It is late afternoon as the utility truck takes the only serviceable eastbound ramp to transition from US Route 231 onto Interstate 85. However, as it does so, its driver, Damon Polchow, slows to a stop before a barricade, guarded by a posse of sixteen armed men and women. One of them, wearing a long headband with its ends drooping down his back down to the backs of his shoulders, wears a mysterious grin as the truck slows to a stop and raises a megaphone.
"'Ey, you, driver dude," he calls out through the megaphone, "come on out. I wanna talk."
Damon narrows his eyes at the megaphone man's weapon hanging at his left hip: an FN P-90 with a EO-Tech sight.
"What do we do, Admiral?" Amatsukaze asks tensely, keeping her fully automatic AA-12 combat shotgun under the window out of sight of the bandits.
"Come with me," Damon mutters. "Take off your safeties but keep your guns in your hands in case shit goes south."
Shutting off the engine, Damon hops out of the truck, making sure that everyone gets a good glimpse of his MK-14 Rogue Chassis designated marksman rifle, and Amatsukaze and Murakumo emerge with their AA-12 and AK-47, respectively.
"Oi, oi, I didn't say you could come out with guns," the megaphone man yells, but Damon hollers back,
"It ain't gonna make much sense if you can have sixteen guys all barrelstuffin' our asses like that without havin' guns of our own, so you can go fuck off. What do you want?"
Damon approaches the bandit with the megaphone, and Amatsukaze and Murakumo flank him closely, keeping a wary eye on all of their potential enemies, looking for any sudden movement.
"Fine, fine, it's only fair, right? I mean, it ain't like we already outnumber you sixteen to mothafuckin' three..." he laughs, and lowering his megaphone, the bandit with the P-90 submachine gun waits for the three to get within comfortable talking distance. "So...jus' wanna say sorry earlier."
"Sorry?" Damon raises an eyebrow. "What for?"
"For that," the bandit points at Damon's wounded and bandaged shoulder. "That was one of our sniper dudes overlookin' the major highways that run through Montgomery. He thought maybe you guys were the Cottonheads, so he opened fire."
Damon crosses his arms. "But we killed his ass."
"Yeah, well, he had it comin'. Nothin' we can do ta drag a guy's soul outta hell, right? Don't worry 'bout it. See, I jus' stopped ya to say that, and to say thanks for basically wipin' out the fuckin' Cottonheads for us."
"Cottonheads? Who're they?"
"Who're they? Damn, son, you must be outta state. Haven'tcha heard 'a all these gang wars goin' on?"
Damon shakes his head. "Mind filling me in? I was just passing through the city and next thing I know it's like some kinda fuckin' warzone. What's goin' on?"
The bandit with the P-90 laughs. "It's easy to explain. So basically, there's been this urban legend goin' on...is that the term people use these days, 'urban legend'? Whatever. Anyway, so, rumors been goin' around. How someone found a super weapon somewhere in Montgomery that, if ya get it, it'll, like, do the work of a hundred soldiers, ya know? So the thing is, one guy claimed to have found it first and bragged his ass off 'bout it like fuckin' retarded dipshit that most people are, and soon before ya know it, people're up in arms 'bout it. Passes from one set 'a hands to another. And here's the funny thing: it's like a container thing, but once they opened it, they didn't know how to activate it. All kinds'a rumors flyin' around. How it's some sorta secret machine the government built before the war, or maybe even after the war to fight in a post-apocalyptic scenario shit like this. Honestly, you ever play Fallout 3?"
"The only kind of fallout that I know of is the one that makes you die like a bitch."
The bandit laughs hysterically. "You're fuckin' hilarious, ya know that? Sorry man, ya missed out, it was a great game. Managed to skimp it off one of my friends back when I was bein' a lazy ol' bitch in the CCPL post up in New Hampshire and play it on some old computer I found in one of the basements fulla old shit. Ironic how the world turns into a shitstorm like this, eh? Yeah, so anyway, all these people buyin' into the rumors of this super weapon bullcrap, and all of a sudden, all these bigger gangs start showin' up...and the two that came out on top before y'all crashed in was us: the Cottonheads and the Mercs."
