Patlabor Fan Fiction ❯ Personal Files ❯ Ep. 1-14 ( Chapter 1 )

[ P - Pre-Teen ]

Imported From: RAAC
"David A. Tatum" <desaix@sysnet.net>


Abbreviated forward: This is an Alternate Universe fanfic, but only
because of a lack of knowledge about the stuff I don't own and a desire to
use everything I do. Essentially, I'm writing this fanfic based on the
following things: Classic Series (Original Series), Tapes 1-3 (7 eps.) and
New Series (The TV Series) Tapes 1 and 2 (10 eps.), merged together;
Setting that merger before Movie 1; Setting The New Files boxed set (16
episodes on 5 tapes) OAV after Movie 1 (despite knowing that New Files
technically takes place at various points during the New Series episodes I
don't own), and saying that Movie 2 will happen at some point late in this
series (why? Well, a large motivation for writing this series is to guess
about what happened between New Files (or Movie 1, I suppose, but that's
going back in time) and Movie 2). If I ever get more of any of the various
series or OAVs (New Series, mostly, is what I'm looking for), then I might
include those as well, assuming it's possible. Oh, btw, if anyone has a
SD-Patlabor .gif or .jpg, can you let me know? I try and put a SD pic by
all the major series on my homepage, and so would like one for this fic,
since I think it'll become a pretty large series before the end (though
might not...).

Ah, well... enough notes. Here's the fanfic...


Patlabor: Personal Files
An Episodic Patlabor Fanfic by David A. Tatum
Disclaimer: Insert legal junk here...

Episode 01: Another Transfer

December 28, 1999

The entire Special Vehicles company was assembled for the ceremony.
Gomioka, the guest of honor, sat at the long table in front of the
assembled crowd between his wife and Captain Gotoh. He was having a hard
time keeping his eyes forward, towards the audience, like he was supposed
to. Instead, he kept looking nervously at the podium, where Captain Nagumo
was about to make her announcement.

"...And with the formation of the Third Unit, I am pleased to announce the
promotion of one of my best Labor pilots. Without further ado, let me
present... CAPTAIN Gomioka!"

Shinobu stepped back and to her right while gesturing towards the
microphone. Gomioka slowly stood up and walked up to the lectern,
accidentally brushing by her as she moved to her seat next to Gotoh.
Clearing his throat a little, he waited for the clapping to die down before
he addressed the assembly.

"This was... completely unexpected. When I heard that the Special Vehicles
division was forming a third unit, I was certain that I would not be
selected as its commander- I figured a command car officer or a desk
officer from outside of Special Vehicles would be promoted into the slot.
I certainly didn't expect I'D be the one to be promoted... But now that I
am, I want to thank those who brought me here- My command car officer,
Akito Kenichi; my transport driver, Tazaki Hiroaki; and, most especially,
the person who recommended me for the job- Captain Nagumo." He paused for
the polite applause that followed. "I will do my best to not fail the
trust the Special Vehicles division, and my former captain, has placed in
me." He winced at his own words, but recovered in order to finish with a
"Thank you" before returning to his seat. He noticed Gotoh looking at him
oddly when he first mentioned Shinobu, and he still felt the stare of the
odd commander of Unit Two as he sat down. 'What is his problem, anyway?'
he wondered, as he whispered something into Shinobu's ear. He saw her nod,
and she stood up and went back to the podium.

"That is all for today," she began. "But the members of Unit Two and Akito
Kenichi are asked to stay behind for a moment. Dismissed."

The maintainance squad, most of Unit One's personnel, and most of the
guests (including Kanuka Clancy, who had flown back from the states on
Gomioka's invitation- the two of them had formed a pretty decent friendship
based on mutual admiration of skill and professionalism) stood up and
walked to the reception area in order to stuff their faces. Asuma
Shinohara snorted.

"Great, now we aren't going to get anything to eat," he muttered to Noa,
the young redhead sitting to his right, barely relaxing her shoulder into
his.

"Maybe it won't take too long," she soothed, despite being slightly annoyed
herself. It wasn't often they had anything other than fish, tomatoes, or
chinese takeout at the Special Vehicles headquarters.

Ohta, sitting behind the two of them, raged. "Will you two think without
your stomaches for once! This could be serious!"

Shinohara rolled his eyes. "Relax, Ohta... it's not like I was going to
walk out of this meeting, after all."

Noa nodded, frowning. "Besides, it's hard to think when you're hungry."

"I'll save some for you all! This looks like business, so I'm going on
ahead," Tamiko, Shinshi's wife, announced.

"I'll see you later, honey," Shinshi said, smiling. His smile became
nervous as he realized his wife was waiting for him to do more, and kissed
her goodbye, blushing fiercely.

Tamiko immediately became her bouncy and energetic self. "Bye, Miki!" she
exhaulted, hugging him fiercely in return before dashing out to join the
party.

"'Bye, Miki,'" Ohta mocked. "What a pathetic display! Police officers
should not be married- it distracts them from their work."

Gomioka, hearing Ohta's comments, frowned. His wife, following Shinshi's
wife out the door, spun around. "Excuse me?!" she screached. "Do you mean
that my husband should never have married me?!"

Ohta backed away from the enraged female. "Uh, no! I mean... uh... sorry,
Mrs. Gomioka...."

"Hmph," she snorted angrily, turning to leave. "Well, you should be!"

Hiromi just looked around nervously during the whole exchange, worried that
another fight was going to break out between Ohta and Shinshi- the last one
had been over Noa's game of catch, and had resulted in a softball flying
into his chicken cage. Akemi still hadn't recovered her old egg
production, she had been so scared.

Akito Kenichi just looked around him, wondering why he had been left with
all these crazy people.

Gotoh, who somehow had made it to up to the lectern without anyone else
noticing, tapped the microphone to get everyones attention. "Um, excuse
me, but I think we should get down to business, and maybe we'll make it out
of here before the maintainance squad attacks poor Tamiko for hording the
food she promised for us." Everyone quieted down and turned their
attention to the podium. "With the promotion of Gomioka and the formation
of the new unit, we are forced to re-organize personel in order to provide
him with at least one veteran team. So, Mr. Kenichi, you are joining your
former pilot. You will report to the Third Unit tommorow. You can go now,
unless you want to know who your new partners will be." Akito looked
longingly at the door, but decided he'd wait at least until he knew who his
new Labor pilot would be. "We'll promote Tazaki to take your place in the
first unit, and add a rookie pilot and driver to replace him and Gomioka.
Now, as far as Unit 2 is concerned... one pilot and one driver will be
leaving my unit to join Unit 3."

The low chatter that had been going on since Gotoh had started talking
ceased, and everyone looked at him with widening eyes, waiting for him to
continue.

Kumagami stepped forward and turned around to face the rest of the unit.
"This was a hard choice, but it was for the best. I felt as if Shinohara
had better chemistry with his team, and I think I would be better at
adapting rookies to the Special Vehicles division, so... Ohta, Shinshi... I
enjoyed the time we've had together, but I am afraid that I volunteered you
to the Third Unit."

Shinshi made a face. "You mean I'm being transferred but I STILL have to
put up with this marraige-hater? Ugh!"

Ohta looked stricken- not at Shinshi's words, but at Kumagami's
announcement. Slowly, he stood and turned to leave the room.

"Hey, Ohta- you were not dismissed!" Gomioka snapped.

He spun around and looked Gomioka straight in the eye. "With all due
respects, SIR, I am still a member of Unit 2 until tomorrow- and unless one
of them orders me to stay, I am leaving. Goodbye." With that, he slowly
marched out of the doors into the parking lot, not even bothering to spare
a glance at the door leading to the reception. Everyone's eyes followed
him in shock.

"What's wrong with Ohta?" Noa asked, voicing the question in everyone's
head.

Shinohara grimaced, looking around. "Come on," he said, tugging her
shoulder to indicate she should follow him.

* * * * *

A bus pulled to a stop outside of the small plot of reclaimed land that
served as Special Vehicle's headquarters. Seven people stepped out and
looked around in wonder.

"We have to work in this hell-hole from now on?" a disagreeable young man
with a mop of hair on his head groaned.

Another young man who's nose looked like it had been broken about a dozen
times snorted. "Shut up, Mashimo. You've done nothing but complain since
we went to labor training."

"You shut up too, Seiroku!" Mashimo shouted. "You've been complaining just
as much!"

"Yes, but I've been justified!" Seiroku replied.

"Um, excuse me," a cute female voice broke in. "Can you two please settle
this argument inside? It's cold out here, and I don't want to be late."

The two arguing men looked at her at the same time. She had curly hair
which made her even more cute than she already was as her wide eyes looked
down her button nose imploringly.

"Um... right," they both said at once, glaring at each other once more
before turning and leading the rest of them into the large warehouse-like
building down the road in front of them.

* * * * *

"Ohta?" Noa began cautiously, Shinohara standing behind her. The other
labor pilot didn't move a muscle when she called his name. "Ohta, what's
wrong?"

"Yeah, Ohta... Normally, you couldn't be happier if you got promoted,"
Shinohara commented.

"Promoted?" Ohta replied hoarsely. "What do you mean, 'promoted?'"

"Your transfer means you'll be the senior labor pilot," Asuma noted.

Ohta turned to face them and laughed sadly. For the first time, the two
who had come to check up on him saw the bottle of sake he was cradling in
his lap, almost empty. "Oh, really? Shinohara, you, of all people, should
know that isn't true. You were with me when we left Unit 1." Ohta took
the last swig of his bottle before continuing. "They said the exact same
thing- that the transfer was not a punishment, despite what they said about
the other team working better together, but a promotion- I'd be the senior
labor pilot in Captain Gotoh's squadron- I'd have command of labor one,
after all!" He snorted. "That lasted all of two weeks. When the new
labors arrived, along with your girlfriend over there, guess where I was
again? Back in labor number two, and a rookie was made senior over me!"
Sighing, he leaned back. "This is just like the last time- I'm being moved
into the new unit because the other team works better together, but I'm not
supposed to worry because I'll be the senior labor pilot. Sorry, I don't
believe that- I think you all are just trying to get rid of me!"

Noa blushed. 'Girlfriend?' she asked herself. Looking at her partner, she
couldn't tell for herself if it was true or not. They seemed to do just
about everything together, and they were very comfortable together- there
had been times when they were so relaxed sitting back to back that one or
the other of them would just fall asleep. She also remembered one vacation
right before a civil war had broken out- she had been wondering if piloting
Alphonse was enough of a reason to stay in the Special Vehicles division
and risk her life on a near daily basis. Then Asuma had called, asking if
she wanted to get together and do something, and she was so excited that
he'd called... she knew then that he, too, was part of why she stayed in
the SV2. She smiled, remembering how she knew her father was jealous of
her for having someone like Shinohara nearby all of the time. Then that
war made her put aside all the thoughts she'd had in that little time
they'd spent together. So she knew he meant something to her... still, he
seemed to act as little more than what he said- a friend- and he always
seemed to be more interested in Kanuka than anyone else. But did he? What
was all of that about a pilot and command car needing to function as 'two
in one?' And did she think of him as more than a friend herself?

Shinohara, however, had missed that little accusation about his
relationship with Noa. He was thinking too much about the rest of what
Ohta had said. "Get rid of you? Ohta, is that what you think we want?
You're our friend! We might sometimes think you're a bit uptight, or that
you're too obsessed with guns, but we certainly don't want you gone!"

"Oh?!" Ohta shouted accusingly. "Prove it to me! Help me stay with the
Second unit!"

"How?" Asuma asked.

"I... I don't know..." Ohta admitted, breaking down.

Asuma thought about it for a second. "Well, I don't think I can do that...
but there might be something else I can do. Noa!"

Noa blinked, looking at him in surprise. While wondering if she was his
girlfriend, she had forgotten he was standing right there- in fact, she
forgot why they were there.

"Um, uh... Yes, Asuma?"

"Come on, we've got to talk to Captain Gomioka."

"Uh, right... coming, Asuma."

* * * * *

The seven people who had left the bus stood at attention in front of
Special Vehicle's three captains. Gomioka and Shinobu were inspecting the
uniforms of the assembled people, while Gotoh sat with his feet on his
desk, casually looking at the new recruits from his chair.

"Name?" Gomioka asked.

"Joudo Ishikawa, sir," a short, thin, balding man answered. Despite having
lost some hair, he appeared to be in his mid-twenties.

"Name?"

"Yamane Seiroku," the man with a broken nose spat out.

"Name?"

"Natsume Kawai, sir," the cute young girl who had been cold replied.

"Name?"

"Kenji Iguchi, sir," a nondescript man shrugged. He doubted anyone would
remember his name in the morning.

"Name?"

"Yoshi Tobe, sir," a man who's looks would be pleasant if it weren't for a
scar over his left eye.

"Name?"

"Koichi Miyagi, SIR!" came the enthusiastic response of a man with a
friendly looking smile.

"Name?"

"Ueki Mashimo," the disagreeable mop-haired man said, yawning.

Gomioka and Shinobu finished their inspection and stepped out from the new
recruits and nodded to them. "Well, it is too late to do much more today.
Tomorrow, we will divide you among the various units and you can begin
learning your duties," Shinobu announced. "There are three slots in Unit 3
with Captain Gomioka, and two slots each in Units 1 and 2, commanded by
Captain Gotoh and myself. I suggest you settle down into your quarters and
get some rest- tomorrow will be a big day for all of you. Dismissed."

The rookies shuffled out of the room slowly, mumbling to themselves.

"Well, what do you think?" Shinobu asked both Gomioka and Gotoh.

"A typical bunch of rookies- you have some troublemakers, some
exceptionally well disciplined people, and a few people who are harmless
but probably not very good policemen," Gotoh considered. "But we'll know
more tomorrow."

"Uh..." Gomioka muttered, not sure of how to proceed. "Well, I've never
had to worry about this sort of thing before, but... I think they'll do all
right." In truth, he thought Gotoh's assessment was pretty accurate, but
he needed to say something.

Before anyone could continue, a knocking erupted from the office door.
"Come in!" Gotoh called.

Shinohara and Noa burst into the door. "Well, we found out why Ohta was so
upset."

The three captains looked at one another and blinked. "Well?" Shinobu
prompted, curious despite not being involved in the whole situation.

"Captain Gomioka, do you remember when he was the junior labor pilot in
Unit 1?" Shinohara asked. Gomioka nodded, and he continued. "Well, do
you remember what we all told him when he and I were transferred to form
the nucleus of Unit 2?"

"No..." the captain replied, thinking. "Can't say I do."

"Well, we told him that he was being transferred because the senior labor
crew had better chemistry, but he that he wasn't being punished- he was
being promoted to the senior labor pilot of the second unit. When Noa
arrived, however, she was made the senior pilot despite his greater
experience. He believes we are doing the same thing again."

Gotoh's eyes widened as he heard this. "And why did no-one tell me he was
promised this when they transferred him to my command?"

Shinobu looked embarrassed. "Er... my apologies... I didn't even think
about it."

Gomioka frowned. "So what does this mean?"

Shinohara bit his lower lip. "Captain Gomioka, do you think you make
certain that there is no competition for senior labor pilot in the third
unit- that you assign that position to Ohta irregardless of how the rookies
do?"

The new captain had no clue how to handle that request. He knew from their
days together that Ohta was a reckless, overbearing man who was obsessed
over the labor's firearms, and it would probably be irresponsible to
promise such a position to a man like that. But... he looked up into
Shinobu's eyes, and saw the guilt she felt over the situation. She had
made a promise, and had forgotten about it- and that caused the current
mess. He could not just do nothing for her when he had a choice.

"Very well, Mr. Shinohara," he said, nodding to the young man. "Go and
tell him that he cannot be displaced as senior pilot because of the
rookies' contest tomorrow."

* * * * *

"I'm... sorry for having said what I did, Shinohara," Ohta said, walking
with Asuma and Noa towards the reception area. They had all given up hope
of getting any food, but at least they could join in on the fun and
entertainment before it was over. "I do not really believe you were trying
to get rid of me- I was just..."

"Relax- I know you were upset, but don't worry about it. Captain Gomioka
promised me that he would not let the same thing happen to you this time.
Now, come on and have some fun- this is your last day with Unit 2. Enjoy
it with us."

They entered the party, already in progress. Tamiko, dragging her husband
behind her, immediately ran up to them. "There you three are!" she
effervesced. "I've barely been able to keep these for you!" With that,
the turned to her husband and took three plates full of food from him,
handing them to Noa, Asuma, and Ohta in a flash. "Come on, eat up! Enjoy
yourself!" With that, she returned to the center of the party, mingling
with the other party-goers. Music was playing and people were dancing in
one corner of the room, and Noa grabbed Shinohara off so that they could
get in a dance or two when they finished their food (not that she had
decided that she was his girlfriend or anything, she reminded herself, but
they DID do this sort of thing together every now and then). Ohta looked
dumbstruck, however, as Hiromi, Kumagami, and Kanuka approached him.

"Ohta, I'm glad to see you are feeling better," Hiromi said, putting one of
his giant hands on the other man's shoulder. "I will miss having you as a
part of our family here in the Second Unit, but you are always welcome to a
tomato when I pick them!"

"I'm sorry to force you out when you obviously did not want to go,"
Kumagami comforted, also placing her hand on Ohta's shoulder. "I think,
however, that your experience will serve the Third Unit greatly."

Kanuka smiled slyly at Ohta. "I don't particularly care if you leave the
second unit or not, Ohta." She turned and started to walk away. Looking
over her shoulder, she continued, "After all, that means I'll have an
excuse to start shaping up another one of these shoddy Japanese Patlabor
units..."

Ohta smiled, a few small tears forming in the corners of his eyes. No,
Unit Two was not trying to get rid of him. Making a mental note to try and
keep in touch with everyone, he walked with them into the middle of the
party.

-------------------------
Episode 1 Closing Notes:
Don't worry about the new characters taking over- they're mostly extras,
with one or two protagonists thrown in. And don't worry about me ignoring
any of the main characters- I plan on dealing with all THREE units about
evenly.

Next Episode:
The new recruits get transferred to the various units, and Kanuka visits
her grandmother.

----------------------------------------------------- -----------------------

Sir Desaix, member # 116 of the Knights of the True Fiancee
desaix@sysnet.net
http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Acropolis /7872
fanfics available at
http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Acropolis/7872/fanfics.htm

----

"David A. Tatum" <desaix@sysnet.net>


Patlabor: Personal Files
An Episodic Patlabor Fanfic by David A. Tatum
Disclaimer: Insert legal junk here...

Episode 02: The Tournament

December 29, 1999

Takeo Kumagami stood before the captains' office, report in hand. She made
three quick raps, and waited. "Enter!" Gomioka's voice echoed through the
door. She stepped in and looked around. Gomioka was the only person in
the room, busily putting files into the drawer of his new desk.

"Where's Captain Gotoh?" she asked.

"Outside with Captain Nagumo," he sighed, grimacing. "They're getting
everything prepared for the placement tournament today. We got the
training labors ready this morning for the combat to be held in, but they
still need to get the awning set up for the tournament's spectators, and
didn't want to wait for everyone else to wake up."

"You don't seem too happy about it," Kumagami observed, smiling slightly.

"Huh?" He blinked, only just realizing he had been frowning. "Oh, I'm
just annoyed that I can't join them. Too much to do in order to set up the
new unit."

"Oh? Do you want me to help you out?"

Gomioka considered her for a moment. "Perhaps you can. When they offered
you the command, did you think of things like what type of labors you would
request, or whether you would want two four-hour shifts a day or one
eight-hour shift, should you be given that option? Or what sort of basic
rules you would establish?"

"Hmm..." Kumagami considered. "No, I was too busy trying to decide if I
wanted to take the job or not, but I can probably help you at least with
the labor question. I'd order two Ingrams and one Peacemaker."

"You would? Why?"

She smiled. "Well, I've hung around Shinohara a bit, and he seems to know
quite a bit about the technical details of our labors. I've heard him
explain it before. It's like making a choice between a manual or an
automatic car- a manual transmission has much better handling and works
much smoother than an automatic, IF you're familiar with it, though an
automatic is easier to use, regardless. The Ingram is like a manual,
whereas the Zero is like an automatic. Given that the Academy still only
has the Ingram trainers, I'd say the cadets will probably know the controls
well enough to put it to good effect."

Gomioka nodded. "Makes sense... but then why get the Peacemaker?"

Kumagami shrugged. "It doesn't happen very often, but occasionally the
second unit has needed to use all three labors in its operations. If your
team ever encounters a similar situation, one of the command car officers
would need to pilot it, and since they rarely get time inside of a labor
unless the unit is having a refresher course at the Academy, it would be
better for them to get one which would work pretty good whether you're
familiar with the controls or not."

Gomioka nodded. "I think I'll take your suggestion," he said, writing down
something on a form in front of him. "Too bad I can't make this order
until the factory re-opens on the second. It's already supposed to be
three weeks at the earliest before they'll be able to send me the new
labors, and until they do my unit will have to use the old 97's we had
mothballed from before the Zeros showed up." He sighed. "So, any chance
you can help me with my other problems?"

She smiled, walking over to Gotoh's desk and setting her report on his
chair for when he got back. "Sorry, but I've got other things to take care
of. I'm supposed to give the pre-tournament lecture to the cadets in five
minutes, so I've got to get going. I'd suggest you ask Shinobu for advice,
however. Don't ask Gotoh, though- while he's a good captain, his methods
are... unconventional, and probably wouldn't work for you."

"Ask... Captain Nagumo... for advice. Yes, that sounds like a good idea.
Thank you, Officer Kumagami."

"Any time, Captain Gomioka..."

* * * * *

"Are you sure you don't want to stick around and see the tournament,
Kanuka? It seems a shame for you to do all this work and not at least see
how things turn out," Shinohara urged. He, Noa, and Kanuka Clancy had
joined Gotoh and Shinobu nearly a half-hour beforehand, and were helping
them set up the folding chairs.

"I'm only in Tokyo for a few days, this time," Clancy replied. "I should
really visit my grandmother while I'm here, but if I stay for the
tournament..."

"You won't have any time for her," Noa finished. She looked over at Asuma
briefly, her stomach clenching. 'Why does he want her to stay, anyway?'
She couldn't forget Ohta's drunken proclamation of her being Shinohara's
girlfriend, and the thought that he might like Kanuka better than her- or
worse, that he might want both her and Kanuka to be a sort of harem for
him- troubled her. She still wasn't sure she regarded him as her
boyfriend, though, so why should she be so upset?

"Hey, Noa," Shinohara began, attracting her attention. "Is something
wrong? You look like you've got another toothache!"

"Huh?" Noa asked, startled. "Oh, no, I was just thinking about
something..."

"Good. You were unbearable the last time," Asuma grinned before turning
back to his work.

"So who's going to be the guest participant, now that I'm unavailable?"
Kanuka asked.

"Huh?" both Izumi and Shinohara asked.

"Captain Gotoh asked me to participate in the tournament as the experienced
guest, like Gomioka did when we had our tournament. I assumed that, since
I wasn't able to do it, he'd have asked someone else..."

"I did," Gotoh said, surprising them all as he slipped in behind them.

"Who?" Noa asked, curious.

"Officer Ohta. I've told him he's not allowed to use his gun... supposedly
to give him a handicap against the rookies."

Shinohara smirked. "That might make him a good test, if he listens."

"If he doesn't, he's going to have problems- we've taken the gun out of his
training labor," Gotoh commented. "Say, Kanuka, shouldn't you be heading
to your grandmothers shortly? You told me you'd promised to fix her
lunch."

As he spoke, Kanuka's watch started beeping. "Perfect timing, captain.
I've got to go."

"Are we going to see you again before you go, Kanuka?" Shinohara asked.
Noa's stomach clenched again.

"No, I don't believe so," Clancy answered. Her eyes flashed towards Noa.
"You might not have a toothache, but something's sure bothering you...
maybe you should rest for a bit."

"Uh, maybe," she answered noncommittally.

* * * * *

"First match," Shinobu announced. "Kenji Iguchi vs. Yoshi Tobe."

"Bow!" Gomioka, officiating the tournament, called to the two labors
through his megaphone. When both rose to their full height, he waved the
flag he was holding signaling the start of the match.

Yoshi's labor charged in, throwing a punch as it reached within an arm's
length of Kenji's, but he misjudged the range and missed by inches.
Kenji's own labor stepped forwards, delivering a punch of its own. Yoshi
raised his labor's arms to protect his face, but the blow landed in the
breast-plate, knocking him off-balance. The labor waved its arms
frantically in a desperate attempt to remain upright, but only succeeded in
looking foolish and dismembering itself as it fell.

"Enough!" Gomioka cried, waving the flag again to indicate the end of the
match. "Winner, Kenji Iguchi!"

"Pathetic," one of the higher-ranking visitors in the seats muttered. Most
of the other observers agreed with the sentiment.

Shige looked over the damaged labor as the maintenance squad carried off
its remains. "Sheesh... this will take a week to fix, at least."

Yoshi Tobe, his face flaming enough to make his scar look even more
pronounced, walked over to the stands. "I didn't think I'd do THAT
badly..." he said apologetically.

Gomioka grimaced the moment Tobe couldn't see him. He knew Yoshi would
wind up in his unit before the day was over, after a performance like that.
'First Ohta, now this... am I going to have a unit staffed entirely by
incompetents?'

* * * * *

"Next match, Ueki Mashimo vs. Yamane Seiroku," Gotoh called. Shinobu was
inside reviewing the tape of the first fight, and when Ueki and Yamane were
done he would switch with her and review the tape of this match.

"Hopefully, this will be better than the last fight," Shinohara commented.
The others of Unit Two around him could only nod in agreement.

"WELL!" the mop-haired Mashimo called out to Seiroku as the later's labor
joined his on the battlefield. "Looks like we can have this out once and
for all!"

"That we can," Yamane answered calmly. "That we can."

"BOW!" Gomioka's voice cried out. The flag came down, and the battle was
joined.

It was, indeed, a better fight than the last. Mashimo launched a furious
offensive, striking out repeatedly with his electromagnetic baton like a
katana. Seiroku coolly blocked with his own, waiting to his opponent to
finish blowing off steam. When the attacks slowed, he struck.

With one strike, the hand Mashimo's labor was wielding the baton with lay
on the ground. With another, the legs were cut out from under him, and the
match was over.

"Winner, Yamane Seiroku!" Gomioka called.

"Wow..." Noa, sitting in the third row back, breathed.

"Impressive," Shinohara, sitting next to her, agreed. "But I think their
rivalry might have let them learn how to fight each other better than they
would fight someone else. In a real fight, I'm not sure Yamane would have
known when to counterattack."

"You think so? Still, it was an impressive battle," Takeo, listening in
from behind them, commented.

Before they could say anymore, Gotoh passed in front of them, holding the
tape of the fight in his right hand.

"Kumagami, could you take over for me?" he asked. "Shinobu isn't finished
reviewing the tape of the first fight yet, and we need someone to announce
the fights and keep an eye on the recording equipment."

"Yes, sir," Kumagami acknowledged. Smiling as Gotoh left, she turned to
Noa and Asuma. "Do you two want to join me up front? You might be able to
get a better view of the fight from up close..."

"Yeah... I'm tired of having to crane my neck to see over everyone's head,"
Shinohara answered for the both of them. Noa was a little uncertain she
wanted Asuma to speak for her, like always, but decided to go along with
him anyway- so far, he'd never made her do something she hadn't wanted to
do when he had. Perhaps he just knew her that well- the thought seemed to
warm her a bit. If she was his girlfriend, at least he understood her.
Maybe.

They made their way to the front table, and Takeo set the video camera up
to record the fight. Shinohara and Noa sat at the end of the table, almost
to the right of most of the rest of the seats, and chatted a little while
the labors got into position.

"The next match," Kumagami announced, "Is Joudo Ishikawa vs. Natsume
Kawai."

Natsume looked very nervous sitting in her labor, waiting for the fight to
begin. Being nervous made her tremble, and trembling made her look even
cuter than usual. Being cuter than usual caught Asuma's attention.

Noa growled a little when she notice Shinohara ogling the young girl, and
got out of her seat and walked away from him, standing outside of the
awning that was covering the spectator area.

* * * * *

"Now that's odd," Gotoh said, reviewing the tape of Yamane and Ueki's
battle. "The hand came off almost too easily." He punched the intercom
button. "Mr. Sakaki?"

"Yes?" his hoarse voice rumbled back.

"Can you make a close inspection of the hand joint for Officer Mashimo's
labor? Something about the way it fell off looks funny."

"I already did," Sakaki's voice replied. "Training needs a better
maintenance squad. The bolt holding that hand on it was rusted through,
and was only supported by the wires that controlled the fingers. It was
amazing it stayed on as long as it did."

"Hmm..." Gotoh said. "So no foul play involved, but Officer Seiroku had an
unfair advantage which may have effected the outcome. I'll note that."

* * * * *

The flag came down, and again a pair of labors faced off against each
other. Natsume, despite her nerves, put up a decent fight, but it was
obvious after the first minute that she was overmatched- she had already
lost her baton and was on the retreat. In desperation, she drew her gun,
before being knocked onto her side.

Asuma caught sight of the trigger-finger moving, and leapt to his feet. It
wasn't aimed at him, but he saw who it was aimed for and made his move.

"NOA, LOOK OUT!"

"Eh?" Noa asked, in shock. All she could think of was that silly lesson
Gotoh and Shinobu tried to give to Unit 2 when they went for retraining,
where he tried to convince Ohta of the dangers of using his gun too much by
faking an accident with a training gun, and how closely this resembled it.
She was startled back into reality when she felt herself bodily shoved
aside, landing several feet out of the path of the paint cartridge as it
flew passed the audience and into the building behind them.

Shinohara stood up painfully. "Are you okay?" he asked, pulling Noa to her
feet.

"I... I think so..." Noa answered, dazed. 'He risked his life for me?' she
wondered.

* * * * *

It took a full half hour for order to be restored after the gun accident.
Asuma took Noa back into the compound with the intention of getting her a
drink to calm down, and Natsume had to be taken off by the medics- she
wouldn't have squeezed the trigger is a piece of wire jarred loose by the
fall hadn't jabbed her in the arm, forcing her hand to clench. Some of the
guests went home, but most had stayed and were waiting for the tournament
to resume. The maintenance crew cleared the field, taking the damaged
labor back into the shed for inspection, and the final match of the first
round was ready to begin.

"Next match, Ohta Isao vs. Koichi Miyagi," Shinobu called. Gotoh still had
to finish reviewing the tape he'd been working on, and then would have to
watch the Joudo\Natsume fight as well.

"Bow." The two labors bowed, and then the fight began.

The fight was even matched for a long time. When Ohta attacked, Koichi
dodged. When Koichi attack, Ohta blocked. Both occasionally went for the
kill, but neither delivered a decisive blow. The battle lasted for several
hours, but soon the two labors were both in trouble.

Ohta was the first to notice the problem. His labor's main monitor went
black, and began blinking 'Low Battery' in big red letters. He cursed. He
was out of time.

Koichi's battery started failing less than a minute later, but he was
lucky. By that time, Ohta's power was gone. The match was over.

"Winner, Koichi!"

Ohta growled. 'Not again!'

* * * * *

"I'm home, grandma!" Kanuka called.

"Hello, Kanuka," a hoarse female voice answered.

"Grandma, are you okay? You sound horrible!" Kanuka exclaimed.

"Oh, it's just a cold... don't mind me," her grandmother said, coughing a
little. "How are things?"

"Well, I was promised a raise and possibly a promotion in a few months. My
partner in New York, Leslie Desaix, recently found out that his sister is
pregnant... Special vehicles is gaining some new officers. But I'm only
here for a few days, and wanted to visit, not talk about my job. Is your
cold too bad to go out with?"

Kanuka's grandmother looked at her granddaughter with a sad smile. "Well,
maybe. I'm feeling a little weak, but I think if I bundle up I'll be fine,
if you want to go out to dinner."

"I'll get your coat," Kanuka said.

As she walked out of eyeshot, her grandmother took out the report the
doctor had given her and hid it underneath the seat cushion. 'I can't tell
you yet, granddaughter... Maybe when you aren't able to come back and take
care of me, but if I told you now you'd fuss over me so much and all you
would try to do would just aggravate my condition... No, I can't tell you
yet...'

* * * * *

"Hey, Noa, you okay?" Asuma asked, a note of concern in his voice.

Noa just sat next to him, a few feet away from Alphonse, staring off into
space. Shinohara repeated himself, trying to get her to snap out of her
shock. Slowly, she turned her head towards him, her eyes unblinking.
"Why?"

Asuma looked confused. "Why what?"

"You could have been killed saving me. Why did you do it?"

Shinohara shifted uncomfortably. "Well, a backup and forward have to look
out for each other, you know?" He smiled nervously. "Besides, who else
would let me order them around so much?"

"Asuma, do y-" Noa began.

Ohta stormed in, a long line of curses following him. "Low batteries! I
lost because of some stupid BATTERIES!"

The moment, such as it was, was ruined. They turned towards Ohta in
surprise. "What are you talking about?" Shinohara asked.

"The tournament! We were tied, but then I lost because I ran out of
power!"

Noa and Asuma looked at each other in confusion. "Uh... that's not bad,
actually," Shinohara soothed.

"What do you mean?" Ohta snapped. "I lost- they're going to put me in the
second labor again!"

"No they won't!" Asuma snapped back. "Gomioka didn't lose his spot as
first labor pilot- in Unit 1, I might add- when he lost in our tournament.
In fact, you were fighting at a disadvantage, remember?"

"Well, maybe," Ohta growled. He still wasn't happy, but then again he was
rarely happy unless he could work with his guns. "We'll see what he does,"
he continued, turning and stomping off back to his room.

