Eight hours, two thousand twenty four rooms, and a million cleaning supplies later, the palace was sparkling clean. Every floor swept, window washed, toilet plunged, and to Dais’ dismay every spider web was removed as well. He was rather fond of the little creatures. An exhausted group of maids-for-the-day collapsed in a single pile of bodies.

Purple groaned and rubbed her back; “I don’t think I’ve done this much work in years.”

“You’re tellin’ me.” Venom agreed; she then held up her hand to inspect it, “I think I broke a nail.”

“No complaints here.” Sekhmet said grinning. Cale proceeded to throw a feather duster at Sekhmet, missing him by a few inches.

“Gee, I wonder why.” Cale muttered then sneezed, “I will never ever set foot near a feather duster again.”

Kayura was running around the room looking at all the glistening things in it, “Wai! You guys did a great job! It’s awesome!”

“I hope it stays clean for a long time.” Anubis grunted.

Kayura stopped and looked at the human pile, “Now that I think about it, Crimson and Asa aren’t here. Where are they?” She looked at Cale.

Cale shrugged and huffed, “Don’t look at me. Asa sort of disappeared. I had to do most of the work after she vanished.”

Kayura’s attention then turned to Purple, “Crimson was with you last. Do you have a clue?”

Purple shook her head, “Nope. None.”

“Hmm¼I wonder where they vanished to.” Dais contemplated, an evil glint in his eye which only Anubis seemed to see.

Anubis smiled secretly at Dais then replied, “Well, how able that mud wrestling match? Y’all still up for it or not?”

“But now we’re uneven.” Venom pointed out.

Anubis smirked, “So you’re backing out?”

“No!” Venom exclaimed.

Sekhmet wrapped an arm around Venom’s shoulder, “Then bring it on, babe.”

“Ready to be beaten?” Cale asked Purple. “In your dreams little man.” Purple said after poking Cale in the chest. Thus the group headed outside to begin their mud-wrestling match...

In the meantime, Crimson and Asa were stuck in quite a predicament. They had been gagged with bandanas and hung upside down, wrapped cocoon style with immense strings of spiders web. Mr. Prongs, Crimson’s spork, was stuck to her ankle by the same white gook. After trying unsuccessfully to wiggle her way out of the white mass several times, Asa let out muffled screams of frustration. Crimson tried in vain to reach into her back pocket and soon succeeded in pulling out her lighter. Now, were spider webs flammable? Only one way to find out...she lit it and hoped for the best. Within moments she found herself on the ground, when she exhaled a puff of smoke exited her mouth.

“Well,” she commented to herself after ripping off the bandana, “now I know what it feels like to be Tamahome when Tasuki flames him. Charbroiled Tama-kins...haha!” She then turned to a horrified Asa who was shaking her head furiously at the thought of the lighter.

“Relax,” Crimson told her before getting her down, “It doesn’t hurt.”

Asa fell to the floor with a loud thud, “Ow...”

“Um...oops?” Crimson shrugged.

“How the hell’d we get here?” Asa asked after removing her own bandana, brushing herself off.

“Beats me, but I think our two warlord buddies had something to do with it.”

“DaiDai and Snoobies?”

Crimson snickered at the nicknames and nodded, “Hai.”

“That would explain the spider webs. So...what’re we gonna do now?”

Crimson smiled evilly, “Come back with a vengeance Asa-chan.”

Asa returned the sinister grin, “What’s first on the agenda Queen Crim?”

“I have a certain collection of Play Boy magazines belonging to Anubis in mind for my trusty lighter to meet.”

“Let’s go! Those magazines are calling out to us! Just begging to be obliterated.” “They will soon learn their mistake of messing with Cow and Chicken.” Crimson smirked. They linked arms and made their way to Anubis’ precious library...

At Mia’s place everyone was happily munching on fresh pizza just delivered from a pizza delivery guy. Well, everyone but White Blaze who was begging for a slice.

Kento held his two slices high above White Blaze’s reach, “Think again kitty cat. Ain’t no way in Hades you’re getting mine.” White Blaze snorted at him distastefully and moved onto his next victim, Cye.

“Get away from me you bloody feline!” was Cye response.

Ryo came up and patted the huge tiger on the head, “No beggin’ White Blaze. Your chow is in the kitchen.” Ryo was referring to a huge steak lying in a round bowl on the kitchen floor. White Blaze growled and headed in that direction.

“Poor kitty,” Oriana stated, “he can’t just have one bite of pizza?”

Ryo shook his head, “If we start feedin’ him table scraps he’d soon come to expect it and start thievin’ from the table.”