"So you're the Mercs."
"It's jus' what we call ourselves, we didn't bother with some fancy-shmancy title or bullshit like that. So yeah, we've been dukin' it out with 'em for a few days tryin' ta regain control of the city 'n find that container that they had."
"So that super-weapon thing fell into the Cottonheads' hands."
The bandit nods his head. "Yup! And guess what?" He lifts his submachine gun and points it directly at Damon's heart. "We gonna ask you to hand it over."
Amatsukaze and Murakumo immediately raise their own weapons, but the barrels of sixteen different firearms all point simultaneously at the three.
Damon gives a wry smile. "So how exactly do you know that I have that weapon?"
"We had one of our scouts confirm it. He said he saw you three in that big ol' garage and repair shop loungin' around in there with Cottonhead assholes lyin' in their own blood 'n shit all around. So don't lie to me, cocksucker, I know you got it. Hand it the fuck over."
Damon continues to smile nefariously. "Hmmm, I won't deny that I do have it. Though, I'll tell ya, it ain't somethin' I can just 'hand over'."
"Look, bro, I'm tryin' ta make this nice 'n easy for all of us here. I'm givin' ya a chance, can't'cher bitchass see that? I don't wanna shoot a cunt, but if I have ta, I will. Now hand it over, otherwise I'ma ask you to hand over those girls, too. I mean, let's be honest, I got some guys here who haven't had a good fuck in years, includin' me. And I'm sure they got their eyes on 'em hot bods you got goin' on."
Murakumo gives the bandit the middle finger. "Fuck off, creep."
"Oi, you lil' cuntnugget, don't tell me ta fuck off!" the bandit roars, taking a few steps forward and raising the back of his left hand to slap Murakumo across the face.
Just as he does so, Damon moves in a flash. His left hand twirls his karambit blade into its grasp and hooks the end of the blade deep into the bandit's throat and severs the trachea and spine, causing the end of the blade to poke out through the other side.
"MURAKUMO!" Damon bellows.
The highway explodes with gunfire as sixteen armed men and women with pistols and semi-automatic scopeless hunting rifles bombard the three of them with impunity in reaction to Damon's murder. However, a light pale blue shield expands just in time to deflect all incoming fire away from Damon, and the bandits cease fire at amazement and horror as the bullets, frozen and adhered to the shield, drop and shatter into pieces as Murakumo deactivates her shield.
"No one needs to know what I found in there," Damon articulates slowly, as if he is roleplaying as a villain in some superhero story. "Finders keepers...isn't that what this world's made of these days anyway? I fought for it, and I took it, and I captured it. Fuck the rest of you. And now that you've seen it, sorry...but I guess none of you are gettin' off this highway."
Before any of the Mercs can react, a deafening shotgun blast sends one of the bandits flying in a mist of blood off the side of the highway, and Amatsukaze, seemingly warping herself behind another bandit, grabs him by the back of the neck, causing his body to catch fire, and throws the hulking burning body across the highway to knock over two more people in a line and setting their clothes on fire as well. As the mayhem begins, the remaining bandits begin firing wildly, and a few even fall due to friendly fire. Amatsukaze herself catches a few bullets, but because of her Smartsteel construct, the bullets ping off with no consequence whatsoever. The majority are dispatched by Murakumo's 7.62x39mm rounds and Amatsukaze's Ignition Glove. One of the last bandits even jumps off the highway down to the ground below, a thirty-something foot drop, and Damon can hear the distant cracks of his ankles and the consequent screams of agony echoing up from ground zero. Pulling out his Glock 39, he puts a round into the side of the head of the last Merc, who was about to fire off his pistol at the back of Murakumo.
"All hostiles eliminated," Murakumo shouts, tossing aside a spent magazine of her assault rifle onto the highway.
