Sunday, March 16th, 2014.

When I woke up, I realized that I missed a perfect opportunity yesterday for a perfect reference. Stupid me.

So as soon as I entered my office for work today, I looked up at the katana hanging above my Navy ceremonial sword and said out loud, "That ain't my sword."

I think there's an anime or manga out there called "Dog Days" or something like that. I've only ever heard of it, never actually read it or watched it myself. But maybe I should, because with Yuudachi at base, it's like I have a pet dog here in Okinawa. Poi Days, more like it. Because the first thing I woke up to was Yuudachi lying on top of me, on my bedsheets, slobbering on my neck and collar like a big Labrador retriever. I still wonder how the hell she even managed to climb onto me without waking me up, since I don't remember waking up during the night. That being said, I don't bother locking my door to my office, which I should, but I don't, so there you go.

For God's sake, Yuudachi's hair smells just like a dog out of the bath, so that doesn't help much either.

She followed me around all throughout breakfast, even sitting down next to me to eat. Samidare, who usually sits with me nowadays (well, before she died), looked a bit miffed at the fact that someone had taken her seat, but she sat on the other side anyway. I asked Yuudachi why she was so clingy the second day she's at base, and she just said that she took a liking to me. I don't know what that's supposed to mean, but it's better being liked than hated, so I'll take it.

When I headed back to my office to handle morning paperwork, I realized that I'd made a grave mistake. Funnily enough, when I realized my grave sin, my heart dropped harder than I've ever felt it drop in my life. Not even the threat of assassination can match what I felt when I sat down on my chair.

I'd completely forgotten Hatsuharu's and Kiyoshimo's birth - er, launch days.

Well fuck!

In preparing for Inazuma's and now Wakaba's upcoming birthdays, somehow I'd forgotten about the fact that Hatsuharu's birthday is on February 27th, and Kiyoshimo's is on the 29th. I can cut myself some slack, I suppose, for forgetting Kiyoshimo's birthday because it's on the leap year day, and this year isn't a leap year, so technically Kiyoshimo's birthday just got glossed over. But forgetting Hatsuharu's birthday is completely unforgivable.

Now that I think back, it's so not me to fret about forgetting about people's birthdays or other special occasions. Back in high school and my time at Hargraves, I didn't give two shits about anyone's birthday, not even about those of the few friends I did have. If they mentioned that they wanted to go out somewhere to eat for their birthday, I'd be like, sure, why not, and we'd go, eat, do something fun, and come back home and go back to our lives. If we forgot or didn't feel like celebrating a birthday or something, none of us didn't care. So it's funny that I'd find myself actually giving a damn about the launch days of these girls.

Anime logic? Falling for hot grills? Probably. Doesn't matter though, I'm still stuck feeling like a piece of shit for forgetting, at the end of the day.

So before I got to work sorting out papers and pencil-pushing, I tapped the PA system on that I've barely used before, and I called Hatsuharu, Kiyoshimo, and Wakaba to my office. They came in within a minute, and when they saw the grave look on my face, they got worried, too, like they'd done something wrong or I had bad news for them or something. The looks they made after I told them that I'd forgotten Hatsuharu's and Kiyoshimo's birthdays (launch days, whatever) were priceless. The two of them (not including Wakaba) just laughed out loud.

Hatsuharu didn't forget her launch day; she just quietly let it slip by when she realized I didn't seem to remember it and helped me prepare for Inazuma's. Kiyoshimo, being the semi-klutz that she can be, admitted that she'd totally forgotten her own launch day, and just like I'd mentioned before, she blamed it on the fact that there was no February 29th this year. She whined that it was unfair that her launch day had to be on a day that only came once every four years.

So I declared that when Wakaba's launch day came up in two days, we'd celebrate all three of their birthdays together, and when I asked Wakaba if that was okay, she said she didn't mind. After all, I'd given her the opportunity to receive the best birthday gift that she wanted, a Kai upgrade, and she felt supremely satisfied with it. "I feel like I'm not an insignificant destroyer anymore," she even said in her usual nonchalant tone. "An improvement that's actually helpful."

