A/N: GypsyxSilent, I must thank you so many times for your unfailing patience with my pathetic level of updating, and also once again for your wining competition entry.

I'm disregarding the whole Masaya=Deep Blue thing, btw. It would gum up the story at this point, though actually I keep finding moments where it would have been useful. But the fact is that I HAVE to get this story out now, and I don't have time to think of a complicated way to work it out.

BTW, listen to Frank Sinatra's rendition of 'New York.' It's pretty cool stuff.

He could never love her.

Despite what the Mews and Cyniclons had learned about one another, he still believed that it was impossible for two of them to be together. Her love for him was hopeless, but she had allowed it to consume her nonetheless. And now, gazing at the dark figure that raised itself, wreathed in smoke, in the centre of the courtyard, Ichigo knew that she had taken her eye off the ball.

All the fights that they had won so easily...and they had let this happen.

'I am known as Deep Blue. I will be the ruler of this planet.'

The voice was soft, cold, and sent shudders down her spine. She watched, frozen in shock, as Pai bowed onto one knee before the towering alien, while Kish and Tart stared, dumbfounded.

'It can't be,' she thought she heard the young alien mutter. 'It's too soon...'

Kisshu...

'Deep Blue,' Zakuro gasped behind her, her cool finally shaken. Voice rough with shock, and maybe something deeper. 'You are our enemy! You are the one who ordered these things, who ordered these three to try and destroy our lives, again and again...'

Yes, Ichigo realised. Her thoughts seemed to be moving in slow motion, drawn-out and echoey. He is the one...and yet...he is the saviour of Kisshu's people also...

'I will destroy you,' Deep Blue said softly.

'Hey,' Ichigo blurted. 'Stop.'

All eyes turned to her in shock, save for Deep Blue's. They remained locked ahead, focussed on her but blank, totally blank. She swallowed, trying to moisten her lips, and spoke again.

'It...it doesn't have to be this way...we're not your enemies...'

'Ichigo-san?' Lettuce said.

'We don't have to fight.' She took a shaky step forward. Her eyes focussed over Deep Blue's shoulder, seeking Kish's. He met her gaze with a look that was grim, but not altogether unfriendly. His look puzzled her; it was almost camaraderie. Almost as though they were about to take the same side in a fight, though why he should be anything less than joyful, now that his saviour had come...

His saviour. That was why she spoke now, spoke with such fervour. Because, though she couldn't simply surrender the planet, she didn't think she could bring herself to defeat Kish, finally and forever. He – and his people – deserved better than what they had. So now it was a truce or nothing. She looked back to Deep Blue, taking another step forward.

'I'm glad you're here now.'

Under his expressionless stare she was losing momentum, her speech drying up, but she forced herself to keep going. 'Tokyo Mew Mew have to defend the Earth, but that doesn't necessarily mean we have to fight you. We...we don't hate...your friends over there...we'll be happy to help you in any way we can.' She was standing directly in front of him now, and slowly, trying not to shake, she reached out a hand. 'Please?'

His eyes bent slowly down, fixing her with a gaze that was brilliantly blue and as merciless as some great, intelligent reptile. His white hand flashed up, and he struck her across the face with a force that threw her off her feet.

For a moment there was no pain, only impact. She was acutely aware of the rough texture of the cobbled pavement against her cheek, and of a tiny ant making its scrabbling way between them. My god, she thought, that ant might not be alive when he gets though with the planet...it's whole ecosystem could be destroyed...all life, to make way for whatever the aliens have got planned...

'Mew Ichigo!'

She jumped onto her hands and knees as the heavy sword with its dull red stone came smashing down between Deep Blue's feet. The paving stones seemed to peel away from the point of impact, tearing up their concrete foundations and spraying backwards in a howling rush of wind. The sheer force of the spectacle seemed to root her to the spot, and for a moment she was nothing but a frightened girl, cowering and crying in the path of the explosion. But then she felt arms about her.

'Mew Mew Power EXTENTION!'

