EIGHTEEN:What the boys do with their time.
Rick Fujimori staggered up out of bed as the alarm clock blared.
"Dang it, I forgot to turn it off. I don't need to be up now. It's a Saturday," he muttered. "Well...I'm awake. Might as well stay up," he muttered and staggered to the bathroom to dash cold water on his face. After tying his hair into it's customary pony tail and slinging it over his shoulder he returned to his room and got dressed. Arriving downstairs in the dining room he found his entire family surrounding the table and eating feverishly.
"What are you all doing up so early?" He asked.
"Eating of course," his father replied. "You can be pretty stupid sometimes."
"Hey....Rick....have a seat and we'll talk Red Wolf style," Kino said.
"What are you talking about?" Rick asked.
"Red Wolf," Kino replied slyly.
Rick had no clue what Kino was saying.
"Um...I'm going for a walk," Rick said and hurried out. My family must be the
strangest on the planet. Jeez...it's six A.M. and they're all up eating. What is
the deal? Oh...well.
Mike Leslie woke up hours later, but it was a very rude awakening.
"Mike! Get up before I tear off your arms and beat you with them!" His father yelled.
"What is it?" Mike muttered rising slowly form his bed.
"We need to harvest the corn!" His father said.
"We don't have any corn!" Mike said.
"Yeah, I know, but I just thought you should wake up," his father said and walked away. Mike could hear him calling to his mother.
"Woman! Why is there water on the floor? What do you mean the dog did it? Why
would he dump water on the floor? Oh...that's not water...I
see.....well...um...I'd better clean that up then," his father said. Mike slowly
got dressed. He loved his parents. His father was a well paid lawyer, who also
was kind of nuts. While he called his wife, Woman constantly, it was just a
playful game they had played since they'd met, or at least that what was Mike
was told. His mother was kind and always playing along with his father's various
rantings. There was no anger behind him when he yelled, it was all in good fun.
Still, Mike wouldn't have minded waking up on his own. Soon he was out the door
and off in search of whoever he could find in the city.
Steve Carlin had slipped out of the house before his parents woke up. His father, Tokyo University's head football coach, wasn't any fun on a Saturday Morning. He had a lot on his mind since he had a game that afternoon. In fact, the coach always slept in and then raced out the door without breakfast, but Steve had found that this was also the time when he was most likely to get yelled at for some reason, it was just the pressure on his father that did it, not meaness. Steve's mother for some reason hated Saturday mornings and spent the entire time complaining about them. Steve really didn't want to hear that either. So off he went. It took him only a few minutes to arrive at Prince Endymion's Hobby and Rocket shop. The small store tucked into a ramshackle former apartment complex wasn't much, but it was all he needed to supply him with the latest in rocketry products. He walked in and found Mike and Rick both standing there in front of a ten foot tall missile painted silver.
"I sware, if you ever try and buy that I'll kick your teeth out, catch them and then feed em to you," Rick was saying.
"Oh come on, it's harmless," Mike said.
"Yeah, it is. Sitting right there," Rick said.
"Hello," Steve said.
"Heyyyyyyyyy!" Mike said.
"What was that all about?" Steve asked.
"Don't know, don't care, don't ask," Mike replied.
"Well, looks like the gang's all here," said the voice of Kyle, the owner of the store who had emerged from the back. "I see you guys are admiring the Silver Bullet again."
"Yeah, but I'm not letting them get their hands on it," Rick said.
"A wise choice," Kyle said.
"Ehh....what do we need that for anyway, we can do as much damage with normal sized rockets," Mike said.
"Darn tootin," Steve said and then thought a minute. "Why am I agreeing with you?" he asked. "I hate it when the rockets go wrong."
"Ehh...you like it and you know it," Mike said.
"What can I get for you Steve?" Kyle asked.
"We need a 7-40 rocket engine. The last six we bought sorta got used up," Steve said.
