Kururu dropped his wrench for the third time in as many minutes. He huffed, bent to pick it up, and returned to tightening the bolt in the pipe.
He'd been ankle-deep in water since day one. The plumbing issue was quite advanced when the secret base's pool and bathing areas stopped working, and despite knowing every problem spot, they were myriad in the darkness between the base's walls.
The broken heating was one, and Kururu had located the pipe causing it, buried back deep and saturated in a chilly fog. Drops falling into the standing water around Kururu's feet seemed to echo off every last pipe around.
His wrench was thick with moisture as well. That's why it kept escaping his grip, he told himself. Before it could fall into the water a fourth time, Kururu gripped the wrench in both hands and applied it to the bolt. This time it tightened.
He tossed the wrench into the nearby toolbox and turned away for a much-needed break. He sloshed through the floor-wide puddle until he reached the wall, then trailed along it with one hand.
He'd overshot it ten steps when he realized the opening wasn't there anymore. Retracing, he found the wall panel back in place. He pushed against it with both hands to no effect.
"Who the hell." He pounded a fist on it once. "Don't tell me they forgot." Keroro had requested Kururu to handle the repairs, even with his intent to do so without orders. Five days had passed since then, however.
Kururu trudged back through the water to get a tool and returned to the wall panel. It was simple enough to open from the outside, but wasn't meant to from inside.
Mister Laser begs to differ. He burned a circular opening in the metal with the hand-sized device. It clanged on the floor outside, causing drier air to rush in, and a chill to go up his body. He turned off the laser and stepped over the fresh exit's glowing orange edges, dropping the tool to the floor. It rolled to the wall he sat against during his curry breaks. Somehow he didn't feel like having any at the moment, and kept walking forward, leaving the toolbox inside the wall, and the many pipes that still needed servicing.
He had accessed the base's inner works through the invasion mech storage, three levels below his lab. The sergeant major trailed sodden footprints past hulking Keronian-faced machines to the elevator.
It wasn't until he reached the literal mouth of his lab, several minutes later, that he remembered he could have teleported there in a single button press. Rubbing his face with one hand, he stepped inside. Wide blue monitors greeted him, and he tapped a key on the console to activate the surveillance camera feeds before falling back into his chair.
Face tilted up to the screens, he got a general view of the Hinata house. It covered every area he cared about, including the bath, bedrooms, dining and living rooms. None showed any activity whatsoever.
He paused on the entryway. No shoes. A visit to Grandma Hinata's in February was unlikely. The feed for the side yard turned up cold campfire ashes by Giroro's tent. Not even the cat was around. The base's rooms showed no life signs, either. Kururu was the only one there, and apparently had been for the past few days.
Upon closer inspection of his commander's room, he zoomed in on a note taped to Keroro's PC monitor.
"'Gone fishin', totally not slacking on the invasion.'" He chuckled. "So they ditched me to go on a little trip, huh? Not the first time that's happened." He closed his eyes, tired of looking at bright monitors in an otherwise unlit lab. He slid out of the chair and headed for the small closet tucked away in the back of the room.
Kururu opened the door just enough to pull himself onto the futon on the shelf inside, rolling onto his back with a sigh. He pawed around until his fingers found the blanket's edge, then pulled it over himself. In a cocoon, he snuggled against the pillow for more warmth, and his remaining energy drained away.
Kururu drifted into a half-awake fog, and separated himself from the clinging strands of sleep. Pipes needed fixing.
He pushed himself up and swayed a bit above the futon as the blanket slid off his body. The fog remained even as he stared unfocused at the rectangle of light from the closet door opening. He wondered why he didn't close it before.
He moved automatically from the lab to the mech storage, and the laser-cut opening came into view. Kururu put one foot into the puddle beyond it and gasped into alertness. It was freezing. He didn't take his foot back from the shock, instead looking down to make sure ice hadn't formed during his nap.
Everything looks the same. He watched the wall's moisture slide down and combine into bigger drops. Maybe I just need to reacclimate.
He stuck the other foot in, already trembling. Thought I fixed the heating problem. He grit his teeth, recalling how much of a bastard that pipe was, and hugged himself while wading deeper within.
He didn't make it to the heating pipe before staring at another he'd done the first day. Fixed at triple performance during Kururu's initial humidity rush, it fountained twin streams from either side.
He sighed and sloshed past it, reminding himself to double-check every previous fix. His tools were still in the back, but as he continued, he found more pipes with new leaks, all ones he'd mended before. The echoing drips had turned into a chorus of trickles.
It didn't make sense. Fixing the plumbing was practically grunt work, and he had perfect recall of the base schematic on his side.
Holes spread and melted through that mental image. Kururu shuffled a foot through the water, his extremities going numb. Thoughts and movements became sluggish, and urgency clawed up his spine. Even if he made it to the toolbox, he probably wouldn't make it back.
He reached a shaky hand under his cap and pulled out an all-purpose handheld device. Shivering did little for Keronians, who were too sensitive to extremes to self-regulate. Keron had mastered weather control eons ago, but it didn't make it any easier to press the buttons on the device one-handed. He leaned against a pipe to steady his arm while using the other hand to activate teleportation.
Reappearing in his lab hit him with a change in temperature and humidity jarring enough to make him stumble. The huge blue monitors swam together in a misshapen blob.
Normally unable to stand the idea of his mind slowing, it was all he could do not to run into anything on the way to the closet. He met it with outstretched hands, the room spinning around him even as he stood still.
