Sunday, February 23rd, 2014.
Today's Sunday, so naturally, I felt a bit lazy. I've written about this before - on weekends, I just naturally feel a bit lazier. Maybe 10%. At tops 20%. But definitely, when the weekend rolls along, it feels like I'm naturally inclined to stay in bed for an extra five or ten minutes. I wonder if it's because of the whole American mentality that the weekends are meant to be used as days off. Maybe it's not just an American thing.
Because of this (no, who am I kidding, it's because I'm still recovering from being sick and my wounds from last Monday), I slept in about two hours and got out of bed at around nine. Actually, Kiyoshimo snuck into my room to make sure that I was still alive, since she was actually genuinely worried that I might've died in my sleep. Understandable, seeing that every single day since we received Akagi and Yamato at base, I'm always up at six or seven helping out Mamiya and Irako and Houshou in the kitchens (even before then, I'd usually been up pretty early too, at least up before most of the other girls).
I guess one good thing about my condition right now is that I can easily fall asleep whenever I want. It's almost like a super power, a switch that I can just flip, and bam, I'm asleep. Usually I don't have trouble going to sleep, but sometimes memories of war in the form of PTSD flashbacks can leave me an insomniac, and I'd just find myself staring up at the ceiling wondering why I'm still awake at four in the morning - and more alarmingly, why the fuck I can somehow hear the blasts of jet engines of fighter planes taking off the runways of the U.S.S. George Washington.
So anyway, that was just all context to explain that when Kiyoshimo snuck in and shook me awake to confirm that I was indeed still alive, I just popped my eyes open and asked her the time. She said it was just past 0800 hours, and I asked her the day, and she said Sunday. So I thanked her and asked her to let me sleep in another hour. She asked me why I felt the need to ask her, of all people, for permission to sleep in when I'm the freakin' Commander here. I can do what I want; I don't have to ask nobody. So I just shrugged and closed my eyes and snapped straight back to sleep.
Now that I think about it, that's some Saturday Night Live shit right there. They ought'a make this into a skit.
Nah, this isn't political enough.
What the hell am I talking about?
It seems that Kiyoshimo ended up blabbing about her adventures to my office, because exactly an hour later, at 0900 hours this morning, I woke up and found Murakumo sitting next to the side of my bed, holding a bowl of chicken noodle soup with specially prepared soba noodles instead of the usual chicken noodle. She said that she was only doing this because I was the Admiral, and that the Admiral mustn't worry about being injured on top of his duties. Well, well, well, Miss Obvious, I won't question your motives, so I let her feed me. She seemed pretty thrilled at doing so. I asked her casually if she was doing this for me as a person, not as an Admiral, and she nearly threw the bowl at my face, which would've been bad.
To be honest, I think I would've taken the bowl to the face just so that I can tease her. Tsunderes like her deserve to be mercilessly teased until they can learn to be honest with themselves. It's not that I openly hate the tsundere archetype, but it's not my cuppa tea.
As she was feeding me, Murakumo said that I should've acted really paranoid last Monday when Sazanami came in and told me that those five dudes wanted to see me. Sazanami had looked frightened and unsure of what to do, so the only thing she could think of doing was bringing me out there so that I would know what to do to handle the situation. In retrospect, those guys were super sketch and suspicious. Murakumo admonished me for not being more careful and at least bringing my gun with me to defend myself. The girls know that I keep a handgun in my room, along with my sword, but I never wear them or carry them around because honestly, they're a pain in the ass to carry, especially since I don't have a pistol holster for my M-9. I could get one, but I don't feel the need. Even after last Monday, I honestly don't feel that much more motivated to conceal-carry. Lazy, maybe. I just don't feel the need.
In response, I said that retrospect is always 20/20. We can sit here and theorize all fucking day about what I should've done and shouldn't've done, but in the end, I'm sitting in bed with three holes in my body, a couple swathed layers of bandages around them, a dying cold, and a cute tsundere girl feeding me breakfast. Yeah, maybe I should start carrying around my gun from now on. But even if I had my gun out during that time, it was still five on one, and those guys had the upper hand since we weren't expecting them to pull guns on us, let alone just shoot me outright on the spot. So whatever. That, and I've mentioned this before - I'm done living my life paranoid and scared for my life all the time. And if I'm supposed to act paranoid or scared at some points of my life, my PTSD'll cover that for me.
Murakumo yelled at me not to call her cute, nor to call her a tsundere. How predictable.
