FictionPress.com - let the words flow| FictionPress.com - let the words flow |
| Home Just In Communities Forums Beta Readers Dictionary Search | Login Register Extras |
Hiro stared at the aliens, resisting the urge to shift into a fighting stance. Years of Amerikan movies had him very resistant to the ideas of aliens as good guys.
“Dad?”
“Hiro, they're here to help.” Kamon smiled tiredly. “Come this way.”
As they walked along, two US Marines followed behind. He saw their weapons were loaded.
Kamon led him into an immense war room. Three tubes were filled with alien bodies surrounding the room. Hiro stared at them. They were big. Very big. Almost twenty meters long, it looked like. Hiro stared as his stepfather told him, “Those are the Outbound. The closest name the translators have come up with. They're warriors. Conquerors. The Eborians are their enemies. They have a code that disallows them to help lesser advanced races. They broke that code for us but they've yet to tell us why. That doesn't matter. They allowed themselves to be captured by us. Then we began reverse engineering their weapons with their help. Well, after interrogations. Those seven people are now dead to their world.”
Kamon showed him a hologram of the four vehicles. “These will be your weapons. A fast recon vehicle. A tank-like car for surveillance. A Stubb fighter for space flight. And the Mountz. You've played them all in the simulator.”
Hiro stared at the last vehicle. He had not seen it in the simulator, just the control schema. A bipedal tank, he was reminded of the vehicles from Battletech. It wasn't like most Japanese anime robots. The design was like the Undine battle armor. Not in fact a vehicle but in actuality, powered armor, though big enough to fit three people inside. It had plasma bolt cannons on the wrists and an immense sword and gauss rifle hanging off its back. Bigger than the average power armor, though. It was at least seventeen meters tall.
“Hiro..., son, I would that you wouldn't be in this position. But we both are. In a year, they'll be here. If we don't win, Earth is dead. We're the first online. Others won't be ready for some time. We need you, son. We need you to lead them into battle.”
He stopped and watched some children playing for a moment, then looked up at the sky. Clouds had come out and the sky was darkening. He looked to where the ship was coming from. A year.
“What would dad do?” Hiro looked at his watch. His father's, actually. “You named me Hiro, dad. Why? Mom always said it was for a reason and not the jap name.”
He sighed and hung his head back, watching a Heron above him, watching something else.
A heavy weight fell on him and he looked forward. Hinata was smiling at him, wearing a pair of jeans and one of his shirts, sitting on his lap, and facing him. She covered his face with kisses, then whispered, “I've missed you so much.”
Hiro smiled. “Hi. This is kind of bad timing. Dad dropped a bombshell on me. I've been thinking about it all day.”
“Oh. Would some sex make you feel better?”
He laughed. “God, you are so beautiful.”
Her phone rang and she grimaced. When she looked at the caller ID, she sighed and kissed him, then walked off, pulling the phone from her pocket as Hiro watched her walk to her house.
Standing, he looked around, then headed home.
“Well, I missed you. Is Hiro home?”
“He's in his room. I'm kind of surprised, actually. I thought he would be at the car shop, working on his Supra.”
Kamon nodded and kissed her temple. “Could you make me something to eat? I need to talk to Hiro.”
“Alright.” She hummed as she walked into the kitchen to work.
Hiro sat up at the knock and said, “Come.”
His stepfather walked in and sat down in the folding chair Hiro kept for visitors. “It's been a week.”
“Yeah. I'll let you know tomorrow.”
“Alright. You want to play House Of The Dead 4?” Hiro was a huge fan of the series and had bought the arcade system, his one main splurge ever with the money from his father aside from cars and that didn't count. His father always believed building cars was just another aspect of art. The money for art was money never wasted. Kamon had finished putting it together the night before when Hiro had gotten a call from Cindy and went to his room..
Hiro grinned. “Yeah.”
Later that night, after they had played through the game twice, Kane had invited Hinata and Yojin over to play Hanafuda with her and Kamon while Hiro spent most of his time in the computer room, watching movies with Kana who fell asleep a quarter of the way through the first movie. Whenever Hinata came up to check on Kana during breaks, the two would trade kisses, wishing they could do more.
“Dad.”
Kamon turned. “Hiro. Have you decided?”
“Show me my team.”
Kamon smiled.
They went back upstairs and got into a waiting vehicle. As it pulled away, two outrider motorcycle military police took up positions as they headed out of the city.
In the park, they went into the outbuilding and Hiro pressed his hand against the metal panel. The computer soon welcomed him. They took the escalator down and his stepfather led him to the gym where the children were working out.
The girls of ORC were giggling at their instructor's fall backwards. He was shaking his head, then got up. “Right, that'll only work once in a fight.” The boy in the group, Natsumi Osamu, had stood behind the instructor and and Gina had attacked during the bow. “And if you pull that crap again, you'll all be on liquid rations for a week.”
“Sensei!” Kamon called out.
The children turned to look.
“This is...,” he froze up for a second then spoke. “This is Commander Hanfuri Hiro. The new pilot of prototype Mentat.”
Mentat? He thought. Like Dune?
“Hiro?” the boy asked. “Looks more like Hikoku.” He had spoken in English but had called Hiro a criminal in Japanese. He was wearing a tight black shirt and dark blue jeans since he had been thinking about working on his car.
The boy was wearing padding for training. Hiro's foot snapped out in one of the only moves he had mastered from Nanbudi. “Call me that again and we'll be short a person again.” The boy went back half a dozen feet then fell on his bottom.
Kamon smirked as the girls all bowed to him, a few seeming to blush. The fighting instructor introduced them and Hiro asked, “Have they all worked on the simulators?”
His stepfather nodded. “Let's get you all in together see how you work together.”
“You did well, Commander.” General Kohichi walked into the room.
“Why is everyone calling me that?”
“Because the ORC is a military program. We can't have a civilian in command. You'll be put through a modified basic training and officer corps training program right here as well as finishing off your high school. Come with me. It's time for the debrief.”
Hiro followed the man into a semi-large room. There were three men—one his stepfather—waiting inside and an elderly woman. She was introduced as the children's caretaker and the other two men were introduced as tacticians.
Hiro sat down and finished drinking his soup, wishing it was something meatier.
The older tactician began speaking, showing a graph on a plasma screen that intimated there had been a nineteen percent rise in efficiency with Hiro in the command chair over letting them decide democratically.
The second tactician stood. “These are the children on the team. Etsuko Gina.” A picture came up of her wearing a sports jersey like a dress. “Err, wrong phot—anyway, she's the eldest and your second in command. She's a Jojutsu fighter.”
Hiro broke in. “What's Jojutusu?
His father answered. “Stick fighting. Like the Indian in Le Pacte des Loups.” He didn't mean that the style was the same, just that they were both stick fighters and as a reference. His son nodded as the man continued. “She's also the only one with a nonstandard Mountz. She also has an extending staff for in fighting.” Hiro nodded at the image of her orange and black Mountz they showed. “Ninamori Zumi.” Hiro remembered her immediately when he saw the image. She was the second smallest but had breasts the same size as Hinata. “Her vehicles are red.”