He clung to the open door and pulled himself inward, throwing his arms flat across the futon. He curled trembling fingers into the rumpled blanket like it was going to help him up. It took several tries to get a knee over the edge, and he lurched into the closet.
His burst of effort spiked the dizziness into a headache, and the light coming in pierced. He shoved the door with one hand until his arm went limp with no progress to show for it, but he was too tired to care.
When he closed his eyes, pipes accompanied the spinning. They extended into darkness, and when he peered up to see how far they went, he rushed down through infinity.
Broken pipes flew up from below and coiled around him, pinning him in the void, covering his face. The corroded metal cut him off from everything, and his airway constricted for want of breath.
He thrashed back to reality with the blanket twisted around his limbs, but the choking feeling hadn't left. He breathed in to calm his heart, but it got stuck and he doubled over coughing. Once it passed, he took shallow breaths and pressed his throbbing head against the closet's inner wall.
The repairs weren't done, but he didn't want to think about pipes anymore, not with their dream weight still pressing him down. All his work had likely undone itself, anyway, and it was only a matter of time before the Hinata house was affected.
But they'd all gone somewhere, and he was alone in his lab as usual. A chest-deep crackle joined every breath, and he couldn't shake the chill stuck to his skin, even as the slightly damp futon and blanket proved he was otherwise.
He gripped the bedding one-handed and gave in to another bout of coughing. It tore his throat and seared his lungs; catching his breath after offered no relief. He worked through the events of the past week: an extended period of humidity-powered activity, followed by continued work through its aftereffects. Enduring cold almost to the point of hibernation was one thing. Stress-induced illness was another.
Kururu fumbled for his handheld device, and paused with it cradled in his palm. Left in a base full of leaky pipes, he had no idea who to call, or why. Giroro liked to think he defined it best, but working alone was Kururu's forte, and he had the cunning to back it up.
The device chimed. He blinked at the small square screen as a pixelated envelope with a wing logo formed on it.
Hey Kururu, thought I'd stop by just for the hell of it. You're in your usual place, right?
~623
Kururu replied, Door's open.
If a kid as perceptive as Mutsumi read anything into those two words, Kururu didn't care. After sending the message, he slid the device away and curled to one side, clutching the pillow closer. The chill over his body had intensified.
It wasn't a day for flying on discarded scraps of paper. With the sky slate-grey, Mutsumi figured walking would do.
Things had been quiet around Inner Tokyo. Fuyuki and Natsumi were away with most of the platoon and their friends on a trip while Kururu fixed a plumbing problem in the base. That much he knew.
Mutsumi was on a company-scheduled holiday from his radio show. With nothing better to do, he thought the little alien might appreciate a spontaneous visit. Any time in Kururu's company reminded him of the short but interesting interval they spent living in Mutsumi's apartment together. Until Kururu had to move to the Hinata house for practical reasons, it almost felt like he'd become attached to Mutsumi.
He smiled. Or maybe it was the other way around. It had taken a while, but he'd gotten rather skilled at reading his contrary yellow friend. Kururu wasn't the type to ask for assistance outright, phrasing most things opposite of what he meant. Mutsumi also noticed the more desperate Kururu became, the less backward his messages got.
The two words he'd received on his phone made the most straightforward text Kururu had ever sent him. He must be bored out of his skull in there.
Mutsumi strolled up to a house with a familiar red roof. He hopped the gate, but stopped on the front walk. The house would be locked with nobody around. So he took out his Reality Pen and drew a set of stairs on the concrete. When he connected the last line and lifted the Kordenite-powered tip away, the drawing glowed and air rushed into the fresh opening in the ground.
Mutsumi pocketed the pen and descended. Darkness lined the walls of the staircase at first, but it soon ended inside one of the walkway-equipped corridors. The stairs vanished the moment he left the last step.
The hall was on the same level as Kururu's Lab. He rode the walkway to the end and turned the corner to find his partner's dome-shaped work space. Piled atop it were mechanical expressions of engineering whimsy, most displaying a swirly-eyed motif.
The entrance to the lab was open. Mutsumi stepped inside to see the usual mass of monitors, all in sleep mode. An empty chair faced the main console.
"You around, Kururu?"
The continuous low hum of technology answered. He put his hands in his jacket pockets and looked around, and caught the outline of a sliding-door closet in a shadowed corner. It was open several inches, and his own closet's one-time occupant lay inside.
"What's up? I didn't think you'd be taking a nap if you wanted me to come over." Mutsumi's tone was playful as he approached. "How's your work coming along on..." He reached the closet with no response. "Kururu?"
Mutsumi peered inside. A rumpled blanket clung to Kururu's torso, face half-buried in the pillow, one hand gripping the edge. There was nothing relaxed about his sleeping posture.
Mutsumi slid the door open wider. "Are you...?"
Kururu cringed away from the opening and curled into a tight shivering ball. Mutsumi reached in and put a hand on him, not caring if he got hell for touching without permission. Kururu turned away from the pillow to say something, then shrank into himself and shook with wracking coughs.
Mutsumi kept his hand on Kururu's arm. Heat radiated through the blanket. "What happened?"
Kururu inched out from under Mutsumi's hand, short of breath. He removed his arms from the blanket and pushed himself up, quivering while still facing the wall.
"Pipes," he said, "are worse than I thought." He turned to support his back against the inside wall. He'd lost some color, and tense lines showed around the edge of his glasses. "It's gonna take a little longer to fix 'em all."