Glowing light bathed her, and she felt relief. They were in trouble, but not beaten. The warm, strengthening power of the Mews was still there to set against this cold, alien onslaught. She pushed herself to her feet, raising her Strawberry Bell to join its energy with her friends' as they surged forward across the crater Deep Blue had created in the centre of the courtyard, meeting the blast of the sword head on. She felt a moment of bone-shattering impact, and then the grey ribbon of energy snapped. She saw Deep Blue's hair whipping wildly as his sword arm was thrown upwards, and then the five of them landed lightly, facing him across the crater.

'We did it, na no da!' Pudding cried, punching the air.

Then Deep Blue smiled. The valiant ring of Pudding's voice seemed killed dead on the spot by that tiny twitch of muscles, and Ichigo's blood ran cold. Suddenly she was more afraid than she'd ever been in her life.

'I guess I got too fired up fighting weaklings.' He gave a short chuckle, cruel and empty. His eyes flicked upwards, and Ichigo saw a dark speck growing in the very centre of the sky. It seemed to grow rapidly, and then she realised that it was plummeting, hurtling towards them at the speed of sound. Closer and closer, until it seemed to her that they must all be crushed beneath it. Deep Blue stared upward with a crazed, ecstatic smile.

Suddenly the object halted. Energy vanished, lost into nothing, as she saw that it was a huge, diamond-shaped building, ringed about with an orbiting circle of cube-like structures. The whole structure floated implausibly above them, solid as rock.

'Pai.' Deep Blue spoke again, his voice switching from the almost child-like tones of a moment ago to brisk and soldierly.

'Yes, Deep Blue-sama.' Pai dropped to his knees, head bowed as he awaited his orders. It seemed somehow wrong to see the calculating, intelligent Pai so servile, so pliable in the hands of his master, and Ichigo shuddered once more.

'I leave the rest to you,' Deep Blue said. 'Kisshu, come with me.'

In the numbness of shock her eyes registered tiny, irrelevant things. The cantankerous glint in Kish's burnished golden eyes, the sweep of Deep Blue's hair as he turned, the flicker of hurt or jealously in Pai's eyes as he watched the two go, tete-a-tete, while he was left to fight out the last battle as the only reward for his loyalty. Then Deep Blue and Kish teleported, and she snapped out of her paralysis.

'Guys! We have to get inside that base!'

* * *

Kish followed Deep Blue down the long corridor, their footsteps echoing around them. He was hurrying to keep up with the other's long stride, but Deep Blue neither hesitated nor turned. It would have been more practical for them to have teleported straight to whatever room they were heading for, and trotting along in his master's wake Kish had the distinct impression that he was being made to feel uncomfortable.

Kish wasn't a person who took kindly to being made uncomfortable, or bossed around, or controlled in any way. He ground his fangs quietly but rebelliously, hunching his head into his shoulders in a posture he had seen many human teenagers exhibit. At last they they entered the central chamber. There he was forced to unslouch for a moment as he leaned back his head to look up, amazed by the sheer scope of the building.

This room alone was the size of a cathedral, and as they had walked through the building he had gained the impression that any number of chambers and corridors interwove around it. The walls were shaped so that they seemed to spring actively to the floor, towering up and sloping gradually together. Everything was a sleek, semi-translucent blue, and he couldn't see any joins. It was as though the entire building had been cut out of a single chunk of artificial crystal.

Red carpets and hangings – oddly and pretentiously out of place – relieved the featureless walls. They muffled Deep Blue's steps as he paced slowly over to a window and looked out.

'Kisshu,' he said softly. His voice was deeper now, more real and solid than the ethereal tone of his spirit, but it still held a trace of that almost childish sound. Kish felt an involuntary shudder. There was a kind of cold innocence in that voice, a complete ignorance of good and evil that could allow a being to commit the most terrible atrocities without feeling them at all...but there was experience too, an old, twisted sadism glittering in those blue eyes –

Kish shook himself. What was he thinking of? Deep Blue was their saviour...

'Kisshu,' the voice chimed again. 'I must confess that I am not entirely satisfied.'

For so long, Pai had insisted that they speak Japanese everywhere, so that they might become fluent, the better to spy on the humans. Now Kish found that it took his brain a moment to feel its way back into the patterns of his native language.

