Well, my whole state's on hurricane watch for the next few days. I rushed to get this one finished so I could post it before we lose power.

Of Best Friends and Shovels

2025

Tomi Kisaragi had never been the type of girl who centered her life around a boy. So maybe she was a little biased about this whole situation. But even if she had been more traditionally (old-fashionedly) romantic, Juro Izumi was not her type.

From the moment he'd arrived, his demeanor had been just a little too reminiscent of the stereotypical heroes of old. From the kinds of stories where girls only existed to be kidnapped and rescued. He always had this air about him like he knew so much more than they did. And, okay, she guessed he had seen some shit. Apparently.

Juro Izumi wouldn't have seemed out of place as the team leader in some cheesy shounen anime. He always sounded so confident when directing others. So responsible and upstanding…

Gag. Seriously. Not that Tomi preferred the other extreme—boys who tried too hard to seem bad. But Megumi's taste was turning out to be disappointingly cliché.

The boy in question currently stood on the path leading up to the school's front entrance, eyes on the cheerfully blue sky. But you'd think there was a tornado approaching from the way his brows had furrowed. Izumi always wore that expression when he thought no one was watching. Tomi had no idea what he did all day. Patrolled around, scouting for the apocalypse, she guessed.

She pressed herself a little deeper into the shadows of the doorway, just continuing to scrutinize him. But she needn't have bothered. Megumi came jogging over from the west building, and the look on his face instantly softened.

That happened when she spoke to him too, so she knew it was a little bit of a mask. He wanted to reassure them that everything would be okay… even though neither girl could really picture the kind of destruction he spoke of… and he clearly didn't believe it himself. But still. Tomi may not have been the most romantic girl around, but even she could see that the look on his face was a little different when Megumi was the one it was meant for.

Seeing that reciprocation twisted Tomi's stomach into a bundle of nerves. It wasn't jealousy. Seriously. It was just… she'd seen Megumi get her heart broken before.

Her best friend was a hopeless romantic. When it came to potential boyfriends, Megumi tended to fall fast and fall hard. None of the boys had ever returned that interest. Until now.

Even with the threat of a giant monster invasion looming over their heads, she could tell Megumi felt like she'd fallen into a fairytale. If that happily ever after was torn away from her… It scared Tomi to think what the fallout might look like.

1985

But somehow… nothing would have prepared her for it to look quite like this.

She couldn't manage to muster up the glare she wanted for Juro Izumi. No… It was Juro Kurabe now.

Their desks were in the same row, making it hard for her to observe him discreetly like this. She had to literally twist around to face the back of the room to do so. But it was break time now, leaving the students free to socialize. The girl behind her was fast asleep on the desk… as she had been all class. And behind her…

Juro Kurabe was standing at the back of the room by the bulletin boards. But he wasn't looking at the club recruitment posters. He was… talking to them. Or rather, talking to the empty space beside them.

He did that a lot, she'd noticed. (She was kind of glad Megumi, who'd been assigned a different homeroom, didn't have to see it.) It was uncomfortable to watch. Though she'd never seen anyone bullying Juro, their classmates tended to keep their distance.

It was such a stark contrast to Juro Izumi's natural charisma. Not that he'd mingled much with the other kids their age back in 2025, but it had been so easy to tell he was the type of boy people were just drawn to.

This change… When she'd first seen it, it had freaked her out, honestly. Tomi had done her best not to interact with Renya Gouto since settling into 1985. But she'd cornered him in the hallway one day and demanded an explanation. And he had explained—in his cold, clinical way—the specifics of DD-426 and brain overload… How far Juro had pushed himself, trying to protect her hometown. All the gritty details that she hadn't wanted to press with Megumi. How his brain had literally started to shut down.

Tomi was not incapable of seeing the big picture. She knew a total personality transplant was preferable to the empty-husk scenario. And sometimes, Juro Kurabe seemed pretty ordinary. He was laid-back, polite… and easy to overlook. But sometimes, there was something undeniably broken about him too.

She stood abruptly as he began laughing about something. She needed to get out of here.

Tomi strode out of the room and down the hall. She would have loved some fresh air, but she doubted she still had time to make it to the vending machines and back before class started. She supposed she'd have to settle for splashing some water on her face or something.

She pushed open the door to the bathroom but pulled up short before she was more than a step inside. There was another girl already inside, standing at the sinks, her head bent.

Tomi would admit it. If it was just a random girl… Tomi might have ignored her. It was clearly a private moment. But she recognized Megumi standing there, one hand holding her glasses, the other wiping tears from her cheeks, and Tomi felt ice form in her stomach.

She let the door close softly behind her and took another step forward. "Megumi…"

But her best friend didn't wait around for Megumi to find the right words. She turned on her heel and rushed past her out the door without even replacing her glasses.

Tomi was left standing there in an empty bathroom, unsure whether going after her would even make a difference. She hated feeling helpless. But what could she do? She'd been driven out of the room by this new Juro herself. She couldn't imagine how Megumi must feel.

But when that shard of ice in her core melted, it left a boiling anger in its place. It didn't feel right to direct it at Juro Kurabe. (Though she may have some choice words for the Izumi personality, if he ever made a reappearance.) But those damn kaiju… It wasn't enough to destroy her home? They had to break her friend's heart too?

She ground her toe into one of the floor tiles. Her glare was not at quite the intensity she would have liked. But she knew that if she gave in to her emotions completely, her own tears wouldn't be too far behind.

The Final Battle

The sounds of the battle were almost deafening. Which is why it was crazy that she could still hear the screams.

The city was in chaos. All she could do now was try to keep it from ending up as another city in ruins.