"Not quite," Damon calls out.
"Huh? You gotta be kidding, more reinforcements?"
"No, not exactly that..." Damon walks over to the edge of the highway and leans over, and he sees the Merc down on the streets below quivering in pain and entering shock trauma. He aims his gun down at the street and calmly fires, and the asphalt is painted with a fresh splatter of red blood and white bone, and the whimpering and choking cease. "Now they're all dead. Let's get the fuck outta here, we ain't got a reason to stay in this shit-stained city anymore."
"Do we not have to worry about the highway falling out from underneath us?" Amatsukaze asks as she carries the medical supply box out from the back of the utility truck to use as a chair and sets it down softly on the side of the highway. Damon has decided to simply set up camp for the night on the Interstate 85 highway, overlooking the southern tip of West Point Lake.
"This part of the highway's still strong enough to support the truck overnight," Damon replies, clipping his fingernails over the edge of the highway.
"And how do you know?" Amatsukaze stands by Damon.
"I actually don't. I'm just hoping it's still strong enough to hold us up while we drive over."
"What, because you're afraid that it'll collapse?"
"Kinda."
"What do you mean, 'kinda'."
"Well, none 'a the highways so far've caved in on us yet, so..."
"Somehow, I don't feel like you're playing this safe at all."
"You don't say."
The last bit of the sun is swallowed up by the horizon, but the brilliant colors of the late evening, accentuated by the hazy clouds above, produce an eerily beautiful landscape in an otherwise bleak and depressingly silent world.
"It's not every day I have the chance to see a sight like that."
Amatsukaze shrugs. "It's just a sunset. Nothing to freak out about."
Damon taps his nail clipper against the side of the highway cement. "You don't think it's beautiful?"
"Well...I mean, it is. But...I don't find it mind-blowing or anything. Maybe it's programmed differently for us ship girls. Beauty is a perception thing, after all, isn't it?"
Damon gazes at the sky off at the horizon and the sunlight that reflects off the surface of the somewhat irradiated waters of West Point Lake. Putting his hands on his hips, he sighs.
"Yeah, you're right. It's definitely a perception thing. 'Beauty lies in the eye of the beholder'...or somethin' like that."
Murakumo also joins them, also placing down one of the larger boxes from the utility truck to use as a seat.
"What're you guys talking about?" she asks, interested in their conversation.
"Beauty," Damon responds. "Amy and I were just talkin' about what we think about it."
"It would be nice if you called me by my real name..." Amatsukaze mutters, but Damon ignores her complaint.
"Beauty?" Murakumo frowns. "What's that got to do with anything?"
Damon points at the brilliant sunset off in the distance towards the lake. "As in this: do you think that sunset's beautiful?"
"...I suppose, but that's not something I feel like I should be amazed by or anything. Why, what about you?"
Damon takes a seat on the medical supply box that Amatsukaze had brought out. "See...this is how I think, 'k? I like things like this. Really wonderful, great landscapes or sunsets. I've only seen a couple of 'em before. Hell, there ain't a lotta shit in this world that really comes off as beautiful anymore...not that I know really what was beautiful before the nukes ruined everything."
Damon sighs lightly and leans slightly backwards, resting his hands against the box surface behind him.
"But growin' up confined in a few specific areas and bein' surrounded by nothin' but dead vegetation, irradiated shit, 'n concrete 'n steel everywhere ain't how human beings are supposed ta live. It's like...it's like livin' in a prison. You have to live there, otherwise if you wander outside without knowin' what the hell you're doin', you die. And even if you do choose to live inside a CCPL post, it's like, you don't even wanna live there 'cause it doesn't even feel natural. The griminess, the smell of steel 'n rock 'n concrete 'n shit that humans made, artificial shit, it wears you down over time. That shit ain't what I would call 'beautiful'. Beautiful is shit like this."
Waving his arm about towards the sunset, Damon continues.
