Chapter 3
----------------------------------------------------
It had not been a good life.
For starters, he had been born.
It was Pedro's slightly blue temperament at the moment that prompted this rather mordant thought.
Still, how could one be anything but mordant when his recently recovered idyllic family life had turned out to be anything but?
It was bound to happen; in his long absence, his family had grown away from him.
Certainly, they had been very much the close, happy family while on vacation in Japan, but now, back home and facing the strains and unpleasant aspects of everyday life, they were starting to slowly but surely get on each other's nerves.
This had hit home with almost painful clarity when, upon accidentally upsetting his coffee all over the table, Pedro had raised his hands to his cheeks and howled,
"NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!"
His sexy wife had rolled her eyes and made an exasperated noise.
"Pedro, it's just spilled coffee. Grown men don't 'no' over spilled coffee, you know. And I wish you would stop doing that! It frazzles my nerves, and you know that with the new baby coming, that is not healthy."
And there was the next of the many problems: the new child. A constant reminder of his sexy wife's unfaithfulness with the lover of his own extra-marital lover.
It was all very confusing – far too confusing for Pedro, who had long ago stopped trying to sort it out and was now merely staring bleakly at his coffee spoon, tears streaming down his cheeks.
"Papa, are you crying again?" a young voice asked from behind him in disgust. "If you spent as much time practicing your football technique as you spend at the table, staring at that spoon and crying, maybe I wouldn't beat you every time."
"Oh, Sandora, do not be so hard on your poor papa," Pedro implored. "It has not been an easy time for our family."
Sandora's expression softened as he prepared to impart the same wisdom that one special child in every universe seems to possess, that every grown-up around them has somehow missed.
"Papa, it has been a long and difficult road for us, but we have finally seen the end of it! Why do you remain so sad?"
"Because, my dear son," Pedro wept, "your papa has the distinct feeling that the worst is not over yet!"
"What more could be to come?" Sandora demanded, bouncing a soccer ball off his forehead. "The anime series has already ended!"
"Yes, I know, Sandora, but it is simply the intuition of a man to whom such misfortune is commonplace. I can't help but wonder—"
"Shh!" Sandora hissed, looking about suspiciously. Eyes narrowing, he leaned closer to his father. "Do you hear that?"
"It is your sexy mama, yes?"
"She is on the telephone in the other room."
Pedro gasped, and then raised his hands to his cheeks, preparing to utter his famous battle cry.
"N—"
"Shh!" Sandora hissed again, more annoyed this time. "Who do you think Mama is talking to?"
"I do not know, Sandora, but your papa fears that his distinct feeling of misfortune to come will be realized much sooner than he thought!"
"Let us go shamelessly eavesdrop through the keyhole!"
"Sandora, as your father, I must—"
"It is for the good of our family, Papa! We must get to the bottom of this if we want to exist happily and peacefully as we did before!"
Pedro considered this carefully for a moment, head buried in his hands, tears forming a puddle around his head like a halo of not-happiness. If it would help to preserve the happiness of his family, could it truly be all bad?
With a sigh of defeat, he raised his head from the table and crept silently, behind his son, over to the door leading into the den. There, two generations of former Afro Warriors crouched, straining to hear the telephone conversation on the other side.
What would they hear?
Only time would tell…very little time, as the telephone conversation was at that moment going on, and the average one did not tend to exceed a few hours in length, unless one was dealing with an incredibly talkative person, which Pedro's Sexy Wife was not particularly. To be sure, she could get as rowdy and talkative as anyone when she had a bit of beer in her, but as it was the middle of the afternoon, and she was carrying a child, it was fairly safe to say that she had not yet partaken of everyone's favorite depressant.
All of this was beside the point, which was that it was high time for a scene change, as revelations such as the one that may or may not have awaited Pedro and Sandora were best taken with the suspense of prolonging the discovery until after another, totally unrelated scene.
Or seven.---------------------------------------------
Menchi lay, draped listlessly across the arm of a chair, pondering to herself the meaninglessness of life and the futility of death.