"I guess Ohta's still not over his sudden transfer," Noa commented.

"Guess not," Shinohara agreed. Then he smiled and turned back to her.
"So, what was it you were going to ask me before we were so rudely
interrupted?"

"Oh, uh..." Noa wasn't sure what to say. She was going to ask him how he
really felt about her, but it didn't feel right to talk about that right
now. The mood was gone. "I was going to ask... if you wanted to go out
for a drink next time we're off duty- my treat-a way of saying thanks."

Asuma noticed her hesitation. It was almost like she wasn't going to ask
him that originally... but he figured she could hide whatever it was from
him if she wanted. Besides, he wasn't one to pass up a free drink. "Sure
thing..."

* * * * *

"Second round, first match! Yamane Seiroku vs. Koichi Miyagi!" Gotoh's
voice called out. He was finally back from reviewing the tapes, and
Shinobu had taken his place in the video room.

"Bow!" The flag came down again, signaling the start of the next set of
fights. The battle was short and violent- both labors started
disassembling each other. Seiroku slapped off a chest plate, and in return
lost an arm at the elbow. The good arm pulled Koichi's labor into his
knee, but then the leg said knee was connected to disappeared as an
electromagnetic baton was stabbed into it and violently ripped out.
Keeping its balance only from it's one good arm, Seiroku directed his labor
to one last attempt for victory- his free elbow descended upon the
sensitive head of his opponent- but didn't do enough damage to finish off
Miyagi- it lacked the added mass the forearm would have provided. A few
seconds later, Yamane's labor dropped.

"Winner, Koichi Miyagi!"

The two former combatants stepped out of their labors and met at the
sidelines while the wrecks they had left behind were carted away.

"Impressive win... Koichi, was it?" Seiroku began.

"Thank you, Mr..." Miyagi answered.

"Seiroku. Yamane Seiroku. Call me Yamane," he smiled. "If you do that
well in the final round, you're certain to win the First Unit slot. Would
you mind talking a bit about the tactics you used there? I don't remember
seeing a labor move like that before."

"Well..." Miyagi considered, then smiled. "Sure thing- come on, lets sit
over there so the next match doesn't disturb us..."

* * * * *

The final match of the round was already in progress by the time Noa and
Asuma returned to the field. Joudo Ishikawa and Kenji Iguchi were fighting
fairly evenly, though every now and then one labor would score a point on
the other. It was getting late into the evening, and several of the
observers had already gone home. One person who left once already, though,
had returned.

"Ms... Ms. Izumi?" Natsume Kawai began, after walking over to join her. "I
want to apologize- it was clumsy of me to be holding on to the gun like
that when I fell- I should have let go... I could have killed you..."

"That's right- you could have," Shinohara growled. "Be more careful in the
future!"

"ASUMA!" Noa berated, turning to glare at him. He didn't normally snap at
cute girls like that- well, actually, maybe he did. After all, didn't he
basically order her around all the time? Still, he almost made it seem
like a game to her- she'd realized that when he'd been visiting her at her
parents home over the family liquor store one time. Looking at him, she
could tell he was sincerely angry at the young girl. Almost like he was
when Ohta's obsession with firearms got them in trouble, only a bit more
serious than that.

"I'm so sorry..." Natsume groveled, almost in tears.

"Oh, that's okay," Noa soothed, warning Asuma not to say anything else with
a glare. "It was just an accident- if you hadn't been hurt, the gun never
would have gone off. And I wasn't hurt myself, so don't worry about it."

"Really?" Kawai sniffed, still looking awfully apologetic.

"Really."

Further conversation was cut off by a loud crash as Joudo Ishikawa sent
Kenji Iguchi's labor tumbling. Another match was over, and the effects of
a previous one were healed.

* * * * *

"The final match," Gotoh announced, Shinobu on hand. "Is postponed on
account of darkness."

"What?" "Postponed?" "But labor battles have been fought at night
before!" "Darkness?" "What's going on!" came various cries from the
remaining spectators. Joudo Ishikawa and Koichi Miyagi looked at each
other curiously.

"Yes, the battle COULD still be fought, if we wanted it to be," Shinobu
began, backing Gotoh up. "But it won't- our video equipment isn't
sophisticated enough to record the match in enough detail."

"Then who's in which unit?" Ueki Mashimo's voice echoed from somewhere in
the midst of the crowd that had started to converge on the three captains
who had made the decision.

"I'm afraid that will have to wait until the tournament is over," Gotoh
answered. Groans were heard, and people seemed exceedingly disappointed.
Joudo looked over at Koichi and whispered something in his ear. A few nods
later, the two recruits approached the captains with a request.

"Sirs," Ishikawa began. "Koichi and I have talked, and in the interest of
speeding up our assignments, we'd like to call off the last match, consider
it a draw, and decide who won the tournament by a coin toss."

"Yeah, I analyzed his style from that first match," Miyagi added in
support. "And I think we're about an even match. A coin toss is all
that's needed."

Gotoh looked at Shinobu. "What do you think?" he asked.

"I don't know," she considered. "This is a highly irregular request, but
then again postponing the last match to the next day is also pretty
unusual..."

Gotoh nodded. "Yeah. I think we should allow them to decide it by coin
toss." He searched through his pockets. "Except I don't seem to have any
coins... anyone got change for a hundred-yen note?" he asked, holding up
the bill.

"Here," Gomioka supplied, holding out a few coins. "Use one of these."

Joudo picked up the coin. "Call it in the air," he said, and tossed it.

"Heads!" Koichi cried.

Gotoh picked up the coin and looked at it closely. "Heads it is. Koichi,
you've just won the tournament. Congrats!" He looked over at the other
two captains. "We'll retire to the office for a while, and we'll post the
positions in a couple hours. Hold on, people- we'll be done shortly."

* * * * *

"This is fabulous food, don't you think, Grandma?" Kanuka asked.

Her grandmother nodded. "Yes it is, child. But it's not as good as some
of your home cooking."

"Oh, quit trying to compliment me. I'm an excellent cop, but as a cook I'm
only slightly above average."

"I think you underestimate yourself, granddaughter, but I won't push the
point. You can be very stubborn when you want to be."

The two of them ate on in silence for a few minutes. Kanuka's grandmother
smiled and looked up at her. "So, have you found anyone special yet? Is
there a chance I might become a great-grandmother?"

"Grandma!" Kanuka blushed. It took her a few seconds to recover from the
question before shaking her head. "No, grandma, no-one yet. One of the
Special Vehicles cops I work with, Asuma Shinohara- I think you remember
him- and I have flirted with each other off and on, but nothing serious has
happened, and I don't really think anything will happen with him. I'm
pretty sure he's too hung-up on his partner for him to get too deeply
involved with anyone else." She chuckled. "Though considering how she
seems to love her Patlabor, I wouldn't be surprised is he never makes a
move on her, either."

"What do you mean, 'love her Patlabor?' Tell me more about them- they
sound like an interesting pair," her grandmother asked. Kanuka went in to
a long-winded explanation of Noa Izumi and her labor Alphonse, and how she
seemed to take better care of her labor than she could herself. Little
bits about how Asuma seemed to deal with her floated in every now and then-
how he would both order her around and basically control her and yet allow
himself to be roped into doing things like cleaning Alphonse from head to
toe. Eventually, Kanuka's grandmother started fading away.

It wasn't until her grandmother nearly slumped into her food that Kanuka
realized something was seriously wrong. "Grandma, are you okay? What's
wrong?"

"Oh, don't worry too much about me, child. I guess the cold I had was
worse than I thought," she answered faintly. "And I'm probably not able to
deal with it as well as I used to be able to deal with colds- I am over
seventy years old, after all. Maybe you should take me home."

Kanuka hailed a waiter and paid for the food, grabbing a doggy bag and
helping her grandmother home, wrapping an arm around her to support her.
When they finally got to the apartment, she dropped her grandmother off
into bed and covered her warmly in the blankets. She stuffed the food into
the refrigerator and sat down.

'That's funny,' Kanuka thought. 'Sounds like I sat on some papers...'
Searching underneath the cushion, she encounters a folder full of paper and
pulls it out.

"What's this? A medical report?" she says, opening it and starting to
read.

'No!' she cried out to herself. 'It can't be! Why didn't she tell me!'

* * * * *

Soon, a printout was posted onto the door of the Captains' Office.

"To the new recruits of the Special Vehicles, Section 2-
As of tomorrow at 0600 hrs, you are to report to the following assignments:

Koichi Miyagi- Unit 1 (Labor Pilot, Labor 2)
Joudo Ishikawa- Unit 2 (Labor Pilot, Labor 2)
Kenji Iguchi- Unit 3 (Labor Pilot, Labor 2)

Yamane Seiroku- Unit 3 (Command Car, Labor 2)

Ueki Mashimo- Unit 1 (Transport Driver, Labor 2)
Natsume Kawai- Unit 2 (Transport Driver, Labor 2)
Yoshi Tobe- Unit 3 (Transport Driver, Labor 2)

That is all."

--------------------------
Next Episode: The recruits meet up with their units, Kanuka confronts her
grandmother about the medical report, and Yamane Seiroku approaches Gomioka
with a request he's not sure how to deal with.


------------------------------------------------------- ---------------------

---
Sir Desaix, member # 116 of the Knights of the True Fiancee
desaix@sysnet.net
http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Acropolis /7872
fanfics available at
http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Acropolis/7872/fanfics.htm

----

"David A. Tatum" <desaix@sysnet.net>


Patlabor: Personal Files
An Episodic Patlabor Fanfic by David A. Tatum
Disclaimer: Insert legal junk here...

Episode 03: First Day on the Job

December 30, 1999

Kanuka looked at her watch. It was 5:50 in the morning, and she had yet to
catch a wink of sleep. She looked through the hospital report one more
time. Apparently, her grandmother had gone in simply to get a prescription
drug to treat some flu symptoms... The routine medical exam led to more
tests, the results of which were serious. Congenital heart failure AND
bronchitis- the heart and the lung were both in trouble. They'd given her
some medicine to treat the bronchitis, but the more serious problem...

She might live another year or two without serious problems, if she took
things easy, but the prognosis was fatal. Kanuka's grandmother was dying,
and there was nothing anyone could do about it.

"Grandma..." Kanuka whispered. It was too early to wake up her grandmother
yet, and it was probably a bad idea to wake her up anyway, but when she
did... well, they would have to chat about why this had been kept a secret.

Sighing, Kanuka got up and went to get herself another cup of coffee. She
had quite a while to wait.

* * * * *

Shinobu stepped in front of the assembled Unit One. Looking at her watch,
she saw she had five minutes until they were supposed to have assembled.
She smiled- everyone was early. She liked that in her subordinates. She
decided to take the extra time to inspect them all.

Yuhki Watanabe was the first one she looked at- he looked happy with his
promotion into the first labor. Shinobu remembered he used to be a bundle
of nerves when he arrived- and still sometimes got a little scared in
situations where he was seemingly overmatched- but her opinion of him had
been greatly improved by the Griffon incident. Hopefully, he wouldn't take
his responsibilities as senior labor pilot too seriously, and make himself
nervous again.

Tazaki Hiroaki was next in line. He WAS looking nervous- it wasn't often a
transport officer was promoted to the command car. In fact, she hadn't
heard of it happening before- but then again, there were only five Special
Vehicles Police Sections (a.k.a., Section 2's) on Japan's main island of
Honshu- Tokyo, Osaka, Nagoya, Sendai, and (officially as the geographic
center-point of the Western side of the island, but more because of
political influence than anything) Kanazawa, and up until now each had only
two units at most. There wasn't much opportunity for such a promotion to
occur.

The next person she came to was the old labor driver for labor two, Hideki
Nomo. He was an older man, and an ex-labor pilot from the original
Patlabor unit. He'd lost a hand in the line of duty, and was given the job
of driving around the labors he loved when he refused both desk duty and
retirement with a full pension. He looked as indefatigable as ever,
totally unaffected by the shift to labor one.

Finally, she reached her first rookie. Koichi Miyagi, the winner of the
previous day's tournament by the toss of a coin. He looked level-headed
enough, and had that enthusiastic shine in his eyes that only came with the
belief that nothing could harm them. She shook her head imperceptibly,
knowing that his belief in his own immortality would be shaken soon after
he began his job. The only person she had seen who had never lost
confidence after working for a time with the police was that girl in Unit
Two- Noa Izumi, wasn't it? Somehow, Shinobu suspected Izumi's enthusiasm
had nothing to do with her job, and instead her love of labors and her
relationship with that boy Gotoh was grooming to be his successor- Asuma
Shinohara. She'd heard rumors of the two of them being involved in a
pretty intense relationship, and considering how he'd risked his life to
save her during that mishap at the tournament, she suspected it was true.
Of course, there was an unspoken agreement among everyone in the SV2 not to
mention it to their superiors- if they ever reached one of the bureaucrats
above her or Gotoh, the affair would be ended and the officers likely
suspended.

Shinobu moved on to the next person in line- another veteran, Yuhki's old
command car officer. Toru Sasaki, another grizzled veteran from the
original Patlabor unit, had kept his position only by refusing several
promotions. He claimed that the newer labors gave him motion sickness,
but also did not want to be transferred out of the SV2. He looked as
immaculate as always, the brass on his uniform shining and not a single
hair out of place. He was the consummate police officer in every way.

She moved on to the final officer in her unit- Ueki Mashimo. His hair
needed to be cut, and looked as if it hadn't been washed or combed in
years. His expression looked grim and sour, and he had beard whiskers
protruding from spots of his chin. Facially, he looked like a younger
Inspector Matsui, but he was somewhat thinner, more muscular... and more
brutish looking. Well, at least he was more competent than the other two
he had a chance to take.

She looked at her watch. Six o'clock, on the dot.

"Welcome to our new officers, and welcome back to our old. You may be
wondering how all of our units have been able to take the past three days
off while we set up the new unit. Well, we've been covered by Unit Two
from Kanazawa, but as of 0800 hrs today, they'll be gone. When they are,
well, we'll take over. The veterans will be pleased to know that, after
myself and Captains Gotoh and Gomioka discussed the various options last
nigh, we now have only sixteen hours of on-base shifts. Between 0800 and
1600 hrs, this unit is on duty, and Unit Two will be on standby backing us
up and Unit Three will be off. Between 1600 hrs and midnight, we have OFF,
while Unit Two will be on duty and Unit Three will be on standby. However,
if any of you aren't back on base for standby duty for Unit Three's duty
shift by 0001 hrs, rest assured I will not be happy." She glanced at her
officers, and nodded. "Until our duty shift, however, I want the veterans
to show our rookies around. Dismissed."

Shinobu smiled as Takeo and Tazaki paired off to take Koichi Miyagi around,
while the two veterans from the original Patlabor unit took the
rough-looking Ueki Mashimo around- possibly to discuss something about
grooming. They would keep her command well-respected and efficient, just
like it had been when Gomioka was there.

* * * * *

Joudo Ishikawa looked at the clock on the wall. The meeting was supposed
to have started five minutes ago- where was everyone? Was he in the right
room? Did he get the time wrong? What?

A short, curly-haired, button-nosed, wide-eyed bundle of energy burst into
the room. "I sorry I'm late- my alarm didn't work and then I couldn't find
my uniform and then I wasn't sure where I was supposed to go and had to
look at the announcement again and then I..." Natsume Kawai blinked and
looked around. "Where is everyone? Is the meeting over already?"

Joudo smiled, unable to keep a straight face seeing her confused
expression. "I don't know... I was here early, and haven't seen anyone
yet. Are we in the right place?"

"I think so- I checked the room number right before I got here..." she
said, getting distressed. "I hope so... I don't want to get in trouble..."

"Don't worry about it," Ishikawa said brashly, trying to make the cute girl
sitting next to him calm down a bit. "If we DID make a mistake, then it
was there fault for writing confusing directions- after all, we both
arrived in the same place, right?"

"I... I guess so," Natsume agreed, nodding her head in a way that made her
curls bounce softly. "But it's our first day on the job, and things are
already going wrong, and-"

Before she could continue, the door swung open behind her and two
bleary-eyed people came in.

"Sorry we're late," a disheveled, sleepy-looking Asuma Shinohara said,
sitting at the desk in front of the room and propping his feet up. Noa
Izumi, her clothes slightly askew and her hair a mess, took a standing
position to his right, a little behind him, and yawned hugely. "We thought
your command car operator, Takeo Kumagami, would handle things here, but
she had to run and get the dispatch reports from the Kanazawa unit that has
been covering for us while we took care of business here."

Joudo wondered why the two officers had slept in to begin with, when their
duty was to be ready for anything, before glancing at how rumpled Noa's
clothes were. Remembering how Asuma had risked his life for the girl the
previous day, he smiled knowingly. Such a relationship as he suspected
they were having would get them in serious trouble if the higher ups found
out about it, and so he decided to no question them further. Looking at
Natsume, he knew that she'd bought their story- and that she was very
nervous being around them. It would be interesting working with this unit-
so far, he'd met two veteran officers having an affair, and a
cute-but-clueless girl apparently prone to hysterics, his captain, who he
only knew so far from the tournament the previous day, was bored with
everything and took even the near death of the people under him in stride,
and he'd seen at that same competition that another of his team members was
a giant of a man with muscles reminiscent of... that American actor, Arnold
Swartzenager. He almost laughed when he realized he very well could be the
only 'normal' person in this unit.

"No problem, sir," Ishikawa answered.

Asuma waved him off. "No need to call me sir- my name is Asuma Shinohara,
and this is Noa Izumi," he presented. "We're the backup and forward for
labor one, an Ingram affectionately dubbed 'Alphonse' by Noa." He smiled
slightly. "No-one here outranks anyone else- I can order Noa around
because of her position, not because of her rank. Hiromi Yamazaki, who you
will meet later, is also my subordinate but, again, has the same rank as I
do. Noa, Hiromi, and I all have more experience than you, but we can't
really give you orders unless we're assigned to give you orders because we
don't outrank you. Well, right now I can, but that's just because I was
asked to brief you and take you on a tour of the facilities."

"Asuma..." Noa began, slightly whining, "Why did you wake me up for this?"

"I figured you'd want to be the one who wanted to show them the differences
between the controls of a training labor and the controls of an Ingram,
since labors 2 and 3 are down for maintenance."

"Oh... of course I'd want to do that." Noa looked at him oddly. 'That
was... well, an attempt to be thoughtful, I suppose. He could have just
woken me when they were about to go through Alphonse, though,' she thought
as she stretched in an attempt to work the sleep out of her muscles.

"Anyway," Shinohara continued, slightly distracted, and pulled out a
rumpled set of papers. He started to read out, "We go on standby duty in
about two hours. Standby consists of wearing your uniform and staying on
base, keeping yourself ready to fill in if the Active duty unit is away.
You can even sleep here, if you like, provided you can be ready for duty in
less than five minutes. Then you go on Active duty, which consists of
answering calls and, when there are no calls, tending the grounds of the
SV2 Headquarters. Until the formation of the third unit, we were always on
active or on standby duty unless we had a vacation day, during which time
we were covered by Unit One. Now, we will have such full-day
Active\Standby duty only when a unit goes on vacation." He looked up.
"Basically, since it takes about two hours get anywhere interesting round
trip, you'll probably want to live on base most of the time. That you have
any time off without a special day being allocated for it is an
improvement, however, so you have nothing to complain about."

"What about meal breaks?" Natsume asked.

"Well," Asuma considered, "Being in the second unit, our time off is
between midnight and eight in the morning. Few restaurants are open that
late at night, so I'd strongly suggest you help the mechanics out with the
daily meals. If you help them cook and catch fish, and sometimes help
Hiromi out when he asks you to look after the tomato vines and hens, you
can share in the common daily meals. There is one restaurant that delivers
lunch, a chinese restaurant called Shanghai Noodles, for the occasional
change of pace, however."

"Anything else we should know before the tour?" Joudo asked.

Shinohara shrugged. "Not that I can think of. Anything in particular on
you mind?"

"Why were we transfered while our pay still comes from the training budget?
Wouldn't it make more sense to transfer us January 1, so that we start out
on the SV2's budget?"

Shinohara nodded. "I think I can answer that. Essentially, if you aren't
able to cope with life in the SV2 after one day, we can send you back to
training without it showing up on your record that you were unfit for labor
duty."

"Has that ever happened?" Joudo wondered.

"Once, and it hasn't prevented the person from returning to the SV2 after
reconsidering. Yuhki Watanabe, from Unit One, went back to training after
he first got here, and was replaced by Ohta, who recently went on to help
form Unit Three. When we formed Unit Two, Ohta was moved here and Yuhki
returned to the SV2." He paused. "Any other questions? No? Then let's
get on with the tour. Noa!"

Noa, who'd almost been asleep, snapped awake at his voice. "Huh, yeah?"

"Come on, we're touring the Ingrams first." His expression and tone became
a LITTLE more compassionate. "Then you can catch another hour's nap, if
you want."

* * * * *

Captain Gomioka stared at his watch. Several people hadn't arrived yet,
and it was already ten minutes after the meeting was supposed to start.
Thankfully, his Unit was SUPPOSED to be off duty for the shift following
the two hour orientation period. Well, all the late arrivals had just lost
those eight hours.

He sighed, and looked at the people who WERE around. There was Ohta, the
man he remembered as so obsessed with guns during his stint with Unit One
that he blew more assignments that could have been successfully completed
than the rest of all five of the Patlabor units combined. There was Akito
Kenichi, his old command car operator. Akito kept shooting nervous looks
at Ohta, and sitting as far away from the pilot as possible. Akito was
reliable, but most of his work was usually handled by Shinobu, and he
seemed scared of the pilot he was supposed to backup. Perhaps he might
want to be exchanged back into Unit One for Toru Sasaki, Yuhki's old
command car operator. Or maybe, if that failed, he could get Takeo
Kumagami from Unit Two, who probably knew how to manage Ohta better than
most. And besides, she'd be a good person to leave in charge of the unit
when he needed to be elsewhere.

The only rookie who had made it was Yamane Seiroku, who seemed to be trying
to keep outwardly calm, but was betrayed by occasionally shifting nervously
in his seat. Any nervousness his face might have shown, however, was lost
to all watchers because his battered nose seemed to catch the most
attention. Gomioka sighed- he couldn't read people like Shinobu could.
How did he handle this situation?

"Sorry I'm late," someone said, breaking into his thoughts. Gomioka
turned, and noticed that it was the other transfer from Unit Two- Shinshi
Mikiyasu. "Captain Gotoh stopped me on the way, and asked me to give you
this note."

Gomioka restrained himself from asking why it took ten... no, FIFTEEN
minutes to be asked to take a note somewhere, but sighed and accepted the
piece of paper.

"Sakaki just let me know that had to steal a couple of your rookies away
from you for a short while. The maintenance squad's transport broke down
while returning home from delivering the remaining training labors to the
Academy in Fuji, and so Sakaki sent them out in one of the 97's (which he
said were best equipped for the task) to retrieve it. On the plus side,
this means at least one of the 97's will have a shakedown run after being
removed from mothballs.

-Gotoh, Captain"

Gomioka restrained himself AGAIN from crumpling up the sheet of paper and
storming over to Gotoh's office and giving him a piece of his mind. It
wouldn't do for his unit to see him as quarreling with the others.

"Do you know what all of this is about, Mr. Shinshi?"

"Um... not really, sir. Just a few details- two of the rookies were
borrowed by the maintenance squad for about an hour. I had to wait while
Gotoh, Shinobu, and Chief Sakaki discussed things."

Gomioka blinked- Gotoh, he wasn't surprised about- he was a competent if
lackadaisical unit leader, but he also brownosed his way to better service
with the maintenance squad. He would have thought Shinobu would have
defended him, however. "Did you overhear anything they were saying?"

Shinshi thought for a second. "I remember hearing something from Sakaki
about getting the rookies used to there machines as early as possible, and
some sound of agreement from both captains. Outside of that... sorry."

Gomioka sighed. "Alright. I'll postpone this meeting until 0800 hrs, but
everyone will lose two hours of off-duty time because of this. That is
all."

A bit surprised, Shinshi, Ohta, and Akito all left the room, but Seiroku
approached his captain cautiously.

"Can I talk to you, sir?" he asked, nervously.

Gomioka looked at the rookie curiously. This day hadn't started out very
well, and he feared doing something which would cause him even more
problems, but looking at Yamane he knew that he should listen to him.
After all, this was the first time one of his subordinates approached him
for help.

"All right, what is it?"

"Sir, why was I put into the command car, and Koichi Miyagi put into the
cockpit of the labor? I thought I had a real good chance of making it,
after my first round match..."

Gomioka thumbed through some papers on his desk to kill time while he tried
to remember how it had been decided. Something about a defective labor
part... Ah, that was it. "The first round match wasn't considered in the
final decision because of some technical problems in the other labor. It
wasn't considered serious enough to disqualify you, or to change the
results or anything, but it was considered enough for us to make the policy
of only looking at the second round fights."

Seiroku trembled. "Is there any way to challenge that decision?"

Gomioka shook his head. "Sorry, it was final."

"B-but..." Yamane hesitated. "I vowed to my parents I would become a labor
pilot for the SV2 or I'd never return home... I was so hoping..."

The captain looked at Yamane's worried face, and frowned. That was
certainly a foolhardy oath to take, but it almost certainly had given him a
drive to succeed. And he HAD been impressed with the rookies first
match... he very well might have been a better pilot than... Koichi, was
it? He'd never remember that boy's name- he just seemed to fade into the
background as soon as he won his match...

"I cannot reverse the decisions that have already been made. However...
every Patlabor unit is assigned three labors, but is only assigned pilots
for two of them. Occasionally, we will need all three in action, however-
Unit two has had to utilize their third labor a number of times, I
understand. I can make you Labor 3's pilot, unofficially, and if you prove
yourself and we have an opening..."

Seiroku's face lit up. "You'll give me a chance? Oh, thank you, sir!
Thank you!" He rushed out of the room and in the direction of the phone.

Gomioka smiled slightly. Maybe things wouldn't be so bad today, after all.

* * * * *

*Beep beep beep beep*

Kanuka was startled into full wakefulness as the alarm clock blared. 'Huh?
I didn't set any alarms... what time is it? SIX THIRTY? Who set-'

"Ah, Kanuka," her grandmother said as she silenced the clock. "Why are you
here?"

"Grandmother, what are you doing setting an alarm for this early in the
morning?!"

"Why," her grandmother smiled. "Getting myself up in time to fix
breakfast."

"You should be resting-"

"I've been getting up this early for the past fifty years! I think I can
handle it... especially since I got to bed so early this morning." Her
grandmother slowly stood up and stretched.

"Grandma," Kanuka said, a note of warning in her voice. "I found the
medical report."

"Oh, you did?" her grandmother answered, flinching slightly but covering it
up by turning towards her dresser. "Well, I was hoping I'd be able to talk
to you about it before you saw that report- in fact, I was hoping you'd
have gone back to New York, first."

"What?!" Kanuka exclaimed. "Why?"

"Oh, I know you- now you're not going to return to your home and your job."
Silence reigned for almost a full minute. Kanuka couldn't deny it- that
was just what she was planning on doing. Her grandmother, seeing how
speechless she was, embraced her and continued, "You ARE a professional,
remember? I don't want you losing your job taking care of a dying woman.
And there's nothing you can do, either- except maybe speed my death by
trying to pamper me too much. Let me live my last months without feeling
the guilt that I would if you were to lose you job caring for me. I'll be
fine."

"Grandma, I..." Kanuka couldn't continue. She loved her grandmother so
much, and here she was saying to forget about her in her time of need. She
couldn't do that. "I can get an assignment in Japan again... a temporary
one, which won't affect either my possible promotion. One which will leave
me some free time... if for no other reason than to visit."

"Kanuka..." Her grandmother looked into her granddaughters eyes, and
sighed. It was impossible to tell her no when she was that determined.
"ONLY if you are CERTAIN it won't effect your career, I... would allow you
to visit me while on your new job."

Withdrawing from her grandmother's embrace, Kanuka nodded. "Thank you,
grandma. I'm afraid I'll need to skip breakfast- I need to try and find a
job."

With that, she rushed out of the door, unintentionally slamming it behind
her.

Her grandmother sighed. "I knew hiding that file wouldn't work... I just
wish I had been able to convince you to go back home. Now, I can only hope
you find your job, because I'm pretty sure if you don't you'll just quit
the police to be with me, and that would hurt me more than you could
possibly imagine..."

--------------------------
Next Episode: The maintenance crew discovers Natsume Kawai, Kanuka asks
for a job, and the SV2 deals with Y2K

-------------------------------------------------------------- --------------

Sir Desaix, member # 116 of the Knights of the True Fiancee
desaix@sysnet.net
http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Acropolis /7872
fanfics available at
http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Acropolis/7872/fanfics.htm

-----

Patlabor: Personal Files
An Episodic Patlabor Fanfic by David A. Tatum
Disclaimer: Insert legal junk here...

Episode 04: Birth of a New Millennium, Part 1

December 30, 1999

Kanuka walked through the door and up to Gotoh's desk. "Captain, can I
talk to you?" she asked.

Gotoh blinked. Kanuka didn't usually barge into his office and ask him to
talk without knocking first. In fact, he was somewhat surprised she was in
the building- by his watch, her plane was leaving in a few hours, and she
barely had time to get on it. "Well... Unit Two doesn't go on active duty
for another couple of hours, and things have been quiet so I doubt we'll be
needed for other reasons, so yeah, sure."

"Sir, my grandmother is... ill. I want to ask you for a job in your unit
for a while, so I can stay in Japan and take care of her."

Gotoh thought about it for a moment. "Hmm.... Ill, you say? Ill in what
way? How long do you need to stay here?"

Kanuka was silent for a moment before sighing. "She's... dying. She's got
a year, maybe a little longer, but she isn't expected to recover..."

Gotoh's eyes widened. "What is her problem?"

"Heart condition... and bronchitis, but that's treatable. She'll be able
to live normally for a while- after she gets over the bronchitis, that is-
but she's got a year a most. I... just want to be around her as long as I
can."

Gotoh looked at his one-time subordinate for a full minute before replying.
"I can't give you a job in Unit 2, and I'm not sure there's a job
available in any labor unit right now. The rookie class of 1999 was just
sent to fill in all available slots. If anyone decides to return to the
academy, there might be an opening, but it almost certainly wouldn't last
for a full year. However..."

"Yes?"

"Do you think you'll be able to deal with an assignment to the Academy?
They're always looking for experienced labor pilots as instructors, and
your time with us will make you an even better candidate. You wouldn't be
able to get the position for another three months- the Academy doesn't
re-open until the first Monday in April- but I might also be able to swing
you an intermittent assignment with the street patrol until it does."

"Street patrol?" Kanuka said, her nose wrinkling in disgust. "You mean as
a traffic cop?"

Gotoh shrugged. He turned to look out the window at the gathering storm
clouds approaching- it was supposed to snow sometime that day, but hadn't
started yet. Looking outside, all Gotoh could do was think about how
inadequate his offer was. "Essentially, but it's the best I can do on
short notice."

"I would never...." Kanuka's voice trailed off. No, she wouldn't ever
have considered going to the traffic cops- she was a labor pilot, after
all. That was all she was good at- and she was one of the best out there-
and she would never have considered being a traffic cop even if it meant
resigning... except, in this case, she didn't have much choice. If she
didn't get SOME job here, she couldn't stay with her grandmother... "I
guess I don't have much choice. Do you mind if I borrow your phone and
call my captain in New York? I'm going to need to get his permission, and
I might need you to talk to him as well..."

Gotoh nodded. "Go ahead, I'll back you up as much as I can." He paused.
"I pretty sure all of the old gang will."

Kanuka stopped for a moment. A small tear was forming in her eye, and she
couldn't afford to let anyone see it or her reputation would be ruined, so
she forced herself to stand still for a moment to recover.

* * * * *

Shige was looking through the engine of the labor transport for Unit Two's
Labor 2 when he heard it- a thumping sound followed by a distinctly female
yelp of pain. Quickly dropping everything (including a toolbox that landed
on his foot and forced him to hop around on the other for a few seconds
while recovering from the pain) he made his way to the sound. There he
found the cute labor officer which he and most of the rest of the
maintenance crew had only seen at the tournament, and even then they'd
barely gotten a glimpse at her.

There she was, rubbing away the pain in her derriere. Shige's eyes
widened- this cute little girl would be WORKING here? Every day? In the
same building as HE was?! He was almost speechless.

"Uh... are you okay, miss?" he finally got out.

"Ow... yes, I think so. I fell trying to climb into the transport's cab-
that step is too high..."

Shige looked at the cab and noticed that it probably was, in fact, too high
for the girl. Shinshi had never complained about it, true, but then again
this girl was nearly a half foot shorter than he was. "Hmm... I think
you're right. Tell you what- give me about a half hour to finish the
tune-up I'm giving to the engine, and I'll mount a small step ladder for
you."

Her face brightened. "You will? Thanks!" she squealed, giving Shige a
brief but powerful hug. With that, she dashed off in the direction of Unit
Two's lounge.

Shige didn't start moving again for another ten minutes.

* * * * *

A couple of hours later, Shige strolled into the Maintenance Squad Lunch
Room (really, just an empty storage area with tables set up) and sat down
with a happy sigh, a smile on his face. He seemed to be just picking
through his food, and those in the room who knew him well figured something
weird was going on.

"Hey, Shige, what's going on?" one of the junior mechanics asked him.

"Oh... you know that new female labor officer?"

"The cute one?" another of his friends asked.

"Yeah... well, I offered to install a step ladder for her Labor Transport,
and so she... she HUGGED me!"

