》MEANWHILE, AT THE FOOD COURT...

"Then I'll ask her myself." Stacey stood from the table.

"No, I'll go." Sora followed her while Thomas took another bite of the baby back ribs.

Violet took a sip of green tea with Jacinto when they saw Stacey pull back a chair to sit in front of them though Sora preferred to stand.

"Can I help you?" Jacinto asked them while Violet drank the tea.

"No." Stacey bluntly responded.

"It's between me and Violet." Sora casted an accusatory glance at the earthly Dimension Guardian. Stacey whipped her braid back while she saw Violet took her sweet time drinking tea.

"What game are you playing?" Stacey asked her in a domineering tone, "You can send this airhead Arivex for a loop but you can't fool me. I won't buy into your mind games."
Violet gave an indifferent glance at Stacey as she put down her cup.

"I don't expect someone plain and simpleminded as you to understand." Violet steepled her fingers.

"Try me bitch." Stacey retorted.

"Stacey!" Sora chastised her.

"That's not lady-like." Jacinto commented absentmindedly before Sora and Stacey looked at the sailor as he awkwardly slurped his tea.

"Violet, you warned me earlier about the other contestants. Who am I supposed to watch out for?" Sora asked her, then Violet saw Mirror come forward as he saw a glint in his eye, then Shadow appeared shapeshifting between her human form and Indoraptor form trying to control her split personality. Violet blinked as she came out from one of her visions.

"Whom." Violet responded.
"So there's more than one." Sora said.
"It's a fighting tournament, what did you expect?" Stacey stated.

The purple striped Indoraptor opened her jaw, ready to bite a bald man's head off when she heard Spino calling out to her. "Shadow! How's the weather up there?" Spino hollered, just as she looked down to see him before noticing the muscular human climb down.

“Great, there goes my next prey.” Shadow begrudgingly thought to herself before she climbed down from the wall climber to meet up with the Spinosaurus.

"Hey, Spino." Shadow greeted humorlessly while Verdauga had arrived, perusing before he found the rest of the squad. 

"This place is massive," Spino looked around, "it looks better than the abandoned stadium that I found a while ago."

Suzanne was drinking another bowl of blood.

"Seems like they saw the flyers." Indy commented idly, Suzanne nodded in agreement until she saw Trevor, the Indoraptor-vampire slurped angrily at the sight of him.

"I can't believe there are so many delicious humans in one place, it should be a crime to not eat one." Trevor mentioned, not caring if anyone heard him. 

"Hey guys," Bary greeted, the tyrannosaurus brandished her teeth in a broad smile though it seemed menacing to which a muscular man tiptoed his way out of the gym and down the hall.  Fortunately, the Indoraptor was more focused in looking for the others than the muscular human standing in front of him. Verdauga heard Suzanne and Trevor bickering for the umpteeth time and moved to the side to meet up with them.

Verdauga stood next to the Squad unnoticed until he spoke, "What are they bickering about this time?"

"The Boss fights." Blue said before they saw the two end the bickering abruptly.

"Whatever." Trevor harrumped as Suzanne sneered.

"Any luck?" Stella asked her before the miniature extraterrestrial lifted her chin to look at her colleague.

"What do you think?" Micah remarked, putting a gloved hand on her hip.

"I only gained one contact." Stella replied flatly.

"It better be to advance our investigation." Micah responded neutrally while she saw Stella take out her notepad.

"If his infrared vision could come in handy, it might." Stella said in a hopeful tone.

"Stella, how many times do I have to tell you to not-" Micah reminded her before she got cut off.

"We don't have many options here, a Reptilian with infrared vision could help track Carina." Stella countered with an authoritive tone as she glared at the Amoebian.

"If he's never met the usurper in person to estimate her body temperature, it's as good as nothing. It's like showing a photo to a blind person. You can describe an image clearly, but they won't see it." Micah stated, waving a hand in front of her goggles for emphasis.

"At least I'm trying to gain intel, if I can convince at least one to stay alert. It's progress." Stella put her hands against her hips while she leaned down to look at Micah.

"Progress? It's like preaching to a desert. We can't go around willy-nilly asking for Carina as if she were a lost cat." Micah spat before their argument paused when a golden blonde cat meowed, "no-no no-no no-no no."

"So cute." Stella squealed. Mewmi looked around to see a magenta haired woman with a sequined jacket ran up to her to carry her in her arms.

"A cat? Seriously Stella?" Mewmi heard Micah say as she saw the short, strange looking child cross her arms while she tapped her foot impatiently.

"Wow." Mewmi meowed.

