on the list of Daily Successes in the Irritation of Ichigo.

Though her life had become rather mundane of late, it never ceased to stroke her ego that she could still rile up their perky leader (though why Shirogane had decided to place someone as ditzy as Momomiya Ichigo at the head of a team of crime-fighting teenage super heroines when there were three – heck, four; even Pudding was more resourceful than Ichigo! – entirely more capable girls at his disposal, was something Aizawa Mint would never understand) whenever she simply felt the desire to.

"Min–" Ichigo began, her face reddening as her cheeks puffed up angrily, but Pudding cut across her.

"Ichigo-onee-chan, watch out!"

The snake had finally gotten bored of waiting around for us to attack it, and had decided to take action itself. It curled around on itself, its sharp eyes landing on the loudest (dumbest, clumsiest, stupidest, perkiest, most annoying – oh, the list could go on forever...) of their team, and it opened its mouth wide, firing a stream of deadly, poisonous needles at her.

Ichigo leaped backwards onto her hands and sprang back onto her feet, executing an almost-perfect back handspring, narrowly avoiding the barrage of pin-like arrows.

"Hey!" she protested angrily. "How dare you interrupt me! Strawberry Bell!"

Her heart shaped weapon materialised magically in her gloved hands, and Mint rolled her eyes. Ever the impatient one, Ichigo was once again jumping into action way too soon, and the others would have to take action quickly before she messed everything up and wasted her attack, since it was the only one of the five of them that actually had the power to destroy a Chimera Anima.

"Mint Arrows!" Mint called, summoning her bow and arrow. She clasped it carefully in her hands, waiting for the others.

"Lettuce Castanets!"

"Pudding Ring!"

Zakuro wordlessly summoned her lasso, gripping it solemnly in her graceful hand and looking comically bored, despite the danger they were facing. Mint watched her for a moment – watched her boundless grace and breathtaking, unmatched elegance as she prepared for battle and lashed her glowing whip, striking their enemy right between the eyes. The snake reeled, recoiling with a half-shriek-half-hiss of pain. The teen sensation really was amazing. Such dignity...

"Reborn Lettuce Rush!" Lettuce shouted from her right, dragging the bird-Mew out of her idolising thoughts. Water blasted from her instrumental weapon, dousing the enormous serpent and rendering it helpless to attack.

"Pudding Ring Inferno!" Pudding cried eagerly, the bells on her tambourine jingling as she thrust it toward their foe. Somehow – again, thanks to the mysterious godlike powers that spurted from nowhere – a trail churned up the earth, rumbling towards its thick tail, and the snake was quickly encased in a sturdy block of amber jelly.

It was her turn.

Mint sighed with a slight reluctance and drew the string taught, knocking her deadly arrow and taking careful aim. Strike the heart, she reminded herself. Aim right for the heart.

She opened her mouth, awaiting the words she knew would unleash her perfect attack and render the foe useless, so Ichigo could do her thing and miraculously destroy it (and assume, of course, that it had been her sheer power and skills that had ensured their win, as she always did).

But the words didn't come.

"Mint," Zakuro called, frowning. "Strike it now, before it breaks out."

Mint took a deep breath, shaking her head and refocusing her aim. She could do this. She knew she could; she'd done it countless times before. She'd just gotten lazy today, that was all.

Again, she opened her mouth to speak.

"I... I..." she choked on her stuttered words, turning to the others in disbelief. "I can't!"

"What?!" Ichigo shrieked. "What do you mean, you can't?!"

"I mean... I can't!" Mint cried, horrified. Normally when she prepared to attack, her battle phrase just flowed smoothly to the tip of her tongue. She didn't even have to think about it.

But today, all that answered her questioning confusion was a heavy silence in her brain. The words simply wouldn't – couldn't – come.

"I–I've forgotten them!" she gasped in horrified realisation. The bow and arrow slipped from her hands and clattered to the ground at her feet, suddenly unimportant.

"Mint!" Ichigo shouted, irritated. "Quit playing around, already, and attack that stupid thing!"

"Ichigo, I can't!" Mint roared back, frustrated. Did the stupid girl honestly think she was deliberately not attacking the enemy that could easily kill them all in a matter of seconds? What was she, completely idiotic?