Hiro interrupted again. “Why the different colors?”
“Since they all look the same, it was decided to paint them different to match the pilot's preferences.”
“Oh. Then I want a purple that's almost black with deep blue trim.”
His father made a note as the briefing went on. “Miyako Misaka. The youngest member of the team. She's a quiet little girl who invariably ends up in rooms she's not allowed in. Small enough to fit through all the ducting in here. She rides in the gold with white.”
The second tactician took over. “This is Harumi Abe. She shows leadership skills, but not enough to make her team lead. Silver with black trim. Samejima Juno. Pink with black. She likes to dress up like... erm, what is it?” Kamon answered. “Naruto. It's actually really cute, Hiro.” “Yes, Naruto. And this is Natsumi Osamu. He's twelve. He has some... problems. We have a therapist just for him, actually. His is orange with silver accents.”
A more detailed set of dossiers was slid over the table to Hiro and the debrief began. The general, his stepfather, and the two tacticians began lobbing questions.
It was another two hours before it was over. Finally, they all left and a sergeant walked in to the room. “Commander, I'll drive you home.”
Hiro gave him the address for the shop where his car was and they walked out to a waiting sedan. Inside, he slumped against the window, half-asleep.
When the car stopped, the sergeant had to shake him awake and, for a moment, thought he was in a taxi and started to reach for his wallet. He stumbled out and into the shop, then made a beeline to the coffee machine. Hiro fed yen into it, then walked in to see how his car was coming along, holding three cans in his arm and sipping on the fourth can.
Piston was sitting in the driver's seat and nodded at him. The car's body was still off and the engine was still out but the interior and electronics had been completed. Hiro looked in from the passenger's side. Everything was black except for a small blue light, blinking away steadily. If it shifted to red, the batteries were a day or so from failing. “Looking good.”
“You look tired.”
“Busy day. I joined a gym. And met a very hot trainer.”
Piston grinned. “A good trainer, eh?”
Hiro grinned and lied. “Very good.” He dropped the cans in the passenger's seat and flicked on the power switch in the shifter. With the doors open, the black and red lights instantly came on. The white in their clothes and the stitching glowed brightly.
“Why red and black lights?”
“Because I can't tint as darkly as I did in Kalifornia. They can't been seen over distances as easily as white and yellow.” Hiro turned his phone back on and saw he had three messages.
“And how come the blackout settings?” He had done the wiring so that all lights could be cut out with the flick of a switch hidden under the dash.
Hiro shrugged. “Habit. I first did it in my Trans Am then I did it in the Z007.” His first built car had been a Trans Am he had worked on with a friend of his father's into a Knight Rider clone. He had sold it the week it was completed to a collector.
With the switch flicked to off, Hiro opened another can and walked off. One of the employees had called for him to walk over. The engine block was completed and sitting on the dynanometer.
He sat in a chair and watched them start the engine, then slowly run it through its paces.
His eyes went wide when they showed him the printout. It had topped out at one thousand three hundred thirty seven horsepower at the flywheel. “Damn, you guys did good.” He had been expecting a thousand, maybe eleven hundred at the flywheel.
The engine was partly taken apart and they began installing the nitrous leads.
This time, they let the engine run, the computer slowly running it up, eating through the ten kiloliters of fuel. Hiro wanted it to run at least eight hundred kilometers before pumping nitrous through it.
As the engine ran, Hiro received a call. He walked off to be alone.
A short amount of time later, Hinata's car pulled up in front of the shop and Hiro got in.
As she pulled away, Hinata asked, “What... what happened at the hotel?”
He thought for a few moments, then said, “When I didn't reply to my dad, they thought something was up. He works for an aspect of the Diet(Japanese form of their legislative assembly -Writer). They tracked the GPS unit in my phone. Then when they got to the hotel, they realized why I didn't want to talk but still had to take me in.”
“Oh.” She hesitated. “So... he knows?”
“About us? No. I told him I was there with someone I met at a club.”
She watched the road, thinking. He hoped she wasn't going to break it off. She looked upset.
He put his hand on her thigh and rubbed it. When she smiled at him, his worry fell away. She licked her red lips and then winked.
He pulled his hand away as she pulled up to the small booth. He handed her a yen note and she used that to pay for parking, then she drove in and up to the highest level. It was only half full and she parked in the north corner then leaned over to kiss him.
Kana knocked on the door, then pushed it open and looked around. She found Kane sitting at the kitchen table, headphones on as she listened to her iPod. Kana hugged her and she took her headphones off, smiling. “Hey, Kana-chan. Your mom still not home?” If Kana came home and her mother was away, and if she didn't feel like staying home alone, she was to come over to the Zakura's.
She nodded and sat down across from her. “Is Onii-chan home?”
“No, he went to work on his car. You want to go play DDR?”
“Can I play the gun game?”
“I don't think so. It's pretty scary. I was about to make cookies, though. You want to help?”
She smiled and nodded.
There was a knock on the door and his mother's voice as she called out, “Honey, is that you?”
“Yeah, mom.”
“I made cookies. And Kana's playing DDR now.” She didn't want him walking through the hallway naked. Since he lived alone on the second floor for the most part—as he had in Kalifornia—he sometimes went in the buff from room to room.
“Alright. Do we have any Pepsi in the house?” They had brought over fifty block packs of Pepsi. The majority had gone into their storage room a town over. The closer ones were all full, though they were on a waiting list for an opening.
“Yeah, I stocked the mini-fridge in the computer room.”
Hiro turned up the heat and reached for the soap, thinking about the shower he had taken with Hinata earlier.
He was walking to his room when his stepfather's voice filtered up from the first floor.
Ignoring it, he walked into his room and dropped the towel. He pulled on his boxers and a pair of jeans, then looked through his shirts on the hangars until he decided on his Penny Arcade hoodee. His space heater had run out of fuel and he had forgotten to buy more. His parents' heaters were electric.
A pair of slippers followed to keep his feet warm and he left his room. He stopped in the game room and saw that Kana was curled up in a beanbag, watching a recording of Naruto, cheering as the protagonist ran in to help Sasuke.
He watched for a moment then said, “Hey.”
Kana looked back and smiled. “Hi, Onii-chan. Wanna watch Naruto with me?”
“In a bit. I'm starving.”
She nodded and turned back to the show.
Downstairs, he walked in on Kamon and Kane kissing and gagged loudly. They broke apart, his stepfather grinning and his mother blushing. “Are you hungry, sweetheart?”
“Yeah. But you're blocking the fridge.”
Kane pulled out a Bento plate she had made earlier and set it on the table for him with a pair of chopsticks as Kamon said, “I'll give you a lift tomorrow, alright?”
Hiro nodded as he sat down and his mother turned the radio up. Kamon went to his office to check his email.