"A talking cat," Stella looked at Mewmi closely, massaging the back of her head, "you must be a really smart cat aren't you?" Stella cooed at Mewmi as she petted her. Micah lifted up her goggles to pinch the bridge of her non-existant nose.

"This is why I question your credibility as a cadet. Is one thing to socialize, but you lack boundaries when you meet strangers. Have you learned nothing?" Micah asked her in earnest while Mewmi looked confused.

"Don't you start--" Stella refuted, but alas, she couldn't stop Micah from ranting and raving.

"The outbreak of the Thornvirus, the Eosino investigation, and don't even get me started when you were at the Venus Hotel with a Venusian Fly Trap hybrid." Micah reprimanded her.

"You knew that I was head over heels for Vincent." Stella pouted as she glared at her.

"Vincent DeVine was this close from biting your head off!" She narrowed her index finger and thumb to demonstrate the proximity, less than an inch. "If I hadn't shot him, he would've eaten your upper body." Micah reminded her.

"I was in love with him." Stella said in a morose tone. Mewmi spotted Chris talking to Octavia and thought, “If I could get him to notice me, maybe he'll fight me this time.”

"You said it! Was. History." Micah reminded her. "Vincent was a predator, Stella, his scent seduced you and put you into a trance."

"He loved me, Micah. Me!" Stella barked, Mewmi jumped off from Stella's hold and ran up to him.

"He used his pheromones to lure you in and wrapped his tendrils around you. That's how Venusians operate." While they were bickering, Mewmi clawed at Chris's pant leg. The Venusian blonde felt the tug that distracted him from Octavia. Octavia's blue eyes descended on a golden blonde feline as Chris picked her up.

"Aren't you a cutie?" Chris looked at Mewmi as she tried to bite him, then meowed.

"So cute." Octavia agreed when she tried to touch her, the cat hissed. Mewmi stretched her paws as she clawed his blue sleeves before she looked at his sky blue eyes, she got mesmerized.

"Mew!" Mewmi meowed before Octavia pouted and walked away. Carina tried to formulate a plan on how to get a sample of Chris's DNA.

“Now how am I going to swipe his DNA with all the attention that he's getting.” Carina thought as she stroked her chin as she paced to get an idea, mimicking some of Micah's mannerisms as she pondered on what method is the most efficient. As she walked past the Reptilian, Scale she didn't pay much attention to her though it was rare to find cold blooded species.

"So you finally gained the courage to put yourself out there." Blade replied bluntly.

"I'm so happy for you." Melon congratulated him as she gave him a warm embrace.

"I only gave her my phone number. I doubt she'll respond unless it's something related to her investigation." Scale clarified though Melon was just being a golden ray of sunshine.

"Is she a cop?" Blade asked her.

"An intergalactic investigator." Scale responded.

"An alien cop." Blade hypothesized.

"Uh, yeah." Scale confirmed.

"C'mon, give yourself a chance at love." Melon encouraged him.

"Only fools fall for love." Grim stated, "Sucks to be you, Scale."

"At least he found someone. What about you?" Melon questioned the more sinister if the Shadow Soldiers.

"Immortality triumphs over love any day. You may be a goddess, but you're still a mortal. Your relationship with tall, dark and gruesome will go up in smoke when your life expires. And guess who reaps the souls?" Grim points a thumb at himself. "This guy right here."

"You must be really miserable being unable to love someone other that yourself." Melon replied in a passive-aggressive tone while Grim grinned cynically.

"How original," Grim said sarcastically, then he rolled his eyes, "as if I hadn't heard that one before." Before adding, "Nice try Goldilocks, but it'll take a lot more than that to provoke me. No mortal has come close to appease me long enough to care and never will because that mortal doesn't exist." Grim gave a malicious grin.

Thomas devoured the last chunk of meat from the baby back ribs, sucking the sauce from his fingers.

"What do you think they're talking about?" María asked, Zack glanced at her and then at the lady in lavender apparel.

"I don't know. I'll go check." Zack stood from the table and tiptoed towards Stacey and Sora to eavesdrop on their conversation. The Morean maiden gave an annoyed glance at the green eyed Dimension Guardian.

"The fighting tournament is merely a ruse to gather some of the strongest fighters in one place either to eliminate them or to take away their powers." Violet warned while Sora and Zack took heed while Stacey showed no concern.

"Suppose what you're saying is true. How do you plan on getting everyone out of the stadium?" Stacey questioned.

"You can show them the exit, but not everyone will want to leave." Violet countered with a rhetoric. "The participants joined the tournament to test their luck at winning the prize."