At least, this is what the narration was left to assume that she was pondering, since her translator was notably absent, and the narration did not, and still does not, speak puppy. Particularly sad, angsty puppy.
Nevertheless, given Menchi's circumstances within the world, it was safe to say that her train of thought was not a happy one.
For Menchi was a smart puppy in her own way, and thus knew that her unwanted owners would be returning any moment. With each day the two girls returned, utterly without food and money, her chances of becoming an entrée grew just a little.
To be sure, it had occurred to Menchi that if these two nutcases she lived with had not eaten her yet, it was not likely to happen, as one did grow quite sentimentally fond of cute, fwuffy wittle animals that one had been around for a good deal of time, but she had shoved the thought aside, as it interfered with and nearly invalidated her artful puppy-angst.
At this point, any further ponderings of the unfortunate Miss Menchi were cut short as the door swung open.
"Awr!" Menchi yelped miserably, darting into the washroom and huddling, terrified, underneath the threadbare bath mat.
Surely, those two terrifying creatures that Fate had dictated she should live with would be looking for her soon…
She lay very still, listening carefully for the excruciatingly cheerful voice of the blonde monster calling for her, or for approaching footsteps.
Neither came.
Blinking sad, pitiful, and somewhat confused eyes, Menchi poked her head out from under the bath mat.
Still nothing!
Well!
Feeling vaguely affronted, she crawled out from under the bath mat and lifted her chin as haughtily as ever a tiny, adorable puppy had.
If her owners wanted to ignore her, she certainly wouldn't go to them first! She would enjoy this short reprieve from fearing for her life!
And so, Menchi curled up on the bath mat to wait…
-----------------------------------------------------
"Senior," Hyatt began softly, putting a comforting hand on Excel's shoulder as the other girl sat at the table, staring blankly into space with very much the expression of a lost little girl.
Excel looked up at her roommate and tried to smile.
"Yeah, Hatchan?"
"Are you going to be okay?
The blonde straightened up, throwing her shoulders back and leaping to her feet.
"Well, they say a person can get used to anything, even being hanged, which sorta makes sense; I mean, after the first time, you don't care if they're hanging you anymore, but that's probably not what they meant. It was probably more of a metaphorical way of saying something like no matter how bad things get, humans have the capability to adapt and deal with massive amounts of crappy luck and things! So, I figure we'll adapt to this! I bet, by the time the week's over, it'll feel like things have always been this way, and we'll love working for Lady That Woman, and…and…"
Here, she trailed off, lip quivering and eyes filling with tears.
"Oh, Hatchan, this really blows!" she wailed, burying her face in the other girl's shoulder.
Struggling to remain upright and conscious beneath the added weight, Hyatt patted Excel's hair soothingly. What was one to say in the face of a friend's personal tragedy?
"I think, Senior," she began hesitantly, "that Lady That Woman is doing the best she can."
Excel straightened up and glared at Hyatt.
"Doing the best she can? Hyatt, Lady That Woman isn't doing anything, let alone the best she can do, or the worst she can do, or the average she can do, or anything else! Remember what we did today? There's a city out there, waiting for the conquering fist of the ideological organization of ACROSS, and we spent the day playing chess while she filled out paperwork!"
Hyatt brightened.
"Congratulations on winning the mini-tournament, by the way," she said, hoping to distract Excel. "I don't think anyone expected you to have such a flair for the game."
But once started on the nursing of grievances, Excel was not to be deterred.
"And did you notice how badly she was treating Lord Ilpalazzo?"
"I don't believe we're supposed to call him that anymore, Senior…"
"Hey, I don't care what that crazy old broad's got in her 'files'; I'm not calling him Phil! I think she made that up!"
"Wouldn't we—"
"I'm not calling him Senior Phil, either!"
"Oh," Hyatt sighed. "Well, I don't believe Lady That Woman would object if we were to call him Senior Ilpalazzo, so long as we do not hail him…"
"That was my favorite part!" Excel whined.