Kane sat down next to him and hugged her son tightly. “I wish you were still small enough to have sit in my lap,” she told him and he blushed this time.
“We should have gone to Disneyland one last time before moving here.”
“We could go to Tokyo Disneyland.”
“Oh, yeah. I forgot about that.”
“I'll ask Kamon when he has a free day. We can have a nice family outing again. How do you find Japan now?”
“Still sucks for the most part. It has been nice meeting some of dad's friends. I planned to invite them all over for a barbecue when the car is done. That's cool, right?”
His mother nodded and patted his hand then stood. She straightened her skirt and said, “What do you want for dinner?”
“Some soup. I had a big lunch and snacked a lot through the day.”
She nodded and started to make dinner as the phone rang. Hiro answered it and then yelled out, “Kana! It's your mom!”
The young girl came down the stairs and took the phone. “Hi, mommy. Okay, I'm coming home now.”
She handed him the phone and waved goodbye then headed out the door, skipping. Kane laughed. “Oh, I hope she's as cute.”
Hiro was confused for a moment, then realized she was talking about her pregnancy.
“What if it's a boy?”
“I'll cry.” She giggled as she began slicing the tofu.
Hiro put his empty plate in the sink then dropped into a chair in their sitting room, wishing they had a fireplace.
“How come they ask for my name and number at restaurants?”
“I have no clue, honey,” his mother told him from the kitchen.
“You need help?”
“No. But I noticed your room was trashed. Why don't you pick it up?”
Hiro sighed and stood. As he walked up the stairs, he stretched, then walked into the computer room and opened Foobar2000. He opened his Massed MP3 playlist and walked to clean his room as the second floor was filled with the sounds of Reise, Reise by Rammstein.
As he stuffed dirty clothing into his hamper and stacked his magazines, he flicked on his new television and saw that Naruto was on. Abandoning cleaning, he settled on his bed and watched the show.
He was hanging up the clean shirts his mother had brought up earlier when she called him and Kamon for dinner. He stopped to turn off his sound system, then headed down the stairs, wondering if it would be possible to take Hinata away for a weekend somehow.
“It's the uniform of the National Defense Academy. The school you've been 'accepted' to,” the general told him. “Don't worry, you only have to wear it to the classes you need to attend. Your accelerated schedule means it will be on Mondays and Tuesdays when you're there.”
His stepfather walked into the room, head-to-head with another of the scientists and almost walked into Hiro. “Oh, sorry. Oh, hey. You got your uniform.”
“So, if I'm a commander, what branch?”
“Naval. It's the only one with that rank.”
“Why Naval?”
“It's easier to hide people in the navy.”
“Wait, does that mean I'll be stuck here?”
“No, you'll be assuming an identity of an officer, as well. You'll be Commander Hanfuri Hiro, twenty-four, currently attached to Japan Defense Agency as my personal attache.”
“General, we need Hiro for simulator work,” Kamon said.
“Right, carry on then.”
The general left the room and Hiro studied the uniform. “Mom's going to have a fit.”
“I've been working on that. We tell her you've been accepted to the academy and are also working with me in my cybernetics lab. Since it's a government funded operation, the schooling at the academy is necessary. And, well, your mother never told you this because they didn't want to press you into something you didn't want to do but your IQ is... exceptional.”
Hiro blinked. “Exceptional? How exceptional?”
“Remember the IQ test you took when you were twelve?”
He nodded. “Mom said I did quite well but we never really talked about it.”
“You scored one hundred sixty eight.”
“Hiro?!” He looked up. Piston was holding a handset of a cordless phone. “Your mom.” He held it up. “Kane-kun, it's good to talk to you again. Here he is.” He handed it over and walked off.
“Mom?” He listened and nodded, then pulled a pen and wrote on the back of his hand. “I'll pick it up on the way home.” He canceled the connection and carried the phone back.
Piston set it on his desk, then asked, “Is there something wrong with the work?”
“No. No. It's all excellent. I'm just starting at the National Defense Academy in a few weeks.”
“Congratulations.”
Hiro nodded and walked out of the office. The engine was in and they were under the car, connecting the transmission to the viscous coupler, allowing him to decouple the front axle and go to rear wheel drive only, then relocking to go back to all wheel drive; though it could only be done from a standstill. Done at speed, it would rip the transmission and coupler into shrapnel.
Except for the exterior of the car and the installation of the steering wheel, his car was almost done. They would have it done by that weekend. Once it was together, he would take it to the wind tunnel, then test it with the different wings he had made.
He got out as the car idled and made a short bow. “Thank you all very much.” He began handing out the invitations and spent the next few minutes talking with them, then got into the car and slowly backed out and into the mostly empty street. The area around the shop was mostly warehouses and surprisingly empty in the midmorning, though it got worse after lunchtime since there were three restaurants and a handful of food booths right across from the shop.
A waiting truck soon had it loaded aboard and Hiro got into the passenger's seat. The other wings were strapped down already on the truck.
When they arrived, Hiro drove the car in and then set the extra wings inside near the entrance to the wind tunnel and set his tools beside them. His father's friend, Taksiyo Inoue, gestured for him to sit and explained how the wind tunnel worked as two of his graduate students. “You are so lucky we could fit you in, Hiro-kun.”
He smiled. “Thank you, very much. I know how much time on these can cost.”
“Yeah. Let's see. That wing really disrupts the flow.”
Hiro nodded and they shut down the tunnel.
Over the next three hours, they tested all the wings and settled on one that created a good amount of downdraft while still keeping aerodynamics. With it done, he loaded in the extra wings to the car, then used Loctite to make sure the wing wouldn't come undone as well as bonding glue that melted the carbon fibre around the screw, locking it in place.
With the car setup, he handed over another copy of the invitation, then slowly drove around the lot, getting used to the car. He would put another three hundred kilometers or more before he would feel ready to race it.
When he arrived home, his mother, Kana, and Hinata were standing in the garden. His lover winked at him and he fought not to wink back as his mother exclaimed over the paint job, surprised he had ignored the black hood he had planned. Her name in Kanji was in it, on the trunk, barely darker than the paint job, twined with his father's name. He didn't plan to point it out. It would only make Kamon feel bad and he didn't want to do that, just to honor his birth parents.
He spent the next hour showing them the refinements before his mother went in to begin dinner and the Fujiwaras went home to do the same after he promised to take Kana driving soon.
Slumping in the passenger's seat, he activated the anti-theft system. If he didn't press one of his fingers onto a biometrics card, the system would activate the Lojack and the alarm system would begin blaring. Stepping out, Hiro moved away and slammed the door. The red light on the dash began blinking and he walked away.
Inside the house, he fixed himself a cup of cocoa then went up to his room and settled onto his bed, wondering how to tell his mother he was going to a military school and working for the Japanese Government without mentioning he was piloting a mecha and fighting aliens. “I've got to be fucking on acid,” he murmured. “The really good shit.”
Kane called them to dinner and he walked down, flipping his keys on his finger. While the doors were shaved, he still had to have his house keys, storage keys, the ignition key, and the door and alarm fobs.