“Speaking of thieving, I spot a piece of pepperoni begging to be eaten by me.” Oriana replied. Before Ryo could respond, Oriana plucked a pepperoni off of his slice and ate it.

“Hey!” Ryo protested. But he was too late, “Okay, if that’s the way you wanna play, I see something _I_ want.” Ryo planted a quick kiss on Oriana’s lips before taking another bite out of his pizza, acting like nothing had happened and leaving Oriana stunned.

Rowen was sitting happily on the couch being fed by Emi and Tamara, “Aaaahhhh! This is the life fellas.”

Sage smirked and placed a piece of pizza in Mia’s mouth, “Yer tellin’ me.”

Emi paused for a second, “You know what TK?”

“Hmmm?” Tamara asked.

“This doesn’t seem right.” Emi answered, gesturing to a placid Rowen and them with pizzas in their hands feeding him.

“You know, I think you’re right.” Tamara agreed, then looked at Emi with a devilish smile, “Shall we?” As if reading her mind Emi nodded and two slices of pizza, one from each girl, each met one of Rowen’s cheeks suddenly.

Rowen jolted up from his slouched position, “ What the--”

Oriana and Mia cracked up while Kento gasped, “What a waste of perfectly good pizza!”

Emi giggled, “It’s not like you can’t lick it off if you want it Kento.”

“Erg¼what?” Kento shuddered, “I am _so_ not that way!”

“Haha! Coulda fooled me, Teddy Bear.” Emi replied.

Kento raised an eyebrow, “You want teddy bear? I’ll show you teddy bear.” Kento grabbed Emi and started tickling her mercilessly despite her very loud protests.

“Stop! Ahaha!” Emi shrieked.

“Not until you say ‘Kento is the coolest guy on the planet’.” Kento laughed.

“Never!” Emi giggled, “Noooooo waaaaay!”

“I won’t stop ‘til you do.” Kento warned.

Rowen peeled the two slices from his face and tossed them at Tamara. This immediately prompted a food fight. Mia watched on helplessly as her living room became the location of World War Three. It was a sight to be seen. Pepperoni, sausage, peppers, mushrooms, and various other pizza toppings flew in all directions. It was an all out battle, every man for himself.

White Blaze happily hopped around the fray catching any morsel of pizza in his mouth that he could with a frazzled Ryo tried to shoo the tiger out of the room. Mia decided it was high time to join in so she grabbed a slice from midair and chunked it into Sage’s hair. Poor Cye was being pelted with anchovies by the millions by a jovial bearer of Strata. Kento was just as happy as White Blaze, grateful to any piece of food that happened to land in his mouth.

The wood floor was becoming slippery as tomato sauce was spread around from everyone stepping on pizza as they tried to hit others with it while at the same time try to avoid becoming a target themselves. Suddenly a booming laughter was heard and everyone looked up to see Cye armed with a Super Soaker water gun, filled to the brim with water.

“Mwa haha haha!” Cye laughed menicingly, “Feel the wrath of Torrent!” With this he began pumping the gun as hard as he could, sending ice-cold jet streams of water all over everyone. Mia jumped behind Sage before water could hit her and it hit him instead.

“Look who’s wet now.” Mia joked, referring to Sage’s earlier comment to her at the pond.

“Oh yeah?” Sage challenged, “I do believe that water was meant for you...so...” He got behind her and grabbed her, “Cye! Get Mia!”

“It’ll be my pleasure,” Cye replied, an evil glint in his eyes and he did so. Mia squealed and squirmed against Sage’s hold on her. Oriana decided to side with Mia and, grabbing a peeled banana from a fruit basket, she held it like a psychotic killer would a butcher knife and “stabbed” Cye with it on his forehead. It stuck on him half squashed, suctioned to his head. He looked as if he had grown a horn. Playing along, Cye staged his death, falling backwards with a really funny ‘dead’ expression on his face.

Oriana danced in victory but it didn’t last long. She was tackled by Sage and knocked to the ground. He was armed with cool whip; squirt bottle style. He straddled her and covered her face with the white clouds of cool whip. Tamara body checked Sage, sending him sliding across the floor thanks in part to all the water and tomato sauce lying about and right into Emi. Emi toppled over on top of him. Grabbing a mushroom from the floor, she chucked it at Tamara for causing the mishap. Tamara just grinned. Cye and Kento tag teamed her, each sending a big slice of pizza in her direction. Tamara ducked and it hit Rowen instead. He stumbled backwards, knocking over the phone from its place on the coffee table. On the way down, he had flailed his arms around to try to stay upright. He had happened to grab Emi, dragging her down with him.