Mutsumi knit his brow. Kururu's voice was almost a whisper, and he looked like he would topple over any second. The real meaning of the two-word text was clear.
"Here." Mutsumi zipped down his hooded jacket. He always made sure to buy them a little on the baggy side. "Let's get you up to the house."
Kururu didn't resist as Mutsumi put his hands under his arms and lifted him out of the closet, blanket falling from his legs. Mutsumi placed him inside the jacket and zipped up, leaving it open an inch below the collar. Kururu shivered against his chest, and sweat dampened the front of Mutsumi's shirt.
Mutsumi decided to save his questions for later, and drew an elevator shortcut to the Hinatas' living room, stepping out behind one of the couches. He took his jacket off while switching arms to hold Kururu in place, and put him on the couch bundled in it.
"Hold on, I'll get you some starfruit." The house was cold from being empty for days, so Mutsumi didn't intend to keep Kururu upstairs for long. He went to the kitchen, opened the refrigerator, and dug through shelves and crisper drawers.
Two minutes later, he gripped the fridge door and chewed the inside of his cheek. "No starfruit," he muttered, closing the fridge and leaning against it to think.
He had none at his apartment, and it wasn't easy to get out of season. Harsh coughing from the living room diverted his thoughts to alternatives, and Mutsumi returned there as an idea solidified.
"I've got extra meds that could help," Mutsumi said, leaning over the back of the couch. Kururu huddled inside the hoodie. "My radio manager's been extra paranoid since a few winters ago. Would they work for you?"
Kururu exhaled carefully and nodded.
Mutsumi gathered up Kururu with the jacket and fished out his pen from an inside pocket. "Will you be okay waiting in the lab while I—"
The Keronian's much smaller hand stopped Mutsumi's.
Kururu's breath shuddered. "Take me with you."
Mutsumi frowned. "But..." After tucking Kururu back into his closet, he planned to make a speedy trip to and from his apartment using a dimensional rift. Taking Kururu along was too risky; the rift had a strange gravity that could've worsened his condition. Walking around with him in the cold weather wasn't much better.
Kururu slipped his hand away to cough into it. Mutsumi remembered there was no sense of time between dimensions, and a short trip for him could mean hours of waiting for his partner.
Mutsumi gave a soft smile. "If you insist." He placed Kururu back on the couch cushions while he got his jacket on, then zipped the Keronian inside the front once more. Mutsumi hoped his jacket would trap enough heat.
He drew an extra door in the wall and exited onto the street. As he stepped into the February afternoon, Kururu stiffened and pressed closer. Mutsumi slipped his arms back through the jacket sleeves and held them around his friend, who relaxed a little.
Before Mutsumi got his pen, he took the train home when it was cold. No way he was taking Kururu on a crowded train. Fortunately, his apartment building was less than an hour away on foot, and he knew the path well. Even if he couldn't take all his usual shortcuts with Kururu in tow, he could get there in a decent amount of time.
The clouds were dark, and hovered lower than Mutsumi remembered. He kept Kururu steady in his arms as he increased his pace.
Mutsumi kept off the crowded sidewalks, making side trips through alleys instead. Then he hit a construction roadblock halfway to the apartment. It was on a street comprising the main portion of his journey, and its alleys were blocked off with fences. He had no choice but to detour.
As he made his way around the road construction, a tiny white flake fell and remained perfectly formed on the sidewalk. They multiplied, and soon he walked through a dancing veil of snowflakes. A few excited children's voices joined the snow like cheers at a confetti parade.
He would've loved to stay and admire it, but didn't stop walking. A few flakes flew at his face, and bitter cold grazed his arms where they met the inside of his jacket front. Kururu shuddered against Mutsumi in a coughing fit, his breath coming too short and quick afterward. Mutsumi touched his chin to Kururu's head through the fabric and continued on.
He didn't run into more construction, but the crowds and snow thickened as school let out. Not every alley Mutsumi dodged into went out the other side, and several times he had to wait while a throng of chattering students passed.
He leaned against the bricks of an old clothing store while several girls from Natsumi's grade flocked by, laughing and trying to catch snowflakes on their tongues. Kururu was quiet, and his shivering had lessened, but his chest still fluttered against Mutsumi's arms.
"Kururu?" Mutsumi kept his voice soft. "You still with me?"
"Fine." Kururu's words were muffled against his friend's shirt. He shifted, small arms brushing past Mutsumi's. "Just tired."
"Hold on, it's not much longer." Mutsumi stepped back onto the sidewalk and bowed his head against a gust of snowy wind. It stuck to the hair sticking out from under his white fleece cap. A gaggle of high schoolers approached, but he dodged around them instead, not looking up when one of them recognized and called out to him by name.
The buildings blocked most of the wind, but the storm gained power, and cold crept in through Mutsumi's clothing. He kept his arms around Kururu, who curled against his stomach.
Snow started sticking to the ground in fat flakes. Through limited visibility, the apartment building came into view. He puffed out a white sigh of relief. "Almost there."
The street crowds had thinned. Most schoolchildren and people running dinner errands had gone home to escape the storm. Mutsumi's path to the building was an unobstructed straight shot.
He bounded up the steps while kicking snow off his shoes, entered the lobby and went to the elevator. Nobody else joined him on his trip to the seventh floor. On the way up, he retrieved his room key from an inside pocket and slipped one arm out his sleeve. Kururu had gone limp, and started to fall out the bottom of the jacket.