After breakfast, I headed to my office, where I found Ooyodo waiting for me, sitting on the couch and cutting the skin off some apples. She'd already done my paperwork for me like she'd done for the paperwork that was piling up over the days when I was comatose, so there were only five papers that sat on my desk that needed either my signature or my review. I told Ooyodo that this wasn't something she felt she had to do; after all, this's my responsibility. She said that she would help shoulder some of my responsibilities where she could, since I had a lot more to worry about than just my responsibilities. Fair enough. The apple slices she gave me were delicious, too. Vitamin C is important.
Got another email from Seal Team Six when I checked my inbox.
"We've received intel from HQ regarding the platoon's discovery of these new enemies that have been named 'Floating Fortresses' and are investigating these new enemies as we can. From now on, send us a copy of any urgent mission intel your fleet finds so that we don't have to wait a few days for HQ to pass us along the info. They might try to censor the reports, too.
Light Cruiser Kitakami is now undergoing the final phases of the Kai upgrade process. She'll arrive back in Okinawa at 1000 hours Okinawa time.
We've took the liberty to experiment with her, and we've managed to implement Abyssal technology into our own. Kitakami is now able to hold a single augmentation. She'll explain what it is once she returns - right now, this is confidential information."
A surprisingly short email from them this time around. It's good that Kitakami's coming back tomorrow in time for sorties, though I am curious as to what kind of "augmentation" she's received.
Inazuma's birthday (or technically speaking, launch day)'s coming up in two days here. Obviously a cake is in order, but I wonder what else I could do for her. It would've been something if I managed to convince HQ to bring over her ship sisters as her present, but seeing how things are going, I seriously doubt it. Besides, even if I did pull that off, what the hell would I give Inazuma for White Day?
So after lunch, I called in my starter ship girls (except for Inazuma, obviously) and brainstormed with them what to give Inazuma. Inazuma's a quiet, shy girl, so anything girly would probably do the trick. Perhaps a party? Sazanami pointed out that Inazuma loved anything yellow, which is really fitting, and anything sweet. So Sazanami and Samidare volunteered to venture out to the nearby towns and buy sweet lemon pastries for me, since I can't be moving around too much, so I gave them some of my money to go off and buy whatever they had in mind. I'll still be making a birthday cake for Inazuma, though.
Wait a minute...Inazuma was launched in 1932. Doing the math, that would mean that this Tuesday, she'll turn...eighty-two years old...!? Please, God, don't tell me I have to put eighty-two candles on the goddamn birthday cake. You can't do this to an injured man walking around with three holes in his chest, this is cruel and unusual punishment. I HAVE MY CONSTITUTIONAL RIGHTS!
Unfortunately, not only were the shops that Samidare and Sazanami all sold out of the potential sweets that Inazuma would definitely like, but they also spent the money I'd given them at an arcade, trying to get a huge stuffed teddy bear that was cosplaying as Thor from Marvel. Samidare was literally sprawling herself out at my feet begging for forgiveness because they'd spent all my money trying to get something that wasn't what they said they'd get, and Sazanami looked more disappointed with herself that she wasn't able to get the teddy. I told Samidare that it wasn't something to make a big deal out of, that shit and bad luck happens sometimes.
Yikes, Samidare takes her own failures at such trivial things so personally that it's just gut-wrenching. You can't help but feel bad for her when you know she's tried her hardest to get something for her friend by gambling something that's not hers for the sake of the greater good that is Inazuma's birthday present. I managed to calm Samidare down and assured her that it was okay, and that I wasn't gonna get mad over three thousand yen.
But in the end, I told the destroyers to spread word throughout the base that we were gonna throw Inazuma a secret birthday party. According to Fubuki, Inazuma herself doesn't seem to be aware that her launch day's coming up, partly because she can be a bit of an airhead and a klutz, both physically and mentally, sometimes. So a secret birthday party at Shinsengumi with karaoke and other sorts of games would be perfect. It's a bit cliche, but we'll go with what works.
I, on the other hand, have some more responsibilities to cover. I spent most of this afternoon searching up the perfect cake for Inazuma and consulted Houshou, Mamiya, and Irako about it.
And for both Sazanami's and Samidare's sake, along with Inazuma's, I'm gonna go get that teddy. I'm gonna send the fleet out on a sortie tomorrow, and while they're away, I'm gonna venture out to the town nearby where Samidare and Sazanami went, find the arcade they went into, and win that teddy and bring it back to give Samidare and Sazanami so that they can in turn present it to Inazuma for her birthday present.
What an immaculate plan. I hope I didn't raise any goddamn death flags all over with this perfect plan to give one of my destroyers just a little bit of happiness.