"I didn't mention this yet, but part of the reason why I do wanna work to get the world under my control is to make it possible for humans to view things like this again. I really hate livin' in this kind of a world...a world where everywhere you go, you see ruined cities, broken highways, hazy orange clouds fuckin' everywhere. Outside of CCPL posts or places like Mobile, the only people you're ever gonna meet are people who wanna kill ya 'n take your shit. All that bullcrap is ugly. Downright, fuckin' godawful ugly. Ugly, ugly, ugly is all that fuckin' shit ever is. And I'm tired 'a that. I'm tired of havin' to look at ugly shit. I'm tired of havin' to eat ugly shit. I'm tired of havin' to drink ugly shit, that fuckin' bullshit fluid that they toss in a couple iodine tablets 'n call that shit water. I'm tired of livin' in an ugly-ass world where everything's the same shade 'a orange or red or yellow or shit like that. It gets frustrating, and like I said, it wears people down...breaks 'em, tears 'em apart on the inside."
Amatsukaze and Murakumo have also taken seats next to him, gazing at either him or at the sunset.
"Why do you think that is?" Amatsukaze asks. "That humans break down like that?"
"In my opinion, people can't handle livin' in a world that's so goddamn hostile to 'em," Damon muses. "Environmental and psychological factors play a huge role in the well-being of human beings. Even if you make sure your body meets all the requirements that it needs to meet in order to survive, if you live with a kinda mentality that says 'oh, it's so shitty to live like this, why am I even living in a shitty place like this', your health is bound to tank. It's happened to plenty 'a people, much more so among older people, since their bodies are more prone to psychological damage that then translates into physical damage. There are those who just simply can't handle the reality that they're forced to live in a world that's devoid of anything that they used to have before the world got bombed to all hell, so either they start goin' mad, not 'cause of the radiation, but because their minds break - their wills break. That'd be it - they refuse to accept their current situation, and they try rejecting it the best they can. And oftentimes, rejection equals a slow, suicidal breakdown."
"Then what about you?" Murakumo asks in turn. "Why do you think you're any different from those kinds of people, if you are?"
"First of all, I was born in this shithole, you have to keep in mind," Damon replies quickly. "I don't know what life was like before the nukes dropped, so I have the advantage of not being held back by a better, more comfortable reality or lifestyle that the survivors have to suffer. That, and my entire life's been nothin' but ugly. Ugly is what I know, so I'm used to it. I don't know the 'beauty' that the survivors knew...so I'm in no way held back by it. And the rare times that I do come across something that I feel is beautiful, like this sunset - " Damon points off into the distance again - "it's utterly amazing. Personally, I love moments like these."
A few moments of pensive, quiet silence pass as the three of them gaze off into the darkening sky.
"Maybe you two don't really quite get what I'm talking about now," Damon sighs. "You are, after all, ships girls, girls who're basically computers in human bodies. From what I can tell by interactin' with you two, you seem to be aware of shit like beauty, morals, whatever - things that normally are only exclusively human properties. But just 'cause you have 'em and know what they are clearly doesn't mean that you really have to acknowledge them, as you've both demonstrated."
"Well, that, and we just haven't been activated for much time at all," Murakumo points out. "It's only been two days since my activation, and Amatsukaze hasn't been online for more than half a day. Obviously we still need to record more memories and experiences to really apply them to things like beauty and stuff like that to understand, you know. That's what I'm guessing, anyway."
Damon nods. "And that's kinda what I'm hoping to teach all of you ship girls, too. To show you girls what I think are beautiful. This..." he waves his arm again at the brilliant evening sky - "is what I think is beautiful. And I'm hopin' that you'll eventually look back on today and agree with me, that this shit truly is something to remember."
"What if we don't think so?" Amatsukaze counters.
"Then I mean, if you don't wanna think this is great, then you don't have to," Damon replies. "I'm not some kinda fuckin' thought police. While I may govern your actions, I don't govern your thoughts, and there's a huge fuckin' difference between 'em. I'm not asking or ordering you to agree with me. But it'd be nice if you did."
