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Parsifal was of two minds regarding the big old tree in Destiny City's main park, the one that had been hibernating for a long time until waking up last year. On the one hand, he was happy to see the tree was not only alive but thriving this season, in full leaf and seemingly happy and healthy. On the other hand, it was once more covered in weird pods, though they weren't as big as they'd been last year, thankfully. And what was more, there were these pods on some of the nearby trees too. They looked just like oversized cicada pods, but they quivered in a strange manner. That was disconcerting.

Still, they seemed harmless enough. Parsifal eyed them warily anyway; he remembered what happened last year, with the monster acid-spitting bugs coming out of those big pods. He was hoping whatever came out of these pods was rather less nasty.

Approaching the tree, the small Senshi fought back the urge to pull a "what does this button do?" stunt and touch one of the pods without first studying the heck out of it. He did notice something oozing from it – from all of them, actually – and against his better judgement, hesitantly touched it. Instantly he regretted doing that: it burned like acid. "Ow ow ow ow," he hissed as he shook his hand to try to ease the burning pain on his finger. He wasn't going to make that mistake again.

At about the same time, he felt another Order signature in the area, and he brightened a bit. For once it wasn't a Chaos person! "Don't touch the pods!" he shouted to warn them off doing what he'd done. "It's some kind of acid goop!"

Reaching for Tololo's offered hand, the Senshi of Alternatives returned her grin. "I'm Parsifal! We are totally on the same side, the sparkly side! Really happy to meet you! But seriously, don't touch that stuff oozing from the pods. It'll hurt you. See?" He held out his acid-burned fingertip as evidence.

"This is a super resilient tree," Parsifal replied to her question with a solemn nod, patting a non-acid covered part of the bark. "These pods won't even hurt it. It's been around for a super long time, this tree. But those pods – I think there's bugs in them. Last year – were you here last year? – ANYWAY last year there were these huge pods on the tree, and they had these giant evil cicadas in them. They would attack you and spit acid at you and were super gross and kinda hard to kill."

Some of the pods began twitching and quivering, and Parsifal jumped back, grabbing Tololo's shoulders and pulling her away from the tree as well. "Aaaaa," he squeaked.

"Yeah, the pods last year looked like these, but a lot bigger," Parsifal said, keeping his voice low, as if that would help protect him and Tololo from whatever came out of the quivering, twitching, oozing pods. "And I'm not filled with confidence either."

Suddenly one of the pods split open, and the familiar sound of cicada wings buzzed right in front of them. "Aaaaa!" Parsifal squeaked again, moving even further back and dragging Tololo with him. The insect poked its head out and buzzed its wings again angrily; it wasn't as big as the monster bugs last year, thankfully, but it was still plenty big enough, and covered in goo. Probably acidic goo, if Parsifal would venture a guess.

Clacking its mandibles together audibly, the bug stretched its wings out and lifted off from the pod it had come from. It hovered in the air for a moment, dripping goo, then flew, red-eyed, right at the two Senshi.

"Run!" Parsifal yelped, releasing Tololo and scurrying backward. "Don't let it drip on you!"

Tololo was right – there was no way she and Parsifal could leave the bugs to have some innocent civilian kid find them. But what could they do? From the sound of it, the other Senshi's magic likely wasn't offense-oriented, or she'd be using it by now; and his certainly wasn't, not splitting into three Parsifals.

"Look for a big stick! We have to try to hit those things out of the air or squish them before they fly off!" he shouted, looking around for a fallen branch or other weapon even as another pod shelled its gooey, angry, buzzing contents. The cicada dove at him, and he squeaked again as it landed on his head, apparently attracted by his vibrantly pink hair.

"Aaaaaa get off me go away stupid bug!" Flailing wildly at his head, not wanting to touch the acid-coated insect, he ran around in circles until it decided he wasn't edible and took off. "What the ********?!?" He shuddered in horror. "It was trying to eat my hair!!!" Where was a stick when you needed one?

Parsifal heard Tololo shouting at him and turned to face her, eyes huge. Then he remembered the plan. "Right. Right! Branches! Big sticks we can hit these things with!" Taking a deep breath to push the rest of the shock out of him, he ran over to her side and grabbed the branch she was tugging on, pulling with all his might. The branch finally broke and sent him tumbling onto his butt on the ground.