"Wow..." said a third mechanic.

More questions about the incident followed, but there wasn't really much
else that Shige could say. So, with that, the rumors started to circulate.

* * * * *

"Did you hear? Shige got hugged and kissed by whatsername- Natsume, the
new female labor officer!"

"No way... Shige? Ah, man- that girl must be desperate!"

"Well, she could just be very friendly- maybe she'd hug and kiss anyone!"

"Maybe that would mean WE could get her to give US hugs and kisses!"

The exuberant whispering continued until Chief Sakaki showed up, at which
point things became dead silent. When Sakaki left, conversation picked up
again... but was a bit more subdued.

* * * * *

When night fell that day, so did the snow. Winter had finally arrived in
Tokyo, and soon the ground was blanketed in a soft white carpet. Things
were quiet for the SV2- most of the time, snow tended to pacify criminals,
and the only problems were with traffic accidents. That made it a
difficult night for some traffic cops, but not for labor units. The next
morning, however, Kanuka was thankful her transfer didn't take effect until
January 1st when she read the paper and saw exactly how many accidents
there were.

December 31, 1999

Gomioka sat down in the captains office, and started writing. Absolutely
nothing had happened during his active duty period, and he was just about
to collapse in boredom. Funny, when he was a labor pilot, he at least had
something to do most of the time- he'd ordered his own unit to do the
dishes and clean the kitchen, then to trash out the cafeteria. Just busy
work, yes- something he'd done a millions times and found boring himself-
but at least something to do. The only work he had was to sit around at
the phones and wait for a message to come in. Hopefully, he could get
suggestions from Shinobu for things to do to kill the time, but not right
now- she was out with Unit One supporting the rescue squad as it attempted
to save a construction labor that had lost its traction and slipped off of
the building it was working on, holding on to a girder to keep it (and the
pilot) from falling to its demise. He made a mental note to ask her when
she got back, though.

Now, of course, he had to write a report SAYING nothing happened during his
active duty shift- how in the world was he supposed to do that? He could
always ask Captain Gotoh how he did it, but Gomioka wasn't exactly sure how
useful he would be- Gotoh always struck him as being a bit shady- not
corrupt, exactly, just not very by-the-book. Gomioka prided himself on
being a model officer, and would NOT look to Gotoh as an example of how to
do things, if he could avoid it.

He was a little surprised when Kanuka Clancy came into the office- he
thought she was back in New York already. She looked at Gotoh's desk
before walking over to him. "Did Captain Gotoh leave a note for me?"

"Um, no- or if he did, he didn't give it to me. What are you looking for?"

Kanuka absently brushed a hair from her eyes. "My grandmother is very ill,
and so I've asked for an assignment here until... until she gets better.
I'm eventually being transferred to the Patlabor Academy, but until classes
open there I need an intermittent assignment- probably as a... TRAFFIC
COP," she said with obvious disdain. "Gotoh is supposed to have a listing
of some openings for me today."

Gomioka blinked. What kind of illness would last so long she'd need to be
here until April, at the very earliest? It was none of his business,
however, so he chose not to pry. Instead, he made a suggestion. "Don't
take any assignments in either the Bokuto or the Nerima provinces."

She blinked. "Why's that?"

"Well, Bokuto has the reputation of having the WORST traffic violators in
all of Tokyo. Real nutcases- very dangerous stuff. Also very boring- you
almost never get anything BUT traffic violations. Nerima, on the other
hand... well, a lot of cops call it a 'grey area.' So many weird things
are rumored to have happened there- monsters, epic battles of martial
artist which cause millions of yen in property damage, and..." he blushed
slightly, "Panty thefts. However, that precincts cops are specifically
ordered NOT to arrest those involved- some have political connections, some
have too much money and are able to BUY the connections, and some are
considered to be undetainable- mostly the martial artists. But, like I
said, you can't arrest any of them, so most people assigned to that
district get frustrated at not being able to do ANYTHING." He sighed. "If
those two are your only choice, choose Bokuto- at least there you have
something to do. I know right now I'm suffering from near terminal
boredom."

"Ah- slow day?" He nodded in response to Kanuka's question, to which she
smiled slightly and continued, "Well, I'd suggest you try doing what Gotoh
does to pass the time, but you're married."

Gomioka frowned. What did being married have to do with anything Gotoh
could do on the job? "What is that?"

Turning to walk out the door, Kanuka looked back at him, the same little
smile on her face. "Hit on Captain Nagumo... and being rejected every
time"

Gomioka sighed, turning back to his report. Yep, he would definitely avoid
asking Captain Gotoh for advice any time soon.

* * * * *

Chief Sakaki waited at the terminal for a while. Finally, Shige showed up.
"Ah, Shige- you're here. Good. There's something I've been wanting to
ask you..."

Shige sighed when he noticed the computer was on. Ever since the Chief
decided to start learning computers, he'd come up with questions commonly
associated with those 'Funny Computer Support Line Questions' he'd found so
many copies of on the internet. Things like people using their CD players
as cup holders, and people thinking something was seriously wrong with
their computer when it was just unplugged. Fortunately, Sakaki had done
nothing like that yet, but he'd come close- Shinohara had mentioned
something about reformatting some storage disks before each use, and he'd
personally seen him mess up the computer's configuration files about a
dozen times. This was not going to be fun.

"Yes, Chief? What is it?"

Sakaki pointed to the computer screen. "I was... how do you kids put it?
'Surfing the Web,' and I found this site. It mentioned something about the
'Y2K Bug' effecting almost anything with a computer in it. What is this
bug, and how does it effect our labors? Should we be making preparations
for tonight?"

Shige looked at the screen- the web page Sakaki was looking at was a couple
of years old- though probably accurate for the time. "Don't worry about
our labors- their computer systems were built after this person put up this
information. The worst that can happen to them is to find that data from
outside sources, like satellite uplinks, a little unreliable. Nothing to
worry about."

Sakaki nodded and turned back to the computer. "Okay, thank you, Shige."

Shige turned away, not wanting to see the chief typing in URLs instead
using his bookmarks- why did he make them if he didn't use them, anyway?

* * * * *

It was about ten minutes till midnight when Shinobu walked in to get ready
for standby duty. Gotoh's unit was on active duty, and Gomioka's was
preparing to go on active duty. It was the first time all three captains
had been in the office at the same time that day.

"I haven't seen you since I went on active duty this morning," she said to
Gomioka, smiling. "How was your first full day as captain?"

"Actually," he admitted, "It was quite boring. What do you usually do on
those quiet days when nothing is happening? I was able to give my labor
officers some busy work, but I didn't really have anything to do myself
except sit around and wait for a call which never came."

Shinobu laughed. "Well, usually I just sit around and chat with Captain
Gotoh, or read a book, or do the crossword puzzles in the paper... There
really isn't much that can be done as far as work is concerned, unless you
wanted to 'supervise' your subordinates in their busy-work, if you're not
on a case. It doesn't really matter what you do, as long as you're near
the phone, and you don't let you hobbies interfere with your professional
work. I understand Captain Mamoru Oshii scribbles down notes for this
manga he's been working on. I could give you some more suggestions, but I
think it would be better if you were to just come up with something to do
on your own."

Gomioka blinked. When he'd heard from Kanuka that Captain Gotoh spent his
time flirting with Captain Nagumo, he'd assumed that not only was it
something that was very unprofessional, but it was something unwelcome as
well. He certainly couldn't imaging someone as serious about her job as
Shinobu would encourage such a thing on the job, but as she just said,
their 'chats' were just a way of getting rid of the boredom. He also was
astounded to learn that she did things like read books and fill in
crossword puzzles on the job. Well, he had much to learn.

His thoughts were interrupted by a banging from the door. Without waiting
for any of the three captains to give their permission, the door opened and
Shinohara strolled in, carrying a television. "Hey, Captain Gotoh! I have
the TV set you wanted to watch the New Years celebrations on!" he bellowed.
"I split Unit Two's dorm room's cable from the antenna upstairs so that
you could get a clear channel, since we have the best reception, I think."
Noa followed him with the cable line.

Gotoh smiled. "Ah, good, you got it. Set it down on my desk, facing the
door, would you? That way, there'll be more room for Captains Nagumo,
Gomioka, and myself to sit around it."

Asuma and Noa, working together, hooked up the television in under a
minute. Shinohara turned the TV on and set the channel to the appropriate
station. Assured it was working properly, he turned to the captain.

"Everything's set up now, sir. I hope you enjoy the- ack!"

"Come on, Asuma- we have to get back to the dorm room before midnight! I
don't want to miss this!" Noa said, dragging him by the back of the shirt
and inadvertently choking him as she scrambled out the door.

Gotoh chuckled at the departing chuckle. Gomioka smiled at the humor of
the situation, as well, but wasn't entirely sure that the relationship of
the two labor officers was appropriate for people in their position, and
how everyone decided through unspoken agreement to keep their relationship
a secret. In fact, he was a little uncomfortable with keeping secret the
fact that Noa had smuggled in a few bottles of her family store's champagne
to help her, Asuma, and the rest of Unit Two celebrate the New Years
with... However, even he had to admit that Noa and Shinohara were largely
responsible for Captain Gotoh's unit being as effective as it had been- of
course, now that Ohta was one of the labor pilots in HIS squad instead of
Gotoh's, it should be easier for Unit Two to gain much of the
respectability that Unit One had. Gomioka sighed- Ohta would be trouble
when they were called in to assignments. Things were going to be pretty
rough for the new Unit Three.

"Hey, come on," Gotoh was saying, breaking in on Gomioka's thoughts.
"Aren't you going to join Shinobu and me around the television? It isn't
every day you see the birth of a new millenium."

"Uh, what? Oh, yeah, of course! Thanks for arranging this," Gomioka said
politely, and joined him and Captain Nagumo on the three chairs in front of
the television. Shinobu sat between the two of them- something both men
were happy about. Gotoh, because it meant he was sitting next to her, and
Gomioka, because it meant he DIDN'T have to sit next to the man who'd
foisted Ohta Isao on him.

"...commonly felt that the new millenium will bring with it many advances
in society," Momoko Sakurayama, the reporter for SNN, was saying, standing
in front of a fenced off zone with a small labor about twenty feet behind
her. A light snow had covered the ground, and her hair had been frosted
lightly. "Including the development of faster and stronger labors- such as
the one that will be sending out the signal of the new year in Japan two
minutes from now. We have with us Mr. Jitsuyama, a plant manager for
Shinohara Heavy Industries, who will explain how this prototype labor
will-"

Suddenly, the picture disappeared and all that was heard was interference
as the signal disappeared. "What happened to the picture?" Shinobu asked,
concerned. She wanted to see this just as much as Gotoh did, and it was
actually her suggestion that he bring the TV into the office. Of course,
she didn't think he'd actually take her up on it, but since he did, he
wanted to see the turning of the millenium.

"Hmm, I don't know," Gotoh frowned, examining the back of the television
where the cable was plugged in. "Maybe it's the antenna."

"How about another station? Maybe they're having technical problems..."

Gotoh half-smiled. "Well, I hate to turn it off of someone who actually
gives us good press on occasion, but I guess we don't have much choice."
He flipped the station to where a male reporter was televising from some
party, with a clock showing a little under a minute until midnight. "There
we go."

"I wonder what happened at SNN?" Gomioka pondered.

"I dunno- but let's not worry about it until after midnight, okay?" Shinobu
asked, smiling.

Niether Gomioka nor Gotoh could say anything in response to that plea, and
settled down to watch the television. Everyone kept quiet until the
countdown began, and then they echoed it with their own voices.

"Ten... nine... eight... seven... six... five... four... three... two...
one... HAPPY NEW YEARS!" They all cried. Gotoh puckered up in the hopes
that he could entice a New Years kiss out of Shinobu, and approached.

* * * * *

Noa looked at Asuma as she popped the cork on the cheap champagne,
celebrating the New Year. If he was her boyfriend, then he'd probably try
to get a midnight kiss or something. He looked back at her, with something
like regret on his face. Was he interested? Was he scared of her
rejecting him? Just in case, she leaned in, hoping to show her interest.
Shinohara's eyes widened when he noticed.

* * * * *

All over the SV2 Headquarters, seconds before two kisses might have
happened, power went out.

* * * * *

Gotoh fell on his face in the dark, missing Shinobu completely.

Nagumo herself was walking over to the phone. "I'm going outside to see if
anyone's trying to start up the backup generator."

Gotoh picked himself up off the floor and searched his desk with his hands.
"I'll come with you," he said, turning on a flashlight he picked up.

Shinobu nodded, and the two went outside to see the generator. There, they
found three members of the maintenance squad, led by Shige, trying to get
the dusty old gasoline generator started up. Shinobu was about to suggest
they return to the office and report the power outage when she noticed
Gotoh staring across the bay.

"What's wrong?" she asked.

"Tokyo is powered by multiple power plants, right?" he replied.

"Yeah, so?"

"Even if a whole plant went down, Tokyo should have power from the
generators in the other plants. So why are the only working lights in
buildings which have their own independant generators?"

Shinobu looked across the bay as he pointed, and noticed that, except for
at a hospital, there wasn't one building she could see which had any lights
on at all. Tokyo was in blackout.

-------------------------
Next Episode: The SV2 helps to stop several riots caused by the blackout.
Yuhki shows he still gets nervous. A plane crashes into Tokyo. And a
number of other things that were supposed to happen in THIS episode.

--------------------------------------------------------- -------------------

---
Sir Desaix, member # 116 of the Knights of the True Fiancee
desaix@sysnet.net
http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Acropolis /7872
fanfics available at
http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Acropolis/7872/fanfics.htm

---Patlabor: Personal Files
An Episodic Patlabor Fanfic by David A. Tatum
Disclaimer: Insert legal junk here...

Episode 05: Birth of a New Millennium, Part 2

In this episode, {...} means speech in Russian

January 1, 2000

At an airport in Vladivostok, the passing of midnight went without
incident. Shortly after the arrival of the new millennium, a turboprop
aircraft belonging to Aeroflot Airlines left, bound for Manilla in the
Philippines. The one hundred thirty four passengers and crew settled
themselves in for a VERY long flight- their first stop- in Seoul, Korea-
wasn't for another twelve hours. They'd heard that a number of large
cities had been hit by the computer bug known as the 'Y2K Crisis,' but
midnight had come and gone, and the airports were still intact- even in
Tokyo, the hardest hit major city, the Airport had restored service in less
than a minute, and was experiencing no problems- it was even still
accepting incoming flights (though they weren't sending out any additional
flights). The autopilot was set after reaching ten thousand feet, and the
pilot leaned back. His only job for the next nine hours was to keep an eye
on the autopilot and make sure it didn't malfunction.

Sighing, the cabin crew of Aeroflot flight 201 sat back in their seats. It
was going to be a LOOONNG flight.

* * * * *

The three captains, Sakaki, and all the residents of SV2 Headquarters all
assembled in the labor hangers. "Okay," Shinobu began. "This is what we
know so far. The phone works, and we were able to get in touch with the
power company. Apparently, a serious computer problem- which they thought
they had taken care of but hadn't had time to test before this crisis
occurred- has crashed everything... including the backups. They are
manually restarting the plants, but so far they've only gotten a few
stations working- Tokyo won't have enough power to run even in brownout
conditions for another forty-eight hours. It'll be weeks before they've
restored every plant."

Gomioka stepped up. "That, believe it or not, is the good news- things
will be fixed before too long. However, the blackout has led to a severe
panic in the public. Riots are breaking out in the streets- mostly just
unarmed citizens, but there are too many of them for the regular police to
handle. They've asked us to go in and help with crowd control- and there's
also the possibility that the rioters may gain control of heavy vehicles
like labors, which would also be our jurisdiction. We were asked to go in
with tear gas guns, however, so the only anti-labor weapons we will have
will be our electromagnetic batons. We want ALL functioning labors in the
city- that includes the third labors of Units One and Three. Sakaki tells
me that Unit Two's third labor was cannibalized for spare parts, so it is
excused. The other two units will be needing manpower- and fortunately
we've got an extra labor pilot on base. However, assemble with your
captains for assignment- some of you will not be performing your usual
function."

The three captains ran off, and were followed by their units. Gotoh went
into his squad room, and was followed by Unit Two's people. "Okay, we're
the only unit which is going to have just two labors in the action. We're
also the first unit to get duty- Shinohara, your labor's got the patrol
around the Imperial Palace. Kumagami, your labor's to deal with the bridge
into the reclaimed land. Any questions?"

As usual, about everyone's hand went up.

Similar assignments were given out to the other units- Unit One, with
Kanuka Clancy piloting the third labor, Shige from the maintenance squad
driving the transport, and Shinobu taking the command car, managed to
outfit all three of its labors with full crews, and quickly placed
themselves into position.

The Third Unit, however, was in much worse shape, personnel-wise. Gomioka
almost took the third labor for himself, but looked at his assembled squad
and remembered his promise to the hopeful-looking Yamane Seiroku.
Remembering his promise to make Yamane the de-facto pilot of the third
labor, Gomioka took the position of command car operator for all three
labors. Akito was asked to drive the transport, and off they went. Their
was only one command car, so all three labors had to go to the same area-
for that reason, they were assigned to the area with the largest number of
rioters.

Just before getting into the cab of the third labor's transport, Seiroku
showed up in front of Captain Gomioka. "Sir, thank you sir!" he gushed.
"I promise not to let you down!"

Gomioka nodded. "Just don't disappoint me."

With that, the Third Unit went on its first assignment- riot control around
the newly-completed tallest building in Tokyo, the Tower City project,
Tower 1. The building which rose almost six thousand feet into the air.

* * * * *

Most of the rioters retreated at the sight of the three hulking Type 97's
that showed up around the Tower City project. Those few that remained ran
off when Ohta started shooting most of his tear gas cartridges into the
crowd, their eyes burning. Peace was restored for the moment.

It did not last long, however, as one of the retreating rioters got it into
his head to hot-wire a nearby construction labor that was supposed to be
used to begin construction on Tower 2 in a few days, and turn it against
the cops. Soon, that man's friends started to do the same to a couple of
other labors in the same lot, and soon five construction labors charged in
against the three Patlabors, an army of rioters behind them.

"Oh, god," was all Gomioka could say before Ohta started firing at them.
The tear gas did nothing to the labors, which continued charging.

"Stupid gas guns!" Ohta snarled, tossing the device he cursed at the
labors- and actually taking the knees out from one of them. "If we had
REAL guns, they'd show more respect for the law!" Pulling out his baton,
he charged in, followed by the other two patlabors (which lobbed gas
cartridges over the rioting labors and into the crowd behind them), and
engaged them hand to hand.

Unfortunately for Ohta, he'd completely forgotten how stiff and
unresponsive the Type 97s were compared to his old Ingram, and soon found
himself on the ground and at the mercy of the construction labors.

Or he would have been if Seiroku hadn't used his labor to pick up one of
the construction labors and toss it into the two others standing over the
fallen Ohta. Kenji Iguchi engaged the final labor, and managed to get it
into a standoff while Yamane helped Ohta up. Finally, all three labors
were up and ready, and surrounded the final labor. Without any support,
the last of the rioters surrendered.

* * * * *

A beloved Ingram stood sentry duty at the Imperial palace. The labor crew
had heard of a number of riots in other areas, and some looting in the
Ginza (which was supposed to be covered by Kanuka's labor) and some other
shopping districts, but so far there was nothing happening in the area
patrolled by the labor known as Alphonse.

"Say, Noa," Shinohara began softly into his radio link, after having spent
a lot of time in thought. There were several questions he wanted to ask
her, but he wasn't sure if it was the appropriate time. Without anything
else to keep him busy, however, and not being able to concentrate on
anything but those questions, he couldn't ignore them. He just had to have
an answer.

"Yes, Asuma?" Noa replied, wondering why he wasn't using his normal voice.

"About the party..." he said, trailing off because he wasn't sure he knew
how to go on.

Suddenly, she realized what he was trying to ask her. Still, she would
wait for him to finish before she answered. "Yes, Asuma?"

"Were you... I mean did you try... I... oh, never mind. It wasn't
important," he said, unable to get it out. 'Chicken! I can't even ask her
if she was trying to kiss me or not!' he thought to himself spitefully.
'But it's probably for the better that I not know, anyway.... I mean, if
she WAS, then...'

"Um... okay," Noa replied, confused. 'Wasn't he going to ask me if I liked
him?' she wondered.

* * * * *

"Requesting permission to fire the gas gun!" Kanuka screamed into the
radio. Nearly fifty looters were still on the streets, stealing clothes,
televisions, anything they could get their hands on.

"Permission denied," Shinobu answered. "If you get tear gas on those
products, then they won't be recoverable. Save that option for the last
resort- try to cow them into submission first."

"Affirmative," Kanuka replied. She stormed into the middle of the melee,
and turned on her loudspeakers. "Attention- this is the police. Drop the
stolen goods and return home. If you fail to comply, you will be
arrested."

Some people did as Kanuka ordered, but several remained and continued
looting. With as much precision as possible, the Type 0 Labor began
picking people up with one hand and trapping them in the crook of its arm.
By the time the regular police had arrived, she had nearly a dozen people
so entrapped, and soon they were carted off to holding cells.

"Situation normal," Kanuka reported. "Anything I should be aware of?"

"Hmm... Riot police have stabilized most areas already. Unit Three may
require some help, however... I understand that their labors were somewhat
damaged- though still functional, they might have trouble if some more
labors show up. Why don't we head to assist them?"

"Affirmative."

* * * * *

By eight-fifty in the morning, the riots were over. A hard snow was
starting to fall throughout the area. Partial power had been restored to
some of the city, and the police were out in force. Unit Two, which had
been up for twenty-four hours, was sent home and given an extra shift off,
and things seemed to have finally calmed down.

That was when it started to hit midnight, Greenwich time.

* * * * *

"Um, sir," an air traffic controller said to his boss. "We seem to have a
serious problem. Suddenly most of the transponder codes disappeared from
the radar- I have no idea what caused it, but now we don't know which plane
is which."

"Odd," his chief said. "Well, get on the radio- ask all planes in the area
to send you their flight information and position- try to keep track of
them that way. And get them in here as soon as you can. Hopefully, we can
cut down on the confusion that way."

"Yes, sir."

"Good. While you do that, I'll find out from the runway crews if that snow
will force us to shut down the runway."

* * * * *

"{Dmitri!}" the pilot of Aeroflot flight 201 yelled at his navigator.
"{Why didn't you tell me we were off course?!}"

Dmitri blinked, looking at the old navigation console. The device was
obsolescent, but he maintained it fairly well and it never failed him. Oh,
sure, the new Global Positioning Systems were nice, but they required
connections to various new satellites which his system had no access to,
and it would cost too much money to replace the old system. It should
still be good until the old satellites died, after all.

"{Sorry, sir- didn't notice it.}"

The pilot nodded. "{That's okay- it was a malfunction of the autopilot,
apparently. Just keep an eye on that navigation system- visibility is
almost zero in this snowstorm.}"

"{Yes, sir,}" Dmitri answered.

About two and a half hours later, they went down to five thousand feet and
started looking for the Seoul airport's radio signal.

* * * * *

"Sir, I'm detecting another plane coming into the radar," the air traffic
controller said. "Coming in from the Northeast. IFF Transponder not
responding."

The chief sighed. "Very well. Let them know we've closed the airport-
direct them to Nagasaki."

* * * * *

"Attention, unidentified flight," the radio crackled. "This is Tokyo
International Airport. All airstrips in Tokyo are shut down due to snow-
please head to Nagasaki, instead. Repeat, unidentified flight- the Tokyo
International Airport is CLOSED. Divert to Nagasaki."

"{Heh... sounds like this snow storm is huge, to be effecting Tokyo as
well. Any luck contacting Seoul?}" the pilot asked, looking intently at
the altimeter to make sure they weren't going in too low. They were still
at five thousand feet.

Dmitri shook his head. "{Nope... doesn't appear we're on their radar
yet.}"

"{Odd, they should have picked us up by now.}"

"{Hmm... I wonder if- hey, what's that ahead of us?}"

* * * * *

"Hey, Madoka," a man said to his new wife as they stood at the observation
window on top of Tower 1 of the Tower City project. "How do you like the
view?"

"Lovely, Kyosuke. This has been a great honeymoon, despite the blackout,"
his wife said. She leaned in for a kiss.

They broke off the kiss a moment later, and turned to look out the window.

"Kyosuke, is that a PLANE heading for the window?"

Kyosuke looked out the window. "Oh, my god! Hold on!" he cried, grabbing
on to his wife.

Aeroflot Flight 201 crashed through the window moments later. Somehow- the
method of which some might think could only be magic- the young couple had
escaped seconds before it hit.

* * * * *

"What was that?" Ohta asked, looking up. He wasn't in his labor at the
moment- he and Shinshi were in the process of replacing the battery. Just
as they had finished securing the pack, a loud explosion came from above.

"Oh, my god! An airplane crashed into the tower! It's spinning out of
control!" Shinshi cried. Ohta glanced in the direction Shinshi was
pointing, and saw a passenger plane spiraling downwards, its nose and one
wing crumpled beyond recognition.

"FIRE IN THE HOLE!" Shinobu cried. Ohta looked up directly above him, and
saw a piece of a wing descending upon him. Shortly before it would have
splattered him, Shinshi drove him under the cover that the trailer allowed.
Burning wreckage collapsed around them.

"That was close," Ohta gasped. "Thanks."

Shinshi nodded, breathing heavily. "Yeah... no problem."

They stepped out from behind the trailer as soon as they were certain that
the debris had finished falling, just in time to see Kanuka's Type Zero and
Seiroku's Type 97 running off towards the crash site.

Ohta turned to get into his labor and join them, when he saw the damage
that was inflicted by the falling debris. He growled.

"Bah... looks like I'm out of the action for a while." His Type 97 was
buried, and Kenji Iguchi's labor had already moved to dig it out.

* * * * *

The two labors tag teamed to rip open the wreckage and search for
survivors. The 97 was working effeciently, but from time to time it would
slow or a limb would tremble. As they sorted through the grisly remains,
Kanuka checked up on the rookie.

"How are you doing, so far?" she asked over the radio.

"Uh... well, ma'am, I think I'm able to handle it. I've never seen a dead
body before, though, and this...."

"Don't worry about it. I've never known a labor unit to be called in to a
situation like this before, and most of the situations where they ARE
called in rarely have any casualties- a labor can take a hell of a
pounding, and the pilot will still be safe, and if you perform properly in
your rescue missions it's unlikely you'll ever encounter a body without a
labor fight first. Just keep your head for this situation, and I'd be
surprised if you needed to deal with another death for the rest of the
year."

"But what about now, ma'am?"

"Just realize that there was nothing you could do to save these people, and
keep working.

"Yes, ma'am," Seiroku replied. "Thank you, ma'am."

As they continued to work, Kanuka noticed a definite improvement in the
work of the young rookie, and smiled. 'So, I'm going to be teaching at the
Academy in a few months, eh? Well, maybe I can use this experience to help
me prepare for it...'

* * * * *

About a half hour into their clean up, shortly after the REAL rescue teams
got the message and arrived, a moaning was heard.

"{Dmitri... Dmitri, what's going on?}" the dazed voice said.

"We've got a live one!" came the enthusiastic shout of one of the rescue
workers. "He's buried here- in the COCKPIT area!"

Using the two labors, they dug the injured but alive pilot from the cockpit
assembly, and he was rushed to the hospital.

* * * * *

January 2, 2000

"...and so it turns out," Shinshi was saying, reading the paper in Unit 3's
work room, "That the airplane crash was caused by an obsolescent computer-
the same bug that led to the blackout that covered this city last night."

"The rescue," Seiroku read aloud from a different paragraph in the same
article. "Was accomplished with the aid of two members of the much
maligned SV2 Section 2, which also assisted successfully in crowd control
during the riot."

"Finally," Ohta bellowed. "We get a little respect! Who's the reporter
who wrote the article?"

Seiroku checked the top of the column. "Special correspondant Momoko
Sakurayama, based on interviews with Captains Nagumo, Gomioka, and Fujimoto
of the riot squad."

Shinshi sighed. "Of course- she ALWAYS supports us. You think one of
these days we could find ANOTHER reporter willing to tell our side of
things?"

Gomioka sighed, staring at Ohta. While he had done fairly well for this
assignment, he knew that much of the SV2's bad reputation was caused by
him. "I doubt it- not for a long time," he said, thinking 'As long as Ohta
was still a labor pilot, we never will find one.' He sighed. 'Maybe I'll
be able to get rid of him one of these days. Just maybe...'

--------------------------
Episode 05 Closing Notes: Just to let you all know what was going on here,
this is essentially a 'worst case scenario' for the Y2K bug- many utilities
are expecting to be able to get themselves Y2K compliant before the new
millennium, but they aren't sure they'll have time to do all the testing
they'll need. Airports should not be effected- at worst, they'd have to go
to backups for power to the radars, etc, but airplane IFF Transcievers will
likely be effected. Also, most modern Satellite Navigation systems (such
as modern Global Positioning Systems) should not be effected, but older,
obsolescent ones (like the ones used by many Aeroflot aircraft) that are
dependant on accurate dates will be, and such aircraft are likely to become
lost. To be honest, I have no reason to care, personally, about Y2K, and
don't think of it as effecting me TOO much (I figure anything that could
effect me will be fixed in a few weeks), but my brother, sister-in-law, and
some of my friends work on the problems.... I just came up with this idea,
one day, when one of my teachers gave a lecture on the horrors of Y2K (for
some reason, I doubt that the government of the US is going to fall because
of some computer glitches). In fact, it was the first of the ideas I'd
started writing down that started Patlabor: Personal files. I did,
however, have to ask a lot of other people about some of the technical
details (special thanks to Kickaha, who explained to me why parts of my
original idea wouldn't work)...

Next Episode: Follow Gomioka on a typical day in his life as Captain of
the Third Unit.


------------------------------------------------------- ---------------------

---
Sir Desaix, member # 116 of the Knights of the True Fiancee
desaix@sysnet.net
http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Acropolis /7872
fanfics available at
http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Acropolis/7872/fanfics.htm

----------

From: "David A. Tatum" <desaix@sysnet.net>
Subject: [Patlabor][FanFic] Patlabor: Personal Files, Episode 08


Patlabor: Personal Files
An Episodic Patlabor Fanfic by David A. Tatum
Disclaimer: Insert legal junk here...

Author's Note: Episode 07 was abandoned (after nearly six months of
struggling to make it work out). What exists of it will now be known as a
'lost episode.' If someone wants to take it off my hands and rewrite or
revise and complete the episode based on the short summary I included at
the end of Episode 06, let me know... after all, I am quite willing to
allow guest authors to write certain episodes (as long as they aren't ones
I particularly want to write). There are also a few places where I have
episodes scheduled but no plot for them yet (episodes 11 and 12, for
example) where I would gladly welcome a guest (or co) author. There were
two major things that happened in Episode 07 that should be noted before
reading this one- the first one is that Akito Kenichi resigned from Unit 3
to be replaced by Kanuka, who transferred from the Nerima patrol division
after being, er, overwhelmed by the wackiness inherent in the precinct.
The second major thing that happened is that, in response to one of Kunou's
speeches, Noa accidentally revealed that she's not a virgin (technically,
she was responding to being called a 'maiden') to all of Unit 2. She and
Asuma have yet to have a chance to talk about this....

Episode 08: A Father's Wisdom

January 7, 2000

Noa was nervous- finally, an off day. One where she and Asuma could go out
for drinks like they had talked about the previous week, and perhaps have a
long and meaningful talk. For one thing, she was... concerned... about
what he thought of her announcement the previous day. It isn't every day
you blurt out to the whole world that you, a twenty-two year old Japanese
girl, are not the innocent maiden everyone thinks you are.

But also... also, if that went well, she wanted to break it to him- she
wanted to move their relationship forward a bit. Maybe not enough so that
their friendship would be lost if things didn't work out, but perhaps they
could go on a few 'official' dates, and see if they COULD be more than
friends.

Now, all she had to do was find him and remind him of his promise to go out
for drinks.

* * * * *

Asuma looked through his closet, trying to pick out something to wear. His
baseball cap, of course, was a must- he almost always wore it on off-duty.
It used to be his late brothers, after all- one of only a very few relics
he had been able to save. The only other one he'd taken with him to the
SV2 was that scarf he gave to Noa when they went to visit the Grave a month
before.

The rest of his outfit, however, was difficult to choose. He didn't really
know what he was doing today, so he had no clue whether he should wear some
jeans he didn't mind messing up, a pair of semi-dress slacks he could wear
into a decent restaurant, or something even more formal.

Hiromi knocked and stepped into the locker room. "Asuma, there's a
telephone call for you."

Asuma blinked. "For me? Who would be calling me?"

"I'm not sure- I didn't get a name. Should I go ask him?" Hiromi asked.

Asuma shook his head. "No, don't bother. I'll go and ask him myself."
With that, he straightened the uniform he hadn't gotten out of and followed
Hiromi to the phone.

When Asuma returned, his decision had been made for him. Reaching into the
closet, he pulled out the most formal set on non-uniform clothing he had.

* * * * *

Noa blinked when she saw Asuma walking down the stairs. 'Either he plans
to take me somewhere much more expensive than I was planning on going to,
or he forgot that we were going to go out today.' She paused. 'Or he
doesn't WANT to go out with me any more after hearing that I'm not a
virgin.'

She approached him slowly. "Asuma?"

He blinked, as if in a daze. "Eh, what?"

"Weren't we going to go out today?" she asked cautiously.

"We were? Oh, sorry... forgot," he said absently. "I'll take a raincheck,
but there's something else I need to do right now. See ya later."

