Thanks for the reviews Rainbowkittyblossomwings, Heinous966, ZanyAnimeGirl, jozs001, Snow Wolf Alpha , Malsyn (Thanks for pointing that mistake out, and I've since fixed it :) If anyone saw two uploads of chapter 9, that was why xP) and Latios381!
If anyone liking this fic likes the Funimation dub of Sgt. Frog, sad news but a Funi rep said at Otakon said the Sgt. Frog has been "shelved". Meaning they won't be dubbing anymore until they think more people are into it. They stopped dubbing just before the Garuru platoon made their infamous first appearance and tried killing everyone. So if you want to maybe get Funi off their arses and continue dubbing, please support the dub, maybe by buying the DVDs if you haven't already and signing this petition that some very smart person made: petitions / we- want- more- sgt- frog . html
If you sign, you won't be put on any mailing lists and you can sign anonymously and don't have to give any details you don't want. So, yeah, please give support and I'll shush now and get on with the fic :) Oh, and a review would be nice too ;P
-=X=X=X=-
Natsumi had never seen the frogs eat before. It never occurred to her that they even needed food, or what type of food they ate. Of course, that question and many others, would have whipped through Fuyuki's mind and out of his mouth in nanoseconds. He probably would have begged them to try a bit of...whatever those ration things were. Natsumi, on the other hand, just sat opposite Saburo at their own tiny table in the corner of the kitchen while all the other frogs (save that pervy yellow one) sat at their big table and talked while they ate breakfast. Thankfully, Saburo's and her own breakfast was just cornflakes. She'd never been happy to see cornflakes in her whole life.
Despite herself, she kept stealing glances at Giroro. Last night kept playing over in her mind and what was worse...she did not hate thinking about it. She should; she kept telling herself that she shouldn't think about him doing one nice gesture and not hate his guts for making her seem weak and pitiful. But when she glanced at him again and locked eyes with him for the briefest of moments before he swiftly averted his eyes, as if he were ashamed to be staring, she just physically couldn't make herself hate him. And it was getting pretty annoying.
"What's with you two this morning?" the medic one, Pu-something, asked Giroro and Garuru. Giroro clammed up and Garuru just shook his head. So the others were noticing the weird tension between those two as well. Natsumi admittedly felt bad he was in trouble with his comrade. But it's not like she asked him to defend her, right? It was his own fault...
"Right, well, back to work everyone!" the stupid green one announced, pushing himself away from the table before gesturing to her and Saburo to clear their table. Saburo simply nodded and Natsumi tried her best not throw her own breakfast at the damn toad.
When all non-humans and filed out of the room, it was just the two of them left in the kitchen. There was no exact schedule for their chores, they just had a list to get through before the end of the day, so they could get to it whenever, but Saburo pretty much started cleaning the table as soon as he'd finished his breakfast. A few minutes into it, he suddenly asked, "So, are you going to tell me why you were crying?"
"H-huh?" Natsumi was caught totally off guard.
"Your eyes are pretty red and you look glummer than usual...You don't have to tell me if you don't want, but I just thought getting it off your chest might make you feel better."
"I...um, I was missing my family," she replied quietly.
"Ah...And what about those weird looks you've been giving Corporal Grumpy all morning?"
"Corporal Grumpy?"
"Giroro."
"I...! I haven't been giving him weird looks," she quickly covered up. He couldn't have noticed, could he..? He arched his eyebrow and flashed her a haughty grin, as if silently saying "Please, girl, you've been giving him more weird looks than a giant mutant eyeball".
"Well, he's certainly been giving you looks."
"He has?!" Her voice was much too high. "I-I mean...so what if he has?" Saburo crossed his arms and lent back against the kitchen counter, looking at her expectantly. "He...might've listened to me...when I talked about my family. He was...He was being nice." She didn't tell him about him defending her from a memory wipe. If he knew about that too, Garuru might decide to wipe his brain clean and ship him off as well.