"As in used up launching a rocket really really high, and then exploding," Mike added.
"What did I say about mentioning that?" Steve snapped.
"Boy I'm glad I'm not involved in those rocket experiements very often," Rick
said.
Later that afternoon the three were in Central Junior High's athletic field. Steve was carefully loading the engine into the back of a rocket.
"Now, this shouldn't do anything weird. It's a simple rocket, no modifications, single engine," Steve said. "This should fly a few feet and then drop harmlessly down well within the limits of the field," he said.
"If you say so," Mike said.
"Give it a shot," Rick said.
"Here goes," Steve said and lit the engine. The rocket surged off the launch pad and was suddenly carried off by a massive gust of wind.
"Uh oh," Mike said.
"Where's it going?" Steve shouted in annoyance.
"City Hall," Rick said.
"City Hall?" Mike asked.
"Uh huh," Rick said.
"Well...so much for this experiment," Mike muttered.
"Uh huh," Mike said.
"Why me?" Steve muttered in disbelief.
A few minutes later the three emerged from the Governor of Tokyo's office. He was still yelling as they backed out of the office.
"Sorry sir," The three said. The now expired rocket flew out of the office and hit Steve in the head.
"Thank you sir," Steve muttered and the three hurried down the hall. As they walked out of the twin towered structure Mike frowned.
"You know. He was a lot nicer when he was campaigning," he said.
"Shut up," Steve muttered.
"I'd never met someone so powerful before. Wow," Rick said with mock joy.
"I will avenge myself upon you two," Steve muttered.
"Hey, we didn't build the rocket," Mike said.
"We have to face facts though. We're dangerous to society," Rick said.
"True, but we weren't the ones building the rocket," Mike said.
"True," Rick said.
A half an hour later the three were eating lunch at a restaurant.
"So...what should we do after lunch?" Mike asked.
"Well...let's see. We've already launched a missile at the Governor, maybe we should visit the Emperor next," Rick said.
"Yeah, I mean maybe we could sing a song for the Emperor or something. I'm sure that would make his day," Mike said.
"You two are crazy. I should go find Lita. Maybe she wants to do something," Steve said.
"Yeah after all, what is a day with your two best friends when you can go out with Lita?" Mike asked showing signs of indignance.
"Oh come on Mike, if Mina came walking down the street right now you'd be out there with her in a second," Rick said.
"Yeah I would, now you see your problem Steve is you don't know where your loyalties lie," Mike continued.
"You just contradicted your own point you idiot!" Steve said.
"Now I didn't, I'm a hypocrite by nature, but you....you are the man, you don't throw away your best friends for a girl. Never," Mike said gallantly.
"And you do?" Steve asked.
"All the time," Mike said. "But I can still be an impartial judge of other people's character."
"Heh....you know what I miss....chick hunting," Rick said.
"Yeah..that was great," Mike said.
"Hmm....it was fun," Steve said.
"Just the three of us, looking for girls, and you two not finding any," Rick said.
"Hey!" The other two said.
"Yeah, but now the old ball and chain is keeping me down," Rick aid. "My freedom has been curtailed."
"Been what?" Steve asked.
"Curtailed, stopped, you know. I curtailed the car at the stop sign. That kind of thing," Rick said.
"What a stupid sentence. You don't curtail a car," Mike said.
"Well I do. I'm a radical. I do not conform to society," Rick said.
"Is that why ten people in this restaurant have the same shirt as you on," Mike said. Rick looked around and realized that Mike was right.
"Uh...they....are....fellow....non conformists I'm sure," he muttered.
A few hours later the group found themselves standing in front of Patterson's house.
"Why are we here?" Rick asked.
"This is dangerous," Mike said. "I mean...he could kill us with a push of a button, I'm sure of that."
"Never mind that. Patterson got injured in a fighting accident, you know that. He told us at school. I just thought since we're supposedly his friends we should just say hello and see how the recovery's coming," Steve said.