With that, he slipped past her, out the door.

Noa sniffed. 'He's avoiding me. He... he can't deal with me having
had...'

Unable to handle her own thoughts, she turned and ran off into the dorm
rooms, tears in her eyes.

* * * * *

Asuma unlocked the door to his car and was about to get in when another
member of the female gender ran up to him enthusiastically.

"Mr. Shinohara, sir!" Natsume Kawai called, running up to him.

Asuma flinched at the use of his last name. "Yes?"

"Mr. Shinohara, sir, can I get a ride with you into town? Just to any bus
stop will do."

"No, I'm not headed into town," he answered, a little harshly.

Natsume blinked. "Please? Pretty please? Can't you just do me a little
favor and take a little detour to get me to a bus stop? You're the only
person with a car on base in all of Unit 2, and-"

"Then borrow Noa's motorbike," he snapped. "I can't take you anywhere
right now. Excuse me, I can't afford to be late." He stepped into the car
and slammed shut the door.

"But I don't know how to drive a motorbike!" she called out as he drove
away.

* * * * *

Hiromi gathered up the dirty clothes that had overflowed out of the hamper
and stuffed them back in. Unlike most of the others of Unit 2, he didn't
have any special plans for the off day other than to get some neglected
chores done. That included doing everyone's laundry, a top to bottom
cleaning of the locker rooms, and some other things that would otherwise
never be done, despite the many hours of busy-work that the members of the
SV2 were constantly assigned.

"Oops- forgot the detergent," he said to no-one in particular. He sped off
to the utility closet by the dorms. To his surprise, he heard some
sniffling on his way back as he passed by one of the rooms. Pausing, he
decided to investigate.

Noa looked up in surprise when Hiromi walked in and quickly tried to wipe
all evidence of the tears which had been pouring down her face. "Hiromi!"
she said, her voice cracking.

"Ms. Izumi?" the soft-spoken giant replied. "What's wrong? Why are you
crying?"

She sniffed. "Crying? I'm not crying."

Hiromi frowned. "I might not say much, but I'm part of your labor team as
well. I can tell something's wrong even though I don't know you as well as
Asuma does..." He frowned when Noa jumped at Asuma's name. "Now what is
the problem?"

Noa didn't say anything for a moment. Finally, her tears started falling
back down her cheeks. "Hiromi, A... Asuma is avoiding me. I blurted out
to the whole world that I wasn't a virgin because some pompous jerk was
getting under my skin, and now Asuma won't have anything to do with me...."
With one last burst of energy, she gasped out, "I've lost him."

Hiromi blinked. "How is it you know he's avoiding you?"

"Well, we had plans for today, and he just ignored them and went out. Said
he had something else to do, but wouldn't even tell me what... and he was
in such a hurry- he HAD to have been avoiding me!"

Hiromi looked perplexed. "Are you sure it didn't have anything to do with
that call from his father he got a half hour ago?"

"No, I'm not 'sure' about anything, but it sure looked like... wait, did
you say his father called him?"

Hiromi nodded. "Yes. They talked for about a half hour, and then Asuma
went into the dressing room and put on his best suit and, of all things, a
baseball cap." A slight twinkle developed in his eye. "I didn't let him
know that I knew it was his father- I thought it best that way."

Noa, however, wasn't listening- instead, she was thinking very hard. 'His
father? He was very dressed up- more so even then when he visited his
brother's grave. Maybe... maybe they're about to have some sort of
meeting? In which case, it's not too surprising that he seemed kind of out
of it when I saw him- he wasn't avoiding me, he was just stressed out over
his father!'

She gulped. "I hope," she said aloud.

"What was that?" Hiromi asked.

"Oh, never mind," Noa said, wiping away the last of the tears. "Thanks,
Hiromi... you know a lot more than you let on, don't you?"

Hiromi smiled. "Well, I just don't have occasion to say much, that's all."
His expression then turned serious for a moment. "Don't worry- he won't
let a little thing like a mistake in the past ruin your relationship-
you're too important to him."

Noa blushed. "Um, thank you." She paused. "Actually, I don't think a
simple 'thank you' is enough right now. With Asuma gone for the day, all
my plans are ruined. How about I help you out around here?"

Hiromi just nodded, not saying anything.

* * * * *

"I can't believe Asuma would turn down a cute girl like you," Shige was
saying to Natsume Kawai. "Well, if he won't do it then I guess I'll have
to. I'll see if I can take labor 3's command car and drive you down to the
bus station in a minute. Let me go talk to Gotoh and I'll be right back."
He started running off, one hand behind his head and smiling like a maniac.

Noa and Hiromi, carrying four buckets filled near overflowing with dirty
clothes (three by Hiromi, one by Noa), started to pass by Natsume as she
stood, waiting. Seeing an opportunity, she ran up to Noa.

"Ms. Izumi!" she called, running up to her. "Ms. Izumi, can I talk to you
for a second?"

Noa looked from Hiromi to Natsume and back again. She said she'd help him,
but she didn't want to be rude and just ignore the girl who wanted to talk
with him. Without another word, Hiromi took the basket from her, added it
to the three he was already carrying, and nodded.

"I'll handle it, Ms. Izumi," he said. "She seems to need you more than I
do right now."

"Thanks again, Hiromi," she said before turning her attention to Natsume.
"Now, what can I help you with?"

"Ms. Izumi, is there something wrong with Mr. Shinohara? All I did was ask
him to give me a ride into town and he snapped at me! Then he drove off
without any sort of explanation..."

A couple of mechanics in the next room overheard this. "Asuma yelled at
Natsume?" the first one asked as they snuck out of hearing range.

"That Shinohara! He already treats Noa like dirt- and the only thing that
makes it forgivable is that they're going out and she doesn't seem to mind
it herself, but now he's starting in on Ms. Kawai too? That's no fair!"

"Yeah!" the first mechanic said. "We should do something about it!"

"But what could we do?" the second mechanic asked.

"Hmm.... Come with me- I have an idea."

Meanwhile, Noa was explaining things to Natsume.

"...Yeah, it's been real trying for him," she was saying. "He and I once
got into a REAL big argument about it. I kept demanding he try and
reconcile with his father, and he wouldn't even hear about it. Well, that
flared up and we wound up not speaking for several days."

"Sounds bad," Natsume commented.

"It was. We kind of made up without ever resolving it, though, when he
saved my life in a labor battle." Noa sighed. "Maybe it's being resolved
now... at any rate, he's under a lot of stress. It's not surprising he was
a bit upset."

Natsume smile. "Thanks, Ms. Izumi. I was afraid he was still mad at me
for that mistake I made in the tournament."

Just then, Shige returned wearing a jacket and carrying a set of keys.
"Ready to go?" he asked.

Natsume nodded. "Whenever you are."

"Come on- let's get out of here before the chief finds out I'm leaving."

As they left, Noa stood, pondering. A slight smile spread across her face.
'If he was so upset he acted like that to Natsume, it's no surprise he
would be a little... detached... when he was talking to me. It's just
natural,' she thought. 'Maybe I still have a chance, after all.' Her face
clenched in determination. 'No- no maybe about it. I DO still have a
chance....' Then it softened again. 'I hope.'

* * * * *

"Your son has arrived, Mr. Shinohara, sir," a servant said.

Okami Shinohara, the owner and president of Shinohara Industries, tensed
nervously. "Show him in, Tsukai."

"Very good, sir," Tsukai replied, slipping out the door.

A moment later, he returned, bringing Asuma with him. Asuma was wearing a
very stylish formal western suit- black dress jacket, black pants, white
shirt, and a tie. The only thing which seemed off about the whole affair
was the battered old baseball cap he wore.

Okami glanced at the hat, pain in his eyes. "Did you HAVE to wear... oh,
never mind. Come on, it's well past my normal lunch time. Let's eat."

Never one to pass up a good meal (even if it was offered by his father),
Asuma nodded and followed him to the table, where a wide variety of foods
had been placed. They served themselves civilly, and started eating in
silence. After a few minutes, however, Asuma grew impatient with the quiet
and resolved to do something about it.

"So... why did you all-of-a-sudden decide that I was fit to be eating lunch
with you again?" he began with hostility.

Okami sighed. "Do we have to fight? After the graveyard incident, I was
hoping that we could get together and maybe see if we couldn't resolve our
differences." Staring up into his son's eyes, he continued, "I'd like to
know why you hate me so much."

"Hate you?" Asuma asked sardonically. "Why should I hate you? After all,
all you did was drive my brother into insanity and eventual suicide with
your constant demands for us to be better in school, more conformant to the
general public, and just good little ambassadors for the company. All you
did was toss me out when I failed to meet your expectations and force me
into civil service. All you did was-"

"Enough!" Okami cried. "I know I've made some mistakes, but everything I
did I thought was in your best interest. Of course I wanted you and your
brother to be better! Every parent wants their child to be better off than
they were. I wanted you and your brother to be able to do what I didn't,
and to not have to ruin your own lives to make something of yourselves."

"And throwing me out?"

"That was to teach you some responsibility. And it seems to have worked!
From what I hear, you're part of the only good team in all of SV2- you
alone maintain its respectability."

Asuma sneered. "You expect me to be swayed with flattery? You think I'm
going to fall down at your feet and tell you I'm sorry I ever doubted you,
and what a horrible son I am for not seeing it all sooner? Hardly!"

"Don't take that tone with me, young man! You should be more respectful
of-" Okami paused mid-sentence and hung his head. "Must we fight every
time we open our mouths? We seemed to be doing fine at the cemetery, and
we were doing pretty good here until we started talking. You and I share
the same blood coursing through our veins- is there no way we can find
something to talk about which won't lead to us fighting with each other?"

"I doubt it," Asuma said, glaring at his father.

Okami opened and closed his mouth several times. "Well, fine then. Let's
eat in silence- we're a family, and if not talking is what it takes to keep
us together than we shouldn't talk to each other."

Without another word, he went back to his food, picking at it with his
chopsticks.

Again, the silence grew unbearable. Finally, Asuma couldn't stand it
anymore. "Dammit! I'm sorry, dad- there's probably something we can talk
about without fighting. I just can't think of what."

A thin smile broke out on Okami's face- perhaps there was a chance for
them, after all. "Hmm... well, we could catch up on what's been happening
in each other's lives. Who was that girl I saw you with? Is she your
girlfriend or something?"

Asuma blushed very faintly. "Her name is Noa Izumi. No, she's not my
girlfriend. Not really... she's just my forward- my partner."

"You're blushing," Okami noted.

"Well... I sort of wish there was something more," Asuma admitted. "But it
wouldn't work out- for one thing, it's against the rules for two people in
the same unit to have an intimate relationship..."

Okami snorted. "It's not like you've let the rules get in your way,
before. I don't think you'd let that stand between you and this 'Noa'
girl."

Asuma bit his tongue to keep from snapping back angrily. Pausing a few
seconds to calm down, he actually considered what his father said. It was
more or less true- if that one rule was all that stood between him and a
deeper relationship with Noa, he wouldn't let it stop him.

"Well... there are a few other reasons I don't think it would work, as
well."

"What are they?" Okami asked.

Asuma thought about that for a moment. What WERE his reasons for not
starting a relationship with Noa? He certainly liked her enough, and she
wasn't too bad looking- she did look kinda cute when she got angry. She
was a bit of a ditz, but not so much of one that it made her annoying- it
just enough to make her fun to bug...

"Well?" his father prompted.

"Uh... well..." He could mention that she wasn't a virgin, but that wasn't
really a turn-off for him. At least she'd sort of know what she was doing
if they ever got that far. What excuse could he give? "She seems more
interested in her labor than she is in a relationship... all she does in
our off-duty time is polish and clean it. She's even named it 'Alphonse.'"

Okami frowned. "Surely she's not more concerned with labors than she is
with people."

Asuma raised an eyebrow. "She wouldn't be the first person I knew who felt
that way."

Okami grit his teeth. "Never mind- it seems as though we really CAN'T talk
about anything without fighting."

Asuma shrugged. "Actually, I've finished lunch already. Maybe I should go
before we get into a bigger fight, huh?"

Okami opened his mouth as if to say something, then closed it. "Perhaps
you'd better." Asuma got up and started to leave. "Wait, son!" Asuma
stopped, not looking behind him. "Could we maybe... things weren't too bad
today, were they? Maybe we could get together again at your birthday in
March?"

Asuma didn't say anything for a moment. "Maybe. I wasn't thinking about
celebrating it at all, but maybe." With that, he left.

"Tsukai," Okami called after giving Asuma enough time to leave.

"Yes, Mr. Shinohara, sir?"

"You heard and saw how Asuma was acting when he was talking about that Noa
girl. What do you think?"

"He appears quite infatuated with her, but seems afraid to build on their
relationship into something greater, sir."

Okami nodded. "Indeed- that is what I thought as well. Perhaps..."

"Perhaps?"

"Well, it would be rude of me not to provide the Izumi family with a dowry,
wouldn't it? It may be some time before they'll need it however, so could
you contact my lawyers? I'd like to talk to them about making a small
change in my will..."

* * * * *

Noa was waiting for him when he got back. "Welcome back, Asuma," she said
nervously. "How... how did your meeting with your father go?"

He blinked. "How did you know I was with my dad?"

'Oops. Didn't mean to let him know Hiromi told me that,' Noa thought.
"Er... it was the only place I could think that you would go on an off day
dressed like that."

"Ah... well, I guess it didn't go too bad for a meeting with my father. We
left on a better note than we usually do...."

"Well, that's good!" Noa exclaimed enthusiastically. "What did you talk
about?"

"Oh... this and that," Asuma replied, making it obvious he didn't want to
discuss it.

Noa took a deep breath. "Asuma, there are some things I wanted to talk to
you about today that we weren't able to because of your meeting with your
father."

"Like what?"

Noa gestured to a chair. "Asuma... I want to know what you think about
what I said last night."

Asuma feigned ignorance. "Er... last night?"

"You know... when I told everyone I wasn't some pristine maiden and all?"

"Oh... that." Asuma had really hoped she wouldn't bring that up.

"Yeah, that," Noa replied matter-of-factly. "Does knowing I'm not a
virgin... change anything between us?"

When Asuma thought about it, though, it really didn't matter. Still, he
wanted to know some things. "Well, I don't think so. Was... it... with
anyone I know?"

"No!" Noa exclaimed. "It was years ago- I was sixteen at the time, and he
was this dreamy eighteen year old boy named Ouki Hamaki. When he asked me
out, it was a dream come true... until he... kind of... forced me into it."

Asuma's eyes burned in anger. "He raped you?"

Noa shook her head. "Not quite... but I really felt intimidated into it.
Like if I hadn't said 'yes' he would have hurt me. I dumped him the next
day... My dad was furious- he's wanted me to get married for a long time
now- but when, a few months later, we found out that Ouki had joined the
Yakuza... well, let's just say dad got over it."

"What happened to him?"

"I don't know," Noa said. "I didn't keep track of him after that."

"Well," Asuma growled with determination, "If he ever meets up with me,
he'll regret it."

Noa couldn't help it- she giggled. He was so defensive of her... Perhaps
he would be willing to... "There was something else I wanted to talk to
you about..."

"Oh?"

"Yeah..." Noa took a real deep breath. "Asuma, I want to..." Suddenly,
she froze. Could she really ask this? What would she do if he said no?
In fact, what would she do if he said YES?

"Noa? You awake?" Asuma prompted, a smile on his face.

"Uh, yeah! It's just that... god, this is difficult to ask."

"That's okay," Asuma said, the smile still on his face in an encouraging
manner. "Just ask it."

"Right," Noa said. Taking another deep breath, she finally blurted it out.
"Asuma, I want to change our relationship a bit..."

Asuma's face was frozen in shock- still smiling, of course. "You... do?"

Noa panicked a bit- he wasn't taking this well at all. "Not much! Just a
little... I'd like to start thinking of the things we go out and do not as
just 'hanging out,' but maybe... as... dating. You know...
boyfriend-girlfriend sort of dating."

Asuma was still in shock. "Ah... I see."

Noa started freaking out. This wasn't good at all- he just stood there,
his face unchanging. He wasn't even able to speak. "If you want to... and
if it doesn't work out, we can always try and stay just friends..."

After not moving for nearly a full minute, Asuma finally got over his
shock. Laughing nervously, Asuma kept smiling. "Ya know, it's funny- you
were asking about what dad and I were talking about. One of the things we
discussed was why I wasn't dating you even if I wanted to..."

This time, it was Noa's turn to freeze in shock. "Oh?"

"Yeah. And you know what? There was exactly one reason I could think of."
Asuma decided not to mention Alphonse- obviously, he was wrong about that
one.

After a few seconds pause of her own, Noa asked, "And that was?"

"Well... it's against regulations for two people in the same division to
have intimate relations."

Noa's eyes widened. "Oh, no! Then that means-"

"Relax!" Asuma soothed, putting his hands on her shoulders to help calm
her. "Everyone in the SV2 thinks we're going out, anyway- as long as we're
subtle about it- or should I say as long as we STAY subtle about it- no-one
will say anything."

Noa inched further into his arms. "Are you sure?"

Asuma took another step in, and wrapped her up in a gently hug.
"Positive."

Watching them from the door (and providing an unasked for look-out) Hiromi
smiled.

* * * * *

"So, are we all agreed with the plan?"

"Yes. Asuma Shinohara MUST be punished!"

"Then it's settled. Operation Let's Get Vengeance for Natsume is on!"

In the small storage room, the gathering of SV2 labor mechanics cheered.

-------------------------
Next Episode: The creature comforts of Asuma's command car are failing,
and little disasters are going on everywhere around him. How many of the
members of the maintenance squad will be thrown into the sea when Chief
Sakaki finds out? And what will happen if one of the pranks goes too far?
------------------------------------------------------------------ ---------
Sir Desaix, member # 116 of the Knights of the True Fiancee
desaix@sysnet.net
http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Acropolis /7872
fanfics available at
http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Acropolis/7872/fanfics.htm

----------



From: "David A. Tatum" <desaix@sysnet.net>
Subject: [Patlabor][FanFic] Patlabor: Personal Files, Episode 09


Patlabor: Personal Files
An Episodic Patlabor Fanfic by David A. Tatum
Disclaimer: Insert legal junk here...

Episode 09: The Curse of the Mechanics

January 14, 2000

Asuma stared up at the ceiling of his dorm room, his face twisted in
frustration. For the past seven days, he'd tried to sleep on a wet bunk
with water dripping on his face. Repeated calls to the maintenance squad
had gone unanswered, he could not move the bed because it was bolted down,
he discovered his bed was leaning in such a way to make it impossible for
him to sleep with his head at the other end of the bed, and there were no
more available dorm rooms. He'd tried stapling some plastic to the
ceiling, but the night after he did that the plastic burst open and all the
water that had dammed up splashed down and woke him up. In fact, he'd
barely been able to get any rest over the whole week. Thankfully, there
hadn't been any calls in that time, due in part to a heavy snowstorm on the
Eighth that had shut down most of the construction projects from which most
labor crimes were generated.

*beep* *beep* *beep* his alarm sounded. Sighing, he reach over and slammed
it off. Rolling out of the bunk, he rubbed his eyes tiredly. Grumbling
inarticulately, he flipped on the light switch. With a pop, one of the two
fluorescent bulbs that had still been working burned out.

"Dammit!" Asuma cried. "Is EVERYTHING falling apart around here?" He
closed his eyes, counted to ten, and opened up his closet to pull out a
uniform. At least those were undamaged.

He quickly got dressed and left for the maintenance office.

"Ah, Shige, you're here," Asuma said.

Shige looked up from the papers on his desk. "Oh, boy. What is it this
time? Another bulb burned out?"

Asuma nodded. "And that leak over my bed STILL hasn't been fixed."

Shige frowned as he handed him a set of maintenance request forms. "That's
weird- I sent out the work order for it a week ago. If it hasn't been
repaired by tonight, let me know and I'll come over and fix everything up
personally. I might do it anyway- it sounds like something's wrong with
the wiring in your room. It's rare that seven bulbs burn out in a week."

"Thanks, Shige." Asuma filled out the forms and went on to the office.

When he got there, only Noa was in the room. She smiled at him and said,
"Good morning, Asuma."

"Morning," he grunted back moodily.

Noa frowned. That didn't sound good. "They STILL haven't fixed that leak
over your bunk?"

Asuma yawned, shaking his head. "No. And Captain Gotoh still hasn't found
anywhere else for me to sleep. Shige promised me he'd fix it himself if it
wasn't repaired by tonight, but my bed is going to need to be cleaned and
dried before it'll be a comfortable place to sleep in again."

Noa thought about it for a second. Looking down shyly, she suggested, "If
you want, we could trade rooms for a while. You could get a good night's
sleep in my room while I see if I can get anything done about your room."

Asuma thought about it for a second. He was tempted, but he knew that
would be a rather bad idea- labor pilots needed their sleep more than
command car operators did. That wasn't why he hesitated, though.

No, he was hesitating because just seven days before, their relationship
had suddenly changed. With no warning that he could see, either. Now,
instead of just being really good friends, they were something... more.
How much more, however, was rather confusing. They were pretty much acting
towards each other just as they had before, though there was both a
nervousness and a giddiness they both experienced whenever they were
together. But that was it- they weren't doing any more or any less than
they had before. They hadn't even kissed yet.

Asuma, however, was thinking of suggesting something a bit more than
kissing. At that moment, the idea of sharing a bed with Noa entered his
head. Perhaps if he hadn't been so tired, he would have remembered that it
was a very silly thing to think about- after all, they were trying to keep
their relationship a secret, and it would be very hard to not be noticed as
sleeping in the same room. Still, he thought about it.

And immediately discarded that thought. It wasn't time yet- they'd just
started 'officially' dating (though as he and Noa had talked about it the
day after she'd confronted him with her desire to advance their
relationship, they'd started to realize they'd been UNofficially dating for
some time), and neither of them were going to be ready for that step for
some time. Even just sharing a large hotel room alone would make her
uncomfortable, considering her past. He remembered the time they'd had to
share a room together on an assignment, and how paranoid she'd been. He
briefly wondered if it was because of that Ouki Hamaki person she'd told
him about.

"No, I don't think that would be a good idea...." Glancing around to make
sure no-one else was around, he wrapped his arms around her gently and gave
her a very brief squeeze. "Thanks anyway."

A clicking announced someone turning the doorknob, and suddenly Asuma was
on the other side of the room, sitting at his desk and looking as if he'd
been going over his morning paperwork for several minutes. Noa, in the
meantime, stood frozen right where they'd been, and blushed lightly when
she realized they'd almost been caught.


Gotoh stepped in and looked around. Smirking slightly at Noa's expression,
he turned to Asuma.

"Shinohara! You've been bugging me for a week for some temporary quarters.
You still want them?" he asked.

"Are you kidding?" Asuma asked. "I haven't been able to get a good night's
sleep in a long time! Of course I do...."

Gotoh nodded. "Good. I have an assignment you and Noa can volunteer for,
if you want. It'll be rather boring, I expect, and I'd usually give this
sort of thing to Takeo, since she's a Lieutenant, but then again we haven't
been doing much around here for the past week anyway and you need somewhere
new to sleep...."

Asuma looked at his captain suspiciously. "And I assume that the temporary
quarters go along with the assignment. What is it?"

"Well, our mechanics have been invited to perform a demonstration of labor
maintenance in Yokohama. We were thinking of sending a team of mechanics,
a labor pilot, a command car operator, and Labor 3. I was thinking with
your bunking problems, you might be willing to go..."

Asuma thought about it for a second. Getting out of his room for a while
would be... delightful. But should he answer for Noa, as well, in this
case? After all, if their relationship was... more than it was before,
should he be speaking for her all the time, like before? He needed to buy
some time to think about this...

"Is there some reason we're not using Alphonse for this?" he asked.

"Well, Labor 3 is already in pieces- if we were to bring Alphonse along,
the mechanics would have to disassemble him first."

Asuma saw Noa flinch. "Well, okay. I agree taking Alphonse apart would be
a bad idea. Um...." He looked around for inspiration. His eyes finally
rested on Noa, who nodded at him. Did that mean she wouldn't mind going,
or that she'd do whatever he wanted, or what? Well, he usually made the
decisions for both of them- why would it be any different now? "How long
would we be gone?"

Gotoh shrugged. "The conference is three days long. You'd leave tonight.
You'd stay through the conference, put the labor through some
high-performance tests after the mechanics are done reassembling it, and
come back the morning of the 18th. A basic milk-run."

Asuma glanced once more at Noa to make sure he wasn't doing anything she
didn't want done, and nodded. "Okay, one trip to Yokohama it is. But make
sure Shige fixes that leak above my bunk, and for Noa... get someone to
keep Alphonse nice and polished while we're gone." He looked at her.
"Okay with you?"

Noa did a quick doubletake. Asuma was asking if it was okay with her? She
couldn't remember a time he'd ever actually asked her that before. In
fact, she couldn't remember a time he'd ever let her make ANY decision
before- not even what to eat. Perhaps he was being more considerate
because they were now more than just friends, and perhaps THAT meant he was
going to really try to take their relationship ser-

"Why are you blushing, Izumi?" Gotoh asked.

"Uh, um... no reason, sir. I don't usually like leaving Alphonse, but if
someone makes sure to polish him every day, I won't mind."

Gotoh nodded. "Good. Head to Chief Sakaki's office- he'll give you
details about where it is and who you need to take. Hiromi will also
likely be coming along, but I still have to talk to him."

"Yes, sir!" they both said, saluting, before nearly bolting out the door.

Gotoh's face cracked into a sly smile after they left. "Oh, so THAT'S what
they talked about..."

* * * * *

Noa reached out and touched the small cloud of mist formed from her breath.
"Cold here in the command car." Usually, she rode with Hiromi in the
labor transport, but since there was no actual labor she might need to get
into this time, she didn't need to be up in it and could choose whether to
take the car or the truck. Obviously, she chose the car- Hiromi was nice
and all, but she'd much rather spend her time with Asuma... at least until
she saw if this relationship would work out. Right now, though, she was
wondering if the company was worth it. "Does it usually take this long to
heat up?"

Asuma shook his head. "I think I've got some sort of curse or something.
First, everything starts going wrong in my dorm room. Now, the heater is
malfunctioning in my car. What next?"

Noa hesitantly reached up and squeezed his shoulder. "Relax- everything
will be fine by the time we get back. It's just a coincidence."

Asuma spared a second to smile at her reassuringly. "I'm okay, but this is
starting to get ridiculous. I just hope it isn't some sort of divine
punishment for falling for you." Suddenly, he realized what he said. "Er,
I didn't mean that."

Noa tensed for a moment. It sort of made sense- all the incidents started
after she'd told him she wanted a deeper relationship, and they'd both seen
enough weird things to not believe that there may be some sort of divine
being out there. Still, what was so wrong with their maybe feeling
something for each other? Surely it couldn't be that... still, she felt it
important to reassure him.

"Didn't mean what?" she said. "That you fell for me? Or that this
situation with your equipment failing is getting ridiculous?"

He didn't say anything for a second. "No, I was saying that I didn't mean
I was being punished by the gods for seeing you. But even if I was, I
wouldn't let it stop me."

"Asuma!" Noa gasped happily.

He shifted uncomfortably. None of what he was saying felt natural. He
meant it, but it didn't feel natural- it wasn't the sort of thing he would
say. He might grow into it after a while, but he still didn't feel
comfortable saying any of it. He wasn't one to show his deeper feelings
through his words, but rather through his actions.

Noa trembled slightly from the cold, and Asuma noticed. Once they reached
a stoplight, he removed his jacket and, without word, handed it to her.

"Take it," he said. "As tired as I am, it's probably better for me that
it's cold, since I'm driving."

Noa looked at him gratefully, and snugged the jacket on. Asuma smiled
slightly.

'Now THAT'S more my style,' he thought to himself.

* * * * *

Shige flipped on the switch for the light in Asuma's room. The fluorescent
light came on- and then immediately burned out.

"Huh... looks like a really BAD electrical problem. Odd that it's centered
on this one room, though.... I should probably go and turn off the fuse,
and then grab a flashlight to check it out." Flipping off the switch, he
turned and ran back to his room to get some electrical gloves.

A fellow engineer intercepted him on the way.

"Shige," he said. "Come quick! Officer Ohta was training in one of the
Type 96, and it froze up on him. We've gotta get it started again so he
can get the door open!"

Shige sighed. "This can wait... at least Asuma's not gonna be needing that
room for a couple of days." With that, he ran off to help Ohta.

* * * * *

"Do you want rollaway beds or futons?" the hotel clerk asked. It was a
Western-style hotel, and a rather elegant one at that. Most of the
mechanics from the SV2 were impressed- it was the best hotel many of them
had ever stayed in. As a matter of fact, it was the only hotel in the area
that was equipped to handle a convention of the size of the one they were
attending.

Asuma blinked. "Excuse me?"

"Well, you have three rooms for eleven people. We only have two beds in
each room, so five of your party's people will need to sleep on either
rollaways or futons."

Asuma looked behind him to Noa, Hiromi, and the gathered mechanics. All of
them shrugged. "Um, I guess we'll take futons."

The hotel clerk nodded, and typed a few things into her computer. "Very
good, sir. Here are your room keys- two for each room. Rooms 516 and 517
are connected, and Room 526 is across the hall from them."

Asuma took the six plastic cards that were shoved into his hand, and turned
around.

"Um... okay, I guess you guys will take the two connected rooms," he
proposed to the mechanics, handing them four of the keys. "Noa, Hiromi and
I will take room 526."

"Uh, right," one of the mechanics said. "Good plan! Come on, guys, let's
go find our rooms!" With that, they ran off towards the nearest elevator,
leaving Asuma, Noa, and Hiromi in their dust.

"They seemed to really like those rooming arrangements," Hiromi pondered,
grabbing all of his bags and some of Noa's.

Asuma thought about it for a second. "Probably need to use the bathroom
badly," he suggested crassly. "So what are we supposed to do here while
we're waiting for them to need us?"

"I think we're not supposed to do anything tonight. The convention isn't
supposed to start until tomorrow," Noa said, picking up some of her bags.

Asuma sighed, put his own bag around his shoulder, and started leading them
towards the elevator. "Yeah, okay... but what are we supposed to do
tomorrow, while the convention is underway?"

"Well, we could try and see what the convention has to offer," Noa offered.
"Chief Sakaki allowed me to learn a few of the basics about mechanics, and
you always seem to know the details of the latest advances in labor
design..."

"Are you sure that's a good idea? I don't seem to be having the best of
luck with the sorts of things this convention deals with lately."

Noa giggled happily and hugged Asuma's free arm to her. He stiffened- not
only were they in public, but Hiromi, one of their fellow officers with the
SV2, was watching. Didn't she realize that they might get caught if she
were to do something like that?

"Ah, are you afraid of the big nasty tools and motors?" she cooed. "Don't
worry, I'll protect you."

"Gah!" Asuma cried, retreating from her grasp. "No, I'm not afraid of the
tools. Sheesh!" She pouted up at him. "Okay, okay," he relented. "We'll
look around the show tomorrow- but we might as well do something else while
we're here, too. We basically have the day off- we could go to the movies
or something."

That time, it was Noa who stiffened. She hadn't even thought of the
possibility of going out on a date- their first 'real' date, even. "Um...
YEAH! Let's go to a movie tomorrow night. Any suggestions?"

Asuma thought about it for a second. Noa usually liked mecha movies- she'd
gone ga-ga over the Nadesico movie they'd seen a while back- however, he
couldn't think of any movies of that sort that they hadn't seen before. He
considered the options.

They could go see a horror movie. Horror movies were generally considered
good date movies because, at scary moments, girls would (in theory) grab
hold of their date to 'protect' them. He didn't particularly like horror
movies, himself, however- he'd seen enough horror in his life- and he
doubted Noa would like them, either.

They could go see a romance movie. He didn't know about Noa, but most
women loved those mushy stories about a boy and a girl falling for each
other. The problem with that was that he would probably fall asleep before
the end, and that probably wouldn't be a good thing.

They could go to an action movie- both of them would probably like that.
However, action movies weren't exactly date movies. If they were going to
think of this as a date, they should try something else.

Which only left comedies. A comedy might be good- getting a girl laughing
would be a good thing on a date, provided the girl is not laughing AT her
date. They'd both be able to enjoy it, at least.

"We should check the movie listings tonight to see what's playing
tomorrow," he suggested, "But how about we try and find a comedy to go to?
And maybe go out to dinner before that?"

Noa smiled. "That sounds like a good idea- lets go dump this stuff we're
carrying in our room and go see if we can find a newspaper!"

Hiromi, quietly following them, smiled slightly. Everyone seemed to forget
about him when he wasn't needed- which was fine with him. It allowed him
to get insights into his friends that he otherwise wouldn't get. It had
actually surprised him when Shinohara seemed to be concerned about his
presence when Izumi had hugged his arm.

Right now, he felt a little like a proud father- Izumi and Shinohara had
worked out their differences (thanks, in part, to his advice- he thought),
and it now sounded like they were going out on another date. Considering
what he'd overheard them talking about last week, this was probably a REAL
date for them. He sincerely hoped nothing would go wrong.

* * * * *

A council of mechanics had gathered together in room 516, and started
discussing their plans.

"Are you certain we haven't done enough?" one of them said.

"NO!" the other seven growled. "Asuma must pay for having yelled at the
beautiful and cute Natsume Kawai, and being cruel to all women everywhere!
So have we vowed!"

"Well, of course he does," the first one said, trying to sound reasonable.
"But, well, we've already made it nearly impossible to sleep for a week, we
thrust him into darkness, and we have taken away the creature comforts of
the command car."