She was running against the current, frantic citizens fleeing in the other direction. She'd gotten Miwako as far away from the current fighting as she could. But she knew it was only a temporary fix. If they didn't find a way to take down the kaiju soon, nowhere in the city would be safe.

She was getting closer. She saw a Twintail go down in the distance and could feel the ground shake beneath her feet. She almost lost her balance and decided this was close enough.

She was just reaching around to swipe the activation switch on her back when a Sentinel came careening her way. It was one of the flying models—a 4th gen. Could it be?

Just before it was close enough to be cause for panic, the Sentinel landed in a spot mostly free of debris. And a figure warped out of it a second later, one knee to the ground.

"Megumi!" Tomi shot forward. Her best friend was starting to look a little haggard, but she was back on her feet.

"Tomi…" Megumi turned to see her, a little surprised, a little disoriented. The other bespectacled girl glanced around at the damaged buildings, trying to place herself. "What happened with your friend? Is she okay?"

That was her Megumi, always thinking of someone else. "Yeah, Miwako's fine. What about you?"

"I'm fine," she said, turning determined eyes back to her Sentinel. "I need to get back out there."

The color was coming back to her cheeks already, but Tomi only had to take one look at her to know she'd been forced out by the threat of brain overload. "Well, jeez, give yourself a minute!"

Megumi spun back around, fire in her eyes. "I have to help them! I won't let Juro do this alone! Not again. Or Miura-kun or even Fuyusaka-san. Or you! I don't want anyone else to get hurt protecting me ever again!"

"You idiot," Tomi scoffed fondly, and it was quiet, but it caught Megumi off-guard. "You think I want you to get hurt protecting me?"

"Tomi…"

"I'm sorry, Megumi," she said, her voice even softer. "I wasn't there in 2025 when it all went down. And I wasn't really here for you in 1985 either. I know how it probably seems… You were doing everything you could to remind Juro who he was… and I went and got some new friends."

"Tomi—" Megumi started again, but Tomi cut her off.

"You're right. Never again, okay? This is everyone's battle. None of us are going to go it alone ever again."

Tomi held out a hand, and Megumi took it with a small smile and a different kind of tears in her eyes. They swiped their activation switches with their free hands in unison and rejoined the final battle.

RS-13 Alpha

Tomi sighed and rocked back on her heels. It wasn't unbearably hot, but the sun was beating down. And let's be honest, she wasn't used to any sort of manual labor on a regular basis.

Okino was still working on producing some of the heavier-duty farming equipment, so they were tilling the field by hand, digging out the rocks that would get in the way of the planting… It sucked. Tomi wasn't one to pretend otherwise.

She placed her hands back on the handle but made no effort to pull her shovel from the dirt. The terrain was getting rougher. She could see the shore of the lake not far away. She'd been assigned to one of the outer fields today… with Juro.

It was just the two of them this far out, and she watched for a moment as the boy continued to work diligently, unaware that she'd stopped.

Tomi wasn't quite sure where everything stood with Juro these days. (She wasn't even sure what surname he was going by—not that it really mattered with them all quickly on their way to using their given names.) Something had clearly been different about him—yet again—during their final battle. She and Megumi had talked a bit since they'd awoken from their pods, but it was a confusing tale.

In any case, she'd gleaned that some of his memories from his life as Juro Izumi had returned to him, and she'd definitely witnessed the strange mix during the fight. Gouto may have officially been their leader, but Juro took charge of the team's morale.

She'd pegged Juro Izumi as a team captain-type—simultaneously giving orders while also being the heaviest hitter. So she'd been surprised to see how much support work Juro was doing during the 1985 battle. Dropping Sentry Guns and Guardians in strategic places… Making sure no one fell through the cracks or backed themselves into a bad situation…

If she'd had doubts before, she respected him now, for sure. And he'd somehow mended things with Megumi in the middle of the whole mess. It was a true happily ever after… There was just one thing left to cover.

Tomi pulled her shovel out of the earth. "Hey, Juro! C'mere for a sec."

He stopped and turned to look back at her. He seemed surprised, like maybe he'd forgotten she was there, and a little sweaty, though not totally exhausted like she was. He obliged and came closer. "Tomi-san? What's wrong?"

She wiped the sweat from her brow, making a bit of a show of how tired she was… before suddenly slamming the shovel back into the dirt, just a centimeter or two from where he stood. Juro jumped but froze in his alarm as Tomi leaned on the shovel, staring him down with narrowed eyes. She put on her most threatening tone.

"Okay, buddy, listen good. You're on thin ice here."

"Uh, wh—"

She cut him off. "Megumi is my best friend. I'm gonna cut you some slack because you were trying to protect our home when you got yourself fucked up… But most people don't get an opportunity to break her heart a second time. So you better watch yourself. 'Cause if it happens again, I'm gonna be digging something else out here. You get me?"

"Y-yes, Kisaragi-san! You don't have to worry! It won't happen again!" he rushed to reassure her with a promptness that put even Keitaro's obedient soldier-boy attitude to shame.

"Good." She kept him in that position a second longer before straightening up with an overly-sweet smile. "Now let's finish up this field, yeah? I'm ready to get out of this sun."

Review please!

I don't own 13 Sentinels.

I love Tomi… She's definitely one of my favorite characters. And the perception other people have of Juro is fascinating to me too. Because for most of his story—and everyone else's—he's a pretty ordinary, likable guy. A little nerdy. But sweet. And then you find out he's the only one who can see Shiba, and I realized that to the rest of their classmates, he must actually be the weird kid who talks to himself.