A/N: I'M LATE :(

Sorry, Clark buddy, Real Life just REALLY sideswiped me this time. In any case, hope you enjoy this little drabblish thing.

"So, how the hell long have we been here?" Ralf checked his watch-still useless-and looked over the strange, gray wasteland.

"I think a week or so? I'm not sure." Clark stretched. "It was May 1st when we were on the plane and that… thing appeared."

"Then we woke up and fought a bunch of…aliens at that bar."

"Then we met with that…Zada fellow. And found out we were in a place they called Alexia Lomta."

"We won the right to drink there, though," Ralf grinned.

"Yeah, that's true. Zada then said something about having to go beat some guy named…Zang Zip."

"That's I think where we left off. He says if we beat Zang Zip, we can go home. I guess he's got…some way of it." The dark-haired man adjusted his pack and examined the new gun he had acquired from a place that Zada-a tall, strange looking alien guy in robes, who spoke 'the old language', as he called it, which was apparently 'English'-had pointed them to. "Getting used to these things, though." A boomerang was also strapped to the man's back, a strange, high-tech one made of a material that he didn't recognize.

"I didn't think I'd ever shoot something like this," Clark replied, adjusting his own gun. On his back, was some arrow-like spear, also made of this strange material, that he was apparently supposed to throw instead of launching with a bow. "They've worked well enough."

"Some of those alien fellas weren't so bad once we beat up a few of them." He grabbed the flask on his waist. "Their alcohol tastes a little weird, though."

Clark looked around with his binoculars, noticing another sort of dwelling in the distance. They were on an incline and were able to look down; there were a few scattered trees about, and they could see a mountain range off to the side. "Didn't Zada say a settlement was near the mountain?"

Ralf rubbed his scruffy chin. Some wind blew; they couldn't figure out if it was warm or cold. "Yeah. Pretty far. Probably a few days' hike." Noticing a rock, he unloaded his pack from his back and set his new weapon to the side, before pulling a notebook from the side.

"What are you doing?"

"I gotta figure out when we got here," he said. "So if we can reach…some sort of communication tower or something, we can try to contact General Heidern."

"You think Zada was lying?"

"About being in the future? Am I supposed to believe that?" He sighed. "I guess we'll find out if we reach a tower."

"Or something that tells us." Clark sat on the rock next to his friend as they started both rummaging through journals. "Okay. We had recorded the mission's success on May 1st, like you said."

"Yeah! I remember that. Now we've seen days and nights…I wrote that down. Been taking little notes each day. Maps and stuff too."

"Of course, we don't know if…days and nights are longer here. Wherever we are. We just sort of kept track. And our watches don't work."

"Yeah. Still, according to this…it should be…" He calculated for a minute or two as he went over his stuff. "...roughly…May 7th." Ralf looked up a second, before looking over. "It'd be your birthday."

"Shit, you're right," Clark said. "I hadn't even thought about it. You know."

"Aww, dammit. I should be taking you out for a drink, not sitting in the middle of some goddamn alien waste."

"I think under the circumstances, it's understandable," his friend replied, pushing his glasses up for a moment and removing his hat temporarily to smooth down his slightly-grown out, disheveled hair. Clark usually kept his blond hair medium length and combable in a nice, slicked-back style, but being gone for a while, between the last mission and now, it had grown somewhat wild.

"Gah!"; Ralf said, thinking. "Wait. It ain't over yet. Gimme your flask."

"Huh?"

"I saw you took some of the stuff in the blue bottle. I had taken some stuff in the green bottle and then whatever else that stuff was. The…uhh…edible alcohol ball things." He grabbed another pouch out, as he took his flask.

"Are you…doing what I think you're doing?"

"Look, we can make some party drinks here."

"Are…you sure you wanna mix that? It could explode, for all we know."

"Ahhh, it's been drinkable so far!" Ralf moved, setting up their mess-kit cups on the rock as he knelt by it. "Nothing ventured, as they say."

"Should I duck behind something?"

"Oh, c'mon, you big baby. I'm doing this for your birthday." He started with the booze in his flask. It looked, smelled, and tasted like booze, albeit it had a strange, bluish color to it. "This stuff was alright." He poured some into both cups. He then took Clarks, which was clear; he mixed it with the bluish liquid in both cups…and nothing happened."

"Huh. Guess it's alright."

"They were selling mixed drinks at the bar. If you could call it that."

"Alright, alright, I concede." He turned, kneeling on the other side of the rock and leaning against it as Ralf removed the strange, grayish colored balls from his pouch.

"So…let's try these things. I ate one there and it got me pretty good," he said. "It dissolves apparently, though." He dropped one each into the cups…and after some fizzing, they indeed dissolved and turned the drinks a vivid purple.

"Huh. They actually look pretty cool."

"Kinda looks like…party punch or somethin'," he said. "Fitting!"

Clark took his cup, sniffing it. It smelled harmless enough, and the trio had all drank this alcohol before. "Okay, then." He looked at Ralf. "Thanks."

"Hey! No problem. Happy Birthday, buddy. Whenever the hell we are." He held up his tin mess cup of strange, purple liquid and clacked it together with Clark's.

The pair started with big sips, rather than drinking them straight down; a slight shiver went through them both. Clark chuckled.

"This is kind of strong," he said, taking another drink.

"Ain't half bad for alien wasteland liquor," Ralf said, taking another big swig of the stuff. "Needs snacks, though."

Clark drank down some more. "We could celebrate with one of our favorite rations, maybe," he said.

"Or we can chance some more of that alien bar food. Those green sticks weren't bad."

"Celery?"

"I don't think that was celery." Ralf rubbed his chin again, checking his bag. "Got a few day's worth of rations left here. How's…" he grabbed one. "Chili and macaroni sound?"

"Hey! That one's actually good." He checked his own bag. "I got one too."

"Heey. These come with those little chocolate cakes."

"So it's sorta like a birthday after all!" Ralf exclaimed, taking out his own and setting it on the rock. "Anyway, old buddy," he said, holding his tin up again. "Happy birthday. I'll make it up to you whenever we get out of this godsforsaken place."

"I know you will," his friend grinned, starting to set up the Esbit stoves and removing his canteen.

Ralf reached over to pat him on the shoulder as the looked up at the strange sky again; it seemed to be evening, at least, and they decided to just take somewhat of a load off to enjoy a moment before going back to their strange mission.

A/N: Happy Birthday, Clark!

Anyway, it shows these two best bros can celebrate a birthday anywhere. Even in a gray wasteland 10,000 years in the future.

This was based off of the Dystopian Future chapter of KOFTober 2022 I had written(if you hadn't read it, it's right over there *points toward list*), where Ralf and Clark got sucked through the portal right after Ikari 1 into the weird wasteland of Ikari 2. The story of Ikari 2 was…minimal, to say the least, being a shooter, and there's two conflicting stories: Taken to another planet, and taken to earth 10,000 years in the future after aliens took it over. I'm running with the 2nd one; either could work in this world but there's already time travel dimensional BS happening with Verse, so why not. I'm really winging it with the Deep Ikari Lore since I got not much else but a half a page and an instruction book to go on, so forgive me here.

Hope this little interlude was fun at least!