Mutsumi hastily secured Kururu with his sleeved arm right as the elevator door opened. He nodded a casual greeting to a middle-aged businessman waiting outside and breezed down the hall.
He unlocked his apartment, slipped in, and relocked it in record time. Working his heels out of his sneakers and kicking them back against the door, he made long strides to a seventies-era couch and sat twelve unresponsive pounds onto it, wrapped in the hooded jacket.
"Kururu?" Mutsumi placed a hand over the Keronian's chest, barely touching. "Hey..."
He waited until he heard Kururu's thready respirations, slower than before. He'd fallen asleep.
Mutsumi closed his eyes and let out his breath. He sat Kururu and the jacket in one of the couch's plush corners, then left for the kitchen. Cupboards opened and closed, and gas-lit flames came to life.
He returned to the living room and sat a little white bag of American-imported prescription medicine on the coffee table, along with two other items. The tea wouldn't be ready for another few minutes.
Mutsumi put his hand around Kururu's small shoulders and gave them a gentle squeeze. "I need you awake for a minute." Kururu grunted, struggling with the jacket before freeing an arm and pushing at Mutsumi's wrist. Kururu's palm was as hot as the rest of him.
Mutsumi picked up one of the items on the coffee table, a squat blue jar. He slid his hand out from behind Kururu's shoulders and twisted off the cap.
Kururu watched him with sleepy confusion. Darkness tugged at him, until Mutsumi placed the jar directly under his nose.
"Wha—" Kururu jerked away, the smell needling alertness into his brain. "What the hell?"
"This," Mutsumi said, dipping his fingers into the jar's translucent gel, "is gonna be your new best friend."
Kururu was all set to deny any such nonsense, but a coughing fit made him curl inwards. Mutsumi's hand snuck in and uncurled him a bit. Kururu grabbed Mutsumi's arm in both hands and stiffened when something cold touched his chest.
"Relax." Mutsumi's gel-covered fingers circled over the skin above Kururu's torso emblem. When Kururu next allowed himself to breathe, the strong smell came with it, but air was no longer razor blades.
He leaned back into his jacket nest. After another minute, Mutsumi lifted his hand away and rubbed his fingers on the leg of his jeans.
"What is that stuff?" Kururu whispered.
Mutsumi capped the jar and held it up for Kururu to see. Vicks, the label read.
"Must be one rich bastard." Kururu inhaled, paused, and let it out again. "Fuck."
Mutsumi set the jar on the coffee table. "What's wrong?"
"I have to get back." Kururu sat up and pushed the jacket away. "Base is gonna flood."
Kururu gripped the old couch in one hand and quivered as he bit back another cough. Mutsumi settled him back into the corner, pulling the jacket around his shoulders. Kururu extracted his hands and tried to shove Mutsumi's away.
"Hold on, what's flooding the base?" Mutsumi kept his hands still.
"Pipes. Busted. Every single one of 'em." Kururu didn't push so much as lean on Mutsumi's hand. "Pressure's been... fucked for a while. Dunno how long." His head dropped further the more he spoke, until it rested on Mutsumi's fingers. "I have to get back."
Kururu's forehead burned. Mutsumi leaned him against the couch and reached for another one of the objects on the table, a flat rectangular packet the size of his hand. He took out a cooling pad, peeled off the backing, and applied it to Kururu's forehead, covering the rank insignia.
Kururu shivered, and Mutsumi furrowed his brow. "Too cold?" Kururu shook his head. A thin whistle sounded from the kitchen, and Mutsumi stood. "Be right back."
After Mutsumi left, Kururu clutched the hoodie around himself. His muscles objected to any movement, and it wasn't so much the cooling pad as it was everything else that was freezing. Something blocked his throat and he coughed deeply into his hands before he could attempt to resist.
Mutsumi returned with a steaming mug. Kururu kept his hands over his mouth as spots danced before him, and Mutsumi sat on the couch beside him.
"Here," Mutsumi said. "This should help."
Kururu took the mug in both hands. It was warm to the touch, but not too hot. The scent was a little too peculiar to identify, and he took a sip.
He pressed the mug back into Mutsumi's waiting hands. "Gross."
Mutsumi pushed it back with a little smile. "You've got to drink it all."
Kururu squinted into the cup as if the contents had tentacles, then took another sip. "At least tell me what's in it." He'd heard about Pekoponian folk remedies. One ingredient he knew for sure, and it didn't go with the others.
"Ginger and fenugreek. Had to take four cups a day one time." Fenugreek; that was it. The seed was a staple in the Indian spices Kururu put on nearly everything he ate. "I added in some honey without really thinking about it, though."
"Oh, no wonder." He took a longer drink, then sputtered. Mutsumi steadied the mug with one hand and rubbed Kururu's back with the other as he started coughing again.
"Easy, no need to rush." After Kururu's breathing calmed, Mutsumi pushed the coffee table flush with the couch cushions. He unfolded the small white paper sack and pulled out a translucent orange bottle with all-caps English wrapped around the label. It was prescribed to HOJYO MUTUMI.
He opened it and shook out a pill. "It calls for two, but we'll just try one for now." He gave it to Kururu, who accepted it in one hand. "I hear Americans don't mess around when it comes to antibiotics."
Kururu glanced at the little penicillin package before taking it with another swig of tea. "If this kills me, I will haunt you."
Mutsumi laughed. "You mean you'll possess my laptop?"
The corners of Kururu's mouth turned up. "Horse porn."