Another moment of pensive silence passes before one of the ship girls again asks another question.
"What else did you see that you thought were beautiful, then?" Murakumo asks.
"Hmmm...for starters, I remember visiting Mount Rushmore, that place up in South Dakota, by heli. Mount Rushmore's this area where four of America's presidents' faces are carved into granite, really big monuments. I dunno...just bein' able to look down on those faces from up high, it was just somethin' that took my breath away." Damon rub his chin. "I could name a few others, but I need to make dinner for us, so I'll end by sayin' that I think the most beautiful thing I can think of is my mom."
"Your mom?" Amatsukaze starts, but then quiets as her memory database also brings up the information that Murakumo had given her that Damon's mother is deceased. "I guess...I guess it's natural for you to think that. Though, I think it's fair to say that...you know, neither of us can say we can feel sorry for you, since, like, we don't know what having parents is like. What was she like, though? If Murakumo's data is correct, you said she died when you were two years old."
"Honestly..." Damon cracks a shy smile, "I don't remember all too much. You can't really fault me for not bein' able to recall much from when I was only two. But even still, whenever I think about my mom, it's like I get the feeling that everything'll be okay, that things'll turn out for the better."
"Well...that's really vague," Murakumo remarks.
"It is, I know. But not everything's determined by cold, hard, concrete data," Damon says. "But to me, that also constitutes as 'beauty' as well. If something can give me that kind of a feeling, a feeling of security and the freedom from worry, then it's a beautiful thing." He turns to his ship girls. "Listen...beauty is whatever you make it out to be. Everyone's got their own standards of what beauty is and isn't, and there's nothing or no one else that can force you to see otherwise unless you yourself change your mind. It can be the most sophisticated explanation, or it can be the dumbest fuckin' reason, whatever. If you think something's beautiful, then that's great. I have things that I consider to be beautiful - and I'm working to get them. That's the biggest thing that sets me apart from the rest, in my own convoluted opinion that probably doesn't matter to anyone else in the world but me..."
Damon stands up to prepare dinner, but he stops.
"Though, if I were to add something else to my really short and irrelevant list of things that I think are beautiful..." Damon murmurs, "it'd have to be you two, I guess."
Damon cannot help but give an amused smile at Murakumo's and Amatsukaze's reactions as they both immediately blush furiously and leap off their own boxes and begin yelling at him in return.
"W-Who're you calling b-b-beautiful?!" Murakumo shouts, while Amatsukaze yells, "W-What're you saying all of a sudden? ! ? ! ?"
"Why're you two getting angry at me? I'm complementing you," Damon chuckles. "Man, what's your problem?"
"B-B-B-Because you're just trying to use that as an excuse to get all close 'n comfy with us!" Murakumo blurts. "That's not gonna work, okay!?"
"That wasn't my explicit intention, but okay, whatever. I'm just telling you what I think, is all," Damon rummages through his backpack to get out some stored food and the skillet to cook. "I know that you girls aren't really that aware of yourselves, but coming from someone who's lived in this world where there ain't a lotta good-looking girls, both of you are actually really, really damn hot."
Neither of the ship girl destroyers can even muster up anything to say in response to Damon's words, so they simply glare at him with red faces and embarrassed looks.
"I'm not kidding. I don't mean to bring this up to make things awkward, but that guy from earlier - the guy with the megaphone - you remember how he mentioned you two have 'hot bods' or something like that. Even though I sliced that fucker's throat in half, if there was anything he said that I'd agree with, it's that."
"S-So you're also a pervert who only keeps us around for your own viewing pleasure?" Murakumo accuses.