"Uh... guys?" Lettuce stammered nervously. "If we don't attack now, that snake will break free!"

Mint and Ichigo turned their attention to the battlefield, alarmed to find Pudding's sturdy prison slowly cracking in places as the monster it detained fought to escape.

Ichigo shot Mint a disapproving glare before raising her bell.

"Reborn Strawberry Check Surprise!" she called. Glittering pink light exploded from her weapon, surrounding the beast and filling the area with painfully bright light. Mint winced, turning her face away to protect her eyes, opening them only when she sensed everything was over.

Her gaze fell on the centre of the clearing, away from which a small, common carpet snake was rapidly slithering. It disappeared into the safety of the surrounding forest before anyone could even speak, leaving a faintly glowing hovering blob in its wake, which bobbed around uselessly until Masha popped up and disposed of it.

Everyone was silent for several long moments, and Mint's cheeks reddened when she felt seven pairs of eyes fix on her. Even the aliens seemed at a loss for words.

Kish was the first to recover.

"Interesting," he purred, clearly delighted by the sudden change in proceedings. "This changes everything. Pie, Tart."

Mint glanced up just as the three of them teleported into thin air, just quick enough to catch the bewildered expression on Pie's face, the confusion on Tart's, and the dark, calculating smirk on Kish's.

Without speaking, she transformed back into her normal form, storming away from the clearing.

"Wait a second!" Ichigo called, still annoyed. Pounding footsteps announced her quickly approaching, muffled by the thick grass underfoot. "What the heck happened back there?!"

"How should I know?" Mint snapped irritably.

"Well it happened to you," the redhead pointed out.

"That doesn't mean I automatically know what it means!" Mint argued hotly, curling her hands into shaking fists at her sides as she marched on, wishing Ichigo would just buzz off. Everything was good and well as long as it all went according to her plan. The minute something went awry, and she was worse than the Spanish Inquisition.

"Your hesitation could have lost us the battle!" Ichigo snapped.

"I did not hesitate!" Mint yelled furiously, hot tears pooling in her eyes. She whirled around, facing Ichigo like an enraged cougar, her eyes flashing with fury, her muscles tensed. Ichigo instinctively backed up before she could grab a hold of her senses.

"Well whatever you did, it wasn't helpful," she pointed out, recovering, seeming almost pleased that the bird-Mew had faulted in the battle, just so she could gloat about it. God, she was almost as bad as Kish!

"Well excuse me for not being perfect!" Mint cried, finally losing whatever little patience she had left. Letting out a small shriek of frustration, she whipped around again and crashed away through the trees.

Ichigo watched her with wide brown eyes.

"Ichigo-onee-chan?" Pudding asked quietly, approaching tentatively with Lettuce, Zakuro lazily bringing up the rear, her midnight eyes fixed on Mint's slight form disappearing in the distance. "What's wrong with Mint-onee-chan, na no da?"

"I don't know, Pudding," Ichigo replied, sighing. "But something's definitely up with her."

~o~

"What do you mean, she couldn't fight?" Shirogane demanded. Lettuce flinched involuntarily, her hands clenching the broom handle nervously as she listened to the conversation taking place in the kitchen.

"I mean, when it was her turn to attack, she couldn't do it!" Ichigo snapped.

"But that doesn't make any sense, baka!"

Their boss struggled to keep his voice level as she reported the afternoon's events. She glared up at him, her big brown eyes resentful.

"Why are you yelling at me? You think it's my fault that Mint was weak?" she demanded. "Stop blaming everything on me, Shirogane! Just because I'm the leader doesn't mean everything that goes wrong is automatically the result of something I've messed up! If you're going to keep yelling at me, then find someone else to do the job, because I'm getting sick of it!"

"Baka!" Shirogane growled. "You're not quitting, because you know damn well there's no-one else who can do it! And I never even blamed you. So stop dragging yourself into the centre of attention! It's not all about you, you know."

"ARGH!" she screeched, stomping furiously from the room. She paused in the doorway to yell back at him, "You're impossible, Shirogane! I hate it here!"

Then, with that dramatic exit, she stormed away to fume.