"My wallpaper needed some livening up, anyway." Mutsumi bent down next to the coffee table to retrieve a sketchpad, and walked across the room to search behind the TV. Kururu watched over the rim of his mug as Mutsumi found the remote for the thermostat and turned it up a few degrees.
Mutsumi returned to the couch. "'Scuse me for a sec," he said, reaching into the hoodie. Kururu inched aside, and Mutsumi pulled the Reality Pen out of the inside pocket. As Mutsumi headed for the entryway, Kururu looked out the window across the room, where large snowflakes flew past and stuck to the panes.
"What do you think you're doing?" Kururu sat up straighter as Mutsumi stepped into his shoes with the sketchpad under one arm.
"Going for a stroll." Mutsumi uncapped the pen and traced the door frame. "Be good and mind the couch while I'm out, will you?"
He pocketed the pen and turned the door knob. Iridescent colors whirled past the opening, and vanished as Mutsumi closed it behind him.
Kururu sank back against the couch. "That's not funny, you ass." He pressed his hands around the mug. Even with the tea warming him from within and the heat turned on, he still shivered.
Sleep pulled at his aching body, so he finished off the tea and slid the mug onto the table. He curled up facing the couch and pulled the jacket's hood over himself. No fucking starfruit, huh?
The wind shifted and blew a spray of snow at the window, making a sound like spilled sugar, and Kururu let himself drift.
The way to the Hinata house was easy to feel out. A baked sweet potato aroma always came to mind when Mutsumi drifted in its direction.
He dropped onto the front walk, sneakers crunching in the snow. This time he entered through a convenient wall-zipper, and descended to the basement.
"Now where would I find a whole lot of broken pipes in an alien base?" Mutsumi stood before the mini-fridge in Keroro's room. "Somewhere out of the way, maybe?"
The fridge portal brought him to the base proper, and he took the walkways and elevators as far as he could go. He had to retreat after hitting the top-secret weapon room, a high-security dead end. He kept a hand to his chin and stared at the walkway as it took him back through the hall on the previous floor.
That's when he heard the dripping. He left the moving path to follow the sound, and entered the invasion mech storage. A faint trickle came from beyond the walls, and he crossed the room to find it coming from a small circular opening with melted edges.
Mutsumi crouched and stuck his head and shoulders through, craning his neck to gape at the huge network of pipes stretching outward and upward. They rained their contents into a gigantic puddle.
"Woah. Kururu wasn't kidding." He dipped a finger into the shallow pool. It wasn't temperate, but was warmer than the snow on his shoes. Deciding he could worry about wet socks later, he stepped inside the walls, water lapping around his soles.
He uncapped the Reality Pen in his mouth and positioned the sketchpad in front of him.
Mutsumi returned after midnight. The door opened with barely a click, and he alighted onto the entryway from the dimensional gap with a squelch, nudging the door shut.
He wiggled out of wet shoes and balanced on one foot to work on his socks. He'd peeled off the second one when he heard muttering coming from the living room, and strode to the couch with damp feet.
Mutsumi leaned over the back; Kururu was hidden in the hooded jacket, reciting half-slurred chemical formulas in his sleep. Most included elements Earth hadn't discovered. Mutsumi had heard these before, when Kururu stayed up for three days tracking his scattered platoon. Staying awake too long just made Mutsumi hallucinate spiders.
The muttering trailed off and Kururu shuddered. Mutsumi couldn't see his face, but a yellow arm emerged and gripped the jacket. He climbed over the back of the couch and sat with his legs crossed, taking Kururu and the jacket into his lap.
Heat radiated through the fabric. The cooling pad had peeled off and laid in the back of the hood. Mutsumi knit his brow. Was it the camphor? Was the tea too strong? Was it the meds? Had he gone wrong somewhere?
Kururu coughed into the jacket, each one rattling deep in his chest. Mutsumi had seen the open toolbox left in a far frigid corner within the base's walls. He guessed Kururu overworked himself in an environment unfriendly to his species.
Mutsumi worked a hand into the sweat-damp jacket and kept it on Kururu's back as he caught his breath. He considered getting another cooling pad, but Kururu let go of the jacket and groped for something. Mutsumi lowered his other hand, and Kururu grasped a couple fingers before his hold slipped away.
Mutsumi's insides constricted and he held Kururu close in his arms.
Their partnership was initially give-and-take, but as time passed, Kururu gave to Mutsumi with no strings attached. He was used to the alien doing things on a whim, but certain free favors lingered in his mind.
Like the Quietan incident. Mutsumi knew why Kururu hadn't asked for anything in return. He knew the moment Kururu overloaded his mech's shields with an expression he'd yet to see twice.
They didn't interfere with each other's lives. Unless, Mutsumi noticed, something threatened to take him anywhere Kururu couldn't reach. The transparency of the American radio deal sabotage still made him grin. And when it came to asking for help, Kururu had him beat.
Maybe his attachment theory held some truth. It wasn't one-sided, at least.
Kururu relaxed in Mutsumi's arms. Mutsumi placed him back on the couch, and headed for the closet nearby. He slid it open and took out a folded blanket from the space Kururu once occupied. With the blanket under one arm, he got another cooling pad from the medicine cabinet and returned to the couch.
He unfolded the blanket partway, extracted Kururu from the hoodie, and spread the blanket over him. The second cooling pad went in the same place as the first, and Kururu shivered and hunkered down under the quilted fabric.
Mutsumi pulled a futon out of the closet, divested his king-sized bed of its quilt and pillows, and set up camp next to the couch.