"You know she will permit you to help him in other small ways. After all, we are still technically his subordinates."
Excel scoffed.
"Yeah; maybe she'll let me bandage him up after those Enlightened Attack Force Hounds she trains to only attack men get him. Great trade-off. Oh, yeah! And she let me jump down the pit after him today to help him kill the giant squid!"
"Well, it is better than nothing, is it not?"
"Come on, Hatchan! The woman's some sort of abusive psycho sexist! Who treats their officers like that?!"
Hyatt laughed softly.
"It is good to know that you still have a sense of humor about this, Senior."
Excel stared.
"What're you talking about, Hatchan?"
"You implied that Lady That Woman was the only commander of ACROSS in our experience to abuse an officer."
"Well, yeah. And?"
"Oh, dear," Hyatt sighed as a montage of clips of Excel climbing, dripping wet and bleeding, from the pit ran through her mind. "She's begun to rewrite the events of her life to what she wishes to remember again."
"Geez, Hatchan, you're saying the weirdest stuff today," Excel noted, crossing her arms and shaking her head.
"Senior Excel, do you have any recollection of how much hardship you underwent before Lady That Woman took over?"
"Yeah, but…but I probably deserved it!"
Hyatt looked skeptical.
"Well…"
"Are you questioning Lord Ilpalazzo's good judgment and fairness?!" Excel demanded furiously, wheeling on Hyatt with such abruptness that the dark-haired girl leapt back nervously.
"I try not to question what isn't immediately apparent," she murmured.
Excel blinked.
"Oh. Well, good. You better not start, either. Excel will not stand for any disparagement of the gloriousness of Lord Ilpalazzo! She will destroy, punish, or otherwise annoy any who do not hold the proper amount of respect for him and buy him nice presents on his birthday and other times that he might need cheering up! It occurs to Excel that the last one would describe her too, since the Ol' Bugdet of Etchan and Hatchan doesn't usually stretch to spiffy birthday presents for divinely sexy men, let alone spiffy non-birthday presents for divinely sexy men, but she's not gonna destroy, punish, and otherwise annoy herself, because with Lady That Woman oppressing that divinely sexy man, he's gonna need all the support he can get, right, Hatchan?"
"I…I suppose so," Hyatt replied rather dizzily as Excel darting at blinding speed about the apartment. It was good to have Senior Excel back to her old self, of course, but it was at the same time so exhausting… "Still, Senior, you must admit that it was very nice of Lady That Woman to offer to find us new part-time jobs."
"No! Excel ain't gonna admit anything like that! Don't you see, Hatchan? By doing things like this for us, Lady That Woman is robbing us of the ability to be self-sufficient! Look at all we've built up for ourselves through our own blood, sweat, and tears! Most of the blood was yours, and most of the sweat was mine, and most of the tears were Menchi's but it all balances out in the end, right? It has much more meaning than anything that some usurper can just sweep in and hand us! Do you want to lose all this, Hatchan? Do you?!"
Hyatt looked slowly about the small apartment, furnished very, very sparsely indeed. Her gaze lingered on the several instances of cracked plaster for a moment before it darted up to the stained places on the ceiling. Then, this well inspected, her eyes flitted down to the stained and threadbare carpet.
"All this, you say, Senior?" she asked carefully.
"Yeah, all this! Isn't this a life worth protecting?! The place may not be great, but it's a place to call our own! We have our freedom!"
"That is true," Hyatt admitted. "And some of our neighbors are very nice, generous, wholesome, and kind people."
As though on cue, a burst of raucous laughter, followed by an angry growl in a different voice, and a painful crash, rang out from the apartment next door.
Hyatt and Excel stared, startled and blinking, at the wall. Excel shook her head.
"And then there are the rest."
--------------------------------------------------------
"Hey, man, whaddaya got there?"