"Seriously? Corporal Grumpy?"
"Why do you keep calling him that?!"
"Because...he's...grumpy?" He shook his head. "Anyway, my point is that he doesn't seem the type to do anything nice for an alien...Hah, he must have a crush you!"
Natsumi blew up bright red, redder than Giroro red. "He-what-no-just-he's-kind? Maybe-never-no-what-huh-like-uh-alien-me-crush-what?!"
"...That was a joke, Natsumi-chan," he chuckled. "But...in all seriousness, he must care for you, even a little, if he did that. Mean old soldier like that, probably would have killed you to stop you crying instead of talking if he didn't."
"He's not mean...and he's not old...is he?" Natsumi frowned. How old was he? Did the frogs age slower than humans? Or faster? "Ugh, more of the questions Fuyuki would have bugged them with if he were here..."
"Are you sure you don't have a crush on him too?" Saburo laughed again.
If she was redder than Giroro before, there would have to be a new synonym for 'red' invented just to described the colour of her face now. It was impossible. He was...And she was...Not to mention the state of her planet! Which was his fault! Well, maybe not his direct fault, he was just doing his job...But he didn't have to be good at his job, did he? And one kind act didn't mean he had a crush on her. Technically, two kind acts...And she was simply interested as to why he did that, and surprised that the soldier wasn't as mean as she once thought. She didn't think he was cool or anything. Besides, she wasn't the type to just randomly get crushes on guys she barely knew- alien amphibian or otherwise.
Then she looked up at Saburo again, still leaning there and smiling calmly. She groaned silently, realizing she did randomly get crushes on guys. It only took a few minutes watching him from her classroom window; staring at him while he simply walked out of the building and took a good look around, smiling at the sun and fresh air with a super-nova smile before hopping on his skateboard and wantonly gliding out the main gates. She pretty much fell for him then, without even knowing his name. But when she looked at him now...Her heart didn't flutter, her cheeks weren't hot, she could string a sentence together. Maybe she was the type that fell out of crushes just as fast falling into them. Not that she had a crush on Giroro.
"Hey, that was just another joke," Saburo laughed, a bit awkwardly this time. "But y'know, Natsumi-chan, if you ever need to talk to someone, I'm just down the corridor in the lab."
"Thanks, Saburo-senpai," Natsumi smiled, genuinely grateful of the offer. And then she uttered a sentence she never ever thought she would say to him before the time of invaders and frogs; "You're a good friend."
Saburo became a statue. Standing there, in the same cool pose and completely still save for his left eyelid twitching ever so slightly. "Friend? Right. Great. Yeah, you're a great friend too, Natsumi-chan. I'd better get to work." Then he quickly marched out of the kitchen and out of sight.
-=X=X=X=-
"Garuru, quit avoiding me!" Giroro yelled at his brother, who at the time was calibrating the energy sphere in the Main Battery. Again.
"I'm not avoiding you, I am merely doing my job," the Lieutenant replied, not looking up from his console. "As you should be."
"Don't give me that crap," Giroro snarled, his blood boiling. He did his work perfectly fine, thanks very much asshole, but what his brother had alluded to last night was raging on his mind so constantly that he couldn't work. "Last night, when you told me about your plan to get rid of Natsumi-"
"I never said 'get rid of Natsumi'," Garuru corrected, "I said 'deal with the Pekoponian situation'."
"Whatever; you just suddenly dropped the subject and said 'oh that's it'. What the hell did you mean by that?"
"One: that is a terrible imitation of me. Two: when I drop a subject, I do it for a very good reason- you know this perfectly well. And three: why on Keron are you so worked up about it? The Pekoponian is staying, memory intact. There is no longer an issue."
"I'm not worked up about it! I-" His heart skipped in his chest. "Wait...Did you say she's staying?"