Might as well get comfortable, he thought.
Kururu's fever broke the following afternoon, thanks to the tea and antibiotics. He regained some color, but was untalkative for another day. The return of his voice brought demands for heaping plates of curry, which Mutsumi served as mild as possible. He denied all requests to add more spice.
Between sitting around all day and having his favorite food reduced to a bland state, Kururu was not the ideal guest. Mutsumi searched every supermarket in the area, but couldn't find a single starfruit. Suspecting imminent revolt, he vanished through the dimensions.
He returned with Kururu's laptop. Kururu stared at him in a way Mutsumi could only construe as gratitude.
"Keroro and the others returned a couple days ago." Mutsumi sat on the couch as Kururu opened the laptop and booted it up. "They seem pretty happy about the plumbing."
Kururu's shoulders twitched with his chuckles. "Did they see whatever the hell you did?"
"Don't think so." Mutsumi stretched his arms and folded them behind his head. "I'm hoping to keep it a secret until you get back."
"Better be good, then." Kururu typed search terms in separate tabs. The history of Vicks was laid bare in one of them. "I'll probably be there by tomorrow, anyway."
Mutsumi lowered his arms and crossed them. "Really."
Kururu scrolled down a webpage and shrugged. "Giroro's not gonna push his own buttons. And Commander's gotta bug someone for custom invasion weaponry." He coughed into his fist, lighter than the day before. "Platoon can't run without me."
"They managed for a while before, didn't they? Plus, they've got Mois."
Kururu let out a short sigh. Mois had her hands full running basic security and babysitting Keroro, nevermind the in-depth electronic management she always paired up for with Kururu.
"Wouldn't wanna hang around here too long, anyway," he said, focusing on the screen.
Mutsumi tilted his head back against the couch and grinned. "I like to think you enjoy my company."
Kururu's typing halted. Dammit, he's gonna make me say it. Instead he went with, "You only got one more week of vacation, right?"
"And?"
"And it'd suck if you couldn't come in that day."
Mutsumi shrugged. "I wouldn't have a problem with it."
The laptop error-buzzed as Kururu mashed his fingers on the keyboard. "Like you don't have a problem with me being contagious?"
"Why should I? We're different species."
Kururu stared at his hands. He hadn't thought about that. "Then... what if I'm not outta here in another week?"
Mutsumi didn't miss the deepening crease in Kururu's brow. "They've got copies of all my shows. My listeners can tell when it's a recording, and none of them ever complain."
Not even Natsumi? Kururu chuckled. "Fine. But you'd better up the curry to at least at eight."
"Zero point five it is."
"Damn."
The building supervisor turned off the heating the next day; economic saving wasn't just for summer. Though the apartment walls trapped warmth better than most, Kururu had hidden completely under the blanket by noon. The thermostat hovered around 15 Celsius, but the blanket layers couldn't hide his worsening cough.
Mutsumi dragged the kotatsu out of backroom storage and plugged it in. He tossed two floor cushions at adjacent sides of the heated table, and bent to grab one of his pillows from beside the couch. On the way up, he tapped the lump beneath the covers and it flinched.
He waited until Kururu's irritated face poked out from under the blanket. "Kotatsu's ready."
Kururu turned to see what he was talking about, then crawled off the couch, under the coffee table, and vanished into the kotatsu's hanging cover. Mutsumi tossed his pillow to land right next to the unoccupied seat cushion, picked up the laptop and Vicks, and sat them where Kururu had entered. An arm reached out and snatched the jar not one second after it touched the floor.
Mutsumi slid his legs under the kotatsu covers and wiggled his toes in the heat. He leaned back with his hands on the pillow and sighed. "Been a while since I brought this baby out."
Kururu rolled his side of the cover inward to act as a cushion and uncapped the Vicks. "Do you even spend that much time here anymore?"
"Only when I have impromptu guests." The jar lid bounced off Mutsumi's foot and clattered to the floor. "Always returning for more of my hospitality."
"Must be a riot at New Year's." Kururu scooped out a handful of gel and slapped it on his chest. His skin absorbed it in a few rubs, and he sighed, staring at the heater's underside.
Mutsumi positioned his pillow behind his floor cushion and lay back with his fingers laced over his stomach. Then he wrinkled his nose and sat up again.
"Kururu," he said, "how much of that have you used?"
Kururu hummed a bit. "About all of it. You should really get more."
Mutsumi folded his legs out from underneath the kotatsu, lifted the cover, and became intimately familiar with the smell of menthol-saturated frog under a heater. He dropped the cover and stood, walking out of the living room and into the short adjoining hallway.
The sound of running water made Kururu peek his head out from under the cover. He smirked and pulled his face back in; more kotatsu for him.
Minutes later, the water stopped, and footsteps approached. Kururu's hand halted halfway to the Vicks as the heater's glow faded.
Kururu's side of the cover flew up to reveal Mutsumi on his hands and knees, wearing only a towel around his waist. "Bath."
"But—" Kururu lost his grip on the jar as Mutsumi pulled him out from under the kotatsu, and it rolled to stop against the couch. He flailed for the cover, but it was folded on the tabletop out of his reach. "Hey!"
Mutsumi carried him under one arm down the hall. "Trust me, you need this."
Kururu hugged his arms around himself and glared at the passing walls. "Like I need more of your sass."
Mutsumi stopped in front of the cloudy sliding glass door opposite the bedroom. He opened it, enveloping both of them in steam as he stepped in and shut it behind them.