"Great, friend!" he yelled encouragingly, giving Tololo a thumbs up. "Lemme get a stick of my own!" Scrambling to his feet, Parsifal grabbed another branch and with the strength of someone in near panic mode broke it off with a couple of healthy tugs. "Thank you Mr Tree! Or Miss, I dunno from trees!"

Wheeling around, holding his branch like a baseball bat, he looked at the buzzing, vibrating pods on the big tree. As one started to split open, he swung the branch at it, hitting it square on with a sickening squelch and a spatter of acid. "Got one!" he cheered, ignoring the smoking end of the stick where it had made contact with the acid. "Let's hit the pods – stop those things from hatching in the first place!"

He went around the tree smashing as many of the pods as he could. Part of the branch he was wielding sizzled and dropped to the ground, but he wasn't deterred. So his stick was a little shorter now – it could still hit things!

"I don't know!" Parsifal yelped as another cicada emerged from its pod before he could smash it. "Aaaaaaa!" He swung at the bug blindly and managed to splatter it before it could attack his hair again. "The other ones, the really big ones, you could only smash them! That was the only way to get rid of them!"

He paused for breath and glanced over at Tololo before resuming his pod-squishing mission. It was a good thing she had shown up – he didn't think he would have been able to take out all these pods on his own. Idly he wondered what she was Senshi of. Tossing her a grin, he smacked a cicada out of the sky with a disgusting squelching sound. Maybe they were making some inroads on these things!

Or maybe not. Some of them had gathered around a fairly full trash can and were examining the contents. An idea occurred to Parsifal at that moment – a potentially good idea. "Hey! I think I know what they want! It's FOOD! Look at 'em around the trash can! Maybe the one that attacked me thought my hair was food or something!" Running over to Tololo, he pointed at the garbage. "See? I wonder if we could draw them away with food!"

The Idea Guy (who was more than a little stoned) thought for a moment. Where could they lead the bugs where they wouldn't scare kids or annoy people who had hair that looked like food?

The obvious answer was 'as far away as possible', and that meant….

"I got it! We'll lead them to the other side of the park!" Parsifal grinned at Tololo, catching the tossed churros in his arms. Mmmm, churros. A delectable treat for everyone – including cicadas. It'd be like the Pied Piper leading the rats out of whatever town that was (he couldn't remember, and it wasn't really important)!

By this point most of the acid-oozing pods on the trees had hatched; the air was filled with the buzzing of large angry cicadas as they dive-bombed the two Senshi, looking for food. The idea also occurred to him that his magic might be appropriate here. "Eeny Meeny Miney MO!" he called, instantaneously dividing into three Parsifals, each holding fistfuls of churros. "Hey, bugs, we got goodies for you!" the Parsifals yelled as one, dancing and hopping and waving the churros in the air. They danced around the trash bin to get the attention of the cicadas crowding it, singing a happy churro song the real Parsifal made up on the spot.

Once the cicadas noticed the delicious treats, they began to swarm towards them. "Run, now! Follow me!" the brightly-colored trio called to Tololo, and they skipped off deeper into the park. Hopefully the bugs would follow!

And the cicadas dutifully followed, buzzing loudly and clicking their acid goo-covered mandibles. Deeper into the park they were led by the Senshis, who were frantically waving fistfuls of pilfered churros as they ran and singing the happy churro song of joy.

Before too long they all were deep in the park, where there were no benches and a long-disused path. Surely this would be a safe place to leave the ravening bugs. Just in time, too, as Parsifal's copies dissipated in a shower of glittering pink and orange sparkles, leaving him standing with Tololo, holding a bunch of churros and surrounded by a swarm of angry, hungry oversized cicadas.

He blinked stupidly at Tololo. What were they supposed to do now?

'OH YEAH HUH," he beamed. "I remember Phase Two! Phase One was getting them away from people. We've done that! The churros were a genius idea, Tololo! Phase Two is leaving them here! Which means dropping the churros on the ground I think!" Parsifal blinked again. "Does that sound right?"