"Affirmative. Now, if we could get back to work-"
"Why- What made you suddenly decide that?!" Giroro's blood was pounding in his veins. Knowing that she wasn't going to be apart from him made him feel...strange and his brother shutting down the conversation- twice- made him anxious and confused. And Giroro didn't like feeling strange and anxious and confused, hence it made him quite angry.
"Your reaction last night," Garuru answered simply. "You obviously don't want her to go, or to forget you, for obvious reasons."
"What obvious reasons?!" The corporal's voice was much too strained there. It must've been a side effect of his blood surging so violently in his body. "If they're so obvious, how come I don't know them?!"
Garuru turned away from the console, and looked his younger brother straight in the eye. "You're in love with her."
A silent moment passed as the words sunk into Giroro's head. He wrinkled his nose and growled, "Bullshit."
His brother crossed his arms. "If you continue to deny it, it will continue to be an issue to you. Best you make peace with it and then you can move on."
"I said it's bullshit!" he roared. "I'm not in love with her! Sh-she's a Pekoponian. I'm a Keronian. There's no way-!"
But she was more than a Pekoponian, he realized. She was a warrior. She was like him. When he first saw her, he thought he saw just a glimpse of a spark in her eye, but dismissed it. But when she struck him, a powerful blow fuelled by the heart, he saw not just the spark but the full on inferno of a fighter's spirit in those beautiful amber eyes. And since then, he just couldn't ignore the fire she carried within her. Even last night...When tears were rolling down her cheeks, she harboured so much strength...She could get sad and lonely, he could get sad and lonely...! But that didn't stop them from being what they were. She was a true fighter, just like him. And she was a Pekoponian- not a bad looking Pekoponian, mind. Her hair was the colour of cosmic dust storms that raged in the Rose Cluster and her hand (well, fist) while as strong as a Tuchankan Thresher Maw, felt as smooth as silk and whenever he thought of her, or that punch to the chin, or her fighter's spirit, his heart skipped and stopped and somersaulted and ...and...Oh hell.
"Oh hell," Giroro whispered. "I...am in love with her."
"Affirmative, little brother," Garuru said.
The corporal facepalmed. "Nooo..." He squeezed his eyes shut under his palm, as if being blind might help the situation. "No, no, no, nooo, I can't be in love! I'm a freaking solider! I especially can't be in love with a Pekoponian!" he groaned.
"Love catches up with all soldiers eventually, Giroro," Garuru said, quietly.
"Oh, stop being so gay!"
"Tch," the Lieutenant rolled his eyes behind his visor, turning back to the console. "Well, what are you going to do about the situation?"
"I...um...I-I don't have to do anything, right?" Giroro reasoned to himself. "I mean...it's not a particularly pressing issue, it won't affect the invasion, a-and it's not like she feels the same way for me, is it?"
"No, of course not."
The corporal flinched at that. He knew Natsumi gently taking his hand in hers, or being held in her arms while she smiled at him happily, or her delicately pressing her lips to his cheek after confessing her own love were impossibilities...but it still hurt for them to be stamped on so.
Garuru turned back to his brother, looking a little guilty. "I apologise, that was...blunt."
"No, it's fine, you're right...I have to go blow up some giant green statue in America. See you later," he said, leaving the room.
"It may help if you imagine the statue as Keroro," Garuru called after his brother, and then heard a curt "Ha!" as his reply.
-=X=X=X=-
Kururu wasn't one to be annoyed easily. Usually, he annoyed others- and hell was he good at it. And usually, he let others' attempts at getting under his skin flow right over his incredibly intelligent head. But right now, while he was trying to work at his computer, the most frustrating person on this uneducated hunk of rock and water called Pekopon was pacing up and down his lab with his stupidly oversized Pekoponian feet, before exhaling an almightily irritating huff, and then waltzed over to the other one of his computers and started clacking away at the keyboard, as if the oaf knew what he was doing.
"Hey, furniture," Kururu growled, "You want to keep the noise down?"