“Your car looks gorgeous,” his stepfather told him. “But can you keep it in the garage? I don't have the street certificate on my car.”
“Yeah, I was planning on going out tonight.”
“Where?” his mother asked, setting a casserole dish on the table then kissing her husband.
“Just doing some cruising to get used to the car.” She ruffled his hair then set the tea and wine bottle on the table. Hiro poured himself tea as Kamon poured wine for himself and Kane.
Kana plated up the dishes and Kamon asked, “Did you tell your mother?”
He shook his head. “No. I was thinking about the car. I need to pull the computer from it and put my music collection in it.” There was a keypad in it, designed to interface with the computer. All he had to do was press pound, then a four digit number, and pound again and it would go to the specific track he wanted while arrow keys would allow him to choose after finding a CD by number. He would print out a CD list by their track numbers once the playlist was made.
“Tell me what?”
“He's working on the project I'm working on now. And he got accepted to the National Defense Academy.”
“How?”
Hiro shrugged as Kamon told her, “His skills with cars and robots.” Hiro had been part of a robot building club in high school that had built an arm able to catch a baseball at up to ninety eight miles per hour in a six foot wide circle. “They keep track of everyone that I come in contact with.”
“But why the National Defense Academy? Isn't that a military school?”
Hiro ignored the conversation, more interested in his meal.
“It is. But they'll allow him to work at the compound and study at the same time.”
“Are you sure you want to do this? What are you going to be doing?”
“Classified, dear,” Kamon told her and Hiro said, “I don't mind. It's an interesting job.”
“When do you start?”
“Monday.” Four days away.
He pushed his plate away. “I'm going out.”
Hiro walked away as Kane began the third degree of her husband.
He hit the alarm and door fobs and it popped open. He slid the key into the dash and turned it, then flicked the switches to turn the car on as his finger was pressed against the biometrics sensor on the back of the wheel.
As he waited for the car to warm up, he slid a burnt copy of Xorcist's X-Raided and backed up the car, checking the address on the screen of the place Piston had told him street racers congregated for mountain drift racing. He popped a caffeine pill and headed out, slipping his phone into its cradle. If anyone called him now, the stereo would mute and he could pull down a mic from the seat so he could talk hands-free. An earpiece was connected to it and he plugged it into his ear as he drove.
He was driving along the highway when he realized there was a car flashing their lights behind him. He ignored the challenge to race. The car was still too new for him to really know its quirks and he didn't know the police congestion either.
Nearing eleven, Hiro found the gathering he was looking for. Parking his car, he flipped on the purple neon underneath the car and turned on the interior black lights, cutting off the red lights.
He drew a crowd slowly until he was recognized by a street racer that had spent time in Kalifornia. He ended up signing three magazines of people who had interviews of his in them. He had forgotten about the phone interview with Option before they had left Amerika.
Hiro popped the hood and accepted the numbers of six racer grrrls as they looked over his engine, all the drivers cuing up for a chance to race him. He turned them all down, saying he had just finished the car and wanted to get it on a track and know it before he took it to the streets. His phone rang and he answered it. Hinata was telling him that Kana was going to a camp the next weekend and her husband was going out of country again so she was free all weekend.
“Mom, you're so grounded from the internet.”
She laughed and walked into his room, wrapping her arms around him then holding him at arm's length to look at the uniform. “Your hair is mussed.”
“I haven't gotten to that yet.” He looked in the mirror again. The uniform looked like the year end uniform for a private school that had mated with the nineteenth century USMC uniform.
When he walked down the stairs, his mother, Hinata, and Kana were sitting at the kitchen table, waiting for him. Hinata licked her lips sensuously as Kana giggled and said, “You look handsome, Onii-chan.”
“I look like an imperialist wardog.”
He sat down to eat and ignored Hinata's foot brushing against his leg. If he had had his way, she would be his breakfast. When he was done, Hiro grabbed his backpack and left the house, flicking his car door open with the fob, slid in, then did the rigmarole to start the car.
When he arrived at the academy, the guard was slightly surprised to see him on the left side of the car but quickly verified his identification, then threw off a crisp salute. He almost returned it, then remembered that you weren't supposed to and instead nodded before pulling away.
The female corporal he had gotten used to showing him around was waiting for him at the front of the building and handed him a sealed letter. Hiro read it and nodded. She was there to make sure he knew what to do and explain any problems.
Hiro spent the next four hours sitting through a class on the dynamics of leadership in the nuclear age, making his notes in English.
Finally they headed back to the command center and the corporal seemed to be in awe of his vehicle.
He didn't say much, trying to absorb the information he had taken in as he drifted through the traffic.
When they pulled into the parking lot, a bus was sitting on front of the entrance. He locked up the car and activated the alarm. As they walked away, someone got too close to his vehicle and Kago Ai's voice ordered: “Step away from the vehicle,” then giggled.
He smirked. Piston was her uncle and had her come in and do the voice for the alarm.
Inside the building, they both quickly moved through the entrance and she went to her duties as he was led off by a lieutenant to the general's office.
Inside, he dropped into a chair and asked, “I thought I was supposed to be in the simulator today.”
“You will be. As a commander, you should act the part, Hanfuri. Here.” He pushed over a folder and Hiro looked through it.
“Is there any significance to the names of the Mountz?”
“Not really. The designers had been watching Dune, I understand.”
“When are the children being told they're fighting to save their planet?”
“We're still debating that. Programming them to be pilots is hard enough.”
Hiro took the binder and a lieutenant showed him to his office. It was sparse, though almost as large as the general's with a filing cabinet, stand-alone closet, a metal desk, a Mirra Task chair, two lamps, and a cot with a microwave and mini-fridge beside it. He dropped down onto his desk and continued reading the folder on the updated stats of his team until a private came to get him.
He changed into his flight suit, then followed the private to the sim room. He found that instead of just one simulator, all seven were in the room, the other pilots sitting around, waiting on him. He nodded and said, “Today we're playing follow the leader mixed with tag. Person who gets the kill becomes it. We're set up for the bikes, right?” One of the technicians nodded and Hiro said, “Osamu's it, then.” The young boy stuck his tongue out at Hiro.
Their simulators were marked with their color preferences and Hiro headed for his deep purple and blue one. Inside, he looked up and spoke. Looking up meant he was talking to the technicians while looking down or to the sides mean to the other pilots. “When do we get in the real deal?”
“Couple weeks. We're ironing out some bugs in the software, Commander,” he was told as the screens came on and oxygen began flowing. “Good hunting, sir.”
The orange and black motorcycle sent up a hail of rocks and dirt as it accelerated away, the rest of the group accelerating to keep up and taking occasional shots. They only had one thousand rounds and had to self-ration.
Hiro accelerated to max speed, avoiding rocks and trees better than he should have been able to. He fired a burst and the front wheel of the Osamu's ride. The wheel came to an instant stop, turning the motorcycle into pinwheeling wreckage that disappeared as a technician's voice said, “Outrider Mentat is it.”