Sora then recalled what Samoht told her. "The Gladatorium is hosting a tournament event for the winner to win a grand prize."

"What is it?" Sora asked.
"I can't say it yet because that would get me in trouble with my supervisor, but I'll tell you this, the prize money that they are offering can be converted into any currency. You just have to get registered to be eligible to compete."

"I remember. The receptionist mentioned the prize money." Sora hinted.

"Which was...?" Stacey dragged the last word into a hiss.

"Convertible money." Sora answered.

"The prize may vary from person to person. Whoever planned this, established the price as a scam." Jacinto speculated.

"If there is evidence of fraud, they have no choice but to cancel the operation." Violet mused at the idea.

"I'm in." Stacey decided, the corners of her mouth lifted into a smirk as she stood up from the chair, she turned around and caught Zack eavesdropping. Stacey's brows furrowed as Zack gave a sheepish grin in return.

Stacey curled her fingers into a fist as she put it on her hip. "You can't last one minute without snooping around, can you?"

Zack stood up as his spiky black hair was in view, "I would when there isn't any secrecy around." He whined while she chastised him.

Violet ate her soup while Jacinto picked up the tea. Thomas and María came to catch up to them. "How did it go?" María asked at the Arivex.

"It went well to say the least." Sora said.

Just when Violet consumed down to the last drop of the soup she heard Thomas speak. "Is best that we leave since there is nothing for us here."

"Sora, I heard that there is another round tonight. Are you going or not?" Zack asked her.

"Sure. I'm going to check if it isn't too late to participate." Sora paced eight steps.

"Just don't get duped this time." Stacey remarked while Sora rolled her eyes.

"Good luck." María added.

"Be careful, you don't know who you're up against." Violet warned.

"Don't listen to her, Sora. She is trying to trick you the same way she did when you were fighting her." Stacey warned her.

"Yeah, she's trying to discourage you from fighting in the Redemption Round, don't listen to her." Zack insisted. Sora looked at her teammates and then at Violet.

"I will fight, there's no doubt about it." Sora clarified. Violet withdrew herself from the table.

"It will require strength and patience to defeat them, you were warned." Violet hinted as she strolled out of the food court with the sailor.

"Not every Venusian is a predator, Micah." Stella retorted.

"Don't pull the racism card on me!" The Amoebian countered. "You're using that as a smoke screen for me to drop it. Well guess what!? I won't! You're putting your trust in the wrong people and I won't stand for it!"
"Like who? The Raptors?" Stella asked rhetorically.

"Yes!" Micah replied, stating the obvious.

"You are being racist!" Stella gasped then pointed at her.

"You daft nematode! How many times do I have to tell you to keep your distance!" Micah bellowed, then gritted her teeth while she controlled her agitated breath. "I warned you about Carina, I had my suspitions but nooooooooo—I was being judgemental, I was acting paranoid." Micah fumed before Stella saw the Amoebian openly mock her and her southern bell accent. "We can trust her. She's part of our team. Carina can help us complete the encrypted coding for the GenomeCollider and secure it," then Micah snapped, yelling, "AND LOOK WHERE WE ARE NOW!" Some of the onlookers were watching them while Stella felt secondhand embarrassment. "This is the nonsense I wanted to avoid in the first place, but you don't listen to me. It's as if you're deliberately testing my patience. What else does it have to happen for you to believe me!?" Micah said with a desperate lilt.

"Don't you think I know that already!? I understand why you're upset, but you don't have to blame me for everything. I know that this case is driving us crazy, but not everyone is an usurper, Micah. We came here to take our minds off Carina and the investigation. I want to find her just as much as you do." Stella reprimanded her.

"Is this your cat?" Chris asked her as he saw Dirlu holding the collar.

"No." Mewmi meowed.

"You can keep her." Eimy responded, "She likes to mooch a lot around the house."

"Does she?" Chris asked while the shapeshifting cat was sweating amidst the fur.

"She's a biter too, keep her away from your lap, especially if you're going to take a nap, so guard your family jewels." Faim mentioned while Mewmi shielded her eyes with her paws from the embarrassment.

"Goodbye, Mewmi. It was nice knowing you." Dirlu waved goodbye while she rang the cat bell, Mewmi scowled at them.

"You forgot to give Mewmi the collar." Eimy said to her.

"You guys are mean." Mewmi said before she jumped out of Chris's arms and shapeshifted into her gijinka form as she glared at them.

Chris didn't expect for the cat to be the same person that catcalled him after his match, he then teleported out of the stairs.