Watanabe gave a startled shout and jumped involuntarily. Once he had regained his bearings, he turned around to glare at one of his two best friends in the entire world, one of the two people that he would truly do anything for.
"What do you want, you idiot?"
"What is that?" Iwata asked, undeterred by this cold greeting, gesturing to the slips of paper the other young man clutched protectively.
"Never mind!" Watanabe said, annoyed, tucking them into his pocket.
Iwata's face took on a cunning look.
"It's that Miss Ayasugi girl again, isn't it?"
Watanabe glared coldly at Iwata again for a moment, before his resolve crumbled before his desire to tell someone the god news, and he broke into a huge smile.
"Yeah, it is. I won two tickets to a live theatre show, so I'm going to ask her." His glare returned. "And don't say a word. If you laugh, I'll kill you."
"Hey, hey, I think it's a great idea," Iwata protested before laughing wickedly. "Chicks love that kind of cultured crap. Don't you agree, Misaki? Ack!" he finished as a fist shot out of the other room and sent him flying to a wall.
"Whatever, man," Watanabe sighed, rolling his eyes. "I'm gonna go ask her now before your total stupidity regarding women becomes catching.
He pulled the tickets from his pocket.
"I'm leaving them there. Whatever you do, don't touch them. I don't want anything to ruin this."
With that, he swung his coat over his shoulders and exited the apartment.
"Hmm," Misaki began thoughtfully, picking up one of the tickets and reading it. "'The Rocky Horror Show. Exclusive Live Performance'."
Her eyebrows shot up and she hid a grin.
"I wonder if life will get worse for Watanabe if his Miss Ayasugi hates it, or if she likes it."
Iwata groaned painfully, peeling himself from the him-shaped indentation in the wall.
"Whaaa?"
------------------------------------------------
"It is all over for Pedro," that same bushy-haired man sobbed into his hands as the vaguely melancholy, yet vaguely heroic guitar music played in the background.
Sandora placed a hand on his father's arm, saying nothing. Truly, things did not look good…
"Your sexy mama has surely taken up with That Man again, Sandora!"
"But Papa, That Man is dead!"
Pedro raised his head from its puddle of tears on the table and stared at his son, aghast.
"You mean, Pedro's sexy wife is a necrophile?! NOOOOO!"
"No, Papa! I meant that it is a different man. But still, we must not borrow trouble when we have been given so much of our own. We do not…we do not know for certain that Mama is seeing anyone."
"What else could it mean, Sandora?" Pedro wept. "She told him that she would meet him in town next Thursday, but that she would have to make it quick so that her husband did not find out!"
"Perhaps Mama is planning a surprise party?" Sandora suggested lamely.
"No, Sandora, Pedro must reconcile himself to a life alone."
"Your son will always be with you!"
"Oh, Pedro, there you are," a voice proclaimed fondly from the doorway.
Pedro and Sandora looked up at the woman standing before them, struggling to keep their expressions neutral in light of what they had recently learned.
"Pedro, dear, I will be taking a trip into town next Thursday, so my two men will have to fend for themselves for dinner," she said with a smile, ruffling her son's hair with one hand and wrapping her other arm around her husband's shoulders, resting her cheek briefly on his shoulder.
Then, straightening up, she turned and left the kitchen.
Pedro, fresh tears already streaming down his cheeks, raised his hands to his face, where they promptly became rather soggy.
Sandora, rolling his eyes slightly, dove under the table and held his hands tightly over his ears as the single world rang out to the heavens.
"NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!"
------------------------------------------------
End Notes: Okay, it was kind of a down-time chapter. Ya gotta have those, right? Okay, Rhianwen's grasping at straws. Still, no author inserts, and the fourth wall remained more or less in tact. That's a good thing, isn't it? :o)
And I have my own doubts about the characterization. Hyatt's too clever, Excel's too dispirited – I'm pretending it's because she's still in shock – Iwata's not his usual entertaining self (although the scene didn't really showcase him), and Watanbe…he's just this over-serious, love-struck twit! Hey, wait a second… :o)