"That's not enough!" a different mechanic said. "We must make him suffer
more!"

"Yes, more!" another one agreed. "He's escaped his punishment by coming
with us to his convention, so we must add on to them! Double the load we
had originally intended!"

"No, triple it!"

"Make his life a living hell!"

"And we do it all for the beloved Natsume Kawai!" they all, including the
one dissenter (caught up in the moment), chorused.

"So, let's get down to making plans..."

* * * * *

January 15, 2000

"See?" Noa said as they approached their room. She was following Asuma,
who held a bag full of papers, pens, pins, business cards, and other sample
items collected from the convention tables. "I told you that it wouldn't
be that bad. You haven't been dripped on, frozen, or sent into the dark
all day, have you?"

He smiled slightly, digging through his pockets for their keycard. "No, I
guess I haven't. Let's drop this stuff off and freshen up before we head
out- do you want to use the bathroom first or should I?"

"You use it first- I need a couple of minutes to pick something to wear."

Asuma sighed slightly as he pulled out the key. They were dressed fine-
neither of them were in uniform, and he was dressed up pretty decently.
She'd look good in anything, but that blouse and pants set fit her very
well. Why did women always have to spend so much time trying to decide
what to-

"Aagh!" he screamed immediately after grabbing the door handle, stumbling
backwards.

"Asuma!" Noa cried, reaching out to steady him. "What's wrong?!"

Asuma shook his head, trying to clear it. "I got shocked- and not just
like a static spark, either- it felt like I was caught by Alphonse's
electromagnetic baton."

Across the hall, a door opened up. A group of the SV2's mechanics ran out
the door.

"We heard a shout," one of them said. "Is something wrong?"

"Yeah," Asuma said. "Something's wrong with my door handle- it nearly
electrocuted me when I tried to open it."

"Really?" another mechanic, this one an electronics expert, said. "Let me
take a look at it- maybe I can figure out what's wrong with it."

"Be my guest," Asuma offered, gesturing to the offending door latch.

"My tools," the electrician said. Immediately, a toolbox was placed in his
hands. Donning some rubber gloves, he pulled out a screw driver and neatly
popped the case off the electronic lock. "Looks like a short in the
electronic lock that's being conducted through the metal of the door knob
somehow- I'll be able to fix it in a couple of hours."

"Hours?" Noa cried.

"'Fraid so."

"Then can Asuma and I use your bathroom to freshen up? We were planning to
go out tonight, and I'm not letting this stop us!" she cried, determination
written in her face.

"Uh..." The engineers looked at each other as if to ask a question of
everyone. Finally, one of them spoke up. "I don't think there's a problem
with that, no."

One engineer led them into the room while the other four that were gathered
huddled around outside.

"I didn't know they were planning on a date tonight!" one of them said in a
hushed tone. "I certainly didn't mean to inconvenience Noa."

"I say it's all right to inconvenience her a little, this time. We have to
get her out of the grasp of the dreaded Shinohara! She has such a fine
appreciation of labor mechanics that she deserves someone better than him."

"What are you suggesting?" the others whispered.

"Isn't it obvious?" he said. "We must ruin this date- make it go so badly
that they'll break up with each other, and she'll finally be free of him!"

"I don't know..." one of them, the dissenter from the previous night, said
hesitantly. "I mean, if we do that, it might hurt Noa, and then would we
be any better than Asuma?"

"We aren't trying to hurt her- it's tough love!"

"But-"

"Look, if it bothers you that much, than stay here- but the rest of us are
going to be working on ridding the world of that enemy to women
everywhere!"

The dissenter stared at him, wide-eyed. 'Ridding the world? How far does
this guy plan on taking all of this?'

* * * * *

Shige studied the pipes over Asuma's bed in shock. Sure, it was weird that
all of the fluorescent bulbs in the room were incompatible with the slots
they were put in, causing them to burn out quickly, but that might have
been a mistake made on the requisitioning forms. This, however, was
obvious vandalism.

There was a very small hole drilled into the plumbing, and around that hole
a piece of towel had been fastened. The result was a very slow leak onto
Asuma's bed, with no apparent loss of water pressure.

But why would someone want to do THAT? Confused, Shige proceeded to patch
the hole. He'd have to ask someone about that later, but the first
priority was to stop the leak before it got worse...

* * * * *

Noa frowned at Asuma. He didn't seem to be paying attention to her, and
had seemed awfully listless when he was ordering his food. She wondered if
he was distracted by something or just bored. If he was distracted by
something, though, it was her job to find out what and see if she could
help, and if he was just bored... well, it was STILL her job to try and
help. That was what a girlfriend did, right?

"Asuma, what's wrong?" she asked, biting back the fear that she just wasn't
interesting enough for him.

"Huh? Oh, sorry- I was just thinking about that short in the door, and all
these other things that have been happening to me."

Noa sighed- that was his 'I'm coming up with a plan' voice. The last time
she'd heard him use it, he wound up leaving her stranded at a pizza place-
after having left behind the pizza. True, that WAS a pretty serious
situation- the virus in the Hyper Operating System could easily have caused
an army of labors to wipe out Tokyo. Still, she'd been rather annoyed at
that.

As she was watching, however, he visibly dropped that mindset. "I'm sorry-
I shouldn't be thinking about things like that right now, should I? I
should be thinking about you."

It still seemed obviously strained, however. "Are you sure you want to?"
Noa asked. "It sounds like you'd rather think about your problems than
me."

"Huh?"

"I can hear it in your voice. And not just now- every time you say
something nice to me, it sounds so forced, and you shied away when I tried
to hug you by the elevators yesterday..." Small tears started to form in
Noa's eyes. This wasn't at all how she pictured it- she'd thought Asuma
liked her and cared about her, and so trying to build their relationship
would make him happy, but instead it seemed as if he was treating it all as
some unwelcome obligation. "Maybe... maybe this just isn't going to work
out, and we should go back to being 'just friends' before we carry things
too far... I mean, this is just our first real date, so we shouldn't have
too much trouble forgetting I ever said anything about us..."

Asuma panicked. He wanted this new relationship to work out- it was
perhaps the best thing he had going for him- but because he felt awkward
trying to talk to Noa about it, he was about to lose it. He had to say
something.

"Noa, I..." He hesitated. How could he repair the damage done? How could
they start over? Suddenly, those two words clicked in his head- start
over. "I'm going to say some things- they might hurt, but I hope when I'm
done saying them you and I will feel better, because right now I think
we're BOTH pretty miserable."

Noa sniffed. This was it- he was going to tell her once and for all it was
impossible, and break up with her. Such a silly thing, thinking she might
actually have been able to get someone she cared about like Asuma to ever
feel anything for her...

"Maybe you're partly right. Maybe this relationship isn't going to work
out," Asuma said.

Noa gasped. This was it. Her worst nightmare, coming true...

"But I don't think we can go back to being 'just friends.'"

No, it was WORSE than her worst nightmare. She was even going to lose his
friendship.

"See, Noa, I've sort of liked you 'that way' for quite some time- almost
ever since I saw you when you were trying to find the Labor Aptitude Test
nearly a year ago, now- and now that I've found out that you maybe share a
little bit of that feeling too, I don't want to just set it aside and stamp
it down, any more."

Eh? What was that?

"But, see, the problem is I don't know how to treat you now that I know you
like me. I don't know how to give you compliments, even if I feel you
deserve them and believe them. I really think that you are more worth
thinking about and talking about than any stupid problems I'm having, but I
just have so much trouble actually SAYING something like that it feels
forced."

"Asuma?" Noa marveled. He wasn't breaking up with her... but what WAS he
doing?

"I've been trying to make you happy, even if it means saying things that I
feel real uncomfortable saying. But... I'm not going to do that any more."
He looked at Noa. "I may insult or tease you a bit, and not treat you
right, but that's just who I am. If you can take that and still want to be
my... well, I guess girlfriend is the best word- if you can take that, then
maybe this relationship will work out."

Noa thought about that. Well, she really hadn't seen THAT much change in
him the past week, outside of his being nervous. And more polite. And
he'd been asking for her input on certain decisions that affected them
which he'd usually just make on his own. Okay, maybe he had been trying to
change.

But she didn't ask him to make any of those changes. She kind of liked it
when he was bossy at times- it almost felt like a game, and she never was
one to ask for compliments to be showered down upon her. The changes were
things he'd decided to do himself. While they might have been a pleasant
surprise, she didn't really need them- so, of course, there was no decision
to make.

"Asuma, I asked if we could try this out knowing that you've been a jerk to
me in the past, and I fully expect you to be one to me sometimes even
though we go out on real dates and things. So of course I can accept it,"
she said. Asuma looked relieved, until a teasingly devilish smile appeared
on Noa's face- a smile which he hadn't seen very often before. Well, he
had, but it was when she was teasing him about HIS toothaches after all the
teasing he had done over hers, and so he really hadn't bothered to memorize
it. "So, if you liked me all this time, why haven't you done anything
about it until now?"

Asuma blinked. "You know, my father asked me the same thing- if I liked
you, why weren't we going out. I couldn't really get an answer for him,
except for the stupid laws about people in the same police division not
dating." He chuckled. "He said he didn't think I'd let that stop me- and
it didn't."

Now Noa really was curious- she'd just been teasing before. "Well, what
DID stop you?"

'Just don't mention Alphonse,' a tiny part of his brain warned. "I don't
really know," he said. "Maybe because-"

Thankfully, he didn't have to come up with an answer as their waiter came
up to them in that moment.

"I'm terribly sorry, sir," the waiter said. "But we can't fill your order
today. For some reason, the gas has been turned off and so we are unable
to cook any food until the gas company has sent someone to check it out.
We sincerely apologize for this inconvenience, and any drinks you have
ordered are complimentary."

Asuma's eye twitched. "The gas is out?" The waiter nodded. "Figures.
Okay, thank you." The waiter turned and left.

Noa pouted. "Now what are we going to do about dinner?"

Asuma checked his watch and sighed. "Well, we don't have time to go
anywhere else- we'll just finish our drinks and see if we can find
somewhere to eat after the movie."

Noa smiled slightly. "Sounds good. Oh, and Asuma?"

"Yeah, Noa?"

"You aren't the only person who doesn't know why they waited so long..."

* * * * *

Chief Sakaki inspected the pipes as Shige babbled on about the stuff he
could see for himself. Someone in the SV2 was a saboteur- and, in this
case, it looked like a practical joker going too far. After shutting down
the water to the pipe, he inspected the holes put into it.

Precision drilling with top-of-the-line tools, measured out perfectly to
keep the water from flowing too fast yet let it flow enough to cause a
steady drip. Centered directly over Asuma's pillow- obviously, the person
who did this was a mechanic. One of HIS mechanics.

"Shige," he said, interrupting his apprentice. "Tell me- do you know if
Asuma has done anything that anyone might have taken offense at, lately?"

Shige frowned. "Well, last week he snapped at Ms. Kawai, but he later
apologized to her and she told me she totally understood what was wrong
after he'd talked to Noa. It couldn't be her."

Sakaki nodded. Of course it wouldn't be Kawai- he already knew it was a
mechanic. But if one of the mechanics thought it would put them in her
good graces...

"Hmm... let everyone know I want to see them one at a time in my office for
questioning. I'm going to go talk to Gotoh about something."

* * * * *

Noa laughed along with the audience at a particularly funny moment in the
movie.

"This movie was a good idea- it helps balance out all the seriousness at
the restaurant," she whispered to Asuma, leaning up against him.

Asuma stuck a hand behind her head, giving her a gentle one-armed hug.
"Well, it wasn't exactly PLANNED that way, but you're right- it does."

Noa looked at his hand wrapped around her. "Hmm... you sure you aren't
pushing yourself right now?"

Asuma shook his head. "Nah- it feels too natural."

Any further conversation, however, was ruined when the sprinkler system
went off, causing cries of outrage and panic to sound out from around the
theater.

"Aagh!"

"What's going on?!"

"I knew I shouldn't have worn this white blouse!"

Many people started scrambling for the doorways while the water continued
to rain down on the theater.

Noa, with Asuma bent over her and using his body to help shield her from
the downpour, sighed. "I guess your problem is getting worse. Maybe I
shouldn't have tried to get you to think of me when we were at the
restaurant, and just let you figure out what's wrong."

"Oh, I have a few ideas... but let's not worry about that right now. Let's
concentrate on getting out of here." He sighed. "Sorry our date got
ruined."

Noa thought about it. They'd gotten over some issues they had to deal
with, she'd had a fun time with the part of the movie she'd seen (and it
was silly enough she didn't care about missing the end of it), and now here
she was, with Asuma holding her while trying to protect her from the fire
sprinklers.

"Actually, Asuma," she said, "It might not have gone perfectly, but it
wasn't that bad."

* * * * *

January 16, 2000

Things had gone rather uneventfully since the end of the date. Dinner, of
course, was out of the question- their clothes had been soaked through, and
by the time they got into their room and changed all the restaurants had
been closed.

As had happened on the night they had arrived, Hiromi spent the night of
the 15th in the same room as Noa and Asuma, and most of his waking time
with them as they went through some parts of the convention they had missed
before, as well. The 16th was much the same... At least, he did until
getting a phone call at about noon- after that, he started hanging around
the engineers all the time.

And that lead to the current situation. He hadn't returned for the night-
in fact, he'd left a note saying that he wasn't going to be back until the
next morning. And that meant that Noa and Asuma would have to sleep alone
together in the same room that night, without the relaxing presence of
Hiromi to chaperone them.

It was, to say the least, a fairly uncomfortable situation.

"Well... it's not like we haven't done this before," Noa said hopefully,
trying to stretch her sleeping robe to cover more of her. "I mean,
remember the time we spend the night at that little inn in Sakata?"

Asuma glared at her. "Yeah- you hit me."

"Hey! You were trying to steal Captain Gotoh's hatahata!"

"I just wanted a midnight snack! I would have replaced what I ate!"

"Well, I was nervous!"

Asuma sighed. "And are you nervous now?"

"Well... a little. But I trust you more, now- I don't think I'll be
hitting you this time unless you do something weird."

"Well, that's comforting," Asuma said, peeling back the covers of his bed.

Noa chuckled. He looked kinda cute when he was annoyed like that. In
fact, it reminded her of something.

"Say, Asuma, there's something I want to do before we go to bed, and I'll
need your help for it," Noa said, getting one of her determined looks on
her face.

Asuma look up. "Yeah? Ulmph!"

Reaching up, Noa grabbed him, pulled him down, and gave him a rather deep
kiss full on the lips, her hands running into his hair. After a few
seconds, Asuma's arms came around her, and he started returning the kiss.

Shortly after that, Noa released him and the kiss. "About time- I've been
waiting for a chance to try that," she said. "This was the first time
we've been alone and haven't had to worry about someone bursting in on us
in a while. So, how did you like our first kiss?"

"Wow. Um, I... uh... just-"

Asuma stopped when Noa put a finger over his lips. "Shh- don't try and
force anything. I can tell how you feel now."

With that, she just smiled at him and then crawled into her bed.
"Goodnight, Asuma." She flipped off the light switch.

It was several more minutes before Asuma moved again.

* * * * *

January 18, 2000

The mechanics' demonstration on the 17th went off without a hitch, and
Noa's performance was flawless. Hiromi left Asuma and Noa alone again, but
after having gone through it once they didn't have any real problem with
it... and Noa once again was able to kiss Asuma goodnight again. This
time, however, she wasn't able to surprise him with it.

The biggest surprise was that Asuma hadn't had any problems since that date
night. Now, however, it was time to go home, and he knew he'd have to deal
with a particular problem that hadn't been fixed.

"Hey, Noa?" he called, packing the trunk of the command car with their
bags.

"Yeah, Asuma?" she said, coming up from having piloted the third labor into
the carrier.

"Why don't you ride back with Hiromi? The heater is still busted, and
there's no reason we should both suffer..."

"You sure you don't want me in there with you?" she said.

Asuma chuckled. "Of course I do, but you should just go with Hiromi, so I
won't have to worry about you...."

"Worry about me?"

"Well, if I think you're going to get cold, I'll feel too guilty and have
to give you my jacket or something else which will make ME get cold. So,
it's better for both of us if you go with Hiromi."

Noa sighed. "Oh, well. I'll see you when we get back home."

Asuma chuckled and ruffled Noa's hair playfully. "Hey, we aren't really
going to be separated by that much, and we're just driving back to work,
anyway. Don't act like we're going on separate vacations or something."

Noa shrugged. "It's just that this weekend was so nice since we didn't
have to hide so much, and it feels like we're going to be... trapped... for
quite a while, so I just... I don't know, I just feel like I'm not going to
be really seeing you for a while."

"Okay, if that's how you feel..." He reached over, grabbed her, and not
caring if anyone saw him gave her a quick but intense kiss. "We have to
hide it when we're on the base, but that doesn't mean we can't still act
how we feel occasionally. We just have to be careful about it. To prove
it to you, I promise to give you one of those within a day of getting
back."

Noa staggered back a little. That was their first kiss that was even
remotely close to being public (though it was highly unlikely anyone saw
it), and it affected her a little. Perhaps the thrill of avoiding capture
would add something to it, instead of just making it more difficult to
relax...

"Well, then, we'd better start hurrying back, huh?" With that, she darted
back to the labor transport and hopped on board.

Shaking his head, a smile on his face, he stepped into his car. 'Oh,
well... hopefully, the mechanics haven't done anything ELSE to the car
while we were here. I guess Sakaki found out and they got Hiromi to keep
an eye on them the past few days, but one might have slipped by him... ah,
well. We'll see.'

* * * * *

Asuma had been driving for about a half hour, but had only just gotten out
of Yokohama. Once he did, however, the road in front of him was finally
clear. Once he reached a long, straight piece of road- a bridge- he
accelerated.

The labor carrier wasn't too far behind him, and the van carrying the
members of the maintenance squad wasn't very far behind that. He wasn't
exactly trying to lose them, but he wanted to get back to SV2 Headquarters
before Noa did so he could find somewhere 'private' where they could be
together without fear, if they wanted. He had a few ideas, but he had to
make sure they were, well, clean enough for her before he could bring her
to them.

Suddenly, the back of his seat gave out. Too startled to think about what
he was doing, his hands left the wheel and his legs came kicking up-
knocking the wheel to the right.

In the labor transport behind him, Noa saw Asuma's car swerve off the
bridge.

"Noooooo! Asuma!"

The command car teetered off the bridge, but didn't fall. However, it was
hanging delicately from the side, and there was no way it could stay there
for long.

"Oh, no..." Noa said. "Asuma..." Her face took on that determined look.
"Hiromi! Help me get the labor ready!"

* * * * *

"Asuma, are you all right?! Asuma!"

"Noa?" Asuma muttered. He was lying in his car, strapped into his broken
seat. A part of the instrument panel had become dislodged and smashed into
his head, but now it was lying on the dashboard in front of him. He could
see a little blood on the corner that had hit him.

Noa's voice was now ringing in his ears. "Asuma? Can you hear me?"

Shaking his head to try and get the cobwebs out, he turned on the
transmitter for his headset. "I read you... what the hell happened?"

"You went over a bridge wall... I'm in the labor, but I can't pull you up-
your car is caught on something down there. Right now, though, I'm at
least able to keep you from falling over the edge. Hiromi's arranging a
way to get you unhooked..."

Asuma frowned. "Where are the mechanics?"

"Um, well, see..."

* * * * *

5 Minutes Earlier

The van with the mechanics drove up just as the labor had reached and
started lifting the command car. Hiromi, wearing a headset in order to
keep in touch with Noa, was standing there watching. The van stopped, and
everyone in it got out.

"What's going on?" one of the mechanics said.

"We don't know how it happened," Hiromi said, keeping his eyes on Noa's
work. "But for some reason his car suddenly spun out of control and nearly
plunged off the bridge. Noa's trying to pull it up, but it appears to be
caught on something."

Another mechanic glared at the first one. "I told you that you were going
too far! But no, you said UMPH!"

Three other mechanics pounced on him. "What are you doing, man?! You WANT
to get us all thrown out?"

They wrestled for a few seconds until one of them looked over at the
wreckage. Asuma's car was now securely held with no danger of falling the
rest of the way into the water below, but the labor holding it was staring
at the group of mechanics in such a way that the observer was wondering if
he and the others had added enough enhancements into it to allow it to
display the pilot's emotions, as well. At any rate, he definitely felt the
labor glaring at them angrily.

Hiromi had also frozen. It wasn't until he had turned around, and an anger
that no-one had ever seen on that face before was plainly visible.

"Um... what, exactly, did you do to Asuma?" he said through gritted teeth.

That's right. The gentle giant was REALLY mad.

"Um... well, it was just supposed to be a little joke, that's all..."

Hiromi's hands visibly clenched up into fists, and that was all that was
needed. In a matter of seconds, the entire story came out- how Asuma
insulting Natsume had lead to the mechanics declaring war on him, and how
this was the latest of a number of tricks they were trying to pull on him.

"It was just supposed to make it uncomfortable for him to sit, not cause an
accident!" the panicked leader was saying.

"Well," Hiromi said menacingly. "You people are going to do something
about it- like put together a winch to help us safely get the car off of
whatever's caught it. And next time, before taking vengeance on someone
for saying something stupid, you should find out WHY he said it- as it
happens, Asuma was going to deal with some serious family problems, and he
apologized to Ms. Kawai later. But did you bother to find any of that out?
No- and another thing, damaging the pipes at SV2 Headquarters is serious-
now, the maintenance dorms aren't going to be getting hot water for several
days while the pipes in Asuma's room get replaced, and..."

* * * * *

Back in the present...

"...and he went on like that, listing everything that had happened- they
even tried to ruin our date because they thought you were going to mistreat
me!"

By this point in her story, they had already recovered the car, and were in
an ambulance on the way to the hospital so they could get his head injury
looked at. There had been several interruptions, of course, as the winches
were put to use and the ambulance arrived, but finally she had reached the
end of the story.

"Huh," Asuma said. "I figured it was probably the mechanics- or at least A
mechanic- but I didn't know why. I don't even remember what I did to
Natsume, too..."

Noa sighed, dabbing at his cut with a wet cloth as she'd been instructed to
by the paramedics. "It certainly wasn't enough to justify this."

Asuma chuckled. "Don't let it change how you feel about the maintenance
squad- everyone there treats us pretty good. They just over-react to some
things, and sometimes take things too far. It's part of who they are..."
Shaking his head, he continued, "I can't even imagine what Chief Sakaki's
going to do when he finds out..."

* * * * *

The mechanic who had been the one dissenter in the group swam over to their
former leader.

"I told you we'd taken things far enough- if it weren't for you overdoing
it, no-one would have found out."

"Ya know," the former leader said absently, totally ignoring the comment.
"I never really realized that he was serious when he said he would throw us
into the sea... I guess I was wrong."

-------------------------
Next Episode: With a period of unseasonable warmth, two mighty forces
decide to do battle on the field of softball. Will Ohta stop throwing
fastballs? Will Gotoh actually take an at-bat? Will the game EVER end?
Find out in Episode 10...
----------------------------------------------------------------- ----------
Sir Desaix, member # 116 of the Knights of the True Fiancee
desaix@sysnet.net
http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Acropolis /7872
fanfics available at
http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Acropolis/7872/fanfics.htm


From: "David A. Tatum" <desaix@sysnet.net>
Subject: [Patlabor][FanFic] Patlabor: Personal Files, Episode 10


Patlabor: Personal Files
An Episodic Patlabor Fanfic by David A. Tatum
Disclaimer: Insert legal junk here...

Episode 10: Gotoh At The Bat

January 27, 2000

It was an unseasonably warm January day in Tokyo. All of the SV2 was
off-duty at the moment- all three units had been called to provide
round-the-clock security for some very high-level political negotiations,
but they had arrived at the site ahead of schedule and had several hours of
time to kill. Noa just happened to have her glove and a softball with her,
and suggested to Asuma that they head over to a nearby field (belonging to
a high school) and get a game of catch going. Shortly thereafter, they
were joined by the rest of the second unit, and finally the other two units
joined in as well. Soon, they were divvying up teams for a friendly little
match of softball as the three unit captains looked on.

"So," Noa whispered to Asuma. "Same bets as before?"

Since coming back from that nearly disastrous engineering and mechanics
conference nearly two weeks beforehand, the two of them had been coming up
with some sort of competition, and whoever lost had to be the one to find
that day's private location where they could act like the couple they were
becoming (they had figured that going to the same place all the time might
get a little suspicious). This impromptu softball game was a perfect
opportunity, since they had been made the opposing team captains.

"Nah," Asuma said, shaking his head. "After our duty shift, we'll be free
to go out on our own, so we don't need to worry about privacy today.
Instead, let's say whoever loses buys dinner tonight, okay?"

Noa smiled and nodded. "Deal."

Gotoh, watching them in the background, sighed. "Oh, to be young again."

Asuma stiffened, overhearing. He wasn't ENTIRELY sure that Gotoh knew what
was going on, but when he first saw the captain upon returning from the
convention he and Noa had gone to, Gotoh had casually said, "I know what's
been going on for the past week or so. Make sure you don't let it
interfere with your job." While that SEEMED to refer to the incident with
the mechanics, the way Gotoh had said it made Asuma think that he was
referring to something else. The thought that he and Noa might already
have been 'caught' made Asuma a little jumpy, at times.

"Okay, team," Noa cried as she walked off, bringing him back to the
present. "We'll bat in this order..."

Soon, Noa's team was up, with Ueki Mashimo, one of Unit 1's transport
officers, on the plate and Natsume Kawai on deck. Ohta was pitching,
Shinshi was catching, and Asuma was playing shortstop. Officers of the
Riot Squad, who had also been called in to protect this delegation, were
watching from the fence. And the game was on.

Ohta's first pitch screamed past Ueki, and hit the top of Shinshi's glove
so hard that it ricocheted into his head and knocked him over.

"Oof!" Shinshi gasped.

"Nice pitch," Gotoh commented wearily.

"Yeah... for a baseball game," the riot squad commander said.

"Throw it underhand, you idiot! UNDERHAND! This is softball!" Ueki
shouted angrily.

"You're a cop!" Ohta shot back. "You should be expecting anything, and be
able to adapt to any situation!"

Shinshi sat up dazedly. "Tamiko, did you get the number of the labor that
hit me?"

"We aren't on duty, you idiot!" Ueki returned to Ohta. "And this isn't the
sort of thing that philosophy applies to!"

"Tamiko, where are you?" Shinshi muttered, walking around and looking from
person to person.

"You call yourself a police officer?"

Shinshi walked up to Natsume, and looked her up and down. "You aren't
Tamiko... what have you done with Tamiko?"

Natsume blinked. "Um..."

"Your own catcher wasn't expecting you to throw the ball that hard! Now
he's going around calling everyone 'Tamiko!'"

The riot squad commander, still standing next to Gotoh, laughed. "No
wonder you guys have such a bad reputation. You're teams can't work
together at all- you're hopeless!"

"They aren't that bad, once you get to know them," Gotoh noted.

"Oh, please. These people couldn't get along if their lives depended on
it! They're utterly incompetent! It's amazing that no-one in the SV2 has
been killed, yet," the squad commander snorted.

"Oh? You really think we can't get along?" Gotoh queried, noting that the
other man's voice had caught the attention of a couple of the people
waiting to hit.

"I'd be willing to bet on it!"

"Is that so?" Gotoh said. "How about a little softball match, your riot
squad unit versus the SV2? Seven innings, losing squad treats the winning
squad to dinner after this assignment is over?"

The riot squad commander raised an eyebrow at Gotoh. "Anything we want?"

Gotoh nodded. "Even Tokyo beef, if you want. But you must be prepared to
reciprocate in kind."

Tokyo beef! At 15,000 yen a pound, it was one of the most expensive
available not just in Japan, but anywhere in the world. On a policeman's
salary, it would be VERY difficult to save up enough money to spend it on
such an extravagant meal. Even the chance to be treated to such a meal was
more than the riot squad commander could even dream of. And what were the
chances of this disorganized group of misfits defeating his well-trained
and highly competent team? He could almost taste that meal already. A
thin line of drool escaped out of the corner of his mouth.

"Are you sure you want to do this? This is your last chance to back
out...." the riot squad commander asked.

Gotoh smirked. "That's my line."

The riot squad commander raised an eyebrow and nodded. "Very well. A
match, then. Seven innings of softball. After the assignment has been
completed."

Shinshi, still dazed, walked up to Gotoh and grabbed him by the lapels of
his shirt. The glasses he wore were humming mysteriously as they shined in
the sun. "What have you done with Tamiko?" he demanded.

The riot squad commander could barely keep a straight face. "Good luck,"
he chuckled.

* * * * *

Gomioka raised an eyebrow after hearing Gotoh's request. "Let me get this
straight. You made a bet that you would pay for dinner for the fifty men
of the Riot Squad- a dinner which could cost you anything- that involved
not just your OWN troop of misfits, but Shinobu's and my units as well?"

Gotoh looked at him tiredly. "Um, you expect me to have that much money on
hand? You and I make pretty much the same salary, you know."

"Yeah, I know. How do you expect to pay for it? You DO plan to pay for it
if you lose, right?" Gomioka growled.

Gotoh coughed. "Well, I plan to pay part of it."

"Part of it? Who do you think is going to pay the rest... oh, no. No!
I'm not having any part of this!"

Gotoh shrugged. "I didn't ask you to. I have a feeling that everyone will
be willing to help out, however."

Gomioka stood proudly. "You may try to talk them into it if you wish, but
I doubt that you'll be able to talk anyone into following this ridiculous
scheme!"

Gotoh shrugged. "If they don't, I can call things off easily enough."
With that, he left the temporary command station that the SV2 had set up
for the assignment.

Shinobu stood up from her chair, tapped the pages of the report she had
been writing evenly on her desk, and sighed. "Captain Gomioka," she began,
trying to keep a smile from appearing on her face. "You're going to have
to learn that Gotoh is quite capable of getting people to do what he wants
them to do. He's going to win that game."

Gomioka stood up himself. "I'll be shocked if he can even assemble a full
team for the game. Win it? Ha!"

* * * * *

The eighteen men and women who crewed the SV2 limbered up in the baseball
park. The game was only a half hour away, and they needed to be ready.
After all, this wasn't just about some silly bet- this was about honor.
Joudo Ishikawa and Takeo Kumagami had BOTH heard the captain of the riot
squad call them all incompetent, and lucky not to be dead. It was probably
at least partially true, but STILL- it was insulting when someone just said
it like that.

When Gotoh had come to them, letting them know that there was a chance to
redeem their honor- only risking the cost of paying for a few dinners (not
thinking how much those dinners might cost, mind), there was little
hesitation. Well, a few people with small bank accounts hesitated a
little, and Shinshi hesitated a lot, but that was because he was still
hurting from that pitch Ohta through.

That changed, though, when a few riot squad officers, carrying some papers
that Captain Gotoh had asked to be delivered to their captain, came by
while Shinshi's group was getting ready for their shift to start. Ohta,
thankfully, was unable to hear their taunts from the cockpit of his labor-
he might have been angered to the point of murder, otherwise- but Shinshi
had no such protection.

"Oh, look- it's the SV2," the first one noted in a sing-song voice.
"Getting ready to look all impressive in their giant tin cans."

"Heh," the second one snorted. "Real men don't need labors to do their
fighting for them."

That caught Shinshi's attention.

"Yeah," a third agreed. "You people in the SV2 aren't real men- you're
just a bunch of boys. How do some boys like you expect to beat a bunch of
men like us?"

"Excuse me?!" Shinshi replied in a very strained voice, his glasses singing
as the sun glared off of them.

"You heard us!" the first exclaimed. "You BOYS are hopeless! Give up now,
and spare yourselves a little dignity."

The other riot squad members laughed as the first one led them off to the
makeshift lounge area that had been set up for the off duty police during
the visit. Shinshi, however, was not going to let his targets disappearing
dissuade him from his wrath. Walking over to the command car, he grabbed
the radio transmitter.

"Ohta!" Shinshi barked. "Get out of that labor right now! I'm going to
get someone else to take over our shift."

Ohta was a little surprised at this change of plan. "What? Why?"

"When you get out of there, find your glove and ball right away! We have
to practice! And we ARE going to win that game, if I have to kidnap the
rest of the SV2 in order to get them to play!"

With that, Ohta was browbeaten into a three hour practice session that made
Shinshi into a very respectable- and very determined- catcher.

That practice was long over, however, and Gotoh was making the last minute
alterations to the SV2 team's starting line-up while the four volunteer
referees from the security guards they and the riot squad had been working
with looked on. A couple of members seemed a little reluctant to stand
anywhere near Shinshi, but that was to be expected- they were the people
who he had 'convinced' to participate.

Gotoh checked something he had written on a piece of paper and frowned
slightly. Walking up to Kanuka, he asked, "Hmm... do you know how to pitch
softball?"

Ohta, stretching nearby, fell flat on his face. "WHAT?!" he cried.

Kanuka shrugged. "Softball was never my best sport, but I'm pretty sure my
skills are more than adequate for this game."

Ohta picked himself up off the ground and ran over to Gotoh. "But I want
to pitch!" he whined, using the same voice he usually used when begging to
fire a gun.

Gotoh shrugged. "I'll put you in as the closer, but I don't think you've
got an arm that will last for the whole game...."

"Of course I do! I spent three hours practicing with Shinshi yesterday-"

"And that is why I don't think you'll have the endurance for today. You
already tired out your arm, you won't be able to pitch very many
pitches...."

Ohta facefaulted as soon as he understood what the captain was saying- he'd
practiced his way out of playing. Gotoh ignored him and continued
assigning people to their positions.