"Yeah, we're his friends all right. He doesn't trust anyone," Mike said.
"He hardly says a word," Rick said.
"It's his way. Besides he helps me get better grades in History. I'm not knocking it," Steve said and rang the doorbell.
"Yes?" came a reply from inside.
"Uh hi, I bet you can see who we are, so I don't have to introduce myself, but I was just here to say hello to D.V," Steve said.
"Ah...I see...well he'll come out and say hello, but remember, I've got you covered," the voice said.
"I read you loud and clear," Steve said.
"And keep your hands where I can see them," The voice said as the door opened and D.V. emerged still limping with his cane.
"Hi," Steve said.
"Hello, Steve," Patterson replied. "How are you?"
"Fine, you?"
"Aside from this da-," he paused. "That is dang limp, I'm all right."
"That's good. I just thought I'd ask," Steve said.
"That's...um..courteous," Patterson said, his scowl expression not changing.
"Um...well..I won't keep you any longer," Steve said.
"Sure," Patterson said and turned to go in.
"Hey, Patterson, do you think of us as your friends?" Mike asked bluntly. Patterson turned back to them.
"I like to think that you're not my enemies, for what it's worth," Patterson replied.
"Uh..well...see you around," Mike said.
"Yeah...take it easy," Rick said. Patterson went back inside and closed the door. The three walked away.
"That is a creepy guy," Mike said.
"He's been hurt by the world and he's responding accordingly," Steve said.
"Yeah, who can blame him. Your parents get killed when your young, I can understand him, but he'll never have fun with his life. That's sad," Rick said.
"Oh well.....say guys...can I ask you something?" Mike asked.
"Go ahead," Steve said.
"Rememeber when there was that big battle at school and we were running away because we knew we couldn't do anything," Mike said.
"Yeah," the two said.
"Well...remember how we were looking for the girls and we didn't see them?" Mike asked.
"Yeah, so?" Rick asked.
"Well.....then we found them right near the school when we decided to head back to see what had happened?" Mike asked.
"Yeah, so?" Steve said.
"Well....what if..." Mike said.
"What if what?" Rick said.
"What if the reason they were near the school was that they were...." Mike said.
"You've got to be joking," Rick said.
"Yeah...there's no chance," Steve said.
"But....isn't it a little bit of a coincedence that..." Mike said.
"Hardly, we were back at that the school too, the girls could have thought the same thing we did," Rick said.
"Yeah," Steve agreed.
"But there were five of them all toghether near the school right after a battle involving five Sailor Scouts," Mike said. This made the other two pause. They each glanced at each other.
"Nah!" The three said at once.
"That can't be," Mike said.
"Not a chance in the world," Rick said.
"Impossible," Steve said. The three looked at each other uneasily and then began to laugh.
"We've become neurotic or something," Rick said.
"Lets go find something to do," Steve said.
"Yeah, before we go insane," Mike said.
The three walked up over the crest of the hill and noticed at the bottom a threesome of girls sitting at on a bench looking bored. It took them only seconds to realize who they were, and only seconds more to race down the hill towards them. The girls in turn didn't miss the sight of their three boyfriends.
"Well...there you are Rick," Raye said.
"Yeah..well..I've had a busy day," Rick said.
"Really...I can't wait to hear about it," Raye said.
"Oh, believe me, you will," Rick said.
"So Steve, what's that bruise on your head from?" Lita asked.
"Oh...nothing," Steve said rubbing the spot where the rocket had hit him on the head thanks to the very accurate throw from the Governor earlier.
"Mike, why do you have a sign on your back that says "kick me?" Mina asked.
"What?" Mike said and glanced at Rick and Steve who were both laughing.
"You had that on you since lunch," Rick said and laughed.
"That explains why that guy in the trench coat...oh never mind..." Mike said.
With that the three different couples went off in different directions as the
sunset over the city.