"Sorry." The blond Pekoponian flashed a stupid grin at him as by way of an apology. "Hey, Kururu...If a girl- or, guy, if that's how you go- you were totally platonic with, but of course still had some carnal attraction to because they were, well, hot, and then they dumped on you the 'You're a great friend' line, what would you do?"
"Rip out their endocrine system," he replied, plainly.
The idiot laughed. "That sounds too messy for my style. But, I think- think - she used to have the hots for me, and now I'm a 'great friend'. That must mean she has the hots for a new guy, right?"
"Why exactly does that bother you if your only interest is carnal?"
"I guess I just hate having my options limited."
"Ku ku ku..." The stupid Pekoponian was intent on unloading his stupider problems onto him, while he was obviously busy enslaving his race, but...It did sound like it was going to get interesting. "So what are you going to do, lover boy?"
He flashed another grin. "Not 'lover boy', simply 'rather-irritated-that-there's-apparently-someone-more-desirable-than-me-onboard boy'. And I think I'm gonna screw with the new guy a little bit."
"You know who the new guy is...?" The sergeant major was surprised by this demonstration of sub-intelligence demonstrated by a Pekoponian.
"Corporal Grumpy, of course! Didn't you see those two eye-sexing each other at breakfast this morning?"
"Ku, I wasn't at breakfast this morning, idiot."
"I mean from your cameras. You have them in the kitchen, right? You have them all over the rest of the ship."
Perhaps this Pekoponian was more intelligent than all the rest. It was a long shot, but a pretty interesting long shot.
"All data regarding all humans made contact with is in the Pekoponian Consensus Network, right? That include medical files?"
"Kuu ku, you couldn't possibly know about that."
"I spend a lot of time in the lab. If her family wasn't on the Holding Ship, that means they either haven't been captured or they're too ill or damaged to serve as...well, servants and are being treated by medics. And that means their info will be in the Consensus. The password is a decimal matrix configuration, yeah? Shouldn't take too long to crack."
Kururu felt his mouth stretch into a smile while his brain patched together the Pekoponian's plan, even noting just how smart this guy might really be. "Kuuu ku ku...You're actually a pretty interesting guy, Furniture."
"It's Saburo!" he chuckled. "God, I thought geniuses were meant to have good memory. Guess your planet must throw that label around pretty liberally, huh?"
"Ku Ku!"
-=X=X=X=-
Koyuki rubbed a speck of dust from her eye, continuing to follow Dororo through the maze of vents. Last night, when she met him in the ducts to share any information they gathered...Well, she would never forget the sound of such worry in his voice as he told her about the kid who was in his old platoon being held captive...and about Katazuchi's threats.
Dororo halted suddenly, shimmying over a small gap in the vent and pointing to it. Through it, she could see a small, black and white Keronian tied to a chair. He looked different to Dororo; the white patch came further up his face, up to his eyes. And he had a different symbol on his tummy. And he looked very, very frightened.
"Private Second Class Tamama," Dororo whispered to her. "He's little more than a child. I cannot sit by while Katazuchi torments information out of him."
"So what's our plan?" Koyuki asked. Tamama looked a lot younger than her ninja friend...but he was probably still dangerous, even if he needed rescues. They would have to approach this carefully, but Koyuki was with Dororo all the way. Had been since she first stumbled upon him in the woods.
"I shall descend and untie Tamama-kun, then blindfold him and guide him far away from the Sanctum and any other refugee camps. Then, I shall activate his tracking beacon and wait for the rest of the platoon to come and pick him up."
"That sounds like a good plan," Koyuki nodded. "What do you need me to do?"
"Unless something unexpected arises, you will escort Tamama-kun and I above ground in case we run into trouble although I doubt we shall, then await my return."
"I've got your back, D," she smiled. He smiled softly back at her. She had learned long ago that his mask couldn't hide his smile; it all shone through his big blue eyes. "Let's do this."