'Is it anything I can rectify at once, Deep Blue-sama?' He knew he sounded sullen, but what was he to do about that. 'Simply give me direction; I am eager for your approval,' he added, trying to sound a little more polite.

Deep Blue half-turned towards him, bleak light from the window falling on his face. 'The human girl, Kisshu. Mew Ichigo.'

'What about her?' he asked brusquely.

'Her friends are full of hate and fear, but she...' Deep Blue spoke almost dreamily, his voice lilting. 'She dares to approach me...she asks for a truce. What do you make of that, Kisshu?'

The endless repetition of his name was beginning to annoy him. 'She seems to me like a slightly less stubborn human than the others,' he said, 'who was making a last-ditch attempt to save her kind from total defeat. I don't see that there is anything so –'

'That will do,' Deep Blue cut in. 'You don't think she had a more...personal reason?'

'I don't see what the problem is.' Kish's patience had run out. He was sick of this game of cat-and-mouse. 'I resisted her advances, didn't I?'

'Kisshu.' Deep Blue turned, facing him full on at last. He was shaking his head slowly, a faint smile on his lips. 'I have no use for soldiers who resist advances.'

Before the words had died on his lips Kish was hurling himself to the floor, but even so the attack missed him by barely an inch. He rolled to a stop, springing to his knees in a mockery of his old subservient posture. Behind him he felt the heat and heard the cracking sound as the energy bolt blasted a hole into the opposite wall. He could smell burning hair.

'You never wanted to save us, did you?' he cried, pointing wildly. He could feel his heart punching a cocktail of adrenaline through his veins, turning the world crisp and searing. 'All this...it was never for us! It was all for you!'

'Clever boy.' Deep Blue was walking slowly towards him, swinging his sword in a wide, lazy arc as he moved. 'No, I am not interested in Cyniclons who join the fight for the sake of their sick friends or their starving families. I have no time for boys who nobly resist their feelings of attraction for loyalty's sake. I may have had to settle for your mess of warring passions in the first onslaught, but that time is past now. I can dispose of you.

The sword came swinging down, and Kish shot up, up into the high vault until Deep Blue dwindled to a tiny figure below. But high as he was, he couldn't relax. The room might be huge, but he felt that the whole sky wouldn't be wide enough to escape into, now that Deep Blue had his sights on him.

'This is what poor, obedient Pai never realised,' the other remarked, as though perfectly unconcerned that his prey had taken flight. 'I fancy that even he might have had a thing or two to say about it if he had. But all the same, he is just the sort I need. It is men like him who will build our new world!'

Kish thought of Pai and Tart below, doubtless fighting for their lives against the Mews...and fighting for what? An eternity as slaves beneath this creature. He shot like an arrow towards the door, and Deep Blue let fly at him again.

This time he only realised his danger when he felt the wind of it on the back of his neck. With no time to control his dodge he simply dived, crashing headlong into the floor and rolling to a stop. He lay where he was, winded and gasping for breath, the easiest target in the world.

He caught a flash of something red out of the corner of his eye, glinting on the floor where he'd hit, more reflective than the dull red carpets. At the same time hot droplets trickled over his top lip. Blood. He propped himself painfully on one elbow as Deep Blue bent, wiping his fingers across the smear on the floor and holding them beneath his nostrils.

'What a perverse instrument the body is,' he commented. 'So hysterical. I don't even have to touch you. I can attack, missing a little each time, and you will kill yourself running.'

For a moment he seemed completely static, examining the blood on his fingertips. Then his sword was blazing again.

This time, whether from exhaustion or the effect of Deep Blue's words, or simply because he had grown tired of the game, Kish didn't dodge. The force of the attack threw him against the wall, and he felt the glassy surface crunch beneath him. For a moment he felt nothing, his senses reeling from the impact. Then the pain hit him.

'You miserable scum.' Pale fingers closed his throat in a crushing grip. 'Did you think I wouldn't notice the way you looked at her in the courtyard?' Deep Blue wrenched him upright, twisted his arm savagely and flung him down once more. 'Did you imagine that I'd missed you wavering, growing more uncertain with every day?' His voice was rising to a shriek. 'You romantic, melodramatic fool! I heard the rebellion in your voice from the very first time I spoke to you!'