Kururu's arms slackened as Mutsumi sat him on a small chair next to a covered bath tub. Mutsumi hung his waist towel on a bar nearby, pulled up another chair to sit behind Kururu, and grabbed a soapy cloth.
Kururu gripped the front edge of his chair, refusing to give Mutsumi the satisfaction of looking over his shoulder. "Are you sayin' I'm startin' to ohhh."
The washcloth draped over his shoulders suffused him with warmth. His fingers loosened from the chair edge, and he leaned further into the cloth as Mutsumi scrubbed his back.
Mutsumi grinned. "Now do you believe me?"
"Little to the left."
Mutsumi handed him the washcloth a moment later, and got another one for himself. As he cleaned, he watched Kururu's movements become more energetic. Why didn't I think of this sooner? Guess I was a little paranoid. He thought of his radio manager. The man did not know subtlety, and Mutsumi wasn't sure whether to laugh or become mortified at the possibility of absorbing his habits.
After getting sufficiently sudsy, Mutsumi rinsed Kururu, then himself with the detachable shower head. He uncovered the tub, allowing more steam to escape. He picked up Kururu, now quite slippery, and maneuvered him carefully to the tub. Kururu stretched a leg down to get a toe in the water, and jerked it back.
Mutsumi stopped. "Is it too hot?" Kururu shook his head once, and Mutsumi dipped him in. Kururu draped his arms over the edge with a deep sigh, and let his legs float just above the bottom. Mutsumi stepped into the other end and sank in up to his neck.
The sound of lapping water echoed off the tiles for several minutes.
"We never did this together, did we?" Mutsumi gazed at the ceiling with half-lidded eyes. "Either I only had enough time for a shower, or you'd already made a pot of curry."
Kururu moved a foot back to touch Mutsumi's. "It was just for a few weeks. You knew I wasn't staying."
Mutsumi shrugged and nudged his foot back against Kururu's. "Can't I entertain a few delusions?"
Instead of answering, Kururu's foot slowly slid down, as did the rest of him. Water sloshed onto the floor as Mutsumi leaned forward and caught Kururu under the arms before his head slipped under.
Mutsumi settled back with his arms wrapped around Kururu. "You all right?"
Kururu held his arms over Mutsumi's and relaxed against his chest. "Perfect."
They returned to the kotatsu after Mutsumi made sure Kururu was dry enough. Kururu didn't make a move as Mutsumi returned the Vicks to the medicine cabinet, and lay half-out of the kotatsu covers, browsing the internet on his laptop.
Mutsumi, in royal blue pajamas, had his legs crossed under the covers, reading a monthly manga magazine with a cup of coffee next to him. He turned the page just in time for his cell phone to ring.
He glanced at the incoming number and flipped it open. "Mutsumi Houjou speaking."
Curry recipes involving ground-up alien organs of varying toxicity scrolled past as Kururu browsed one-handed, the other propped against his cheek. Mutsumi responded now and again with a word or a grunt behind him.
Then it was silent enough for Kururu to pick up the murmur on the other side of the phone. Mutsumi left the kotatsu and went down the hall.
Kururu looked up from the directions for preparing space cat liver. They callin' him in early?
Mutsumi returned a few minutes later, fully dressed and stuffing the phone into the back pocket of his jeans. "Got a little shopping to do," he said, getting his shoes on. "Be right back."
He opened the door to the apartment building hallway, then shut and locked it behind him. Kururu waited until Mutsumi's footsteps faded, and hotkeyed another program open. He typed Mutsumi's phone number into the transparent blue prompt and downloaded a sound file in seconds.
"Mutsumi Houjou speaking," the laptop parroted. The other speaker, now less an indistinct murmur and more a drawling rasp, took over the conversation. In the last five seconds, Mutsumi ended the call with something he must have said in the bedroom out of Kururu's range.
The seek bar on the audio player returned to stay at the zero-second mark while Kururu's fingers remained clenched in the floor cushion.
"That idiot." He closed the program and opened a direct link with the secret base.
Giroro sat by the campfire with the cat curled on his feet, buffing a sniper rifle with a smooth cloth. It'd been bitterly cold for the past week, but keeping himself busy in front of the flames took the edge off. Besides Dororo training, the rest of the platoon refused to set foot outside. And one of them had gone missing altogether, Giroro thought with a snort.
His cat screeched and leapt sideways over the fire as one of the platoon's hoverbikes smashed through the sliding glass door behind them. Giroro squawked and fell over his gun, the campfire flames dancing wildly as the hoverbike swept over the dividing wall.
Teeth clenched, Giroro jerked his head up at the departing vehicle. It didn't have a passenger.
He sat back on the cinderblock, then slowly looked over his shoulder at the broken glass strewn everywhere. Natsumi wasn't going to be happy about this.
Kururu activated his anti-barrier as he rose above the city on the hoverbike. After it evened out with some of the higher buildings, he accelerated, leaving a zig-zag contrail in his wake.
The wind bit past his skin; he gripped the handles and bore down against it. He lowered altitude into an alley, and entered what looked like a solid wall to most Pekoponians.
The foot traffic in Side-6 was sparse that afternoon, and aside from the usual security bots, the flying space above was vacant. Kururu zoomed over heads of various shapes and colors to one of the many secret black market entrances, disappearing into a high corner.
He emerged in a section of the alien shopping district restricted only in name. Lit in permanent dusk, it was fraught with those willing to take risks to get what they wanted. Money overpowered taboo.