Hiro put on a burst of speed, playing chicken with rocks and trees as his team attempted to catch him.
Twenty minutes later, an annoyed technician said, “Transferring 'It' to Outrider Zensunni.”
Hiro smirked.
When the simulators were cracked open, Hiro pulled his helmet off and smiled. “So, none of you can catch me, huh?”
“You're amazing, commander-san,” Zumi said, bowing.
“Maybe. Let's get some lunch as we debrief?” he asked and one of the technicians nodded, picking up a phone.
As they ate, the group answered questions from one of the tacticians.
Hiro's phone was dancing but he ignored it. His reception wasn't very good. And it was Hinata. He couldn't talk with her with his command around.
When the meal was over and the debriefing had ended, Hiro asked, “When was the last time you kids actually did anything outside the training centers?”
“Umm, they stopped for food at a McDonald's, Commander-san,” his second told him and Hiro rolled his eyes.
“You're all just down here all the time?”
They nodded and Hiro shook his head. “No promises but I'm going to talk to the general. See if we can get you all a break and some time at an arcade or something. Osamu, knock it off.” The young boy had been mocking him, thinking he was out of Hiro's line of sight. His eyes were rounder than the average Asian thanks to his father's fifty percent Dutch ancestry and he had much better peripheral vision.
With the meal over, the group went to their classes as Hiro went to his. This one was a cross between a workout and a lecture. As he ran on a treadmill, a elderly general lectured him on Sparta and how their culture had ties to Japanese culture. Hiro wanted to call bullshit but continued the workout as the corporal—who had told him she was his new attaché—recorded the speech for him.
As he showered afterwards, he listened to the speech again, surprised that there was actually a valid point or three in the man's speech.
“I needed to go shopping and thought you might want to come along.”
“Shopping for what?”
“Lingerie.” She patted her stomach softly. “I have a surprise for Kamon and I want to surprise him tonight.”
“You're pregnant?”
“Uh huh. Just starting to show.”
Hinata grabbed her keys and turned off the coffee maker then they went out to warm up the car.
As they drove into Osaka, Kane asked, “So, tell me more about your Boytoy.”
“Umm, not much to tell, really. He's busy with his academy and job. We usually see each other twice a week or so but sometimes not that often.”
“You should get something for him. A fishnet bodystocking. Hiro's father loved the one I owned.” Kane giggled. “I was wearing it when I went into labor, actually. I never bought a new one.”
Hinata laughed and asked, “Do you think it would be weird for me to drive a car like Hiro's? I've always thought cars like that were so pretty. Bright purple with sakura all over it?”
“Ask Hiro. He's pretty busy, but he could design it for you. Piston—he's an old friend of Daiki—has a shop that did most of the work on Hiro's car. Luckily for him. His Z06 took him three years to build. The Supra was done in months with more done to it.”
They parked in a lot and then took public transport to the mall. Inside, they went to the trashier lingerie store. As the looked around, Hinata asked, “Do you miss your first husband?”
“Sometimes. Usually when I look at Hiro. He looks just like him. Except for not having black eyes.” Hiro's eyes were a very rich chocolaty brown with gold flecks. A photo of him when he was a baby had been used for a baby food company because of his eyes. “But he would have wanted me to move on. Ooh, this would look so cute on you.” She held up a black teddy with fishnet inserts.
“He likes fishnets, I know that. How much is it?”
They spent the next hour looking until Kane started laughing at a mannequin wearing a race queen dress. Hinata asked, “What's up?”
“He used to have me wear these outfits. I have a huge collection of them, actually. You want to borrow one?” They wore the same size, except for bras but that didn't matter in most dresses.
“No. But I do want to get a schoolgirl outfit. He said he bet I was the hottest girl in my school. I wish,” she sighed as Kane shook her head, grinning.
They went to a sex shop but Hinata didn't like the costumes and they found themselves in another lingerie store that had what she wanted. A good cross between a traditional uniform and the Amerikan image of a schoolgirl.
As they drove past Kane's home, they saw Hiro opening the front door and walked in. Kane got out and Hinata drove on as her friend walked to the house. She was going to come over soon for lessons on putting on makeup the Amerikan way. Kane had told her that she needed to do her makeup in a more natural way when she wore it instead of caking it on.
Hiro was hanging up his uniform when his mother looked in and shook her head. “I still don't understand the whole you being a commander thing.”
“You don't understand it? I don't understand the whole damn thing. Why do I need to be an officer when Kamon and the others working on it are all doctors and the like?”
“Hinata's coming over in a bit. She said she was interested in getting her ride pimped.”
“She didn't actually say pimped, did she?”
His mother giggled. “No. But that would be awesome if she did.”
She headed back down to the first floor, still giggling as he pulled on a pair of black trousers and a dark red shirt. His inside slippers were next and he went downstairs to see if there was any takeout left in the fridge. He found a few slices of pizza as his mother asked, “Do you plan on keeping your American citizenship? Because if you are, you'll need to remember to register to vote.”
“I still need to get a Japanese license, too.... I wonder if the general could fix that,” he murmured to himself.
She knelt on the couch, watching until his right gun 'died' and he set it down. When his left gun died, she dropped down onto her bottom. Finally the right gun died and he ignored the bowl of tokens and turned to smile at her. “Hey, Onee-kun.”
She stood and hugged him. “Are you really going to work on mommy's car?”
“Maybe.”
“Can I help?”
“Well, I'm going to design it. My friend's shop will do all the work. I'm too busy with school and work.”
She nodded and took his hand as they walked down the stairs. Downstairs, she let go when his mother said she had cookies. As Kana knelt on one of the chairs around the table, Kane set down a plate of cookies and a glass of milk as Hinata smiled and asked, “My lease is about up on my car and I was thinking about buying one. Could you make mine pretty?”
“Just exterior? Or interior and engine work, too?” he asked as he sat beside her, snagging a handful of cookies.
She shrugged. “Well, a pink and white interior would be nice,” she said thoughtfully as Kana stopped eating cookies to look at her mother and giggle. “What?”
“You should make it match Hiro-kun's car.”
Hiro rolled his eyes and wondered if she was ever going to decide on a specific name and honorific to call him.
“No, I think pink with sakura petals on it. Kind of blowing away in the wind.”
“That would be pretty,” Kana admitted then went back to eating the cookies.
“Um, what kind of car do you plan to get?”
She shrugged and his mother said, “Why don't you two go look at cars on the net? Kana, want to help me make dinner?”
She nodded as Hinata headed towards the stairs. Hiro followed, watching the top of her stockings show when her skirt slid farther up her thigh from leg movement. He could feel himself slowly becoming tumescent.
In the computer room, she grinned wickedly and dropped into his lap, kissing his throat and neck as she murmured all the things she wanted to do. She pulled away after a few moments, then unbuttoned her jacket, showing him she wasn't wearing anything underneath except for a faux camisole around her neck that covered the tops of her breasts and made it look as if she were wearing a blouse.