"Asuma, you'll play shortstop. Noa, you're second base. Shinshi's
catcher..."

* * * * *

When all was said and done, the SV2 had a rather solid starting lineup,
even including a third base coach. Hideki Nomo, the old officer with just
one hand who drove one of Unit One's labor transports, wasn't able to play,
but Gotoh was able to convince him to relay his calls to the base runners
or onto the field.

In addition to having Kanuka as the pitcher, Noa and Asuma as the second
baseman (woman) and shortstop, and Shinshi as catcher, Gotoh had filled the
rest of the starting line-up with the most athletic of his team. Takeo
Kumagami was on first base, the very friendly and enthusiastic rookie labor
pilot for Unit One, Koichi Miyagi, was playing third, and in the outfield
were the mop-haired Ueki Mashimo, the competent and efficient Yamane
Seiroku, and Unit One's senior labor pilot Yuhki Watanabe.

The SV2 retired the riot squad rather quickly in the first inning, with
three strikeouts being dished out with the minimum number of pitches thanks
to Kanuka. She was also the first one to bat, and looped a ball over the
riot squads infield to reach first base. Yuhki Watanabe was up next, but
was startled by a brush-back pitch that nearly grazed his nose and played
the rest of his at-bat overcautious. As it turned out, it didn't matter
too much, since the pitcher walked him anyway. Next up was Takeo, who
calmly and coolly stepped up to the bag and smiled as the pitcher through
three strikes right past her for the first out.

Next up was Seiroku, who snorted out of his once-broken nose as he
approached the plate. The riot squad's catcher, seeing his opportunity,
decided to try taunting him good-naturedly.

"Your mother worked for Beach House!" he said, invoking the name of one of
the most inept group of terrorists that plagued Japan.

Seiroku sniffed. "So?" he said coolly, as the pitcher rose in his wind-up.
The pitch came, Seiroku swung, and the ball went flying out of the park.
Smirking calmly at the catcher, Seiroku took his bases, and the SV2 was up
3-0.

The riot squad captain, in his dugout, slammed his hand against the water
fountain in frustration. "Dammit!" he growled.

"Relax, Cap'n," one of his subordinates soothed. "We'll get those ones
back."

Noa, up next, grounded out to first, and Asuma quickly followed, bringing
the inning to a close. The riot squad went up again, eager to try and
rally, but once again Kanuka shut them down with three strikeouts- again,
on the minimum nine pitches.

This time at the plate, the SV2 didn't do quite so well. Ueki Mashimo hit
a single, but Shinshi wasn't really ready for batting.

'Oops,' he thought to himself as he struck out swinging. 'I should have
spent some of that three hours with Ohta yesterday batting and not just
catching....'

Koichi Miyagi grounded into a double play, and the second inning was over.

Once again, Kanuka was as methodical as ever, not letting her opponents
even have a trace of mercy. To say this frustrated the riot squad captain
didn't exactly do it justice. As his team left the dugout, he pulled his
own pitcher aside to talk to him in secret.

"We don't stand a chance while she's still pitching," the captain said,
gesturing to Kanuka in the on-deck circle. "Hit her- hard. Knock her out
of the game. It's the only way to win."

The pitcher looked flustered. "Captain, you can't ask me to-"

"Do YOU want to pay for these idiots' food?"

"Of course not! But-"

"Then this is the only way. Do it... that's an order."

The pitcher looked tight-lipped for a moment before nodding slowly. He'd
do as ordered. Besides, this was softball- there wasn't really any way he
could hurt her seriously with a pitch, was there? The captain wasn't
thinking straight- he'd see how ridiculous this was once the girl just
shrugged off being hit by the ball. "Yes, sir."

He stood up to the plate, and stared over at Kanuka as she waited, the bat
slung over her shoulder. The pitcher regretted what he had to do- she
looked kind of cute. Well, maybe when this was all over he could take her
out for drinks, or offer to pay for her share of the dinners as an apology
for what he was going to do. Well, no more time to worry about the
consequences- it was time to pitch.

His first pitch was wide to the outside. Best to let them think he was
losing control of his pitches, so that it wouldn't seem so intentional.
Kanuka smirked, and the pitcher took a deep breath. Wind-up, deliver....

With a meaty thump, the ball crashed right into Kanuka's eye, knocking her
down. The pitcher didn't need to fake horror at the strike- he hadn't mean
to hit her nearly so hard, so when she fell, he let out a shocked gasp.

"Ack- no! I'm sorry, I'm so sorry," he cried, running up to make sure she
was okay. "Are you all right?"

He was stopped when she sat up and glared at him out of one eye, barely
restrained anger showing in her face. She slowly stood up and dusted
herself off.

'Hmm,' the pitcher thought to himself as he stumbled back to the mound. 'I
don't think she's going to go for a make-up coffee.'

Gotoh slowly strode his way from the dugout to home plate. "Can you still
play?" he asked.

Kanuka shook her head. "Not as a pitcher- I won't be able to see the plate
clearly. I'll run the bases, but get Ohta warmed up."

Gotoh sighed. "Do you think he's up to it?"

Kanuka shrugged. "If he remembers that this is a softball game." Her good
eye narrowed, directing itself at the Riot Squad's pitcher. "He did that
intentionally."

Gotoh nodded. "It wasn't his idea."

Kanuka nodded, redirecting her gaze at the Riot Squad captain. "I know."

* * * * *

Kanuka, at the direction of the umpire, walked over to first base. Yuhki
walked up to the plate, remembering how he'd nearly been hit himself the
first time up to the plate. He struck out despite the fact that the
pitcher was rattled by his own pitch, too worried to get close enough to
the plate.

Kumagami walked up to the plate, and this time her calm smile was gone.
The ball came in, and with a crack went back out. Unfortunately, it didn't
quite go far enough- it was caught at the fence for another out.

Seiroku was next up. He was calm as he waited for the pitch, and smacked
the ball out of the park for his second home run of the game.

Noa came up next. She was starting to get mad- after all, this had all
started because she had wanted to have some fun playing catch with Asuma.
Then everyone else had to butt in- which wasn't so bad, as long as it had
been a friendly game. But then, her dinner out with Asuma had been
interrupted by this stupid challenge that the Riot Squad had issued- they'd
been forced to practice instead of going out. THEN this stupid pitcher,
who was winding up to throw his next pitch, had hit a friend of hers... She
was more than just mad, she was FURIOUS.

*crack* Asuma gaped as the ball went flying out of the park. "Eep," he
said, noting Noa's expression as she rounded the bases. This was more than
just a game for her- this was getting personal. "Good shot," he said as
she walked by.

"Asuma," she said sternly as she walked by. "Remember not to strike out...
or I'll be really mad at you."

'Oh, yeah... she's pissed,' he thought as he stepped up to the plate. He'd
never been good at sports- he figured he could do pretty well at shortstop,
considering how often he and Noa had played catch while off duty over at
SV2 Headquarters, but hitting was another matter. He slumped back, waited
for the pitch, closed his eyes, and swung as hard as he could.

His ball went soaring as well, ending up with another home run. As Asuma
rounded the bases, he could tell that the pitcher still hadn't quite
recovered from hitting Kanuka- something which the Riot Squad captain saw
as well after the back-to-back-to-back home runs, as he called time out to
change pitchers.

Noa, however, didn't care why the pitch went so far- she was just glad that
Asuma had listened to him about not striking out. When he got into the
dugout, she grabbed him and gave him a kiss, not thinking about the danger
of discovery.

Once they realized what they were doing, however, they quickly broke apart
and glanced around. Asuma noticed that only Gotoh could have seen them,
and he wasn't looking at them. Of course, the captain might have just been
pretending to have not seen anything, but Asuma couldn't be certain.

Asuma coughed, and whispered into Noa's ear, "If we win, I'll make sure we
can eat our dinner privately."

Noa just beamed at him, saying nothing. They were now leading seven to
nothing- even IF Kanuka was out, their lead was large enough that they
could just coast through the rest of the game.

* * * * *

The new pitcher for the riot squad proved to be coolly efficient, striking
Ueki Mashimo and Shinshi out without any difficulties and bringing the Riot
Squad up to the plate. As Ohta approached the mound, Asuma pulled him
aside.

"Remember, Ohta," Asuma noted, "This is SOFTBALL, not baseball. Throw
underhand, not overhand."

Ohta didn't say anything- he just nodded. After the three hour practice
Shinshi put him through, he didn't want to risk throwing overhand. At
least, he would at first. Use that overhand fastball for a surprise move-
that was the key.

Ohta threw a pitch and, for the first time, a member of the riot squad made
contact with the ball, sneaking between first and second base and into the
outfield, where Yuhki Watanabe picked it up and cut the runner off before
he could advance the hit past a single.

When Ohta got the ball back, he grimaced. That pitch didn't work as he had
hoped. Gritting his teeth, he looked at the signal from Shinshi and
nodded. Once again, he threw an underhand pitch... and once again, with a
crack of the bat the riot squad players were running.

The ball bounced in the direction of Asuma, who dove and grabbed it before
it could get past him. "Noa!" he cried, tossing it straight to her from
his back.

Noa, in perfect co-ordination, caught his toss, tagged the bag with her
foot, and fired the ball over to Takeo at first.

In the dugout, one of the riot squad players whistled. "Nice double play,"
he said. "Those three work well together."

The riot squad captain nodded. "Next time someone's running into second
base, take that girl down."

The others looked at him in surprise. "What?"

"You heard me- take her out. Slide into base with your cleats- spike her.
If you can't do that, run into her and knock her down. Get rid of her- if
you remove the linchpin of that group, the others will be will be
weakened."

"Captain, that's-" one of the officers started.

"Are you considering disobeying my orders? If so, do you realize charge
you with insubordination?" Silence answered him. "We are NOT going to
lose this game to these incompetent fools, no matter what we have to do."

The man at the bat (who had not heard the orders given by his captain) ALSO
made contact with the ball, sending it flying into the outfield, between
Ueki Mashimo and Yamane Seiroku. Both players sped towards the projectile,
neither looking out for the other. In the middle of the field, they
collided into each other and tumbled to the ground. Mashimo, struggling to
disentangle himself, reached out and caught the ball before collapsing back
into a heap.

Seiroku jumped up, a scowl on his face directed at Ueki. The two
outfielders made their way back to the dugout in silence, but when they got
there, neither of them were particularly happy.

As Koichi Miyagi walked up to the plate, Seiroku started blowing some steam
off against Mashimo.

"What do you think you were doing?" he ranted. "Don't you look where
you're going?!"

"Hey, it was my ball!" Mashimo shot back. "You should have been looking
out for ME!"

"I'm the center fielder! It's ALWAYS my ball, unless you call it!"

"It was in right field! It's not your ball if it's in right field!"

"It was NOT in right field!" Seiroku screamed. "Are you BLIND?"

By this point, everyone in the dugout was staring at the bickering pair, so
no-one noticed when Koichi struck out and Ohta went from the on-deck circle
to the plate. Koichi approached at this point, smiling as usual, and
looked around. "Hey, gang, what's up?" he asked.

"Just shut up!" Ueki shouted, throwing a wild punch in the direction of
Seiroku. The fist made impact against Seiroku's battered nose, splattering
it across his face.

Ueki paused, staring at Seiroku's ruined face, then at his bloody hand,
then back at Seiroku's face, and gaped.

"I. Can't. Believe. That. You. Broke. My. Nose. AGAIN!" Seiroku
growled. "That's it! This time, I'm not going to just let you get away
with this without answer!" Charging in, Seiroku started pounding on
Mashimo, sending punch after punch into the other man. In self defense,
Ueki started returning the attacks blow for blow.

Even Gotoh was a little ruffled by the sudden outburst between the two
officers. "Hey, break it up! That's an order!" he cried.

The fighters didn't listen... until, that is, Hiromi came between them,
picking each of them up by the back of the neck and pulling them apart. As
the two of them were held in mid-air by the gentle giant, Gotoh came over
and inspected the two of them.

"Hmm. Bruises, torn uniforms, looks like at least one dislocated arm,
and... if I'm not mistaken," Gotoh said, poking each of them in the ribs.
Both Seiroku and Ueki shuddered. "Yep- rib injuries as well." He paused,
contemplating what to say. "You do know that there are penalties for
intentionally rendering yourself incapable of working, don't you?"

"I beg your apologies, sir," Seiroku muttered.

"Yeah, same here," Ueki said.

Gotoh shrugged. "I accept, but you aren't going to have as easy a time
apologizing to the people who it will really matter to- your captains. But
in the meantime, you will have to go to get those injuries checked out."
Gotoh turned away to inspect his bench players as Ohta returned after
striking out. Pointing to two people at random, he said, "I don't know
either of you, but you'll probably be best suited to playing in the
outfield." Tazaki Hiroaki and Toru Sasaki, the commander car operators for
Unit 1, both accepted their new roles with a simple nod. "Oh, yeah," Gotoh
said as he turned his attention back to the game. "Hiromi, you can let
them down now."

* * * * *

With Ohta out, Yuhki Watanabe went up to the plate, and he, too, struck
out. The two new players, together with the rest of the team, went out to
the field and prepared to play defense.

Once again, the first pitch towards the riot squad player was hit. It was
popped up into center field, right where Tazaki Hiroaki was standing. He
was so surprised that a ball was coming his way on his first play that he
didn't move to catch the ball, and it fell a couple of feet in front of
him. Quickly gathering his wits, Tazaki grabbed the bouncing ball and
threw it as hard as he could to Noa, who tossed it to Asuma covering her
spot on the second base bag. It didn't matter, though, because the person
who hit the ball didn't even try to move past first.

A scowl grew on Ohta's face, but he was determined not to make any
mistakes. Once more, he threw underhand. Once more, he watched the ball
bounce over his head. Asuma darted back, fielding the ball behind Noa and
tossing it to her. She caught the ball, tagged the bag, turned...

And was plowed over by the runner coming from first. In addition to being
knocked over, she was stepped on by the riot squad player's cleeted shoes,
sending several small spike wounds into her back.

"NOA!" Asuma cried, running over to her and picking her up, cradling her in
his arms. "Noa, are you all right?"

"My back!" she whimpered. "Aagh! It hurts... Asuma, it hurts."

Asuma grimaced. Only now did he notice the cuts in her back, as blood
started dripping over his hands. "Damn," he cursed. Gotoh and the rest of
the team ran up.

"Noa, are you okay?" Gotoh asked. When she didn't answer, he turned to
Asuma. "Is she okay?"

Asuma shook his head. "She's bleeding... Captain, request permission to
take her to be examined."

Gotoh half-smirked and nodded. "Of course, Shinohara. Attend to her well.
I'll just have to find a replacement for you."

Asuma, carrying Noa in a classic damsel-in-distress pose, hurried away as
Gotoh returned to the dugout to find a couple of replacements. "Ishikawa,
Kawai, go on out there."

Natsume Kawai and Joudo Ishikawa nodded. As they trotted out to the field,
Natsume whispered to Joudo, "Um, what am I supposed to do? I've never
played this game before."

"Urk!" Joudo squawked. "Um, okay, first, you need to stand by that bag
over there... when the ball comes you direction, you..."

* * * * *

Joudo finished his crash course in softball as the two of them walked up to
their positions, and the game was underway again. The end results of the
play that injured Noa was an out, but there was still a man on first base
to deal with.

So, in order to get past the inning, the SV2 had to make two more outs...
AND contend with Ohta, who by that point had blown his top.

'All right,' he thought to himself. 'These little "underhand" pitches are
getting me nowhere- I'm going to throw a REAL fastball!'

And so he did. It was perfectly straight, perfectly on target- and
perfectly illegal.

"That's an illegal pitch!" the umpire shouted.

Ohta ran up to him, and would have confronted him directly if Shinshi
hadn't stepped in his way.

"It IS a legal pitch!" Ohta barked. "A fastball's a legal pitch!"

"This is SOFTBALL! A fastball's only legal if you can throw it underhand!"

"What does it matter? We're police officers- we should always be expecting
the unexpected!"

"THIS IS A SOFTBALL GAME! WHETHER YOU'RE A POLICE OFFICER OR NOT DOESN'T
MATTER!" the umpire cried.

"Help," Shinshi, now crushed between the two of them, whimpered painfully.

* * * * *

Ohta managed NOT to be ejected, but in the process the batter was to first
and Shinshi was so battered that he had to be carried off on a stretcher.
Gotoh sent in the biggest target possible- Hiromi. In fact, Hiromi was so
big that the umpire couldn't see around him, so when (the now emotionally
contained- sort of) Ohta tossed in his next pitch a bit outside, the umpire
couldn't exactly tell what to call it.

"Uh... um... strike one?"

The game continued, and Ohta actually managed to strike out the batter.
When the next one came up, however, a crack of the bat cleared the bases
with a home run. The final batter of the inning popped out to Koichi
Miyagi, and the SV2 came back up to the plate.

Takeo Kumagami was the first batter, and she had words for the catcher,
opening her mouth for the first time since the game started. "You know, I
wasn't taking this game very seriously," she noted. "Not until you started
intentionally hurting our people. And then, of all things, you hurt Noa in
front of her boyfriend- which really ticks me off, because those two have
something really rare. Something I wish I had. And that shouldn't be
hurt, no matter what. And yet, you did."

She slung her bat over her shoulder. The pitch came in, and Takeo smacked
it out of the park. "I'm going to start trying to win, now," she noted as
she set down the bat before making her way around the bases.

Toru Sasaki, the grizzled old veteran who had taken over one of the
outfield positions when Seiroku and Ueki Mashimo left the game, stood into
the plate next. He smacked the ball off into right field, but was unable
to run fast enough to beat the throw to first base, and was called out.

Following Toru was Noa and Asuma's replacements, Joudo Ishikawa and Natsume
Kawai. Joudo grounded out on his first pitch, and then Natsume came up to
the plate.

"Um... I've never played this game before," she said to the catcher. "What
am I supposed to do?"

The catcher smirked. This was too easy. "Don't worry, sugar," he said
flirtatiously. "This is all you have to do- when you see the ball coming,
close your eyes and swing your bat against the plate."

Natsume frowned. "That doesn't sound like what the others were doing...."

"What, you don't trust me?" the catcher whimpered, trying to get that
puppy-dog look on his face.

"No, I don't mean that!" Natsume assured. "I believe you! Don't be
upset!"

"I won't. Now, are you ready to play?" he said. Natsume nodded, the curls
of her hair bobbing in acknowledgment. 'Like taking candy from a baby,' he
thought as he put on his mask.

The ball came in, Natsume closed her eyes, and *bam*.

"Ow," the catcher said, as he removed the bat from the back of his head.

Natsume looked deeply apologetic. "I'm sorry- I couldn't see with my eyes
closed, and so I missed the plate, and..."

The catcher wasn't in any position to reply.

* * * * *

After the riot squad changed catchers (and Joudo snuck up to give Natsume a
more correct version of how to act when a hitter), the game resumed.
Natsume actually got a bat on the ball- to hit a couple of fouls. Finally,
though, she struck out, and the game went on.

The SV2's luck ran out the next inning. Several balls skipped past Natsume
Kawai or over the reach of Joudo Ishikawa. Several balls hit to the
outfield were fumbled by Tazaki Hiroaki or could not be reached by the
slow-moving Toru Sasaki. Ohta was able to manage one strikeout, and
Kumagami was able to stop a ground ball and run to the bag to get another
out on her own, but six runs scored before the last out could be made- and
that last out a difficult one, as well.

Finally, though, Joudo was able to field a ground ball, and toss it to
first- off balance, but he made it just in time for the out to be called.

"Good play, Joudo!" his teammates called, but their voices were a little
dispirited. They were now losing, eight to nine.

The opposing captain, however, was grimly satisfied. "Okay, men- we're now
in the lead. Make sure we stay that way- I don't care WHAT you have to do,
got it?" His team knew better than to question him, that time.

Tazaki Hiroaki was the first one up. He went down rather quickly, swinging
wildly and popping up a foul ball that the catcher caught. Hiromi was
next, looking a little too large for the bat he was carrying.

The first pitch came in right down the middle, hitting the catcher's mitt
dead on. "Ball one!" The umpire cried.

The pitcher didn't believe it. "Ball? How can you call that a ball- it
was a perfect pitch!"

"It was low- it needs to get at least as high as the hitters knees!"

"Are you kidding? His knees are taller than my catcher!"

"Sorry, but I can't help that- the rules say-"

"Fine!" the pitcher growled. With that, he wound up and threw his next
pitch... which went soaring over the catcher and clonked the umpire,
knocking him over.

"That was intentional!" the umpire growled, standing up with a hand on the
lump that was forming on his head. "You're out of the game!"

The pitcher's eyes widened. "WHAT? You're throwing me out?! For what?"

"For hitting me on the head with a softball- what do you think?"

The pitcher couldn't reply to that.

* * * * *

The new pitcher decided it wasn't worth trying to get Hiromi out after the
debacle with the last pitcher, and so just walked him intentionally.
Koichi Miyagi, who had yet to lose his smile since the game began, came up
next. The new pitcher hadn't yet gotten control of his pitches, however,
and walked him. Then Ohta came to the plate, but he was a bit too
enthusiastic. Believing he had to give the team the lead himself, he swung
for a home run at every pitch, even those that would not have been strikes,
and so was quickly struck out.

Yuhki Watanabe was up next, and for once he actually wasn't nervous.
Swinging heartily, he hit a nice ball into the outfield. He rounded first
and started to second, but couldn't go on because there were people in
front of him. Koichi Miyagi, rounding second, was tripped up by the
shortstop. He stumbled up, and limped back to second Hiromi made it home
for the tying run. Gotoh walked out to first base to talk to Koichi.

"How's your leg?"

"Hurt, sir... I don't think I'll be able to run around the bases."

Gotoh nodded, and singled to the dugout. Yoshi Tobe, the transport driver
for unit three with a pleasant disposition and a scar over his left eye,
ran out and took Koichi's place while Gotoh helped him off the field.

Kumagami came up next. The catcher, remembering her threat from the
previous time she'd come up to bat, intentionally walked her. The next
person due up was Toru Sasaki, the oldest and slowest member of the team.
Gotoh, sighing, grabbed a bat and a helmet. "Sasaki, sit down. I'm going
up to hit, myself."

"Sir?"

Gotoh smirked. "I'm a player-coach this game. We didn't have enough
people on the bench for my comfort, considering he had fifty to choose
from, so I made myself eligible to play. Since I was the only person left
on the bench, I figured I'd go up to bat."

Seated on the bench, the very non-descript Kenji Iguchi wondered why Gotoh
had completely forgotten about him. Then he remembered he wasn't ever
remembered by anyone, including the author of this fanfic when he was
plotting all of this, and decided to remain quiet and sit right where he
was.

Gotoh stood at the bat, slung the bat over his shoulder, crouched down, and
looked into the pitchers eyes. The pitcher glanced in to see the catcher's
sign, and caught the look Gotoh was giving him. He froze, hesitating.
There was a power in those eyes- something he couldn't quite explain. It
was something that caused the hair to stand up on the back of his head, and
made him fear throwing that pitch... he wasn't quite sure what to do.

"Pitch the ball," Gotoh said, calmly and evenly.

The pitcher could hardly refuse a request like that, and reached back to
pitch the ball.

With the bases loaded, two outs, and a tie game, the ball soared in. Gotoh
eyed its trajectory, pulled back with the bat...

And dropped it when his cell phone rang, letting the ball pass by for
strike one.

Turning to the surprised umpire, Gotoh pulled out his cell phone. "Um,
time out- I need to answer this." Flipping open the phone, he said, "Gotoh
here... Ah, Shinobu! Why didn't you come to the game? Oh... ah... uh
huh... well, okay, we'll be there in an hour." Closing his phone, he
sighed. "I'm afraid we'll have to end this little match- duty calls."

The referees and all the players from BOTH sides collapsed, not believing
that the whole game was for nothing. The riot squad's captain, however,
was furious. Charging up to Gotoh, he growled, "So, you forfeit?"

Gotoh shook his head. "Why should I forfeit? This is no different from
what would happen if it had rained. It's beyond the control of either of
us. Furthermore, the score it tied right now, so neither of us would win."

"Then when do you want to schedule a rematch?" the captain growled.

Gotoh's eyes hardened. "I won't."

"What?"

Finally, Gotoh exploded. "You idiot! This was just a stupid game, and yet
you crippled half of a police unit to win it! I'm not going to risk my
people's necks just because you want to prove yourself, damn it! Now,
excuse us, we have a job to do."

The members of the SV2 followed Gotoh out, looking at him with shock at his
furious explosion. The members of the riot squad, on the other hand,
looked at their captain with something very different- contempt.
-------------------------
Next Episode: With the second and third unit largely decimated by the
softball game and Gotoh actually taking the day off for a change, the SV2
is temporarily reorganized back into two units, one under Shinobu and the
other under Gomioka. Shinobu's shift is rather lonely without either Gotoh
or Gomioka around... what does she do when no-one else is there?

----------------------------------------------------------- ----------------
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fanfics available at
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From: "David A. Tatum" <desaix@sysnet.net>
Subject: [Patlabor][FanFic] Patlabor: Personal Files, Episode 11


Patlabor: Personal Files
An Episodic Patlabor Fanfic by David A. Tatum
Disclaimer: Insert legal junk here...

Episode 11: Daily Relief
January 28, 2000
(Ya know, I'm beginning to regret having put dates in this fic... oh, well.
This fanfic is set in a universe where the Y2K problem really existed,
where labors run rampant, and where you can have three new years
celebrations in 1999... well, you get the idea)

Shinobu and Gomioka both stood up as Gotoh returned to the hospital's
waiting room.

"How are they?" Shinobu asked.

Gotoh sighed. "Mashimo and Seiroku will both be out of action for three to
five days, at least- and that's only if they take a lot of bed rest. Noa
is worse off- she had to have surgery for a punctured colon. She'll be out
for more than a month recuperating, and then light duty only when she gets
back. Koichi Miyagi can only have very light duties for the next few days,
and nothing that'll put any stress on his leg. Shinshi will be fine by
tomorrow, but the doctors said he had a concussion earlier in the week that
should have treated than, and have advised bed rest. That means we have
six people out of major action for the next week or so."

Shinobu raised an eyebrow. "Six?"

Gotoh nodded. "For some reason, Shinohara suddenly asked to take a lot of
leave he had been saving up. Considering we would be down two labor crews
regardless of his being on the station or not, I figured it wouldn't do any
harm to grant his request."

"I knew that stupid bet of yours was a terrible idea," Gomioka grumbled.
"Now look at us- we're down a whole labor team! And for what? For some
silly grudge match between you and a captain from the riot squad?
Disgraceful."

Gotoh shrugged off the near insult. "At any rate, we're going to need to
reorganize the SV2 until things get more closer to normal."

"Most of the injuries were to your two units," Shinobu noted, "But I do
need a transport driver for my second team since Mashimo was injured."

Gotoh nodded. "Since both Izumi and Shinohara are unavailable, I'll lend
you Hiromi. He's our best driver, and his size makes him rather
intimidating."

Shinobu nodded happily. "Thanks," she said.

"By the way, do you happen to know what happened between Seiroku and
Mashimo to set them off on one another like that? Beyond the events in the
game, I mean."

Shinobu frowned. "I'm not entirely sure. I believe it has something to do
with one of them ratting out the other for having something they weren't
supposed to in their cabin- something alchoholic, probably, though I don't
know for sure. Whichever one it was who got turned it found out about it,
and the confrontation that followed resulted in a pretty nasty fight. That
was how Seiroku's nose got broken the first time. Then, there was a
training incident where Ueki accidentally hit the same nose with a pugil
stick, and then the martial arts training where Ueki threw Seiroku onto the
ground face first, breaking his nose, and then... well, you get the
picture."

"Indeed," Gotoh said. "Well, at any rate, Gomioka and I still need to
reorganize our teams. I suggest we use Kumagami to take Seiroku's place in
Ohta's unit, and Kenji to take the command car for Joudo's labor. That
means that we're back down to having two units, but we have two captains
for them. Say, Captain Gomioka, how would you like to take today's shift
at captain, and we'll alternate days until we can return to three units
again?"

Gomioka was caught a little off guard. Gotoh and Shinobu were both acting
rather unconcerned with the situation, considering... of course, there had
been several times where the second unit- or part of it- had been knocked
out of action for several days in the past- the first Griffin incident
which lead to Asuma and Takeo both being hospitalized for the entire
action, the time food poisoning took down not just most of the labor
operators in the second unit, but the entire mechanics squad as well, and
various incidents where one or both labors were rendered inoperable for a
period of time.

It was when Gomioka had come to the realization that temporary
reorganizations were a commonplace think in Captain's lives that Gotoh
posed his question, and so Gomioka was unprepared for it.

"Yes, sir," he replied automatically, not thinking.

Gotoh nodded. "Good. If you and Captain Nagumo will excuse me, I want to
go home for the day. I'll take over for you tomorrow."

Shinobu was shocked. He usually spent every minute either on duty or
trying to hang around her- even if it meant staying on base when on duty.
There were times Shinobu wondered if Gotoh even had a home of his own, or
if he lived on base- for him to be leaving was downright un-natural to her.

"Gotoh? What are you going to be doing? If you don't mind my asking, that
is...."

Gotoh grabbed his coat from the chair and started out the door. "My niece
is in town for the week... I thought it might be nice to visit her while
she's here, considering she IS staying at my place."

"Have fun," she said as the door shut behind him. She stared at it for
several moments, wondering why she hadn't heard about his niece being in
town before. Several long moments.

"Shinobu, are you listening?" Gomioka asked.

That started her out of her reverie. "I'm sorry, what did you ask?"

"Do you want to take the first shift or the second today?"

"Oh... first. Go and get some sleep, but do so in the dorm rooms. With
just two units, you're on standby today."

"Yes, Ma'am!" Gomioka cried, saluting. Shinobu didn't even notice as her
attention was once more on the door that Captain Gotoh had gone out of.

'What is he up to?' she wondered. His behavior was so uncharacteristic of
him he MUST be doing something- after all, he didn't get the name of 'Razor
Blade' Gotoh for nothing- but what was it? And why didn't he want to ask
her about it?

* * * * *

"Uncle Gotoh!" the teenage girl cried as her uncle came through the door.
"I didn't think you'd be able to visit!"

Gotoh smiled. "Well, I still might want to talk to Shinobu again later
today, but I figured I shouldn't miss a chance to talk to you while you
were in town. So, how has life been since that little training prank we
pulled together on my unit?"

"I got accepted to all my colleges, Uncle Gotoh! I could even go to the
police academy, if I wanted!"

Gotoh smiled. "That's great! Let's celebrate. Where do you want to go
out to eat?"

* * * * *

Noa blinked open her eyes to see Asuma sitting at her bedside.

"Ack! What are you doing here?!" she screeched, trying weakly to pull the
blankets up to cover her nightclothes... only to discover she wasn't
wearing her usual pajamas, but a hospital gown. Which was probably worse,
but once she realized she was in the hospital she calmed down and
remembered he was probably just worrying about her.

Asuma looked a little annoyed at being yelled at. "Well, I figured you
might want someone here when you woke up to tell you what was going on. I
took some leave time to keep you company for the next few days as well...
but it's not too late for me to cancel it if you don't want me around."

Noa glared at him. "Of course I want you around- I want company, and I
want that company to be my boyfriend. So, how long until I can use
Alphonse again?"

Asuma squirmed uncomfortably. Noa calling him her 'boyfriend' so
blatently, while not unpleasant, made him feel rather uneasy- as if he
wasn't entirely sure what he was getting into, and wasn't entirely sure if
he'd like it or not. Still, he wasn't going to stop her from doing so...
well, not unless there was a chance one of their co-workers might overhear.

"Sorry, Noa... you had to get surgery to repair a punctured colon. The
wounds themselves weren't really that severe, but since you had to go under
anesthesia and get stitches you are out of action for a while. No police
work- which means no Alphonse- for a month. Then, only light duty- which
STILL means no Alphonse- until you receive medical clearance... and they
won't give you that until at least two weeks after you get back on duty-
that's a policy I was told about when my ribs got busted."

"Six weeks without Alphonse?" Noa cried weakly, distressed.

Asuma sighed- he hadn't wanted to tell her that. "I'll see if I can
arrange for you to visit him when you're back on your feet, but that won't
be for a while yet." He hesitated. "I can try to take his place while you
can't see him, though- I'll still be here."

Noa smiled tiredly- she was still feeling the effects of the drugs they had
used to put her under. "That's sweet, Asuma... but no. Alphonse fills a
part of my heart you don't... but then again, you fill a part of my heart
he can't."

Asuma almost asked her what she meant by that, but then he noticed she'd
fallen asleep as she said it.

* * * * *

Shinobu sighed, relaxing into her chair. All of her paperwork for the next
five weeks had been completed, there had been no calls, and there wasn't
anyone around flirting with- er, bugging her. She'd tried to puzzle out
what Gotoh was doing, but she didn't have enough evidence to even start
investigating... but she was fairly certain visiting his niece had nothing
to do with it. She had called his house the moment she could and found
that niether he NOR his niece were there.

The other person she might talk to, Gomioka, was asleep... and she could
tell he needed it. Shinobu wasn't too sure about him, any more. She'd
been certain that he would be a good captain when she recommended his
promotion, but it appeared at times the job was getting too stressful for
him. There was certainly no reason for him to jump on Gotoh about the
softball game- it was supposed to be just a friendly contest, not the near
bloodfest it became. There was certainly no way of knowing that the riot
squad captain was actually willing to injure fellow police officers to win
some stupid game.