"No, don't twist my words out of context. You will be, first and foremost, my soldiers and my ships. You will be my army and my navy that I will use to further my own agenda and objectives. What I'm saying is that it's really nice and lucky of me that the soldiers that I have control of at the moment just so happen to be attractive girls. As a guy, I can't complain. If you think my judgment of your physical appearances are the equivalent of the thoughts and actions of a pervert, then I suppose I will forever be a pervert in your eyes. Though, I personally would disagree." Damon sets up the materials and points at the back of the utility truck. "Don't stand there 'n stare at me, go get a few pieces of timber from the back so I can make dinner for us, will you?"
The highway is filled with the familiar smells of cooking food. Illuminated mostly by firelight, since by this point the sky has darkened to the point where sunlight is no longer a reliable source of light for the rest of the evening, the little camp area that Damon, Amatsukaze, and Murakumo have set up to eat is being taken over by smells of bacon, sausage patties, broccoli, and tomatoes, in addition to a few new foods such as zucchini and mutton chops.
Needless to say, Amatsukaze's mouth is watering uncontrollably as she eagerly watches Damon shake the skillet over the campfire on the side of the broken highway, turning over the strips of bacon and sausage patties and making sure to pour a dab of maple syrup.
"When did you learn how to cook, anyway?" Murakumo asks, a bit bored while watching Damon prepare their dinner.
"Back when I used to live in those CCPL posts. During the first five years or so after the nukes dropped, our diets basically consisted of canned food and emergency preservation food, shit like that. There were times that we came close to starving, but surprisingly those times were pretty rare, at least from what I've heard around the US. The Feds did a damn good job makin' sure that all the CCPL posts that got established in most major cities that didn't get nuked got enough stuff to make sure the people there survived. But jus' 'cause you got food doesn't mean it's gonna taste good."
Damon blows a bit on the top of the skillet, and Amatsukaze and Murakumo watch the light frying smoke waft away from Damon.
"I got sick 'n tired of eatin' crappy food day in, day out. But back then, in those fuckin' CCPL posts, there was virtually no way for normal people to get their hands on anything better than the food they handed out...the rations. Those fucking rations...God, I hated them. Then, I remember one month I helped out one of the directors at the CCPL post up in Columbus in Ohio, and he paid me in food. Like, as in, real, good food. Not the crap I ate outta cans 'n shit for like, years. Actual food. I almost fuckin' begged him to teach me how to cook, but he didn't, so I learned to do it myself. Stole ingredients from the kitchens, tried cooking for myself. It was tough, not having anything for reference and learning how to cook from scratch. Just had to get the feel of the ropes all by myself...tough, but I think it's one of my most valuable skills. I'd've killed myself a long time ago if I didn't learn..."
Dividing up the food onto two plates, Damon hands the food to Murakumo and Amatsukaze, the latter of whom simply gapes down at her dinner in sheer amazement and wonder.
"Hm? What're you staring at your food for, Amatsukaze?" Murakumo asks. "It'll get cold if you don't eat it right away, you know."
"...so this is food..." Amatsukaze thinks aloud in picks up her fork and bites into a bit of her bacon, and it is almost as if the air around Amatsukaze is glowing brighter than the light from the campfire itself.
"Don't eat so fast," Damon cautions Amatsukaze, watching her shovel the food into her mouth with a bit of entertainment.
"Er, Admiral, where's yours?" Murakumo asks, a bit concerned as she, too, starts to eat.
"Me? That was the last portion left," Damon says, shrugging and rummaging through his backpack. "I gave it to you two."
Amatsukaze instantly stops with her fork midway into her mouth, and Murakumo, too, freezes.
"...er...you're kidding, right...?" Murakumo stammers.
"I'm not. That was it. I'm gonna have to start grabbin' some of that shitty canned crap from the back of the truck."
Amatsukaze's face is wrought with complicated emotions, and it is clear just by looking at her facade that her heart is torn between her immense satisfaction in her first time ever eating food, at least in a very long time, and her guilt at denying her Admiral of his own dinner. Murakumo feels trapped in the same dilemma as well.
"Th-Then, um...then I-I'll share some with you!" Murakumo blurts out, getting up from her box and sitting down next to Damon. "H-Here..."