Emi sweatdropped. Enough of her falling over. Not that she minded. Hell, a lot of other Ronin Warriors fans would die to fall into the laps of Sage Date and Rowen Hashiba. But, boy was it getting old. It was high time to bring in the heavy-duty equipment. None other than duct tape of course! No anime otaku should ever leave home without it.

“That was the last straw!” she announced, holding a roll of duct tape high for all to see. Oriana and Tamara looked at her fearfully while the others looked at the three confused.

“What’s so good about some tape?” Sage asked.

“That’s no ordinary tape.” Tamara gulped. “That’s duct tape.”

Oriana nodded, “The strongest tape in the universe. Heavy duty stuff there.”

Ryo snorted, “Yeah, sure. I bet it isn’t as powerful as the mystical armors.”

“It wouldn’t stand a chance against my armor, for sure.” Kento agreed.

“Wanna test out that theory?” Emi asked, suddenly decked out in mad scientist gear ala Washu.

Rowen’s eyes sparkled, “Science! Wheeee!” Cye groaned at the over enthusiastic Rowen and whopped him with a pepperoni.

“Who wants to be my guinea pig?” Emi asked, “Kento?” Kento smirked, this should be easy. He nodded and proceeded to call upon his armor Hard Rock.

“Everyone stand back!” Oriana commanded as her and Tamara ushered everyone to the safety of the kitchen doorway. They all watched on at the happenings in the den.

Emi stuck a strip to Kento’s chest plate and ran around him in circles until he was covered from neck to toe. She stumbled around dizzy and re-caught her balance, “Alright Kento, try to destroy it.”

The poor guy couldn’t budge. He struggled for several minutes, which soon resulted in him falling face first to the floor. He continued to squirm around, resembling a wriggling worm. His face was red with frustration. “What the hell?” Kento huffed, “This stuffs not normal¼somebody get me out of this.”

“Baaa daaaaaaaaam! Wildfire to the rescue!” Ryo grinned, but he earned weird looks from the girls. Armoring up, he prepared to send a blast of fire at the duct tape.

“No! Nononononoooo!” Kento panicked, “Ryo you’ll melt it onto me!” It was too late, Ryo flamed Kento with his swords. The duct tape became stickier and oozed, sticking to Kento even tighter, “EMI!” he screamed.

Mia stepped up to him, “Here Ken, I’ll help you get loose.” She began to peel off bits of melted duct tape piece by piece.

Laughing nervously, Emi planned her escape, “Well guys! Who’s up for karaoke?!” Catching her hint, Ryo said it would be a great idea after he had armored down. He knew Kento was equally ticked at him and he wasn’t planning to stick around when Kento finally got free of the stuff. Everyone else quickly mumbled their thoughts on going but before everyone could leave the house...

“MY DEN IS A MESS!” Mia screamed, “Clean! Now!”

“It’s Rowen’s fault,” Tamara smirked, “I think he should stay behind.”

“But you and Emi were the ones who stuck pizza to my face.” Rowen replied, shifting the blame.

“Cye’s the one who brought in the water gun,” Emi pointed out, to shift the blame again.

Cye just grinned, “Damned straight I did!”

Sage swiped the keys to Mia’s jeep and everyone but Mia and Kento made a mad dash to it. They locked the doors as a ticked Mia had run after them and was pounding on the driver side window, “Sage Date!” The rest of what she was saying could not be heard for the jeep was cranked and slammed into reverse, sending the group off the long dirt driveway and onto the road leading to Tokyo...

Back in the Dynasty, the mud wrestling competition was getting underway. Purple and Venom were tag teaming against Sekhmet and Cale while Kayura, Anubis, and Dais looked on amused. Venom and Purple were covered from head to toe with mud. The only thing that wasn’t covered was their eyes, which stuck out like a beckons of light against the brown gook. They stood poised, daring the guys to make the first move.

“This is gonna be so easy.” Cale remarked, circling the girls.

“We’ll see about that.” Purple smirked. Bending backwards and grabbing Cale by his waist, she straightened up and threw him over her head. He slide into the mud and nearly into Sekhmet, only splashing a few drops on the Snake Lord’s cheek. Sekhmet wiped it off and laughed at Cale.

“Well...well...looks like she knows what she’s doing Cale. I’d be careful if I were you.” Sekhmet said.

“Oh shut up.” Cale muttered.

“He’s right.” Purple perked up, “I do.”

“Looks like he underestimated you.” Venom said, “All men tend to do that.” She eyed Sekhmet.

Sehkmet approached Venom slowly, taking a finger and running it along her jawbone. “All men, huh?” Ha, as if Venom was gonna fall for that trick. She knew damned well he was up to something.