Kururu hovered near the entrance, scanning the kiosks below, and replayed the caller's voice in his mind. It matched conversations he discovered from the past five days.
"Come unarmed. The cops don't take kindly to weapons around here, ya know."
Mutsumi never went anywhere without his pen, but that wasn't why Kururu flew for a far corner at a speed just low enough to minimize the sound. A high-ceilinged dead-end corridor came into view, with two figures at the end of it.
Kururu began lowering his bike near the wall, then stopped and gripped the handles tightly, bending over them. He trembled for several seconds, then slowly breathed out, and set the anti-barrier to max before continuing his descent.
Mutsumi kept a casual stance before an alligator-faced man, hands tucked in his jacket pockets. "Show me the goods first, like we arranged."
The man tapped his wrist device, and a clear rectangle materialized into his clawed hands. A waxy yellow fruit with a hint of green filled it.
"Your carambola, sir." He grinned, revealing metal plating on every fang. "I can see you're a man of taste."
He tapped the cube with a hooked claw, and the barrier vanished, leaving the starfruit. Mutsumi removed his hands from his pockets, and the scaly man curled a hand over the fruit.
"Now to discuss my price," the man said.
"Name it."
The edges of the scaled alien's mouth pulled up further. "Cuts right to the chase. You'll be a good one."
"Stop, in the name of intergalactic law!"
A young policewoman's voice echoed through the black market. All activity ceased, and the area emptied in a roar of feet, pseudopods, and engines. Mutsumi and the alligator man remained in the dead-end hall as a lone sales flier blew past.
The man narrowed his slit-pupil eyes. "You snitched!"
Mutsumi held his hands up in a placating gesture. "Why would I? I'm not even supposed to be here."
The man whipped a hand into his open vest. "If you think I'm gonna let ya back out on our deal—"
"Officer Poyon, reporting for duty!"
The voice came directly from their right. They turned to it, bodies tensed, to see a yellow Keronian sitting sideways on a hoverbike with a plush doll in his hands.
Kururu pulled and released the string on the back of the Poyon plush. "You're under arrest!"
Mutsumi and the lizard alien stared. The former bit his lip with barely contained laughter as the latter dropped the starfruit.
Kururu crossed his arms, the doll hanging from one hand. "'Sup, Sinensis? Out ruining your parole so soon?"
"What's a Keronian doin' here?" Sinensis pulled a needle-pointed handgun from his vest. "I ain't got no bounty, so—"
Mutsumi flicked his wrist and the uncapped Reality Pen slipped out of his sleeve into his hand. He dropped to the floor and moved his arm in wide curving strokes. Sinensis jabbed the gun toward him, and a stone floor-fist cracked him under the jaw and snapped his teeth together. His eyes rolled back as he hit the floor, fangs clattering out around him.
Mutsumi put the pen back in his sleeve and squatted to pick up the starfruit. He brushed a metal-encased tooth from its unblemished surface, then walked over to Kururu.
Kururu tossed the doll aside. "You suck at haggling."
Mutsumi shrugged and zipped the starfruit into his hoodie. "I think it went pretty well. And you shouldn't be outside."
"He once got four hundred years for Pekoponian trafficking." Kururu's enunciation sharpened. "And no one lets the other guy name their price on the alien black market."
"I thought it'd be a cool line. If I didn't like what he said..." Mutsumi looped his hand in a drawing motion. "I figured I'd give him a sporting chance, at least."
Kururu leaned his hands on his knees and laughed softly at the floor. "That's not what 'sporting' means, dammit." He hunched over coughing into his hands.
Mutsumi frowned at the way Kururu clutched his hands around his chest afterward. The bike's equilibrium briefly shifted as Mutsumi seated himself in back. Kururu sighed and swung a leg over the other side, and hit the ignition.
Economy hours were over when they returned to the apartment, and Mutsumi wasted no time turning the heat back up. Kururu almost nodded off on the ride home (Mutsumi was kind enough to steer), and was asleep when Mutsumi carried him to the couch.
He tucked Kururu under the blanket and went to the kitchen. He returned with five slices of starfruit on a plate, and set it on the coffee table.
"Kururu?" No reply. He found Kururu's skin cold to the touch, and Mutsumi sat him on his lap with the blanket, rubbing the fabric against the Keronian's arms.
After a minute, Kururu twitched awake. He blinked at his surroundings; it was almost dark out, and no lights were on inside. His unfocused vision fell to something yellow and pointy on the coffee table.
Mutsumi reached over and took a slice of starfruit. With some effort, Kururu got an arm out and accepted it as Mutsumi drew his hand back in.
The slice was gone in seconds. Mutsumi felt a rise in energy and warmth from Kururu as his small body tensed, then relaxed.
"So," Mutsumi said, "are we even?"
Kururu took a deep, steady breath. "You didn't have to do that."
Mutsumi smirked. "That'll teach me not to keep starfruit on hand. I might have to deal with a cobra-head guy next time."
Kururu laughed, his signature cadence back in full, then turned and pressed his cheek against Mutsumi's chest. Mutsumi slid his arms under the blanket and around him.
Kururu returned the embrace. "Now we're even."
The next day, Kururu returned to the base, ignoring everyone's surprise at his reappearance and Giroro's lectures. His senior's nagging would have to wait while he took one last look below.
He found the wall panel back in place without a mark. After removing it again, he leaned inside and stared.
His laughter echoed up the walls. The pipes were a patchwork of waterproof pop-art bandaids.