"Wait, wait, that's supposed to be my responsibility! Admiral cooked this for me since it's my first dinner, so he should have some of mine!" Amatsukaze speaks up too.
"I mean, we can just split this up three ways, can't we? Here, put some food on the skillet for him," Murakumo insists as she starts to put some of her food onto Damon's skillet, but by this point he can no longer keep up his act and ends up bursting out in laughter, causing both of his ship girls to stare at him in complete wonder.
"Oh God...this is...I can't, I just can't," Damon grins with a grin that a prankster would make after successfully pulling off a great prank. "I have more food, don't worry, take your food back. I was just...I was just lying to you to see what kinda reactions you two would have."
Murakumo punches Damon's right arm again in furious embarrassment.
"Ow!" Damon, who is holding his skillet with his right hand, releases his grip on the handle out of reflex of the sharp pain that shoots up his shoulder, and the skillet clatters onto the decaying asphalt and cement of the highway floor, causing the few contents of the skillet and drops of light cooking oil to fly. Murakumo, who clearly realizes what she has done again too late, simply stares down at the skillet as the color drains from her face faster than a dry sponge absorbing a few drops of water.
"I-I'm...I'm really sorry..." Murakumo utters in a barely audible voice. Damon says nothing as he looks at the bandage patch over his bullet wound, which is again darkened once more from the reopening of the wound, and leans down to pick up the scattered food bits and tosses them back onto the skillet. He turns to Murakumo, who instinctively backs away from him, afraid of what he is going to say to her as Amatsukaze quietly eats her own food awkwardly.
"You gonna eat this?" Damon says with a quick sigh.
"...uh, what?"
"I said, are you going to eat this?"
"...er..."
"I already said I have my own portion that I can cook; I just cooked the two of yours first. I know this's been on the ground, but it's kind of a waste to toss this."
Murakumo wordlessly and hesitantly takes the food from the skillet and drops it on her own plate. "...you're not angry at me?" she mutters.
"No."
"Well, why not?"
"Because it's a waste of effort," Damon says abruptly as he prepares his skillet again to cook his own dinner. "I asked you not to do that earlier today, and you did it again anyway. Clearly, even though you're supposed to be following my orders, you still haven't understood that somehow. I dunno if it's like a command prompt glitch in your system files or somethin' or whatnot, but I can only assume you'll do this again after this. Knowin' that, it's not worth me wasting my energy getting pissed off anymore. Or, even better, I can probably just order you to deactivate yourself if I'm that fed up with your bullshit."
Murakumo eats very slowly, not enjoying her food anywhere near as much as she was before she accidentally punched Damon on the arm for the second time in a row today. The ship girls sit very awkwardly as Damon makes his own dinner, but he has some difficult in doing so as his right arm is still shaking with some pain and having to exert more energy to keep the skillet over the campfire, something Damon has no trouble doing without his injury.
"I-I can hold that for you," Murakumo tries to offer, but Damon shakes his head.
"I'm fine."
"Well...n-no, no you're not. Your arm's shaking..."
"And I wonder why that is. I am fine, Murakumo."
Murakumo falls silent, bitter and guilty at her mishap.
"Couldn't you, like, hold the skillet with your left hand instead of your right?" Amatsukaze points out. "I've noticed that you cook with your left hand managing the food and your right hand holding the pan. Can't you switch?"
"This's how I've taught myself to cook," Damon says. "I'm right handed. I could try, and to be honest that's probably a good idea, but it'll be kinda awkward for me."
Soon, however, Damon eats his own food with no further trouble, and by that time both of the ship girls have already finished their dinners.
"Amy," Damon says after swallowing a bite of his food, "your clothes."
Amatsukaze stares back at him. "What about my clothes?"
"Your shirt's got holes in it 'cause of the bullets you took earlier today. I got some sewing stuff, so I'll fix that for you."