Lettuce sighed heavily and relaxed again, the war over for the time being. She resumed her quiet sweeping of the dining room floor, her blue eyes soft behind her big round glasses, humming ever so softly to herself as she worked; a tuneless melody that served little purpose, other than to gradually irritate the blue-haired girl sitting silently at the table in the corner, who glanced at her sharply every now and then.

Lettuce came to a rest when she neared the bird-Mew's usual table, wondering whether she should say something that might console her, or to leave her in peace.

"Mint-san," she said gently, gathering courage from somewhere inside her. "I'm sure what happened today is nothing to be worried about. You were probably just having a bad day. I'm sure everything will be normal again next time."

Mint didn't say anything; she just stared down stonily at the china tea set before her, then reached for it with her slender hands, pouring herself a fresh cup of tea.

Well, Lettuce mused optimistically, she can't be too upset, if she's still drinking her tea...

"Good afternoon, ladies," Keiichiro's charming voice greeted merrily, as he fought his way through the front door, his arms full of paper bags almost overflowing with food from the store.

"Hi, Akasaka-san," Lettuce replied obediently, inclining her head as he walked past cheerfully.

"Ryou," he said, heading into the kitchen, "I think that part you ordered came in the post today; I signed for something this morning. We put it up in your room. I didn't open– What's wrong?"

He set the bag down on the bench, his expression falling when he caught the troubled look on his partner's face.

"Something's wrong with Mint," Ryou replied.

"Is she okay?" Keiichiro asked in alarm, immediately thinking the worst.

"No, no, she's fine," Ryou said quickly. "But something's not right. She couldn't fight today."

"Couldn't fight?" Keiichiro said sharply. Ryou nodded, his brow furrowed as his mind ticked over the dilemma.

"But that's so odd," the taller man commented, beginning to unpack the paper bag, stacking the contents neatly on the bench.

"Tell me about it," Ryou agreed, azure eyes bothered. "It's never happened before."

"What happened, exactly?" Keiichiro asked curiously, his dark eyebrows pulling down over his warm brown eyes.

"She couldn't remember her attack phrase."

"She... forgot it?"

"Something like that."

"But... how?" Keiichiro wonder, baffled. "What in the world could cause something like this?"

"Well," Ryou sighed, pushing off from where his hands rested on the kitchen island, "that's what I'm planning on finding out."

~o~

"So... why am I being tested?"

"Because there might be something wrong with your DNA," Shirogane explained, carrying the vial of blood he'd just extracted from her arm over to his bench and slotting it into a complicated-looking contraption he'd no doubt invented himself.

Mint sighed.

"And what does that mean?" she asked tiredly.

"Well, I'm not sure," Ryou admitted. "This isn't something I've had to look into before."

"Sorry for burdening your peaceful, uneventful life, then," Mint scowled sarcastically.

"Stop causing trouble," he snapped. Clearly, he was in no mood for her chiding today. She sagged a little where she sat on the table, wishing her shift at the cafe would just finish so she could go home and sulk in the comfort of her own, lavish bedroom, without being disturbed by annoying people like Ichigo, or the irrepressible Pudding, whose eternal joy had only served to exacerbate her grumpy mood over the rest of the afternoon.

"Shirogane?" Mint asked quietly, breaking the silence. He glanced at her, acknowledging she'd spoken.

"What's happening to me?"

The worry laced in her voice distracted him from what he was doing for a moment, and he turned from the complex procedure of processing her blood cells.

"I don't know," he replied truthfully. "But don't let it worry you, because whatever it is, we'll be able to sort it out."

His blue eyes watched her for a moment, until she couldn't hold his gaze any longer and she tore her eyes away to glance down at her hands, which were knotting themselves together nervously.

"Just relax, Aizawa," Shirogane said, his platinum-blonde hair catching in the light of the computer. "Everything will be fine."

But for some reason, she found she couldn't wholeheartedly agree with him.

Oh, yes, and on top of the whole 'less description/shorter chapters' thing, I'm also writing with the Manga names for the characters, when I normally use the Anime names. Odd, no?

I thought so.

So, erm, yes. This chapter feels strangely like FLoaBW, if anyone remembers that good old fic XD ... Back in the day, ne?

If you're reading, please review. Thanks for reading, though :)

Until the next chapter,

Cherrie xx