That wasn't the only thing that made her wonder- she had dismissed the
fears Gomioka had expressed about his leadership ability the other day as
rookie mistakes, but in truth Gomioka was having a very poor success rate
with his men. Perhaps she should ask Gotoh to take over the temporary
combined unit for the rest of the week, and give Gomioka some extra time
off to relieve some of his stress. She knew it didn't help that his
marriage was in trouble- a week off might be enough time for him to work
that out, at least. Then again, knowing what a workaholic Gomioka was,
he'd never go for it.

Shinobu distracted herself from her thoughts with a loud yawn. 'Hmm, I'm
getting awfully tired,' she thought to herself, stretching. 'Usually,
though, there's a lot more to do during the day... I wish Gotoh was here-
or at least that he would call like he usually does when he isn't in the
office. Then at least I'd have the challenge of fending off his advances.'

Sighing, she stood up and walked over to her personal mailbox, checking to
see if anything new had come in for her since the previous night. Finding
a small stack of letters, she pulled it out and headed back over to her
desk.

"Hmm," she said to herself, "Let's see what we've got.... Junk, junk,
junk, bill, postcard, bill.... Wait, postcard?" Checking the address on
the back, she blinked. "Tsuge Yukihito? Why, I haven't heard from him
since he left on that mission for the U.N. several months ago! I wonder
what he has to say?"

Tsuge Yukihito had been an instructor of hers at the academy... and a
little bit more in her personal life. Things had gotten rather...
intimate... between them for a while. After she'd gotten command of her
own unit, however, their rendesvous became fewer and fewer. At some point-
shortly after Gotoh had been transferred into the SV2 to become her XO- she
had realized that they'd drifted apart completely. They still communicated
by mail frequently, but they hadn't seen each other in more than a year.

At times, Shinobu wondered if the timing of that realization had been a
coincidence... but it wasn't that she was no longer in love with Tsuge.
She was. It was that he wasn't around any more.

Of course, that might have been it. Tsuge was unavailable, and Gotoh was.
While she loved Tsuge, she couldn't deny being at least a LITTLE attracted
to her fellow captain. It would never work out between her and Gotoh,
though- he was too much of a slob, and Tsuge was still number one in her
heart. Well, maybe not NEVER work out, but it would take a while.

Smiling fondly to herself, Shinobu started reading the letter on the back
of the card.

"Shinobu, my Love," it began.
"I am not entirely certain what I can and what I can't tell you. Suffice
to say, however, that as much as I care about you, this will be the last
time I will ever talk to you or send you any sort of letter. I am very
sorry. However, I will leave you with one thought of comfort- here is a
poem I have composed, which should explain things better than I could say
them...."

Shinobu stopped reading right there. "What?" she gasped. "Why?" She
tried to read on, but the tears that had suddenly appeared in her eyes made
that impossible.

It was probably inevitable that one of them would have said it, but she was
still unprepared for it. Obviously, he had also realized that they were
over, and was breaking all ties. A real break up, instead of the simple
seperation they had been living under.

'Why?' Shinobu thought to herself. 'I loved him, and now he isn't even
going to talk to me again....'

* * * * *

Gotoh smiled at his niece. "Well, were do you want to go next?"

His niece seemed to consider the question for a bit. "Hmm... I think I'd
like to go see where you work... I mean, I may go to the police academy,
and if I do I might wind up involved with labors. Shouldn't I see what it
is I'd be getting myself into?"

Gotoh seemed a little surprised. "Of course... in fact, while we're on our
way there, why don't we stop by police headquarters and I can introduce you
to a few friends of mine. They should give you a better example of what
life in the police is like..."

* * * * *

A few hours later, Gotoh and his niece were walking through the halls of
the SV2 Barracks.

"...met Shinobu before, but that was when we were on the campus," Gotoh was
saying. "Now you'll meet her in her professional environment, just like
you met Inspector Matsui in his."

His niece laughed. "Matsui was funny... how can someone so fat be a good
field officer?"

"You'd be surprised," Gotoh replied, opening the door to his office and
looking in.

Shinobu was slumped down into his chair, a now empty bottle of whiskey
stolen from his file cabinet clutched protectively in her hands, her
uniform jacket and vest removed, her shirt top loosened, and tears dripping
down her face.

Gotoh closed the door before his niece could see. "On second thought,
Shinobu is rather busy and doesn't look like she could talk to you right
now. Why don't you go talk to Sakaki of the maintenance squad, four doors
down on your right. I'll go see if I can help her out...."

His niece blinked. She knew her uncle well enough to know something was
behind that door that he DIDN'T want her knowing about. "Um, okay, Uncle
Genma," she agreed, running off down the hall. When she disappeared into
Chief Sakaki's office, Gotoh reopened the door and went in.

"Ah, Gotoh!" Shinobu slurred. "I thought that was you just a moment ago...
or was it a while ago? Oh, whatever... glad you're here."

Gotoh was concerned to say the least. As quickly as he dared, he moved to
her side. "Shinobu, what's wrong? Why did you, er..."

"Why am I as drunk as a skunk?" Shinobu finished for him. "'Cause I let
him slip through my fingers."

Gotoh blinked. "'Him?' 'Him' who?"

Shinobu shook her head drunkenly. "It doesn't matter anymore- he doesn't
want to ever talk to me again. I mean, I knew it was over, but I always
thought it would never REALLY be over, you know?"

"I... don't understand," Gotoh said.

Shinobu reached up and patted him on the cheek. "Don't worry,
'Razorblade.' I won't let it get out that you don't know everything."

"Er, thank you," Gotoh said, trying to keep himself from peaking down her
unbuttoned shirt. "Um... how'd you know I keep my booze in that cabinet?"

Shinobu laughed. "Are you kidding? After working with you as long as I
have, I'd be a TERRIBLE cop if I didn't know a few of your secrets. Just
like I know you bet on horse races and give your unit free beer despite
regulations against it...."

"Er, well, that isn't really that much of a secret," Gotoh noted.

"And you know what?" Shinobu continued, apparently not hearing. "I don't
care about it, I don't care if you drink when you shouldn't, I don't care
if you gamble, I don't care if you're a slob...." Reaching up, she grabbed
him by his lapels and pulled him down to look at him face to face. "All I
care about is that I can talk to you when I want to, okay? That's it."
With that, she pulled him even closer and kissed him fiercely. Gotoh was
so shocked that he didn't know what to do.

It was then that Chief Sakaki walked in. "Gotoh, why did you tell that
niece of yours to talk to... er, excuse me. I think I'll give her a guided
tour of the facilities for a while, okay?" Quickly, the door shut behind
him.

His quick exit didn't matter, though. The mood was broken, and Gotoh had
enough time to recover from the kiss and step back for a moment, to think
about how he should deal with all of this.

"Shinobu, stop... this isn't the way I want this to happen," he said. "Not
when you're drunk- not when you aren't in control of yourself. Not on the
rebound."

"I lost him because I didn't hold onto him tightly enough... you aren't
him, but you're all I've got right now, and I'm gonna hold tight onto you
enough to not lose you ever."

She was, in fact, holding on to him rather tightly... his shoulders, where
she was clenched onto with a vice-like grip, were starting to hurt rather
badly. Not that Gotoh cared at the moment.

"Shinobu, you aren't going to lose me. Go ahead and hold on, if you like,
but don't do it like this- you're drunk, and not in control of yourself,
and depressed." Gotoh paused. "Well, you're not in control of yourself
and depressed. I might not have any objection if you were just drunk...."

Shinobu laughed, sliding out of the chair to hang over him. "That's
probably why I like you so much- you can always keep your sense of humor
going no matter how bad the situation is. Well, that and I know you aren't
going anywhere... not like SOME people I've loved...."

Gotoh sighed. "Shinobu, please... I'm having a hard enough time resisting
you, do you have to hang over me like this?"

Shinobu sniffed, not quite able to cling onto him like she'd planned and
falling a little. "I'm a little upset you're able to resist me at all! I
thought you liked me?"

"I more than like you, Shinobu," Gotoh said, catching her before she
slumped to the ground. "That's why I'm resisting you."

Shinobu didn't say anything in reply- she had passed out after standing up
too quickly.

Looking at her silently for a moment, Gotoh picked her up and carried her
into his personal office, where he had a cot set up. He didn't want to
carry her through the hallways and let her crews see her passed out, drunk.
Setting her on the bed carefully, he covered her with a blanket, and
stared at her for a moment.

"Hmm," he said to himself. "Looks like I'm gonna have part of a duty shift
today, after all."

* * * * *

Gomioka stepped into the office when his shift arrived, feeling more
relaxed then he had been in a while. He had no Gotoh to deal with, which
meant he'd be having a MUCH better day than normal.

"I'm ready to take over, Captain Nagumo," he said, not looking at the duty
desk.

"Go ahead- I'm just finishing up some personal paperwork," Gotoh replied,
looking curiously at a postcard. "Shinobu's asleep on the cot in my
personal study- she was exhausted when I showed up to visit with my niece,
and I suggested I take over for her until your shift came up."

"Hi!" the afforementioned niece said, waving. "So you're the new captain.
I'm thinking of joining the police academy, and may even decide to transfer
here when I graduate. Who knows- you might become my commanding officer
one day."

'Great,' Gomioka thought to himself. 'Now his FAMILY intends to haunt me
for the rest of my career.'

"Well, we're going home," Gotoh said, picking up his coat and setting the
postcard on Shinobu's desk. "I'll be here to relieve you for standby duty
tomorrow."

"Carry on," Gomioka said.

Gotoh and his niece went out the door, leaving behind a mess on Gotoh's
desk.

"Bah... does he EVER clean up after himself?" He walked over to clean up
the mess, and noticed a bit of orange cloth. Curious, he picked that up
first.

"Shinobu's vest? What's that doing at Gotoh's desk?"

For some reason, Gomioka started feeling even MORE jealous than he had been
before.

January 29, 2000

Gotoh walked into the office. "Here to relieve you for standby duty, Mr.
Gomioka. Carry on."

Gomioka, the disciplinarian that he was, saluted. "Captain Nagumo has yet
to be awakened. I should take care of that before I go."

Gotoh shrugged. "Nah- don't bother. I'll do that."

Gomioka grimaced. Letting Gotoh have that opportunity was NOT a good thing
in his book- especially if things he really hoped hadn't happened the
previous day HAD actually happened, but he didn't have much say in the
matter. "Very well... I'll relieve you tomorrow."

Gotoh nodded. "I'll probably be on base even when I'm off duty. I've got
a lot of paperwork to catch up on."

Gomioka stormed out the door, not even bothering to acknowledge Gotoh's
announcement.

"Huh... I wonder what's wrong with him." Gotoh set his jacket on the chair
behind his desk and then stepped on into his personal office. Shinobu was
sleeping in his cot, her clothes ruffled badly, drool coming out of one
side of her mouth. Gotoh pulled out some equipment he had on hand and
perked up some coffee before going over to wake him up.

"Shinobu? Shinobu, wake up. Shinobu...."

"Ugh!" Shinobu grimaced, sitting up slowly. "What hit me?"

"Some cheap American rotgut whiskey. Nasty stuff to be drinking if you're
not used to it."

Shinobu winced, trying to open her eyes. "I got drunk?"

Gotoh shoved a cup of black coffee into her hand. "Yep. Pretty badly,
too."

Shinobu frowned. "How did that happen?"

"Something about a letter on a postcard, I believe. Um, you wouldn't
happen to remember anything you did last night, do you?"

Shinobu finally managed to open one bloodshot eye, glaring up at him.
"Why? I didn't embarass myself, did I?"

Gotoh coughed. "Well, actually..."

"What did I do?"

"You kissed me."

That got the other eye open. "You didn't take advantage of my being drunk,
did you?" she growled angrilly.

Gotoh shook his head. "Like I said last night, you were drunk, out of
control, and depressed. I might take advantage of you when you were drunk,
but unless you were both in control and as happy as you could be."

Suddenly, that phrase triggered a partial memory of the previous night.
"Er... it never happened, got it? And it won't ever happen again,
understand?"

Gotoh nodded. "I know better than to argue with a woman with a hangover."

Shinobu nodded, wincing her eyes closed again as the pain from her head
(and her stomach) overwhelmed her. "But promise me you won't stop trying,
okay? Things get pretty boring when you aren't around here, bugging me."

Gotoh blinked at her in surprise. Maybe not all of last night was due to
the whiskey. "Like I said, I know better than to argue with a woman with a
hangover."

-------------------------
Next Episode: Unit 3's new labors finally arrive! There may be one last
mission for the old ones, however.... And now that Kanuka is part of the
team, will she or Seiroku be the unofficial 'third pilot'?

---------------------------------------------------------- -----------------
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From: "David A. Tatum" <desaix@sysnet.net>
Subject: [Patlabor][FanFic] Patlabor: Personal Files, Episode 12

I THINK I left off with Episode 11 last time. Here's 12... sorry if it's a
duplicate.
Patlabor: Personal Files
An Episodic Patlabor Fanfic by David A. Tatum
Disclaimer: Insert legal junk here...

Episode 12: Last Battle of the Ancient Warriors
February 15, 2000

Gomioka REALLY needed this meeting- he had to get his mind off of the
previous day. Valentine's day. Perhaps the most humiliating day of his
life.

As was custom in Japan, most of the women had bought chocolates for all the
men in their lives- their lovers, their co-workers, and their bosses.
Natsume Kawai from the second unit had hand-delivered a small box of
chocolate to everyone in the mechanics division, including Chief Sakaki,
before giving out more chocolates to Captain Gotoh and all the male members
of the 2nd Unit. Takeo Kumagami followed suit, delivering small chocolates
to Hiromi, Asuma, and Joudo before delivering a slightly larger chocolate
to her captain.

Noa had shown up to deliver chocolates as well. Asuma had been with her at
the hospital (officially taking 'personal leave,' and trying to convince
people that he WASN'T hanging by Izumi's side night and day), but that day
he'd been given permission to take her onto the base to visit friends,
'provided she not engage in any work' and that she be confined to a
wheelchair. Asuma saved a much needed day of leave by officially being on
call, but his duties that day consisted of pushing Noa around in a
wheelchair. That was how he got the chocolates from Takeo and Natsume- the
matching chocolate stains on their lips when Noa arrived told everyone who
wasn't completely oblivious to what the two were doing that they'd decided
to share the chocolate Noa had given him earlier.

Shinobu delivered her own chocolates to everyone in her unit- there were no
other females in first unit, for some reason. She also gave one to Gotoh,
as well- though not to him. Her official excuse for having one to give to
Gotoh was that she'd accidentally bought one too many, but Gomioka had to
wonder. He had his suspicions about what had happened that night about two
weeks previous, and the hesitant- almost guilty- way the two had been
treating each other since that night seemed to confirm it, but Gomioka
hoped he was wrong. In fact, he fervently wished he was wrong. He
couldn't think of how to find out, however.

Even Kanuka, despite being an American by birth, followed the Japanese
varient of the Valentine tradition... sort of. Chocolates from her went
around to the various people she'd worked closely with- Captain Gotoh got a
chocolate from her, Shige and Sakaki got chocolates, Hiromi, Ohta, Asuma,
Shinshi- basically, all of the guys in the second unit or associated with
it prior to the re-organization of the SV2 Division 2.

Her final Valentine chocolate- obviously a piece of 'giri' chocolate- was
delivered to Gomioka himself. That would have been fine, except the timing
of it was way off.

Just as Kanuka handed Gomioka the box of chocolate, Gomioka's wife walked
in, carrying her own box. Taking one look at the scene, his wife turned
and walked back out. Gomioka ran out to follow her, and found the gift she
had gotten for him lying in the trash can, while she, herself, was long
gone.

It had taken many long hours of talking with her over the phone to calm her
down and convince her that no, he was not having an affair with Kanuka, and
that the chocolates she was giving him were merely a professional courtesy,
and had no romantic connotations whatsoever.

In the end, Gomioka wound up with no chocolates, because in order to
satisfy his wife he had to return the gift back to Kanuka. Gomioka was the
only male in the entire SV2 Second Section who had no chocolates by the end
of the day, as Kanuka, upon getting the chocolates back from him, divided
the contents of the box with two of his other men- Yoshi Tobe and Yamane
Seiroku. It might be noted that Kenji Iguchi was a male who also failed to
receive any chocolates, but that was because no-one remembered him- Kanuka
forgot to save a portion for him, and his teammates forgot to remind her.
However, no-one noticed his disappointment and so Gomioka didn't even think
about the fact that Kenji also didn't get anything.

Gomioka knew he was probably being paranoid, but he could swear that every
time he turned his back on someone in the SV2, they were pointing at him
and laughing about his misfortune. It didn't help that his most bitter
rival in the SV2, Captain Gotoh, recieved more Valentine chocolate than
anyone.

Regardless of the whole Valentine's day fiasco, there was a piece of news
that Gomioka hoped would help him rise from the doldrums. Finally, he was
getting the equipment he would need to turn his unit into an EFFECTIVE
force- his three new labors were coming. Soon, very soon, he would have
top-of-the-line labors to man his shift with.

They weren't supposed to arrive until the twentieth, but Gomioka had a
surprise for his men (and women). But now, with the date of delivery
confirmed, there were certain things he would be allowed to do to get them
ready.

"Listen up, people," he said, addressing the six members of the third unit.
"Finally, we're all back together again, after that disaster of a softball
tournament crippled half of you. Unit 2, however, is not- they are still
down a pilot due to injury and a command car operator due to, ahem,
personal reasons. Because of this, Unit 2 has... graciously... loaned us
one of their Ingrams so that those of you who aren't fully familiar with it
can learn the differences between an Ingram and a Type 97, and for those of
you who ARE familiar with it to get a refresher course in its workings."
Gomioka had to struggle to say 'graciously' without showing his distaste
for pandering to Gotoh too publically, but he managed. Continuing, he
announced, "Our own labors are on the way, and we'll be recieving them in
five days. I expect all of you to be the best Ingram operators in the
country by the time they arrive. Understand?"

"Yes, sir!" the six labor operators chorused.

"Good- everyone, get your equipment. Drills start in two minutes!

* * * * *

February 20, 2000

The drills had been tough and intense. For four days straight, Gomioka
would make sure everyone had a turn at the controls, getting the Ingram to
do complex tasks with minimal motion. Gomioka started enjoying command for
the first time- he was in his element now, and no-one was better than he
was at running labor drills.

Finally, the day the new labors were to join them had arrived. Gomioka
could drive away his concerns over Gotoh and Shinobu by putting himself
into his work. Furthermore, now that he had useful patlabors on the way,
much of the stress would go out of his job. Perhaps, for once, his
position as Captain would be what he'd been dreaming it would be.

For some reason, though, his labors were late.

He walked into the office, where both Shinobu and Gotoh were working.
Shinobu was officially on her duty shift and Gotoh was officially on his
standby shift, but Gotoh for some reason chose to spend all of his time in
the office with Shinobu even when he didn't have to.

Gomioka stiffened for a moment upon seeing his inter-office rival standing
over Shinobu's desk, pointing something out on a piece if paper. Quickly
recovering his composure, he walked over to his own desk and sat down.
Turning to the other captains, he asked, "My labors should have been here
three hours ago... who am I supposed to call for inquiries about such
things?"

Shinobu looked over at him. "Probably they're just stuck in traffic. You
might want to call the quartermaster's corps to find out for certain,
however- they're in charge of labor procurement."

Gomioka nodded and looked through the SV2 Official Phone List to find the
number of the quartermaster's corps. Dialing them up, he waited for
someone to pick up the phone.

After twelve rings, he hung up the phone and tried again, just to make
certain that he had dialed the right number. When again it didn't answer
after twelve rings, he turned to Gotoh and Shinobu, still discussion
paperwork. "Hey, is this the current number for the quartermaster corps?"
he asked.

Gotoh, already standing, walked over to check what he was pointing to.
"Yeah- that's it, all right."

Gomioka frowned. "Well, they aren't picking up on the other end- not even
voice mail is coming up."

"That's strange," Shinobu said. "There's always someone on duty over
there."

Gotoh walked over to his desk and picked up his own phone, dialing several
other numbers. A few rings after each call, he hung up. "Hmm... I just
tried to make contact with various people I know who works in the same
building- niether they nor their voice mail is picking up, either.
Something very strange is going on." Gotoh paused to consider things for a
moment.

"Should we investigate it?" Shinobu asked, thinking aloud.

"You and I can't," Gotoh noted. "We're on duty, and it would be a bad idea
to go out on just a hunch when there's a chance we could get called into
action at any moment."

Gomioka caught the implication in Gotoh's voice, and nodded. As much as he
disliked the man, he had a point. "My unit IS officially off duty... think
anyone would mind if I took the Ancient Warriors out for one last spin?"

"Ancient Warriors?" Shinobu asked.

Gomioka looked abashed. "It's a nickname the mechanics squad gave them,"
he explained. "I sort of picked it up."

"Fitting," she said. Gotoh nodded as well.

"I suspect you could get away with it," Gotoh said. "But you'd have to
hurry- your standby shift starts in just six hours, and it would take you
an hour to get there and an hour to get back... IF there isn't too much
traffic. More likely than not, it'll take two or two and a half hours each
way- which means you won't have more than a couple of hours to do your
investigating."

Gomioka nodded. "We'll be back in time. See you in six hours."

After he left the office, Gotoh turned to Shinobu. "Hmm... he just might
work out as a captain, after all."

* * * * *

Shinshi yawned. "What's going on? I thought we were off duty- I need
sleep." Murmurs of ascent joined him from most of the remaining crew of
Unit 3.

"We're police officers! We're never off duty!" Ohta snapped.

"Then why do the charts say 'off duty, 0800-1600'?" Shinshi asked.

"People, people!" Gomioka cautioned. "Settle down. I can't explain
anything until you're ready to listen." The bickering quickly stopped
before he continued. "I need to ask you all to voluntarily join me in an
investigation. For some reason, our labors have not arrived yet. Trying
to figure out WHY they hadn't come, I attempted to make contact with the
quartermaster corps. However, there was no answer on the other end of the
phone. Several attempts to call others in the same building also failed...
which means that there's a chance something seriously wrong is going on.
The duty officers can't investigate since it's only a conjecture based on
the wildest of speculation, but WE aren't on duty."

Kanuka nodded to herself. "You need us to go in and poke around to see
what's going on, don't you? Well, I volunteer."

Ohta nodded. "I will, as well."

Shinshi sighed. "I really shouldn't- I should be getting my sleep, and my
wife would KILL me if she found out I was risking my neck unnecessarily
like this, but... what the hell. I'll go, to."

Yamane Seiroku, Koichi Miyagi, and Yoshi Tobe all nodded at this. "We
won't let the first labor team get all the glory," Seiroku stated proudly.

"I'd like to take all three labors along, as well... just in case," Gomioka
noted.

Seiroku's face lit up. He started to grab his helmet and head for the Type
96, but Kanuka started moving first. Seiroku rushed up to her and caught
her by the shoulder. She turned and glared at him, making him back off a
step and swallow.

"Um," he explained nervously. "I sort of have the unofficial position of
third labor pilot in this unit."

Kanuka opened her mouth to reply, but Gomioka intervened before she could
say anything. "I think we should let her take it out this time. You're
totally untrained for the 96, but she's been a patlabor pilot long enough
to have piloted it before and is more likely to understand all its quirks."

"But captain-" Seiroku protested.

"We'll discuss whether to put her in that position permanently or have it
alternate between you after we get our regular labors, but this is not a
normal situation."

Yamane's face fell. "Yes, sir," he said sullenly, walking at a much slower
pace for his 97's command car.

Gomioka nodded. "Everyone, board up and move 'em out!"

* * * * *

Gomioka, for the first time, felt as though he was in complete control of
his command. Even Ohta, the prototypical hothead, was obeying his commands
to stay cool and not alert the populace- after all, there was no proof that
anything was wrong, yet.

The three labor transports (the third driven by Gomioka himself) made their
way through the streets of Tokyo, thankfully not attracting TOO much
attention. It actually helped that the patlabors were obsolete, for once,
as most of the populace assumed they were being taken to be scrapped.

"We're getting close," Gomioka informed the others through the radio.
"Let's pull over two blocks from the building. Command car operators and
labor transport officers will raise their labors and then join me as I go
in on foot, and we'll keep in touch with everyone else."

"Yes, sir," the labor crews confirmed over the radio.

Gomioka pulled his transport into the empty parking lot of a shopping
center that was under renovation. "You all set back there?" he asked
Kanuka.

"Yes, sir."

Gomioka pressed the 'raise labor' button. Once he was fairly certain that
the Type 96 was safely raised, he opened the door and popped out as quickly
as he could. Shinshi, Yamane Seiroku, and Yoshi Tobe quickly joined him.
Together, they made their way down the last two blocks as casually as they
could, then slipped inside the building which housed the independant
contractors and logistics sections for the police.

A pretty female receptionist decked out in a typical police woman's uniform
greeted them upon their entrance. "Hello, can I help you?"

Gomioka, poised for action, was a bit surprised at the casual greeting.
"Um, maybe. We tried to call several times to several different offices
throughout the building and got no response..."

The receptionist nodded. "Yes. We've had some trouble with the phone
system today."

Gomioka sighed. He had been so geared up for action that it was a severe
disappointment to find out that nothing serious was wrong. Oh, well- while
he was here....

"I initially called to try and get in touch with the Quartermaster's Corps.
May I ask what office they are in?"

The receptionist nodded. "Certainly, sir... just let me look them up."
She rifled through the papers on her desk, searching for something.

Gomioka pulled out his radio and made contact with the labors. "Stand
down- false alarm," he ordered.

Shinshi, pacing impatiently, kicked something with one of his feet.
Bending down to look closer at it, he blinked. "Um, Captain Gomioka, sir?"

"Yes?"

"What do you make of this?" he asked, handing him a police badge.

Gomioka looked at it in surprise. The badge itself was dented and the
clasp was violently twisted. He couldn't quite puzzle out why it had been
so badly damaged, unless it was torn off of a police jacket and stomped on
several times....

Approaching the receptionist desk, he looked over at the attractive woman
and said, "Excuse me, but it appears as if-" He stopped, seeing a foot
stick out from under the desk. "Hey, what's going on here? Oof!" he
didn't have time to finish as the receptionist, quick as lightning, flashed
a punch out at his chin which knocked him five feet back and leapt over the
desk to continue the fight.

Gomioka watched, his vision dimming, as the other three mobilized, running
to aid their fallen captain. Shinshi was caught by a kick to the face,
sending him into an unconscious slumber. Yoshi Tobe went down just as
fast, leaving Seiroku to face the woman alone. He nodded imperceptively,
and the woman charged. Seiroku was apparently a bit of a martial artist,
successfully deflecting several of her blows and returning some of her own.

Gomioka attempted to rise and help him, but that proved to be a mistake.
With his equilibrium knocked out of whack by the blow given him, he wasn't
able to keep from stumbling and falling face-first onto the floor in front
of himself, unconsious.

* * * * *

He woke up feeling someone rustling around behind him, cords being tied to
his wrists. Not giving whoever it was a chance to finish, Gomioka lashed
out and broke free of the attacker's grip, snapping the not-quite-tied rope
apart.

"Whoa, sir!" Seiroku cried. "I was just trying to untie you!"

Gomioka blinked in the dim light. Shinshi and Yoshi were nowhere to be
found. "Where are we?"

"A storage closet, I think. I just got myself free and was working on your
knots when you attacked."

"Sorry about that," Gomioka apologized. "I thought you were trying to tie
me up. Where are Tobe and Mikiyashi?"

"Dunno, sir. You know as much as I do- except I was awake when they
dragged me here. That woman pinned me to the ground and chained me up in
my own hand-cuffs, dammit! Thankfully, I always hide a spare key for them
in my shoe."

Gomioka nodded, and stood up cautiously. He had a bad headache, but
otherwise felt fine. "I doubt they could have locked us in here... whadya
say we go find our fellow officers then get the labors to come and bring
these idiots to justice?"

Seiroku nodded. "Sounds like a plan. Let's go."

Gomioka and Seiroku burst out of the closet, looking both ways. An armed
man standing outside looked at them in shock, but Seiroku knocked him out
with a chop to the neck before he could raise an alarm.

"Let's split up- we'll cover more ground," Gomioka suggested.

Seiroku nodded. "Were do we regroup?"

"Try and get back to the parking lot where we left the labors and let them
all know what's going on."

"Yes, sir." With that, Seiroku ran off down the right corridor.

Gomioka looked at the unconscious man at his feet and sighed. "If I had
time to wait for you to wake up, I'd ask you who the hell you are, but I
don't have time...." With that, he grabbed the man, dragged him back into
the closet, and tied the man up with the ropes that had initially been
secured to his own wrists, and then he moved on.

* * * * *

Ohta frowned. "It's been WAY too long since the Captain said to stand
down. Where are they?"

Kanuka sighed. "It's probably just taking them a long time to track down
our Labor shipment. If anything had gone wrong, they would have called
us... but if it makes you feel THAT much better, you can prepare your labor
for action again."

Ohta smiled. "Yes, ma'am!" he cried happily, saluting. Dashing off, he
returned to his 97's cabin and set about getting it combat ready.

Kanuka sighed. "One of these days, he's going to have to tone down that
enthusiasm," she noted, heading over to her 96 to prepare it for combat
herself. "But for once, maybe he's got the right idea- it HAS been an
awfully long while, come to think of it...."

* * * * *

Gomioka looked around, uncertain of where to go next. Then he heard
muffled voices coming from another room.

"Most of the prisoners have been released, thanks to the SV2's untimely
interruption. Without the element of surprise on our side, we won't be
able to hold them off for long. Give me the papers, I'll hide it from them
even if we're captured," the first one was saying.

"Okay, here. I'll go and cause a distraction, you just get the hell out of
here," the second replied.

"Use the Brocken. That thing will cause such a disturbance they'd miss a
tank trying to sneak away."

"I'll get right on it."

A man ran out of the room, which for the first time Gomioka noticed was the
office given to Shinohara Heavy Industries as the SV2's chief contractor,
and stopped. "He's here, already! Run!" The man crashed into Gomioka,
taking him down and allowing the second man to run out a back way.

Gomioka, using his martial arts training, flipped the attacker off of him
and stood up. With three blows, he disabled the guy and took off in hot
pursuit of the man carrying the stolen documents. By the time he got out
the back entrance, however, the second man was gone. What was worse was
the man he thought he'd knocked out was also gone when he returned to tie
him up.

"Damn. And they've got a Brocken, too- the 97's don't stand a chance
against it," he muttered to himself. "And now they know I've escaped, too-
this is bad." He tried to use a nearby phone to call for backup, but found
that the line was dead.

Moving on, he searched the halls, moving as quietly as he could and
listening for anything which might be a warning of an attack. Eventually,
he heard something, but it wasn't anything to do with an attack.

"Mmmm- mmmm!" came a muffled shout from a nearby closet. Gomioka opened
the door and found someone tied up and gagged. To Gomioka's relieve, he
recognized the guy.

"Shinshi!" he cried with relieve. "Hold on, let me help you."

Once he got the gag off, he started working on his bonds.

"Yoshi's in here, too," Shinshi explained. "We've gotta hurry- I heard
someone saying that they've got a Brocken to cover their escape."

"I heard the same," Gomioka said as he finished untying the knots. "Tried
to call in support from headquarters, but I found that the phones are dead.
Let's get Tobe free and get the hell out of here."

"Yes, sir," Shinshi said, working on Yoshi Tobe's feet as Gomioka started
on the hands. Together, they had him free in a matter of a few seconds,
and he tore the gag off of himself.

"Yuck!" Yoshi Tobe said.

"Seiroku's already freed most of the building's personnel, I think- he's
supposed to meet us over by the labors," Gomioka explained. "If we get
seperated, regroup there." With that, they started to make their way out
of the building.

* * * * *

Kenji Iguchi, who hadn't mounted up in his labor like Ohta and Kanuka had,
blinked in surprise. "What the hell!" Pulling out his radio, he shouted,
"Ohta, Kanuka! There's a Type 7 Brocken coming down the street!"

"All right! Finally, some action!" Ohta roared, pulling out in his labor
and running down the street in the direction of the Brocken.

"Ohta, wait!" Kanuka shouted, pulling out in her own 96 and following him.
"You aren't in an Ingram- you don't stand a chance against a military
labor!"

Ohta ignored her in his usual battle craze. Running as fast as he could,
he rammed the 97's shoulder into the chest of the Brocken. The military
labor, not expecting the move, staggered back, nearly falling before its
auto-stabilizers kicked in and helped it to right itself- just in time to
receive a blow to the head from the 97's combat baton. That rattled the
Brocken, but did nothing more than that. The 97 just wasn't strong enough
to do any significant damage to the other labor.

Before it could go on the offensive, however, Kanuka pulled up in her 96,
attempting a similar set of moves. This time, however, the Brocken was
prepared for it, and counterattacked, smashing Kanuka's labor on the nose
and digging it into the ground. Kanuka backed off and waited, hoping the
Brocken would make a mistake it could use.

While this battle was going on, several people ran out the building, using
the Brocken for cover as they boarded a nearby bus. When the bus was
filled, it drove off, leaving the military labor to fend for itself.

Kenji Iguchi's labor joined them a minute later, and together Unit 3's
three labors were able to hold the Brocken to a stand-off.

* * * * *

Gomioka, Shinshi, and Yoshi Tobe made their way through the halls,
frequently running into panicked groups of police contractors or other
police officers trying to escape from the now-departed terrorists who had
struck the building. Someone had pulled a fire alarm, and in certain
sections of the building the sprinkler system had gone off.

"Seiroku!" Yoshi called, spying their comrade amidst the chaos of the
situation. "Over here!"