Hinata buttoned it back up and sat in his lap as he grinned and asked her what kind of car she wanted.
“A four door. Sedan. Not a hatchback. Pretty.”
As he flipped through common used cars in Japan, she decided on a Lancer Evolution though didn't decide on a year since she wanted a used car, then whispered in his ear, breathing hotly and promising him whatever he wanted that weekend.
She slid off his lap when they heard his mother coming up the stairs.
“Yeah, the tacticians said he was going to a thing then would be here at one for driving.”
“The cars? Awesome.”
The two walked into the showers and began washing themselves off. “You think he'll be able to get us out to a concert or something?”
“Maybe. He's just doing it to make us trust him more,” Gina said cynically.
“Maybe. But it'll be out. With other kids.”
Gina nodded and stepped away from the spray then walked off to get into the bath. Abe joined her a few moments later and they sat, relaxing. Soon the other girls arrived and joined them, Zumi holding on to her left breast. “Ugh, stupid Osamu hitting me in the tit.”
“At least you have them,” Gina said, sitting up farther and revealing her nearly flat chest. “Annoying preteen with C cups.”
The other girls giggled and Junko quipped, “You just wish you had tits so the Commander would notice you.”
Gina's blushed, deep enough that it showed through the already flushed cheeks from the heat.
Their relaxation was cut short when a female sergeant came in and said, “Commander Hanfuri is back early. You have twenty minutes to be in uniform and in your sims.”
The girls scrambled out of the bathtub and went to get back in their flight suits.
When they walked into the simulator room, Commander Hanfuri was standing with two of the scientists, talking earnestly until the lead scientist pointed to the pilots.
Hiro turned and said, “Where's Natsumi?”
“He's in the sickbay. He got knocked into a wall.” Two of the girls giggled while the others grinned. Zumi had literally thrown him into the wall when he had hit her in the breast.
“Alright. D-err, Zenaku-sensei here has finished our new versions of the simulators. These are the exact units we'll be using in the real world.”
Lights came on in a dim corner of the room and seven suits of armor were revealed, looking somewhat like the Mountz, though much smaller.
Hiro's stepfather spoke now. “These are your armor for if something happens to your vehicles. Inside, a vehicle, your hands and faces will be free. If something happens, the gloves and mask are ready. The mask face slides down and the gloves are connected to the waist. Hiro, show them.”
He stepped up to the armor and a technician helped him fit it. The mask slid into place since he was out of a vehicle and he pulled the gloves on. They were studded with spikes and looked more like mitts than gloves.
“How come no weapons?” Gina asked.
“There's a repulsor cannon built into the right gloves. Just aim them straight on. Has the Commander's been depowered?” A technician nodded and Hiro aimed at the wall and manipulated the firing toggle with his thumb. A pulse of blue light shot out and hit the wall. “With full power, you have twenty-one shots. The armor isn't for battling. It's to protect you to get to a covered position if your vehicle is damaged beyond usage. We'll keep the armor modified until each of you has reached your optimal height and weight so that means weekly checkups that are a bit more invasive.”
Hiro locked the gloves back into their holsters and used his freehand to push the mask plate back up, feeling vaguely like a knight for a moment.
“Everyone suit up. From now on, we need to know how to pilot our rides while in the armor: getting used to the changed weight and the minor sight disruption. General, you listening?”
“Yes, Commander.”
“How long until Natsumi can cowboy up? Sorry, I mean, suit up?” Most of his friends in Amerika were either street rodders, cowboy-wannabes, or surfers, something Hiro missed doing and planned to find a beach in Japan soon. His board was languishing in a corner of his room, acting as a bookcase sitting on four bright green traffic cones.
“He's being sent down now, Hanfuri.”
Inside the modified simulators, the group slowly got used to the minimally delayed reaction time.
On Hiro's display, a readout told him that they were all averaging a fourteen point three millisecond delay between armored and non-armored responses.
Natsumi appeared in the display and Hiro continued observing their battle against a simulated Godzilla. One of the technicians was in a funny mood.
“Ow! Fuck that would hurt,” he whispered. Misaka's Mountz had stabbed the immense lizard's groin.
He handed out smartphones and told them, “We have time, so we'll stop off at a store and get you some accessories to customize. No wandering off. I'm serious.”
They cheered as they ran to their rooms to change. When they came out a few minutes later, Kamon and two female corporals in civilian clothing waited on them.
Kamon got into his own vehicle, the now heavily modified Smart Roadster. He followed the bus the children and corporals were on to a local mall then helped the two ferry the children to a mobile phone accessory store and waited as they used a purikura and made their decisions on accessories.
When they were finally done, the six were herded back to the bus and this time it followed Kamon's roadster, three black sedans acting as almost unseen outriders.
At the house, already thirty people were there and Hinata and his mother introduced the children to Kana and the children of the crew at Piston's shop while Hiro and Piston stood by the grill, watching the meat and discussing the modifications to be done to Hinata's car once she bought it.
Hiro's car sat proudly in the driveway, the hood removed and replaced with a second one he had designed with a sakura tree cut out and fitted with a layer of plexiglass to protect the engine while still letting people see it.
A car scout for the next The Fast And The Furious movie had seen it and wanted it in the movie for one of the more shown extra cars. Hiro had been fine with that as long as the car got its own credit: Pheat of Logic as Pheat of Logic. Pheat was a portmanteau of Purple Heat.
The scout was standing with some of the build crew and Hiro asked, “How many cars did he talk you out of?” Piston had a shop full of cars that had been seized by police and he had bought, the majority cars he had built in the first place. They usually ended up being stripped then used as the beds for new cars for other clients.
“Seventeen. My personal RX8 is going to be in it, as well. Hand me another Asahi.”
Hiro tossed him the bottle of beer and sipped at his own bottle of soda. He didn't mind the flavors of Guinness nor Asahi for the most part but didn't like the taste of most beers, though.
Hinata slid past him and smiled then moved on. Piston raised an eyebrow. “She looks like she wants some Hiro in her.”
“All women want that.”
Piston laughed. “Sixteen hundred at the wheels with first stage nitrous. I'm almost afraid to ask if you tried the second and third stages.”
“I totally do not plan to. Tomorrow night I'm going to the Outlaw Road Stars.” Outlaw Road Stars were sanctioned street races open to anyone who had cars that met the minimal requirements. A helmet, a roll cage, and an AWD car.
“I'm going as well. Most of the crew is, actually. We'll see you there. You plan to race?”
“Does Godzilla own Japan?”
“Frequently.” The two laughed then Hiro went to use the bathroom while Piston stayed with the food.
On his way back, Gina gave him a short bow then asked, “Your mother mentioned you had some arcade games?” They had already thanked him for inviting them.
