W Subaru's Great Struggle
Author's Note: Set after Shooting Star Rockman. Parodies episode 46 and episode 47, "W Luna's Great Struggle" and "W Luna's Heaven and Hell" ("W" being slang for "Double"). As with my previous Shooting Star Rockman fic, "The Adventures of Rocky and Cancer Bubble", shout-out to Super Smash Bros. Ultimate for motivating me to write this. Enjoy the story and R&R.
Disclaimer: I do not own anything related to or of the Shooting Star Rockman series.
Pairing: Established Subaru x Tsukasa.
Summary:
Using Cygnus' EM Wave Change machine, War-Rock materializes and spends a morning as Hoshikawa Subaru. What began as a joke quickly takes a turn for the worse, as people start mistaking him for the real deal.
In the FM-ians' secret hideout, locked behind the shelf of a cramped low-rent apartment funded by the late Ophiuchus' odd jobs, War-Rock and Cancer appeared. The base hadn't seen action after the FM King, Cepheus, called off the war, and now the sad place merely accumulated dust in the wake of their comrades' premature deaths at the hands of the treasonous Gemini Spark.
Cancer muttered solemn respects for his fellow fallen soldiers under breath. They did not always get along, but their adventures on this forsaken blue rock had been a transformative ride. Amusing and disappointing. They didn't deserve what happened to them.
He missed Wolf's dry wit. Libra's bento boxes. Ophiuchus' mothering. His and Crown's shared fanboying over Hibiki Misora. Even Ox's obnoxious determination.
"This is the EM Wave Change machine?"
The crab put his reminiscences on hold, making himself useful. "Yes, we reverse engineered Cygnus' technology, except the radio composer's polarity is reversed. That's how we gained our human disguises, buku. Gemini's idea, buku."
At the bottom of a staircase the FM-ians carved manning stolen excavators, there rested a glass tube on a raised platform. It wasn't the largest present; wall-length cylinders pillared the flat. Within, contiguous cubic structures climbed in a loose spiral, the device's power source.
Springing up, Cancer installed a Wave Scanner onto the terminal, rebooted the computer, and began typing commands.
War-Rock took position beneath one of two rectangular arches at the far end of the chamber.
"System is a go!"
"Do it."
"Switch on!"
Electromagnetic frequencies irradiated the cubes, and the appliance buzzed to life. Green light enveloped War-Rock, and the AM-ian teleported across the Wave World.
Hoshikawa Subaru stepped out the second arch.
"Experiment successful, buku!"
…
War-Rock sedately dragged his feet toward Kodama Elementary's east wing. It had started as a joke. A dare he, Harp, and Cancer pettifogged while Subaru and Misora received new gear tutorials from Amachi and Utagai at AMAKEN. Whereas the FM-ians adopted human forms to mingle among the planet's native population, defectors War-Rock and Harp cohabited with their hosts, hanging close by.
Although War-Rock felt abnormally at home in his spurious skin, Cancer warned of side effects, namely, residual elements of Subaru's personality influencing his behaviour.
Was that why he found himself attending class, when Earth education bored him silly? Any other occasion, he'd jump whatever hoops necessary to impede Subaru bringing him to school, yet today he purposely crashed the lawnmower into the boy's telescope (not irreparably this time) to take his friend out of the equation, compelled to – choke – learn.
At least Subaru wouldn't be showing up. Emotionally distraught beyond quitting the house, last he left him.
Mechanically, War-Rock located Subaru's regular seat. Ikuta-sensei of the Kodama Science Institute was subbing, assembling a Bunsen burner before his lesson, flasks garlanding his stocky shoulders.
"Morning, Subaru-kun!" A green-haired androgyne claimed the chair next to him.
Futaba Tsukasa. Gemini's old container and Subaru's lab partner this semester.
"Er, good morning," War-Rock coughed.
"Huh. Do you have a cold? Your voice is all gravelly."
"Um, no. It's nothing."
"That's a relief." Tsukasa kissed him innocently.
Despite the suddenness, War-Rock stayed in character. Why do humans do this? It's disgusting.
Since Cepheus wiped Tsukasa's mind, he and Subaru had been going steady. The doctors did not expect Tsukasa to recover his lost memories. Both Subaru and War-Rock also thought it was best he permanently forget the crimes he committed as Gemini Spark. Thus, Subaru steered him away from piecing together his past, and their bond blossomed. Truly beautiful. An echo of the utopian connection promised by Subaru's father's BrotherBand network.
"Are we still on for the park tomorrow?"
The park? Right, Subaru said they planned to go flower viewing. Oh. Maybe not anymore. He's depressed I trashed his stuff!
"I-I have to use the bathroom!" War-Rock hustled off.
"Subaru-kun…"
…
Much to his mother's delight, the real Subaru was not moping in bed. Grr, that guy has no manners!
A few more paces and he could bury his head in his studies until he cooled down. Neat smoke signals and lemon batteries! Bottle rockets! Or it would have been just a few, if not for a lout yanking him backwards through the lavatory door.
"W-who –?" He alarmingly came face to face with himself.
"It's me."
"W-War-Rock?"
"Long story."
File hearing War-Rock's voice out his own mouth under his Top 3 Scares, below ghosts.
"No kidding! Is this why you broke my telescope again? So you could impersonate me?"
"Well, you see, I borrowed Cygnus' EM Wave Change machine –"
"And War-Rock, this is the girls' room! What have I told you about coming in here? It's off limits!"
The alien prepared a rebuttal, but noticing the hinges creak, he shed his guise and sought refuge inside his sidekick's Star Carrier. Subaru daftly turned to exit the same way he entered and almost ran into Shirogane Luna.
"Iinchou!"
"Aieeee! Hoshikawa-kun! What are you doing? Get out, get out, get out!"
Prez's screams attracted the floor. Subaru crawled on his knees, dodging thrown rolls of toilet paper. Teachers and students alike looked on in disparagement. Kizamaro and Gonta pretended they never met him. Only Tsukasa vouched for him, as he knew Subaru was too flustery around women to be a skirt chaser.
War-Rock's shenanigans earned Subaru a month of everyone else's cleaning duties.
"I'm exhausted!" Subaru discontinued mopping. "Stupid War-Rock!"
Tsukasa kneaded his aching joints. "He fixed your telescope. That's something."