So with that out of the way, I rushed through the light amount of Sunday paperwork and started thinking of what to make for the birthday girls. I don't think I can really get them gifts, since I don't know what they'd want, and I didn't feel like going out to the town nearby to shop around. I still remember what happened last time I tried doing that. So maybe just cooking some stuff would suffice. Hatsuharu seems like the kind of girl who'd be content with whatever she got, and Kiyoshimo too, just in a more happy-go-lucky sense. I checked the kitchens to make sure we had ingredients stocked up, which we did thanks to the supply drop yesterday that came with those ultranationlist fuckers who were kind enough to drop by. I suppose I'll make mizu youkan, a thick jelly Japanese dessert eaten during the summer, for Hatsuharu and chocolate pound cake with sprinkles, cream, glaze, and chocolate cream filling inside. I've heard that Kiyoshimo really loves her chocolate, and because we've got just a bit of leftover chocolate ingredients from White Day, I can use up the rest for the pound cake. So it all works out.

Surprisingly, I got an email back from HQ saying that my weapon request order for the fleet was being taken into consideration, meaning that they're looking to provide some weapon upgrades to the fleet. Interesting, I didn't think they'd do something as generous as that.

After lunch, I brought out the refurbished consoles and walked into Shinsengumi to test them out and see that they were all in working order. All the new girls from yesterday were hanging out there with their friends, and Houshou was already busy serving them Ramune and mikan. Sazanami asked me what's in the big box I was carrying, and I told them that they'd find out soon. I set up the consoles one by one, and they all worked, thankfully. As soon as they saw the consoles come out, the girls watched me intently. Yuudachi kept crawling up to them as I put the consoles down on the ground after testing them, like a dog trying to sniff at some new object it's never seen before, so I asked Shigure to restrain Yuudachi a bit.

Once I made sure everything was okay, I fished out the old games in the big box and asked what the girls wanted to play. As soon as I said the word "play", Yuudachi was all over that shit, and she fucking tackled me to the ground, screaming "GAMES!? ARE WE GONNA PLAY A GAME, ADMIRAL!? I WANNA PLAY A GAME, POI!" Ermagerd, Yuudachi pls, y u heff 2 do dis 2 me.

Because the girls couldn't decide, and because I haven't played Nintendo games since I was in frickin' sixth grade, I decided to bust out the Monopoly of console party games: motherfuckin' Mario Party. Specifically, I got my hands on cheap copies of Mario Party 4 through 7, which are all the Mario Parties for the Gamecube. I knew that if I was able to get out of Shinsengumi alive, I should get the goddamn Medal of Honor for this shit, because friendships were about to be ruined.

And just like that, for nine hours, me and the girls played Mario Party, switching out turns every so often.

I don't mean to sound offensive, but Shinsengumi turned into an irradiated shitfest of Hiroshima and Nagasaki combined for today. Because I knew how to play the games better than anyone, I ended up more or less screwing everyone out of their minds. I pulled all the dirty tricks in the book: paying to steal stars, winning minigames that only I knew how they worked, and getting lucky a couple times. At one point, when I jacked one of Sazanami's stars by paying Mr. Boo, she threw her empty Ramune bottle at me, and it smacked me in the side of the face, and she stormed out of the izakaya. It still stings.

And thus, the fleet and I produced an ocean of salt to put Japan's entire salt production industry out of business. The girls who weren't playing watched the others play and laughed hysterically at every misfortune along the way, and those who were subjected to said misfortunes became salty as fuck, and those who came out on top often had to run for their lives, as was exemplified by Murakumo chasing Kiyoshimo right out of the place when Kiyoshimo bumped into Murakumo during Bumper Balls or whatever that minigame was and caused both of them to lose. Hell, Kitakami chased me a few times around base because when Kitakami was about to roll the dice, I called that she'd roll a 1, and she did. She caught me eventually, but all she did was tackle me and shake my head around like a bobblehead, screaming at me why I had to jinx it for her.