"Um..." Amatsukaze's face again goes red once she realizes what this means. "Y-You idiot, what the hell am I gonna wear, then!?"
Damon gives Amatsukaze a nasty look, the kind of condescendingly irritated look that screams bitch-what-are-you-asking-me.
"I don't have a problem with just letting ya keep those clothes the way they are and never bother ta mend 'em, ever. Soon they'll be so fulla damn holes since both of you are immune to bullets that you'll be fightin' shirtless if you're really okay with that."
"F-Fine, fine, I get it!" Amatsukaze hisses.
"I think I have a spare shirt in here, or maybe a jacket or something. You can just wear that while I'm busy mending your clothes."
Damon quickly finishes his repast, and after cleaning up the plates and skillet, he starts mending the few bullets holes punched in Amatsukaze's shirt by the shots fired by the Merc bandits earlier in the day.
"Do either of you know how to sew?" Damon asks as he pulls on his sewing needle, and both ship girls shake their heads. "I ought'a teach you how so that you girls can fix your own clothes on your own time. We're bound to get into some rough fights down the road, and seein' that you ship girls're pretty much immune to basically anything, do expect me to order you to tank a few shots sometime."
"You do that, and I'll call you a damn scumbag for the rest of the time that you're my Admiral," Amatsukaze glares at Damon.
"But sewing, huh..." Murakumo murmurs. "Did you learn that too? Like cooking?"
"Waddya think? I was an orphan since I was two. I didn't have anyone to teach me how to do shit. The only things I learned how to do from other people were to know where ta take a shit so that I don't piss off the guards 'n break the rules whenever I can to help myself live a slightly better life than the shitty one that most people lived during those days. Everything else, I took the hard way, 'cause there was no other way."
The rest of the time that Damon spends mending Amatsukaze's shirt is spent in silence all the way until he finishes. He stands up after packing away his sewing kit, hands Amatsukaze her shirt back, goes to the back of the truck, and comes back with one of the weapon supply crates to set on the ground next to the brightly burning campfire.
"What's that?" Amatsukaze asks.
"It's one of the three weapon crates we picked up earlier when we got that truck of ours," Murakumo says. "I think that one...does that one hold the big gun, Admiral?"
Damon lifts up the L.S.A.T. light machine gun, albeit with some difficulty due to his shoulder wound. He sits down with it and begins loading one of the giant 200-round belt magazines into the machine gun.
"Alright, listen up," Damon orders with a strict voice. "Tomorrow, after we get some sleep, we're gonna drive south of Atlanta, which you should both already know is one of the six major independent factions of the South. Atlanta's a pretty nasty place - run by some of the biggest douchebags you can imagine. They'll put a bullet in the heads of anyone they don't know or recognize, and if they don't trust you for a second, they'd much rather just kill you on the spot and be done with it. What we're gonna do is drive south of the city to avoid getting into direct contact with any of those assholes runnin' around up there. Instead, we'll take a detour to Macon, and we'll continue to Charleston from there. Got it?"
Murakumo and Amatsukaze nod.
"I'm gonna use this machine gun here and the DSR sniper. Murakumo, I'm giving you my Rogue Chassis. Amatsukaze'll stick with the AA-12 that I gave her earlier. If you see anyone suspicious, you let me know. If they shoot at us at all, you waste 'em if you've got a shot. That clear? Good."
Damon slaps down the cover of the belt feed mechanism of the L.S.A.T.
"Lemme ask, neither of your GPS's work right now, do they?"
Both of them shake their heads. "We keep getting a no signal...the satellites in orbit must either be offline or in need of repair," Murakumo muses.
"The nukes probably destroyed a lot of them," Damon nods. "If there's still a few operational ones out there, their signals're probably gettin' blocked by the radiation clouds or the debris clouds or something...I don't know the exact details. But it'd be more convenient for us if we ever find out if there's a couple, even one that we can try to salvage somehow so that you girls can start using your GPS's. But that'll be a plan for another day..."