'Please!' Kish choked. 'I didn't –'

'It does not matter what you did or did not do.' The voice was quiet and impassive now. The sword rose for the execution 'I know you better than you know yourself. Never forget it.'

A wild shriek erupted from somewhere to his right, and a vivid blur came barrelling into his field of vision, crashing headlong into Deep Blue. The alien was knocked to his knees, his sword clanging on the floor. The figure who had run at him tumbled into a handspring and landed perfectly on her feet, planting herself between him and Kish.

Ichigo.

Despite her slight figure and that ridiculous costume, she still managed to display all the aggression of a Bengal tiger defending its cub. Her teeth were bared, her strawberry bell clenched in her gloved hands, her whole body language spoiling for the fight. Like a kitten that thinks it's a lioness. He tried to speak, to raise a hand in warning, because he realised now what Deep Blue had seen, seen but never understood. He did care for Ichigo, he could no longer deny it for the sake of convenience. She was gutsy and petulant and ridiculously brave, all qualities he could admire. And now those qualities were most likely about to get her killed, because, in a fit of pig-headed passion which was all too familiar to him, she had come running to his rescue. Despite everything he'd said.

Deep Blue was still kneeling on the floor, clutching his arm. His expression was livid, but he looked oddly broken crouching there. Kish knew how he felt. The Mews might only be weak human girls in comparison to him, but their power burned all the same. It was the perfect weapon to use against his kind.

'What do you think you are doing, harming your own allies like this?' Ichigo was shouting, true to form. 'For hurting him, I won't forgive you! Ribbon strawberry –'

Her words cut off in a squeal as a bolt of energy from Deep Blue's fingers knocked her off her feet. He lunged forward with his sword raised, but before he could deliver the blow Kish interposed himself between them, blocking the sword with both his own. He sprang and somersaulted over Deep Blue's head, levering himself up on their locked swords and landing lightly behind him. On his other side Ichigo was scrambling to her feet, shocked but unhurt.

Poised for fight or flight, Kish took stock of his body. There wasn't a muscle in him that wasn't bruised and aching, and he could feel a tracery of cuts and scratches across his back and shoulders from slamming into the glass wall, but nothing seemed to be broken, at least. All the same, he didn't fancy their chances. He wouldn't have to die alone, though. That was some comfort.

He and Ichigo circled slowly, Deep Blue at their centre. His eyes flicked between them for a moment, and then he wheeled on Ichigo with snake-like speed once more. Like lightning Kish teleported, scooping her into his arms and flying with her across the room. They landed – crashed, really – behind a chunk of rubble as Deep Blue's attack lit up the hall with glaring brilliancy. A thousand flares of light reflected in the crystalline walls, burning into his eyes, blinding him. Chunks of masonry thudded all around them. Then came silence, in which they could hear, with agonising clarity, the swish of Deep Blue's cloak as he began to pace towards them.

'Kisshu...' Ichigo breathed. Her fierce bravery was all gone now; she was shaking, terrified.

'I tried to tell you.' She was his last ally, his lifeline to good and bravery in the face of Deep Blue's icy power, and he clung to her tightly. 'You should have hated me while you had the chance.'

'Come out, little children,' Deep Blue called, his voice like fingernails down a blackboard. 'There's no use in hiding...'

Kish made a grimace at the lack of originality, risking the shortest of glances out from behind the boulder.

'Ichigo,' he hissed, 'we need to distract him...if one of us can just engage him for a few moments, the other can get a blow in from behind –'

Ichigo nodded once and then buried her face in his chest with a squeal as another blast of energy hit the pile of rubble in front of them. Kish hid his face in her hair, his nails biting into her back, and when he looked up the heap was considerably smaller than it had been.

'Good luck, then,' he whispered quickly, pushing her forwards.

'Huh?' Ichigo turned, and for one moment she was the fierce, brave fighter she had always been, no trace of fear in her rosy eyes. 'Why me?!'

