Chapter 4
Giroro tapped his foot as he now had switched porches, from Akina Hinata's to the Hinata household's. They were running late. Why of all times would someone like Garuru be late? He was doing it on purpose, he was playing another head-game, and Giroro just knew it. He remained in his stationary position, and only turned his head and he heard a small bump, followed by an aggravated grunt.
"What're you doing out, here, and at this hour? Don't you usually wake up when the sun's a lot closer to setting?" Giroro said as Kururu adjusted the chair he had bumped into.
"Kukuku, there were problems at the office last night," Kururu walked into the kitchen, and opened the refrigerator.
"They're running late," Giroro grumbled, glancing at the clock. Kururu lazily walked over, one arm full of vegetables, and pulled out his white remote, holding it down to Giroro's level. "What's this?"
"A tracker... Kukuku, looks like they've entered out atmosphere," Kururu took another look at it and then took up the vegetables he had collected from the vegetable bin. "I'm going to start on dinner."
"You're not going to stay and wait for her?"
"She knows where to find me," Kururu answered dully, and with that left.
"G-Giroro Goucho, you make it hard to sweep when you don't move from your corner," Keroro appeared next to the corporal, and poked Giroro gently with the end of his broom. Giroro only gave a growl in response, and Keroro gave a nervous laugh. "I'll go start on the dishes."
"Finally," Giroro hopped off of his perch as he heard the front doorbell. He jumped up to open it, and sure enough, there was Kirere at the door with her bags, and Garuru standing behind her.
"Did you have a good time?" Giroro asked the little girl, who nodded at this.
"She liked being around people of her intelligence level for a change, and seeing how a functional platoon works," Garuru answered. "Here she is, safe as I promised."
"He said I could come back again!" Kirere added.
"Go inside and unpack your bags. Say goodbye to your uncle, first,' Giroro instructed. Kirere did just that and disappeared, leaving an obvious tenseness between the two brothers. "...You have her home in one piece, that's some good news."
"She can come visit around Pekopon's wintertime as well, we have some downtime around then. Or maybe I'll come visit, I have some vacation time saved up, considering how my last one was cut short," Garuru announced. Giroro only gave a grunt at this, and nodded. Garuru returned this, and beamed himself back up to his ship.
"...Hrm. Pekopon winter, eh? When is that?" Tororo muttered from deep inside his computer room, not paying any mind to check the files he'd collected from Kururu's computer the night before. More rather, the hard blow to the head had made him forget that he'd gotten anything from there at all, "...Pupupu... We'll have round two, then."
Garuru, meanwhile, went right back to work, looking to see exactly what Tororo had been up to the night before. It wasn't so hard to find the little hacking monster's trail, and he wasn't the least bit surprised to see he'd been trying to hack into the Keroro Platoon's system.
"Hrm," he did see a few newly-downloaded files that caught his eye. A super-weapon? He made sure he was alone on the bridge, then opened up the file.
'Genetic alterations? What're they letting him get away with?' Garuru wondered as he scanned through the files. He then stopped dead, and read over the summary paragraph. He then read over it once, twice, five times more to make sure he was reading it correctly.
"Garuru Chuii! What're you reading, our new orders?" Taruru asked with his usual grin as he now entered the bridge.
"Nothing important," Garuru shut down the file and prompted began its permanent deletion. "I was sent some pictures of my niece."
"Oh, all right! Your parents are probably wondering now when you're going to give them one, huh? Considering you're the older brother and all! It's kinda like he's finally beat in you in something, huh?" Taruru said jokingly. From the death-glare Garuru gave, it was apparent that this had indeed taken place. "...I'll get back to my post."
"That'd be the intelligent thing to do," Garuru answered, then rested his hands on the keyboard, and thought for a long, long while. He would say nothing of this.
"Gero gero! So I see we have Chief Mechanic Kirere back with us! Excellent!"
"Gunso-san? What happened to your arm?" Tamama pointed to the sling Keroro's left arm was in, and Keroro gave an uneasy chuckle at this.
"Oh, it's but a sprain, Tamama Nitohei. When Kirere-chan arrived home yesterday morning, she decided to surprise me with a hello. Unfortunately I was on a ladder at the time, trying to put a heavy jar onto a high shelf."
Tamama looked over at Kirere with a glare. She stuck out her tongue at this, and Tamama returned this gesture. Giroro nudged Tamama lightly in the gut with his elbow, and then with just a look Kirere stopped, and turned her attention back to the picture she was drawing.
"...Ehehehe..." Keroro laughed at this gesture weakly. "Getting back to things, our newest Pekopon invasion strategy! Now with our group fully assembled, our plans can come to fruition!"
"Hrm? You sound more focused than usual," Giroro looked upward at Keroro, his curiosity piqued.