And thus, whatever my relationship was with my fleet before today doesn't matter, because almost all the destroyers fucking hate me and hate each other. Even Inazuma was a bit salty when Ikazuchi kept rolling higher numbers than her, and Hibiki kept beating Akatsuki in every single minigame they played.

Use all the internet slang lingo for this. Salty, butthurt, the WAAAAAAHs, some cheese for dat whine, whatever. We had that in spades today.

It got so bad, in fact, that Houshou had to pull me away to ask me if I was trying to ruin everyone's relationships. I said that I was innocent, that I was only trying to provide them some entertainment, and that the brutal slaughtering of friendships was a side effect. Houshou had to point out to me that such a side effect wasn't good for the girls, but I passed her off. They need to realize that they're just playing a game, and that they need to learn that what happens in a game should not affect them outside of it, and if they let it bother them, they really need to learn what they truly need to give a shit about.

Now here's the part where I become a scumbag and say that I thoroughly enjoyed watching friendships get murdered in the most hilarious ways possible, courtesy of Mario Party. Thanks, Nintendo, you'll be the reason why I'll have a permanently anchored fleet by the end of this month. Now I know never to have the girls play Mario Party ever again.

I had to clean up Shinsengumi by myself after we were done. (I had to do it by myself after sending the fleet back to their dorms, and Houshou refused to help me, saying that I needed to take responsibility for the mess I'd made, which she isn't wrong about). Still, watching the hilarity of today was well worth having to tidy up the izakaya. I'll proudly bear the name Kuso Teitoku (Shitty Admiral, thanks, Akebono!) on my back if they forced me to, heh. But surprisingly, Shigure, one of the few girls who didn't participate in the frenzy of friendship-slaughtering, quietly slipped in when I was about fifteen minutes into it and asked if she could help. I told her that she didn't need to help me, because I had inadvertently masterminded the giant bomb that blew up in here and caused all this fallout.

(Seeing that I'm an American, that's a really fucked up metaphor. I am a terrible human being and I should apologize for writing it.)

But Shigure didn't leave. She didn't say anything, either. She must be one of those silent types. So I just shrugged, and we pitched the place back to normal together. After we were done, I fetched two bottles of Ramune for the two of us, and we drank together at the counter.

I asked her how it was here, this being her second day at base. I admitted that my first impression that I'd given her and the new girls wasn't great, seeing that Akatsuki is a bit frightened of me since they'd watched me execute Takeda like they used to back in medieval times, but I'd try my best to rectify that image.

Shigure quietly told me that it wasn't really because of what happened yesterday that the girls had a bad first impression of me. She said that when they were informed that she and the other girls who came on Saturday were going to be deployed to Okinawa, the HQ people who were in charge of them had told them all about me. Or they'd tried.

According to Shigure, those people told them that I was a scary person, that I was the stereotypical macho American military officer who was going to be super strict and whipped everyone around to obey my orders, or that I was the whole generic fat, perverted dude who'd just ogle at them all day, perhaps go further if I felt I could take advantage. I see that the people running HQ are still very much so butthurt over the fact that an American is commanding the Moebius Platoon. I explained to Shigure why that was, about the jurisdiction of the Moebius Four Armament Pact that required that this fleet needed to be commanded by an American navy officer, and that there were a lot of people in the higher-ups of the Japanese government and military who knew about me being here and despised me for it.

"Is that why those men we were with yesterday approached you like that?" Shigure asked with a grim but sad face on. She's always got that downtrodden look that a sad puppy has.

I told her that those men were the extremes, that while I wasn't liked by many people in the Japanese government, they weren't going to go out of their way to kill me or do anything extreme like that. Those guys were an exception, a small minority. I told her not to worry about it, that it was a problem that I needed to keep out of the lives of the ship girls. I said that if she didn't want to get close to me, then that was fine. I wasn't going to try to become friends if she wasn't interested.

Shigure just gave me a sad, sad look, like she felt genuinely sorry for me.

"I hope you don't die too, Admiral."

And she just left.

She dropped the mike and boom, she's gone.

What the hell was that supposed to mean?