'Cos I can teleport, and you can burn him with your strawberry thingumy. Good luck.' He pecked her swiftly on the cheek, propelled her forwards and teleported.

Ichigo staggered into the open, her mind reeling. She could barely focus on Deep Blue as his face broke into a smile of cruel pleasure at her appearance. After a moment, however, a fog seemed to clear in her mind, and her stomach clenched with fear.

Something moved, catching her eye. Kish. She could make him out at the far side of the chamber, flitting along, half-visible. The sight of him gave her strength, but it also distracted her, and by the time she had pulled herself together enough to think about attacking, it was too late. All she could do was raise her bell above her head, surrounding herself in a flimsy soap bubble of protective light as Deep Blue's attack came shooting at her.

Teeth gritted, head down, she maintained her shield, but her feet were slipping backwards on the polished floor. She felt tired, bone tired, her arms trembling with fatigue. She gave a cry, and both their energies vanished, and she was exhausted, and he was not.

His long white fingers closed around her throat, and he hoisted her into the air. He was winning, completely in control, and yet he still grimaced as though she burned him. And maybe she did. All she could see was shimmering red, her instincts rising in her, stronger and hotter than they had ever done before, blotting out fear and pain. She gave another scream, this one of pure fury, and lashed out with all her limbs. At first they flailed in empty air, but then her hand connected with his face.

He lowered her slightly, touching his cheek in surprise. Three scrapes marred his skin, flesh-red but dry and bloodless. She could feel her nails tingling where the force of the blow had wrenched them backwards. They stared at each other for a moment, and then Deep Blue threw back his head and laughed. The sound started out cruel, rose, became high and inhuman, until she was writhing in her efforts to get away from it, her sensitive cat ears flat against her scalp. And Deep Blue laughed on. The arm that held her did not tremble. His fingers tightened as he laughed, constricting her throat, and black and purple spots began to shimmer in front of her eyes, her struggles weakened, sounds turned echoey...and still Deep Blue laughed...

Then the sound cut off sharply as a bright blade emerged through his chest. He and Ichigo both stared down at it, uncomprehending, as it finished its thrust and retreated once more. Then Deep Blue dropped Ichigo and whirled around to face Kish, who stood with his dragon swords raised, flashing brightly and smeared with only a little blood.

Deep Blue lunged, and Kish charged straight to meet him, stabbing both swords forward and up to the hilt in his old master's body. Deep Blue gave a high shriek and crumpled forward, and Kish shouted over his shoulder:

'Now, Ichigo!'

'Ribbon Strawberry Surprise!' she screamed.

Kish flung himself out of the way as the attack engulfed Deep Blue, incandescent sparks hungrily tearing him apart. Ichigo was on the ground, flung backwards by the force of her own attack, staring wide-eyed at the writhing silhouette. It crumpled in on itself, smaller, darker, its final scream fading, and then...nothing.

The light faded, and there was a clink as something dropped to the floor.

They stared at each other across the spot where Deep Blue had stood, both battered, bruised and exhausted. Ichigo thought she would lie down and sleep right then and there, but Kish was always the soldier. He dragged himself to the point where Deep Blue had vanished and picked up the thing that had clinked. It was a bigish chunk of crystal, very like the stuff the palace was carved out of, but somehow warmer, less cruel. It felt as though the whole building had been trying to mimic it, and had gone horribly wrong, but this...this was right. Ichigo thought that she felt less tired just looking at it.

'Mew Aqua,' Kish said.

Their eyes met, both of them wondering whether they were supposed to leap up and start fighting each other for it. Then Ichigo said:

'Keep it.'

'Huh?'

She clambered unsteadily to her feet, and he followed suit. 'Keep it, I said. You can use it to heal your planet, and then your kind will be able to live there, and we won't have to fight over the earth any more.' She took his hand and folded it firmly around the crystal.