"I like to call this little beauty Operation Manipulate Pekopon's Buying Masses!"
"Could you say, hitting them right at the wallet?" Mois suggested with a grin.
"Kukuku! Teicho is venturing out into the business world? I'm intrigued," Kururu chuckled from his corner, and Kirere looked up from her drawing long enough to see Keroro's wide, proud grin.
"An episode of Admiral Geroro, on average, consists of twenty-four wonderful, action-packed, drama-filled minutes," as Keroro explained a screen came up behind him, showing stills from Admiral Geroro as he spoke. "Twenty-four minutes, and it has a half-hour long slot. Some shows run for only twenty-two minutes nowadays! So how is the rest for the time used?"
"Oh! I know! Commercials!" Tamama gasped.
"Exactly! And the more clever the commercial, the more intent someone becomes on buying the said items! I myself found myself so entranced by an ad during last week's episode, I took the next possible opportunity to head to the store and buy three Admiral Geroro figurines!"
"Idiot! You don't need to watch a commercial to fuel your impulse buys!"
"Perhaps Teicho-dono is hitting upon a point, as much as I hate to admit it," Dororo finally spoke up. Kirere watched this the entire time, and looked over at Tamama as he now spoke.
"What're we going to market, anyway?"
"...Um..." Keroro stopped at this point, and a silence went through the room. "...Well... That's where my inspiration hit the proverbial wall, and I was hoping we could figure that out as a group, as a sort of team-building activity!"
"You haven't thought it out that far...?" Giroro grit his teeth together.
"Hey, it's been a while since we've had a round table! All right, Giroro Goucho, off to you! What do you think we could market to Pekoponian masses?"
"...H-how should I know!?" Giroro snapped. "Don't go passing the ball to me!"
"K-Kururu Soucho?"
"Kuuukukuku!"
"Eh?" Keroro then looked to Tamama, Dororo, and Kirere, and then to Mois. Blank faces all around. "...I think we need a field trip."
"Hrm, so why here of all places again?" Giroro wondered aloud. All were dressed in their Pekoponian suits now, later that same day, and they had come to a busy Tokyo department store. Keroro's Pekoponian suit's left arm was also in a sling, as he couldn't use the control to work this arm.
A woman pulled out a screaming toddler behind as they exited, and Giroro got the smug satisfaction of knowing his child knew better. Kururu only gave a laugh.
"It's a shame Kii-chi couldn't come with us," Tamama muttered, although any sorrow was completely fake. He had gloated the fact that she would have to stay at the base, due to the fact that all of the Pekoponian suits were too large for her.
"Kuku! Who said she didn't?" as Kururu spoke another person came through the sliding department store doors, this one with her arms extended, at a full run. She gave a large and wrapped her arms around Giroro's neck, nearly sending the stunned Corporal to the ground.
"W-what the!?" Tamama looked across, wide-eyed at the sight of this.
"Kururuko?" Keroro blinked, looking down at the familiar orange-haired "girl".
"Guess again!" she jumped up and gave a wide, unforced grin.
"You... You're joking," Tamama muttered, his arms falling loosely to their sides.
"I made a few... Kukuku!... Adjustments to this model," Kururu said with a chuckle, and indeed he had. The head was basically the same, except the expression was a sincerely cheery one, and the outfit was completely different. Gone was the magical girl outfit, replaced by a familiar-looking girl's school uniform.
"It's really cute, right?" Kirere laughed, and Giroro now noticed the even stranger looks they were garnering. "Kuru-san let me borrow it!"
"Kuku! It was gathering dust," Kururu added.
"Y-Yes, let's focus on the operation, though," Giroro tried to retain his composure while she remained clutching onto one of his hands. Kururu had probably fed her sugar when he wasn't looking.
"So what do we have to do here?" Kirere stood back, her hands behind her back now.
"We're trying to see what sorts of wares Pekoponians are spending the most time shopping for," Dororo explained, a little shaken at how hyper the girl had become. She was probably just excited to be out in a place where she didn't have to hide for once, though, or as in previous occasions, pretend to be a doll that one of the others carried around.
"Gero gero..." I say we split up into teams and do our researching that way," Keroro explained. "I'll go with Tamama Nitohei."
Tamama's eyes shone at this thought, and he happily joined Keroro's side.
"I'll go with Dororo-kun," Kirere shot her hand up, and Giroro began to protest, but Dororo only gave a small laugh.
"She shouldn't be a problem. "I- W-wait, Kirere-chan!" Dororo called out as the young girl happily went running over to the tools section.
"I suppose that leaves us," Giroro grumbled.
"Ku ku!"
"We'll meet up in an hour," Keroro announced, and with that he and Tamama went off towards the clothing, while Kururu and Giroro went up to the next floor.