Hiro nodded. He had bought two new cabinets when he had seen them for sale. They weren't in brand new condition like his HotD4 cabinet but they worked. “House of the Dead 4, a Neo-Geo machine with Art of Fighting, Fatal Fury Special, Metal Slug X, and Twinkle Star Sprites. The third cabinet has Gauntlet Dark Legacy. I have a big collection of games as well. Kana, come here.” She jogged over and sipped at her drink as he said, “Take the kids up to the game room. Just make sure they stay out of my room.”
Kana nodded and took off as Kane made her way towards her son. “Piston said the steaks will be ready in a few minutes. Then he'll put the burger patties on.”
The instructor back off, holding his side where he had been hit. Bowing, he winced, then said, “You've improved.”
“I've been practicing daily.”
“Next week, we'll work on Kojiea Mular moves.”
Hiro nodded and gave a bow, then walked off, limping and wishing he had a walking stick. Instead of showering, he dropped into the tub and let the hot water slowly soothe the slowly forming bruises and the old bruises. For a month and a half, he and the instructor had been spending four to nine hours a day training depending on their schedules.
He was about to get out when the the rest of his team walked in and dropped their towels as they greeted him, sliding into the water. Closing his eyes, he leaned back, wishing that they didn't believe in communal baths. Hiro slid under the water until only his nose was above the water and tried to ignore their chatter, discussing their scheduled trip. The generals in charge had consented to a trip every other weekend for them as long as they behaved.
“What style are you learning?” Abe asked when Hiro pulled his head out of the water.
“It's not one style. It's a fusion of many. Since I have more muscle mass and am mostly fully developed, the instructors are pushing me through an advanced schedule. Now be quiet or you all get One Thousand Year Of Pain kanchoes.”
They giggled briefly, going quiet until Osamu said, “Whatever.”
Hiro trapped him between his calves and dunked him under the water, holding him down for almost a minute. When he came up, sputtering and yelling obscenities, Hiro kicked him in the chest. “I said, shut up.”
He stood, wrapping his towel around himself and limping off.
After he dressed, Hiro walked to the exit, making sure he had his identification clipped to his uniform. He had a class in an hour on a training ship moored at the docks, forty minutes away.
He turned up the stereo, the windows visibly flexing as the bass made heads turn.
At the booth, Hiro handed them his identification then drove on when they handed it back. He found a parking place then got out and pulled his cover on, returning the salutes of the enlisted and lieutenants he came across.
He walked up the gangway and requested permission to come aboard. When he was granted permission, Hiro continued on, heading to the Fire Control Center.
Inside, he took his cover off and settled down into the chair as two SDF lieutenants and an Amerikan chief petty officer began the class on how to run the systems. While he wouldn't be using the style, he would still need to be semi-conversant with the equipment a commander might need to come into contact with. There would be many times he could be on a ship, in transit between ORC bases.
When the hours-long class ended, Hiro left the FCC, then headed to the gangplank. There he requested permission to disembark, received it, and headed down to his car, wondering what to do for dinner. His parents were going out of town for the night to Tokyo so his stepfather could be at a symposium the next morning.
Hinata and Kana were out of the city as well, visiting her parents for the weekend. Hiro sighed. He had gotten used to waking up to Kana in his bed with him, curled up against him, waiting for him to awake and help him work on whatever project he was doing or play the HotD4 with her all day, trying to beat his score.
When he got home and finished parking his car, he walked into the house, tossing his cover onto the coat rack they rarely used. In the kitchen, he found five pre-made Bentos and a note from his mother telling him to keep the house clean. He took one from the stack and went up to his room. Inside, he dropped onto his bed and opened his Fragbook. As he checked his gMail and his IMs while away, he used the remote to the audio system in the computer room to cycle through the playlist until he came to the Discovery CD by Daft Punk.
He was writing a reply to his old Japanese teacher when his phone rang. He pulled it out of his bag and said, “Moshi-moshi.” Hanging his head, he replied an affirmative, then stood, walking to his closet as he pulled his uniform off. Piston was short five people and needed help at the shop. When he was done changing, he put up an away message, put the Fragbook back on its laptop cooler stand, then headed down the stairs.
He put the half-empty box back in the fridge then walked out to his car, pulling his hood up. The clouds had gotten heavier and a chill had settled around the neighborhood.
As he cruised towards Piston's shop, Hiro searched for his only Ramones track.
As I Wanna Be Sedated thumped, he pulled up to the shop and hit the switches to open his trunk and both doors. Music filled the air and it sounded like a concert as he leaned against his car, waiting for the song to end.
When the song was over, he walked away from the car as the crew from the car wash next door began detailing his ride. In the shop, Hiro unlocked his toolboxes—he was using one of the bays at the shop, renting it for four thousand yen—and pulled the tools he needed to tear down a fifty-seven hearse that was going to be used in a movie in six months. They were building the show version while the production company was shipping over twenty stunt ones.
Piston pulled him off the dash after an hour and asked, “Can you go pick this up for me? You've got your license to drive large vehicles, right?” Hiro had been talking about getting it before.
“Yeah, why?”
“Our new,” he paused for a second to remember the English word, “semi was delivered. Toshi, drive Hiro-san here.”
They took the company pickup, a heavily decorated and modified Toyota FJ Cruiser, Hiro driving. He had wanted to get behind the wheel of it for a while after Piston had told him it had a twin-turbo V8 from Toyota's GT-One cars and had been modified for off-road racing, though it saw little more action than ferrying parts or customers.
At an offloading area at the port, Hiro and Toshi waited patiently as they finished inspections on the vehicle. Finally it was wheeled out and Hiro saw it. Surprised, he looked harder. It was a Kenmore that had been heavily modified, including a very intricate paintjob on the trailer. Hiro had an idea he had seen the image before, then realized it was a street racer version of the Bandit's trailer from Smokey and the Bandit.
Climbing up in the seat, he took a few minutes to familiarize himself with the pedals and layout of the cabin, then switched on the CB, making sure it was Japanese first. As the diesel engine idled, he saw that the preferred fuel type was on the keys and nodded.
When he was ready, Hiro pulled on the air horn, then followed Toshi out of the port and back to the shop, thinking, Damn, king of the motherfucking road, bitches. I wonder if I can get parking space for one of these for myself? Grinning, he waved back at a kid in a backseat then pulled the horn for him.
His phone rang and she dug it out of her pocket, looking at the screen. A scanned GIF of her and her mother from a purikura sticker the two had done in a trip to a shopping centre flashed on the screen and she answered the phone. “Hi mommy.” She listened for a few moments, gave her a distracted yes, then looked at the three girls dressed in EGL outfits. “Oooh, I want a dress like that,” she murmured.
“What?”
“Oh, sorry mommy. I just saw some pretty dresses.” She listened then said goodbye and hung up as Hiro gestured for his helmet.
A PA spoke to him in broken Japanese and Hiro told him, “I probably speak better English than you.”
Kana giggled as Hiro walked off after an admonishment not to move from that spot. Piston walked up to her and she smiled brightly at him. “Piston-sama. Hiro-kun went that way.”
“I know. He's driving my car for this scene. The director's letting me watch the scenes. Want to come?”