Kish swallowed dryly for a moment or two, and then thanked her with a fluid gesture of his free hand. His mind was spinning, taking in what this meant. He had no doubt that the Mew Aqua could do what she said, and so the battle was over. He could return home. But even as his heart leapt at the thought of seeing his loved ones again, he felt sadness. There was no excuse he could make to stay here any longer, and so he had to face and acknowledge the fact that he might regret going, and every reason for it. He had to choose, finally and completely. He knew already what he had chosen, but that didn't make it any less painful. Almost as if on cue, Ichigo asked:

'Is she pretty?'

'Huh?' he said again, stupidly.

'The girl you love, back on your planet. Is she pretty?'

'Yes,' he blurted, 'she's beautiful. It's the way she smiles at me when everybody else thinks I'm being cruel of flippant...she hated it when I had to go, but she understood why...' The flood of memories was rising now, unstoppable. 'Ichigo, I have to go back to her,' he said, almost pleadingly. 'I can't abandon her just because – just because I fell in love with you when she wasn't here to fight for herself.' He heard Ichigo gasp, and realised that of course, she had no idea of the complicated feelings that had been battling inside him. He had suspected for a long time that he might not love her, but this was the first she'd heard of it. Would it have been kinder to not mention it at all?

She was crying now. He rubbed her back awkwardly, wondering what to do, but with surprising speed she pulled herself together and said:

'We have to tell the others.'

Oh hell, the others! Were they still fighting and killing one another outside, while he wrestled self-importantly with his own small uncertainties here.

'No,' Ichigo murmured, 'they're not fighting any more, I can feel it.'

Kish blew out a long sigh. 'Then we'll go to them. Tell them what we've decided. Pai will agree; he's not as pig-headed as all that. Our people have always been his top priority, he'll be keen to start –'

'Will I ever see you again?' Ichigo asked in a small voice.

'I don't know. I think...' He floundered, considering. 'I think I might...I might come back...don't hold your breath but...yes. Maybe. Probably.'

'Hmmm.' There was just a hint of the old spark back in her eyes. 'How old are you?'

'About fifteen, in your years. Why?'

'I was just thinking, fifteen isn't so very old. You might change your mind.'

'You're incorrigible,' he said, shaking his head. He saw her blanche and immediately regretted it. In truth he was touched, touched that he meant that much to her, and her unshakable hope was making him all the more sorry that he had to leave her.

'Do you think, Kisshu,' she said, in a subdued tone, 'that there's any way we could have been together? Maybe, if we'd both been human and you'd been able to choose fairly between me and her, or if you'd come to Earth not loving anyone? I just want to know...that it wasn't totally stupid.'

Totally stupid? Of course it hadn't been that. He placed his hands gingerly on her shoulders.

'Maybe things might have turned out differently,' he said. 'Ichigo, you're special, and one day you will be very happy. And I will never forget you, because you are...my all-time favourite kitten...'

And he pressed his lips to hers.

A long, sweet, honest kiss, broken only when they heard the calls and footsteps of the others clattering in the passage outside. Then they released one another and turned, somehow refreshed and understanding themselves more fully than before, to counteract the bitterness of parting with the sweetness of peace.

Ichigo watched Kish head towards his comrades, beginning to speak swiftly in their own language, and though she knew this might be the last time she ever saw him, she somehow felt more hopeful than ever. She could carry on without him, now that she knew he loved her, and there was no reason to think of this as the absolute end. On some future occasion, she might have better luck...

But for now she turned away, back to Shirogane-san, back to Aoyama, and back to the dear friends who had fought beside her through it all. She let them pull her into joyful embraces, a little sad, but no longer lonely. She looked back at Kish once, over her shoulder. Tomorrow she might go to kendo practise and cheer, and in ten years they might meet again. And no matter what happened then, she had friends on other worlds.

No, she wasn't lonely any more.

A/N: Feeble last line, I know. Sorry! And I used '...'s too many times, and Deep Blue came out really incompetent, now I come to think of it...he was missing on purpose, OK guys!

I just wish I'd found some more powerful way to deliver those last few lines. And I just feel that, somehow, this came out wrong...maybe it's because I've left it for so long. Maybe I should re-read the rest of it, re-tune to the nuances that I'd fed in, and then try again...but anyway, for now, there you have it.

Many thanks for tuning in!

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