She spoke seductively back to him, her face coming closer to his as she spoke, her lips were millimeters from his, “Yes. Even a guy like¼you” With one palm on his chest she knocked him backwards with a strong push and to finish the job kicked him behind his knees to further conclude his fall. Not wasting a single second, she jumped on top of him and they both struggled to knock the other out. Sekhmet soon became as drenched in mud as Venom, it caked into his emerald locks mercilessly.

During this time, Purple and Cale were rolling around in the mud, trying to gain the upper hand from each other. Cale was straddling her, and holding her arms tight against the ground, which prevented her from moving around too much, “So you really know what your doing huh? Coulda fooled me.”

Purple grunted, not good¼this was not good¼she couldn’t move a muscle.

Cale continued with his taunting. Weak spot...Purple desperately searched for a weak spot. A time to strike...though his hold on her never weakened, he began to stand, now bending over looking down at her. Bingo. She took the opportunity to kick him hard in the nuts and roll away from him as he was now bent over in the mud whimpering, his face flushed a deep red.

“Hey!" Anubis said, “Low blow!”

Purple merely shrugged at him, “So? There was never a rule against it. If you have a problem with me I’m right here buddy,” she challenged. Anubis was about the comply when...

“Does anyone else smell smoke?” Dais asked.

Anubis paused and blinked, “No.”

Kayura sniffed the air, “I’m not sure¼why? Do you?”

Anubis rolled his eyes at Kayura, “Obviously so Kay or he wouldn’t have brought it up.” That comment earned him a hard whack on the head.

“Look!” Dais pointed in the direction of the castle, a line of black smoke was rising from a part of the large structure, “A fire!”

Kayura sighed, “You don’t reckon Wildfire and Hard Rock are pulling another stunt do you?”

“Highly doubtful, since I beat the crap out of them last time.” Anubis stated.

Purple had deserted the fight with Cale and joined the three in looking at the smoke pile, “What’d they do?”

Dais took the liberty to answer; “Every now and then they try to ruffle our feathers by setting fires around the place. One year a harmless fire got out of control turned into an inferno because the ground was so dry. We nearly lost the castle to it.

“Ah.” Purple replied, how lame of a joke that was. But then again...Ryo and Kento weren’t all that smart anyway. Kento’s so bullheaded and Ryo’s just plain annoying...to her anyway. A pair of arms snaked their way around her waist and she ‘eep’d, surprised. She found out soon enough it was Cale because his voice was super close when she heard him speak up.

“Think we ought to go investigate it?” Cale had said.

“Duh.” Sekhmet responded, Venom hanging onto him from behind with her arms wrapped around his neck. As he walked over to the others, Venom’s feet dragged the ground trying to slow him down.

“I’m not through with you yet Sekhmet!” Venom warned him, she jumped up and wrapped her legs around him so he would have to comply giving her a piggyback ride to the fire.

Everyone hurried to the site of the fire. Out of breath after reaching it several minutes later the site that meet them was shocking. Crimson and Asa looked like savages as they danced and chanted around a pile of burning magazines.

Upon closer inspection, Anubis saw them to be his beloved Play Boy collection, he screamed in horror, “My magazines! Argh! You two are SOOOOOO dead!”

“Da horra...” Dais commented, “Da Hoooooooooorra!!!”

Crimson smiled, “It’s what you get.”

“Yeah, you think you can hold us captive? Think again.” Asa smirked.

“And the spider web¼totally stupid idea.” Crimson added, “That stuffs as flimsy as spaghetti.”

Anubis fell to his knees, “My poooooooorn!”

Cale, Sekhmet, Purple, Venom, and Kayura blinked with confusion. Something was going on¼and they totally missed it. Cale was the first the come back to his senses.

“You!” he spat at Asa, “You ditched me and I had to dust the entire place by myself!”

Asa shrugged, “I would have helped but these two losers nabbed me and Crimson and tied us up.”

“Yeah, well, you two had it coming.” Anubis shot.

“And look where it got your precious pin-ups ‘Nubis.” Crimson smirked. Anubis glared at her, all pouty.

“You gotta admit Anubis, they got you back pretty good.” Dais said happily, glad he wasn’t a target.

“Don’t think we won’t get you too Spider Dork.” Crimson replied coolly. “The second you turn your back on us...BAM!”

“I’d like to see you try.” Dais dared.

“Alright, alright! Enough!” Kayura stepped in, “Let’s put this fire out before it gets out of hand okay?” Everyone complied and helped to snuff out the fire.

The sun in the horizon began to set, covering everything with an orange-ish glow. Pretty soon it was gone completely and was replaced by a full moon and a blanket of sparkling diamonds...

to be continued…