She nodded then said, “But Hiro-kun told me to stay right here.”
“Don't worry. As long as you're with me, it'll be alright. He just didn't want you to get lost.”
“Okay.” Wrapping her hand in his, they walked to where a bank of monitors sat; video beamed from the internal and external cameras and saved on HDDs for later processing.
On three of the monitors, Hiro's helmeted face could be seen, nodding and occasionally moving his lips. There was no sound since a unit on his belt recorded and sent it to a separate station.
“Here.” He handed her a small Walkman like device and she put it on. “--Just make sure that you have the road cleared of non-pros,” she heard Hiro say. While his voice wouldn't be on the movie track, he still needed to keep in touch with the stunt coordinators.
“Shift over a bit,” Piston asked and Kana did so, watching the screens. Hiro's phone had been digging into his crotch.
Piston saw him reach down, then the video began to jiggle, almost unnoticeable. Cameras began moving into place, spectators cleared, and then an AV Idol trying to break into the mainstream walked out in a schoolgirl outfit to start the race.
Piston held Kana from bouncing as they heard the two cars rev, his RX8's twin-turbo I6 a whiny, almost annoying, growl.
The girl dropped the flag but neither took off. The director yelled cut and another women, this time not very attractive but a trained stunt woman, took the AV Idol's place and waited for her cue. Action was called again and she dropped to a crouch, spinning so she could see as the cars accelerated away, keeping her face offscreen.
Hiro looked over at the other driver and nodded. The man pulled forward as Hiro kept on his right, the two sliding in and out of the staged traffic.
On the last few monitors, they saw Hiro accelerate hard, drafting behind the first car then pulling out and drifting around a corner before accelerating hard again and taking the lead.
The director called cut as Hiro spun the wheel and hit the emergency brake, slewing the car then losing traction and spinning. The car came to an almost perfectly aligned stop next to a small billboard advertising Naruto.
The director went wild. “Did we get that?! Is that on tape!? That was fucking awesome!!”
The director of photography had been watching over Piston's shoulder who was looking quite incensed. The director gave a thumbs up as Piston began gritting his teeth. Even though he over-engineered his car, he was planning to kill Hiro.
Hiro got out of the car and grinned as he pulled the helmet off, shaking the sweat off his hair. Only a two minute long drive, there had been more stress in it than in any other race he had ever been in.
The director, trailed by a dozen other people from the movie, were coming towards him, the director almost diabetically kind as he praised Hiro for the stunt, telling him they had got it on tape and it was definitely going to be in the movie.
As Hiro walked back with them, another PA came up and said, “The girl for the EGL scene isn't here.”
“Which girl?”
“The ten year old, sir.”
The director saw Kana and said, “Hey, you.”
“Her name's Kana,” Hiro told him as Kana scampered over.
“You want to be in the movie?”
Kana nodded excitedly and looked up at Hiro. He was her guardian with a letter of proof giving him temporary custody. He shrugged and said, “Fine with me for the most part. What happens in the scene?”
The director told him and he nodded. A female PA led Kana off to get dressed as Piston approached Hiro, fire in his eyes and fists clenched.
General Kohichi walked in and took the seat across from the scientist. “How goes the final modifications?”
“We've just finished the last one. They're being loaded up for going to the training center.” They weren't going to let the public see the vehicles until they absolutely had to. The training center was on a man-made island, deep in the Amazon in an area owned by one of the corporations that helped build the robot factories that built the vehicles.
They would spend one month there, then come back and finish training with the simulators.
Kohichi picked up the magazine, surprised. He had thought it was a technical journal.
“Hiro.” His mother's voice. He ignored her and pulled the bottle of orange juice out of the fridge, drinking straight from the bottle. “Hiro-chan,” she called, making fun of him by using the female diminutive. “Get out here.”
He walked into the sitting room and realized they had company. Both of his parents' parents were visiting. “Hey, slugger,” his Amerikan grandmother said. She was a tomboy still.
“Grandma. What're you doing here? I thought you two were on that six month cruise?”
His mother's parents said, “They're docked for two days. We arranged to visit at the same time since you're eighteen in a month.”
“Great. But I have to change. The general's car is picking me up in an hour.”
“General?” Grandmother Asahi asked.
He gave a short bow and disappeared up the stairs instead of answering. Music began filtering down as Kana changed the subject back to the cruise.
There was a knock on the door as Hiro walked down the stairs, picking lint off his cover.
His grandparents stared at him in his uniform as he pulled his cover into place and opened the door, then returned the salute from the sergeant driver.
When Hiro came back down from the apartment, on his arm was a one-hundred-fifty-seven centimeter bombshell of an AV Idol with J-cup breasts that translated to H-cup in Amerika poured into a very slinky black and gold gown that offset Hiro's white and blue dress uniform well. The driver had a stunned and very jealous look
As they headed to the restaurant being used for the party, his date practiced her English with him, making him laugh when she said, “I am wanting to suck.” She had been trying to say she was wanting a drink as soon as they got there. He corrected it for her as she wrapped her arm in his.
When they arrived, he whispered her name to the announcer then he called out, “Commander Hanfuri Hiro and date, Shizuoka Gara.” (A competent researcher should be able to figure out who this hottie is based on with all the information I've provided. -Writer)
Hiro introduced her to a few people then soon the two found themselves slowly making their way to the quieter—surprisingly quieter considering what it was—karaoke bar.
“I like you,” she whispered in his ear. “You don't molest me like most guys. Come back to my place?” The party was winding down as it was almost one in the morning.
He thought for a moment. Hinata had never said anything about being a couple. His mother—unsurpringly since she had caught him having sex at fourteen—had taped a handful of condoms in his cover earlier that day. “I would love to,” he said as they made their way to the front door and the valet called their driver.
He was halfway up the stairs when Kamon said, “Morning. How was the party?” It had been for the military personnel only.
He groaned and continued up the stairs.
Late that evening, Hiro came down the stairs, yawning and scratching his back. In the kitchen, he poured himself a glass of water from the fridge, then headed back for the stairs to go back to sleep. He was stopped by his mother and Kamon. “Your birthday present is here early, Hi-Hi,” his mother said, using the nickname she rarely ever used.
“Oh. Um, alright.”
“It's outside.”
Hiro nodded and went up to get dressed. When he came back down, Kane put her hands over his eyes and guided him outside. “Surprise.” When her hands moved away, his eyes went wide. In their driveway was a Suzuki Hayabusa in black, the badging and logo painted out as well. He could see some modifications had been made right off but they looked good.
“A motorcycle?”
“Well, I didn't like the idea, but you always talked about buying one and I knew I wouldn't be able to stop you,” his mother admitted. She hadn't had problems with him dirt biking but riding motorcycles in Kalifornia traffic was tantamount to suicide.
Hiro raced into the house, then came out, tugging his boots on and hopping. He grabbed his helmet out of the garage and pulled it on as he swung his leg over and kicked up the stand.