Yamane Seiroku ran over to the group. "Sir, I found the building's REAL
staff locked up in the warehouse and released them," he said, saluting.

Gomioka returned the salute. "Good work. Let's keep moving- there's a
Brocken out there and we need to find a way to call for re-inforcements."

Seiroku nodded. "The way out's just down these stairs- come on."

In less than a minute, the four men reached the front doors and bolted
outside-

Only to leap out of the way to avoid the foot of a retreating 97. The
battle had been going on for several minutes, and the damage to the
surrounding neighborhood was astounding. The damage to the labors was
relatively minor, however- there were some dents in the heavy armour of the
Brocken, and Kanuka's 96 was missing its left grapple arm, but the 97s
weren't visibly damaged at all.

"Good god, don't tell me they're actually trying to stop it on their own?"
Gomioka said.

* * * * *

Kanuka saw the rest of her unit leave the police building just as the
Brocken attempted a feint. When she saw it charging in on Ohta's labor,
she saw her opportunity arise. Using the overdrive on the 96, she managed
to push it up to almost the Brocken's speed- and approaching from the side,
crashed right into the military labor's knee.

With a loud *crunch* the Brocken fell, and Ohta's labor descended on it,
stabbing with as much force he could muster into the fallen labor's back,
killing the power source.

"Take that, you terrorist scum!" he shouted, pulling his baton out and
about to bring it down again, when he noticed Kanuka's labor wasn't moving.
"Kanuka, you okay in there?"

"Just fine, but I don't think this labor'll ever see action again."

* * * * *

In the end, even though the Brocken had been defeated, their was no way to
tell if the SV2 had succeeded or failed. Had the papers successfully been
stolen? No one knew, and even if they had been, whoever had done it was
also a mystery. The captured labor pilot wasn't talking and the various
offices had been so badly rifled or damaged it would take weeks to sort out
what was missing.

But the mood of the third unit was high. Successful or not, they had
finally proven to themselves that they were an effective unit- and, better
yet, they were now getting new labors to replace their obsolete old
vehicles.

"Well," Gomioka said as he told the story of the mission, "The Ancient
Warriors DID prove to be somewhat useful... just as we're getting rid of
them, too. Oh, yeah- I never did find out what happened to our new
labors."

Gotoh put a hand behind his head. "Oh, yeah- we got a call shortly after
you left. It was Shinohara Heavy Industries; they apologized for the
delay, but said that they wouldn't be able to deliver until the 22nd due to
problems with the transport trucks."

Gomioka sighed. "Well, only a couple more days of dealing with the Ancient
Warriors and then we're finally rid of them."

Mechanics Chief Sakaki, listening into the tale for his own reasons,
smirked. "Ancient Warriors. I like that name for them... say, when we get
the new labors, what're we going to be doing with the old 97s and 96s."

Gotoh shrugged. "I understand they'll just be mothballed again, for the
next time we expand the Special Vehicles."

Sakaki nodded. "Hmm... might I have permission to take them to my home
instead of mothball them? I'd like to try and keep them maintained, maybe
tweek them up a little more. That way, we'll always have an extra labor or
two if we need to send some back to the factory for maintenance... and I'd
have something to help train a young cadet or two with."

Gotoh looked to Gomioka, who shrugged, and Shinobu, who nodded. "I don't
see why not... we'll have to get an O.K. from headquarters for you to work
on them off-site, but if you're willing to maintain them on your own budget
I don't think anyone will have any complaints."

* * * * *

Sitting in his office, a man opened an envelope. "Ah, here we go- finally,
found what we were looking for. Excellent. With these plans, we're
another step closer to our final goal."

"But we sacrificed a Brocken to get those plans. Are they worth it?" a
second figure asked.

The first man stood up, looking over the diagrams of the Ingram and its
varients. "Yes, I'd say so," he said, adjusting his square-rimmed glasses.
"I'd say so."

-------------------------
Next Episode: Someone finds Gotoh's personal notebook, including notes on
all of the members of the SV2. This episode may help those of you who are
confused about who all the new people are...

----------------------------------------------------------- ----------------
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From: "David A. Tatum" <desaix@sysnet.net>
Subject: [Patlabor][FanFic] Patlabor: Personal Files, Episode 13

Patlabor: Personal Files
An Episodic Patlabor Fanfic by David A. Tatum
Disclaimer: Insert legal junk here...

Episode 13: Patlabor: Personnel Files
February 22, 2000

"Hmm, I need the stapler..." one of the SV2 officers said, searching
through the top of Gotoh's desk. The three captains were all out of the
office, but that didn't stop people from coming in to file reports.

As the officer looked through the clutter on the desk, he knocked a book
off the table. Picking it up and casually glancing through it out of
curiousity, he noticed something.

"Hey, is that my name? And Shinobu's... and Kanuka's... and- whadya know?
Everyone's name is here. What is this, exactly?"

Turning it to the beginning, he read the title page.

"Thoughts on my co-workers in the SV2, by Luitenant Gotoh. Begun
11/23/98."

The officer blinked. "LUITENANT Gotoh? This thing must be from back when
the SV2 was first formed. Interesting."

He flipped to the next page.

"Shinobu Nagumo," it read.

"Captain of the SV2, Division 2. Age: 32 (hey- she's my age! Woohoo!).
A real looker. Very competant. Should probably be in a higher position-
should investigate why she isn't. I'd love to ask her out, but she's my
superior- it could hurt my career if we were caught. I'm due for a
promotion, though- maybe I'll have a chance when it comes.

"Updates:

"12/29/98- I got promoted to captain. We're of equal rank, now, and I'm no
longer under her command- I can date her without being punished by internal
affairs. I'm gonna ask her out for new years.

"1/01/99- I got shot down. No explanation why from her- maybe she's
already got a boyfriend, but she seemed reluctant to admit it. I'm not
giving up, though- she didn't seem to mind the attention.

"10/04/99- Oh, god, what a road trip! We wound up sharing a hotel room in
a love hotel. Shinobu is SO cute! Too bad she caught me before I got a
chance to see her in the bath. She didn't seem to mad about it, though,
after she was done with the bath. I didn't get any sleep at all, though-
not only was I just using a sofa and a towel to try and get comfortable
with, but she was in the room the whole time. I went over to just watch
her for a few moments- just watching her is a pleasure- and found she was
still awake as well. Then she checked on me a few minutes later. I don't
know- she seemed rather nervous. Was there a chance that she thought
something might actually happen? If so, does that mean she might find me a
little attractive? At least a very little?

"1/4/2000- Went to kiss Shinobu on New Years, but she dodged. It didn't
help there was a huge power-out at the time. Sigh.

"1/28/00- Shinobu got drunk today. I read a postcard from someone who I
think is a former lover named Tsuge. All I know about him is that he
established a school in the Police Academy that was a predecessor to the
Patlabor Training Facility, and that was where she met him. I also know he
was married- which is a bad, BAD thing. Shinobu kissed me for the first
time today, but as good as it was I couldn't let her do it again. Not like
that anyway- not when she's on the rebound.

"1/29/00- Shinobu and I talked about last night. She says to forget last
night happened, but encouraged me to continue pursuing her. I've gotta
move real carefully, now- don't want to move in so fast that I become a
short-lived rebound relationship for her. I'm also not certain she's
entirely over that postcard."

The officer reading Gotoh's journal sat down at his desk and leaned back.
"Interesting- very interesting," he said. "I always thought there was
something wierd about their relationship. I wonder what this book has to
say about the rest of the wierdos here."

Turning the page to the next tab, he continued reading.

"Tetsuo Gomioka.

"Very junior luitenant. Will probably replace me when I'm promoted. Very
serious. A couple years younger than I am. He's the pilot of Labor 1, so
I guess that means we're equals- both luitenants piloting a labor. He's
very good, technically, but I don't know how good he is with people. He
seems a bit arrogant. Other than that, he's okay. Oh, yeah- he's married,
but I don't get the feeling it's all that happy a marraige- he seems to
avoid his wife and she seems quite jealous and suspicious of him.

"Updates:

"4/12/99- Shinobu got mad when we she found out her unit was being used to
develop military equipment. Gomioka found out about her anger, and so
abandoned the labor that was the cause of this so as to make her happy,
despite the belief that the older technology of his labor made his
assignment dangerous. He might have a crush on her, too- is he a rival for
Shinobu's affection?

"12/27/99- Tomorrow gets promoted to command the newly established third
unit. VERY BAD IDEA in my opinion- he's not ready for command. Shinobu,
however, thinks he can handle it. I'm going along with it for her, but I
fear what it might do to Division 2.

"2/20/00- He did a good job today. Maybe he's growing into the job. We'll
see."

The officer sighed. "Not much to go on, there. Odd, though- I never saw
anything between him and Shinobu. Then again, I haven't been around here
for too long. Who else is mentioned in here?"

Continuing through the book, he read, "Ohta Isao.

"Headstrong firebrand. A bit triggerhappy. Pilot of labor 3 (a Type 96-
he's only called on in emergenceis. He also acts as the command car
officer for Gomioka's labor, but he usually have to ignore half of what he
said). Ambitious brown-noser. Crack shot, adequete hand-to-hand ability.
As likely to cause problems as to solve him. He has a rivalry with
Shinohara. Oldest person in the division who isn't an officer- though
still just about my age. He'd do better if he could calm down.

"1/1/99- He was given to me to be one of my two labor pilots in my new
unit, as part of a deal to get Shinohara. Still need to find another-
Shinohara, who would be my top choice, is VERY reluctant to do it. I'm
trying to convince S. to take the assignment by making him Ohta's command
car operator. A few weeks of that and poor Asuma'll be begging for any
other position.

"1/20/99- The Shinohara expirement is failing. I'm getting new labors- and
a couple of new labor-trained personnel- in a few days. I'm keeping an eye
on someone I bumped into on my recent trip to the academy- Noa Izumi.
Izumi has the same never-say-die attitude that Ohta has and Shinohara
lacks, but also is in control of herself enough to not be a threat to the
public. I'll put them together if possible. Maybe between them I'll get
what I want- Asuma's tactical skill combined with Ohta's stubborn will
minus Ohta's hair trigger. At any rate, I'm moving Shinohara off of Ohta's
team- Shinshi's the most likely candidate to replace him, unless one of the
new recruits turns out to have promising chemistry with him.

"1/26/99- PERFECT! An American officer just arrived, hoping to join our
unit. She also has the sense to realize piloting a labor of her own is
impossible, despite her impressive skills in the field. She's a firebrand
in her own way- maybe she can tame Ohta down a bit. At any rate, she's
better than Shinshi would be.

"6/24/99- Bad news. Kanuka had to leave, meaning I'm going to have to make
Shinshi Ohta's backup, after all. He can do the job, but it'll be a
serious struggle for him. I'm going to search all my resources for a
replacement.

"7/1/99- Found a replacement for Shinshi. Takeo Kumagami. She's a
luitenant, so she'll have his respect like Kanuka did, though she's
inexperienced. We'll work on it.

"12/27/99- Pushing Ohta off on Gomioka. I feel for the guy, I really do,
but after dealing with Ohta for a full year now I think it's time he became
someone else's problem. It's sort of a lateral promotion for Ohta, but
it'll probably be good for his career in the long run."

The officer reading smirked. "Yep, that sounds like what it would be like
dealing with Ohta, all right. I wonder who's next?"

"Asuma Shinohara," the book said.

"A bit of a punk, but considering what I know of his brother's suicide,
that's to be expected. Does NOT get along with his father, who heads the
largest labor manufacturer in Japan. Despite this, he still is able to use
his background in the labor industry to his advantage. Knows the technical
ability of just about every labor out there, and an impressive tactition,
as well. I think I'll take him under my wing. I just wish I could
convince him to become a labor pilot- I think he'd be good at that
position. Don't know why he doesn't like being one, he just does. Has a
rivalry with Ohta. Twenty four years old.

"1/1/99- Asuma's been assigned to my unit. I begged Shinobu for him,
shegave him to me... but I had to take Ohta, too. I'll make Asuma Ohta's
command car operator- might convince Shinohara that there are worse jobs
than being a labor pilot.

"1/23/99- Heh... Asuma met the academy girl I've been keeping my eye on.
She isn't even officially part of our unit yet, and already they're working
together like a great team. Maybe I don't need to try and make him a
pilot, after all- he seems to be good with the command car position.

"1/26/99- Asuma and Noa came up against each other in labor competition
today. Asuma was holding his own (even though it had degenerated into a
sort of elementary school play-fight, I could tell they were about even)
but then 'his leg suddenly gave out.' I know better than that- he threw
the match to her. I don't mind, though- he made up for it by showing that
he and Noa will be an EXCELLENT team as forward and backup. After he was
eliminated, he, without even being asked, assumed the position of command
for her... using his advice, Noa advanced to the finals and even fought the
extremely good and heavily experienced pilot Kanuka Clancy (from NY) to a
standstill, losing only because of a simple rookie mistake (running out of
power).

"6/2/99- Asuma and Noa have had a huge fight. I'm going to have to
separate them when we go on this next mission, and hope that the temporary
separation will help them make up.

"6/10/99- Asuma actually decided to pilot a labor, for once. He did it to
rescue Noa during a fight with some strange- but very powerful- labor.
Seems to me they made up.

"8/2/99- Asuma was severely injured in battle against a (different)
super-powerful labor. He was test-driving the mass-production labor, and
claims that it was not running smoothly at all. I believe him. At any
rate, he'll be out of the action for a bit.

"8/7/99- Asuma aggravated his injury because he wouldn't listen to the
doctors advice and came to help us out against the black labor.

"11/5/99- Asuma had a class reunion today. He's acting very distracted,
like something strange happened at the reunion. Actually, he's been doing
that for a few days, now, come to think of it. Wonder what's going on...

"12/16/99- Asuma took Noa somewhere today. Considering it's the
anniversary of his brother's suicide, I can guess where.

"1/7/00- Asuma went to dinner with his father. Curious- perhaps they are
attempting some sort of reconciliation? At any rate, he was rather upset
before he left.

"1/18/00- The maintenance squad had a little spat with him because he was
rude to Natsume. I think Sakaki stepped in and settled it, though.

"1/28/00- Asuma's taking personal time off to look after Noa. He'll
probably be gone as long as she is- which is about a month, I think."

The man reading the journal chuckled. "Of course Shinohara'd take a month
off to look after Noa. They're lovers, aren't they? I wonder why Gotoh
didn't mention the depth of their relationship in this journal, though?
Maybe it's in Noa's entry. Ah, well, wonder who's next."

There were a couple of entries the man passed by- people who were no longer
part of SV2, including Akito Kenichi, the most recent to have departed,
looking for more relevant entries. He stopped when he got to Toru Sasaki.

"Grizzled veteran- he's been a Patlabor pilot since the program got started
in 1996. Retired from piloting to become a command car operator in 1998.
Refuses promotions and claims the new labors give him motion sickness-
which seems odd to me, if the old ones didn't. Typical veteran, except he
has a thing for keeping his uniform clean."

Their were no updates on him, and so the person reading turned another
page.

"Hideki Nomo,

"Labor driver. Was a labor pilot from the start of the industry alongside
Toru Sasaki, until he lost a hand in the line of duty. Unphasable by
outside events. Otherwise uninteresting."

That seemed a rather... pointless... entry. Again, the page turned.

"Shinshi Mikiyashi

"Harmless.

"1/26/99- Make that Mostly Harmless."

For some reason, the reader of the journal was expecting a longer entry for
Shinshi, considering certain things. There was no mention of Shinshi's
marraige, his rivalry with Ohta, the triggers which would upset him, or
anything. Then again, Shinshi probably WAS just mostly harmless. Oh,
well- on to the next entry.

"Yuhki Watanabe

"Returned to Unit 1 to replace me when we created Unit 2- apparently, he
couldn't hack it the first time he joined. I wasn't part of the SV2 when
he was first here, but apparently he was just too nervous in combat
situations to deal with it. He's still rather nervous, but maybe he's over
it by now."

Again, there were no updates- Gotoh apparently didn't have much to say
about the members of Unit 1. There was only one more to deal with,
however, until they reached the entries on the latest crop of rookies.

"Tazaki Hiroaki

"Another man brought in to fill up Unit 1's ranks. He's a transport
driver.

"Updates:

"12/27/99- Promoted on permanent basis to become command car operator for
Yuhki."

Another real short entry- barely worth reading. Maybe the next one would
prove more interesting.

"Hiromi Yamazaki

"A gentle giant. Really quiet. I'm not entirely sure why he joined the
force- he spends more time worrying about his tomato garden and caring for
the hens than he does caring about police work. He's the first person to
have my unit as his first assignment- should be getting another one soon
(I'm looking at Noa Izumi, a delightful young girl who I hope has the
ability to go with that enthusiasm). He'll be on the not-yet-formed labor
team 2.

"Updates:

"1/26/99- Found the rest of Labor Team 2. Noa Izumi and Asuma Shinohara.
It seems as if they'll have pretty good chemistry.


That entry was a bit longer than the last few, but still left something to
be desired. Oh, well- there really wasn't much to know about Hiromi,
outside of that, as far as the reader knew. On to the next entry.

"Noa Izumi," it said.

"What a find. The tests all show that she should be a barely average cop,
but there are a few things about her that make me think those tests are all
wrong. Namely, she's already shown herself a skilled labor pilot, almost
singlehandedly rescuing the new Type 98 labor as it was being stolen.
That, along with her enthusiasm and affinity for her labor, all show she's
perfect for her position. That, and the chemistry she has with Asuma
Shinohara all make me think she's a tremendous find.

"Updates:

"1/26/99- She's named her labor Alphonse. She also won the position of
pilot for labor 1 over Ohta. Deserves it, too. She fought Kanuka Clancy,
who is reputed to be the best Patlabor pilot in the world, to a standstill,
losing in the end due to having neglected to keep her eyes on the power
guage. She DID have an unfair advantage, however- Asuma was helping her.
As I said, good chemestry between those two.

"6/2/99- Noa and Asuma had a spat. I'll work on fixing them up- I'd hate
to lose as good a team as that over something stupid.

"6/10/99- Spat seems to be resolved. Asuma saved Noa's life in a labor
battle today.

"8/7/99- Noa's fight against the black labor nearly sent her into a nervous
breakdown. It'll take her a while to recover from this one.

"10/11/99- Noa's second fight against the black labor ended much better for
her. I don't think we'll be seeing it again.

"10/15/99- Noa had a toothache today. It didn't exactly make her happy,
and Asuma teased her about it constantly. She seems to hate going to a
dentist...

"11/18/99- We went on our first unit vacation this week. Noa seemed a
little upset that she couldn't get drunk despite everyone else being so.
Odd, that.

"12/16/99- Noa went with Asuma to visit his brother's grave.

"1/7/00- Noa seems upset today. Don't know why."

"1/28/00- Injured with freak sports accident. She was trampled, and will
be in the hospital almost a month. Asuma's keeping her company."

Finally, a longer entry. There were a few things missing, however. Like
with Asuma's entry, there wasn't any mention of the two of them going out.
Well, except maybe for that repeated mention of 'chemistry,' but that
doesn't seem to be enough. Maybe Gotoh just didn't care... or perhaps he
was afraid someone might go snooping through his books, and didn't want to
risk it being someone who might harm said relationship. Come to think of
it, the officer reading the book could be just the sort of person Gotoh was
avoiding mention of the relationship for. Oh, well- next entry.

"Kanuka Clancy

"Reputed to be the best patlabor pilot in the world. Honestly, I think Noa
Izumi will probably be better than she is, but at the moment I guess that
she's a little better. An American who's joined our unit temporarily. In
theory, to learn our 'tactics' or some bullshit like that. The truth is
she's being exiled for a temper- she and Ohta think a little alike. I'm
going to make her Ohta's command car operator- the two of them might hit it
off, you never know. She DOES have a lot of skills outside of being good
with labors. She seems to be trying to out-Japanese us Japanese. She even
speaks our language better than her native one! Rather arrogant about her
abilities, however. She'll only be staying with us for 6 months.

"Updates:

"6/24/99- Went back to America.

"8/4/99- Kanuka's come back for a little while, to help us out while
Takeo's in the hospital. Should be interesting.

"8/12/99- Back to America.

"9/15/99- Kanuka's back AGAIN. This time, it's to help us with E. Hoba
problem. Good thing, too, since Kumagami's in Hong Kong, pursuing a lead
on the guy who shot her.

"9/20/99- Back to America.

"10/7/99- Kanuka showed up again, with her Grandmother. I think her
grandmother's planning to move here in a few months.

"10/11/99- Kanuka helped us out with the Black Labor again.

"10/15/99- Back to America.

"11/18/99- Kanuka was able to join us for the first unit vacation. Takeo
was there, too- and BOY did the sparks fly. Both of them were involved in
a contest of one-upmanship (poor Ohta- he got the worst of it from the both
of them!) that I was a little concerned would end in a serious catfight.
It ended peacefully, however

"11/20/99- Back to America.

"12/26/99- Back here to participate in Gomioka's promotion ceremony.
Sometimes I wonder why her home police department keeps letting her go,
considering how good a cop she is.

"12/31/99- Kanuka's asked for a position in our unit because her
Grandmother's dying and she wants to be able to stay in Japan and look
after her. I can't do anything, myself, but I was able to make
arrangements for a unit of the street cops to take her in temporarily. She
doesn't like the idea, though.

"1/7/00- She's back in the SV2, having been given her old job back of
taming Ohta in Unit 3. Heh... well, she got what she wanted, I guess."

The reader chuckled. 'Taming' Ohta- yeah, that sounded like the position
his command car officer would be given.

"Takeo Kumagami," the next page read.

"A supercop, sort of like Kanuka but without the background in labors.
Terrified of the supernatural. Looks a little like Noa, but with different
colored hair. Putting her in charge of Ohta for now- she's really more
interested in using us as a stepping-stone for promotion than anything.

"Updates:

"8/2/99- She's been shot and is in the hospital.

"8/23/99- On duty again. She doesn't seem fully recovered, yet, but
physically she's fine.

"9/10/99- She took some personal leave to take a trip to Hong Kong. She
claims she has an idea about the man who shot her.

"9/20/99- She's returned. Apparently, she was unsuccessful. She arrived
just in time to miss the E. Hoba incident.

"10/11/99- Interesting. She has a connection to this 'Richard Wong'
character.

"11/18/99- Kanuka showed up for the unit vacation, but the two of them
didn't exactly get along.

"12/16/99- Odd. I didn't expect her to turn down the promotion we were
offering. Instead, she claims she wants MY job! She can have it, if she
wants it."

So, Kumagami wasn't as ambitious about her career as she seemed. The
reader filed that little bit of information away as being possibly useful
in the future- there was someone he knew who might be interested in that.
The man continued reading.

"Koichi Miyagi." Ah! The first of the rookies.

"Enthusiastic. VERY Enthusiastic. Smiles all the time. He's rather
creepy about it, in fact... I'm glad he's in Shinobu's unit and not mine.
Labor Pilot."

It was back to short entries with few if any updates, but that was to be
expected. These were people who hadn't been here nearly as long, and
weren't as likely to make much of an impact on Gotoh's unit. Next.

"Ueki Mashimo

"Doesn't care about his appearance. Has some sort of rivalry with Yamane
Seiroku. This is not a happy man. Physically reminds me of Inspector
Matsui, however. Transport Driver. Assigned to Unit 1."

"Updates:

"1/28/00- Heard the OFFICIAL story of his and Seiroku's rivalry. Not sure
I believe it, though. Getting into a fight because someone turned in the
other over some booze? Doesn't seem likely to me."

Next.

"Joudo Ishikawa

"Nice enough guy. Good labor pilot. Has a thing for Natsume Kawai- but
then, so do all the engineers. They're on the same team, so I guess
there's a chance something could come of it. They'll just have to hide
their relationship a bit. Internal affair would have their hide if they
found out.

"Updates:

"1/6/00- Takeo reports that he was very effective. Imagine, a NORMAL
police officer piloting one of MY Labors. Unheard of."

Heh, funny. Next.

"Natsume Kawai.

"Er, not much I can say about her. She's... cute. Seems to have attracted
the attention of the entire mechanics division, and her teamate Joudo
Ishikawa. So far, only Joudo and Shige seem to be able to attract her
attention, however.

"Updates:

"12/29/99- Mental note: She and Asuma don't get along well. Probably
because she nearly killed Noa by accident today, but still...

"1/18/00- The Maintenance Squad nearly killed Asuma on her behalf today.
Maybe we should think about trading her in with that idol singer who was
made an honorary part of our unit- Kana, I think her name was- she'd be
just as popular as Kana, and Kana would be better suited working here than
she would! Don't have anything against the girl, but she's barely able to
succeed as a member of the team. I'll have to think about what to do with
her."

The man reading frowned. Gotoh hadn't mentioned it, but he had a slight
crush on Natsume, himself. Oh, well- it wasn't likely that Gotoh was going
to be able to replace her any time soon. Next.

"Yoshi Tobe

"Transport Driver, Unit 3. Don't know anything about him."

Heh... oh, well. Next.

"Kenji Iguchi

"Oops- I made this page to write about him when I got his file, and forgot
to put anything on it. Oh, well- I'll remember to come back to it later.
No time, now."

It looked as if Gotoh STILL forgot to write anything about the guy. From
what the reader knew, he was a totally non-descript man. Totally
forgettable. It was almost as if the gods had decided to toss in one extra
person to put in situations where just one more man was needed. Oh, well,
it seemed pretty obvious there wasn't much of importance about him.

Now, for the last entry.

"Yamane Seiroku.

"Interesting guy. He REALLY wanted to be a labor pilot, from what I heard,
but instead we had to assign him to be a command car operator. I think
Gomioka's talked to him, and decided to make him the pilot for the third
labor. His placement match was a little wierd- his first opponent's labor
was defective. I'd almost say it looked like sabatoge, but I've been
assured that isn't possible. Part of unit 3. Very competant. Could be
the next Kanuka or Takeo as a command car operator. Has a rivalry with
Ueki Mashimo.

"1/28/00- If this is really why he and Ueki got into such a fued, I pity
his nose. Broken HOW many times, now- and by the same person? Poor guy.

"2/20/00- Gomioka has put him up for a commendation for excellence in the
Quartermaster's Building break-in. First time I've ever known a Captain in
the SV2 to put their officers up for commendation to the high command-
usually, that's done by public relations. Honestly, I think Noa and Asuma
both deserve commendations more than him, but I may approve the
recommendation to boost Gomioka's morale. He needs a pat on the back for
finally getting his act together as captain. However, I think Mr.
Seiroku-"

The door opened, and the officer shut the book before anyone could catch
him reading it.

"Hello. What are you doing here?" Captain Gomioka said, entering the room.

"Finishing up a report, sir," the officer replied. "I was looking for a
stapler, and knocked some things off of Captain Gotoh's desk."

Gomioka nodded. "Carry on, then."

The officer placed the book back on Captain Gotoh's desk, breathing a sigh
of relief. He didn't want to get caught reading that book... not that
there was really anything that private in there, but it probably wasn't
anything that Gotoh wanted anyone else to read. It was rather interesting,
however. Oh, well... now, where to find a stapler?

-------------------------
Next Episode: An unusual theft from Shinohara Industries has brought in
some of the members of the second section to investigate- namely, Noa and
Asuma. Instead of helping the investigation, though, they're appropriated
by Asuma's father for a little tete-a-tete.

----------------------------------------------------- ----------------------
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From: "David A. Tatum" <desaix@sysnet.net>
Subject: [Patlabor][FanFic] Patlabor: Personal Files, Episode 14

Patlabor: Personal Files
An Episodic Patlabor Fanfic by David A. Tatum
Disclaimer: Insert legal junk here...

Episode 14: A Meeting With the Wolf
February 29, 2000

Sakaki walked out onto the catwalk, surveying the work that was going on.

"Shige!" he barked, noticing something wrong.

"Yes, chief?"

"You missed a spot!"

"Sorry, chief!"

Shige buffed clean the dirty sensor, sighing.

"Much better, Shige," Sakaki acknowledged.

"Thank god Noa and Asuma are supposed to come back today," Shige muttered.
"I won't have to keep waxing Alphonse any more."

"Shige!" Sakaki roared.

Shige flinched. "Yes, chief!"

"Don't forget to clean the monitors inside!"

"Right, chief."

Sigh.

* * * * *

"Well," the doctor said, looking over the results of Noa's physical.
"Looks like we can clear you for light duty today. If you keep up this
rate of recovery, and don't strain yourself, you should be completely fine
in two weeks."

"So, no Alphonse?" Noa pouted.

"Er... Alphonse?" the doctor asked.

"Her labor," Asuma explained simply.

"I see," the doctor replied, though clearly he didn't. "No, I'm afraid
not. No Alphonse for two weeks."

Noa sniffed sadly. "I miss him," she whimpered. Asuma squeezed her
shoulder reassuringly. Hopefully, she asked, "Are you sure? Can't I even
take him out for a spin, if I don't do anything strenuous in him?"

"Er...." The doctor wasn't entirely sure what to do. The woman looked so
desperate for the ability to use her labor, that he was reluctant to say
no, but he would be lying if he said it was entirely safe.

"How about if she were to sit in Alphonse's cabin, but not use him?" Asuma
suggested.

"That would be acceptable," the doctor said, grateful for having an option
over COMPLETELY disappointing the girl.

Noa nodded. "Good. Come on, Asuma- let's get back to headquarters. I
want to make sure the mechanics squad has been taking good care of them
while I was gone."

"Gaack!" Asuma choked out, staggering after Noa as she dragged him off by
the shirt.

The doctor shook his head as they went. "Cute couple, but wierd girl. Oh,
well- next!"

In walked a man with square-rimmed glasses, smiling so widely his eyes were
almost obscured by his cheeks. "Hello... I don't suppose you caught the
name of that young couple that just left, did you?"

The doctor nodded. "Yes, I did- why?"

"Oh, I think I've met them before, but we've never been formally
introduced. Oh, well. I suspect I'll meet them again later- we do seem to
keep running into each other."

* * * * *

The car drove up into the Division 2 Parking lot. Asuma helped Noa out and
they slowly made their way in the building. Asuma blinked- it was dark,
though he thought he saw movement in the shadows. Cautiously, he switched
on the lights.

Lined up from the doorway straight to Alphonse was the entire mechanics
squad. Shige, with a stern-faced Chief Sakaki behind him, were waiting at
the end of the line. Walking slowly while taking in the surprising
turn-out, Noa and Asuma slowly made their way over to the two senior
mechanics. As they did, the mechanics burst out into cheers and applause.

"Welcome back, Noa!" Shige said, clapping her on the arm. "We've been
keeping Alphonse clean and ready, just for you!"

Watching from the catwalk, Shinobu turned to Gotoh and said, "The mechanics
sure are enthusiastic about her return."

Gotoh nodded. "Of course. After all, thanks to Sakaki tutoring Noa in the
basics of mechanics, she's becoming one of them. Besides, I think that
Shige's a little glad that he won't have to buff and wax labor 1 any more."

Shinobu raised an eyebrow. "I thought Noa was only approved for light
duty."

Gotoh nodded. "Yep. Do you really think that's going to stop her from
babying her pet labor, though?"

Shinobu didn't have a chance to respond before Hiromi came up behind them.
"Captain Gotoh, sir- was a call for you. I picked it up- we're getting
something faxed to us."

"Who is it from?" Gotoh asked, still keeping his eyes on the jubilant
mechanics and the bewildered couple.

"Someone from headquarters, sir, requesting two of our officers by name for
a special detached assignment."

Gotoh was a little surprised at that one. "Oh?"

* * * * *

"I'm sorry, Alphonse- I wish I could take you out to stretch your legs, but
the doctor says I'm not allowed to.... I missed you, Alphonse, did you
miss me?"

Asuma, sitting on the platform next to the labor's cockpit, rolled his eyes
as Noa cooed over Alphonse. He didn't really blame her- after all, it had
been a little more than a month since she was able to even see Alphonse
(she'd refused to see him on the Valentines day she'd visited the
headquarters, since she wouldn't be allowed to touch him then). Still, for
some reason he couldn't identify it was starting to get on his nerves.
Perhaps it was the sheer enormity of the affection she was displaying for a
mere hunk of metal and circuitry, but for the first time he could remember
he was honestly starting to get annoyed at Alphonse.

Or maybe jealous, though he would never admit it.

"Shinohara!" Gotoh's voice rang out from the railing above. "Could you an
Noa please come to my office?"

'Finally!' Asuma thought to himself. 'I won't have to put up with this
anymore!'

"Can't I have a few more minutes?" Noa whimpered.

Asuma looked at her in the cockpit, her eyes wide and begging. "Captain,
could we have five more minutes?" he asked.

"Make it ten- this isn't that important," Gotoh answered.

"Thank you, sir!" Asuma replied. 'The things I put up with for that
girl...'

* * * * *

Gotoh waited patiently at his desk until Noa and Asuma walked in. Noa was
sighing wistfully as she walked in, but Asuma looked a little relieved.

"Ah, finally. I trust you've had enough time to start readjusting
yourselves to being back on the facilities?"

"Yes, sir," Asuma replied quickly, not giving Noa a chance to say that she
wanted more time with Alphonse.

"Good. Noa, I know you are only cleared for light duty, but you and
Shinohara were both specifically requested for a particular assignment.
I'm told that this mission shouldn't involve any strenuous work, but you
have my permission to hold back if you think something it going to be too
difficult for you," Gotoh noted.

"Thank you, sir," Noa said.

"What's the assignment?" Asuma asked.

Gotoh handed him a folder. "Everything you need to know is in there."

Asuma opened the folder and read for a few seconds. His eyes widened.
"You CAN'T be serious," he growled, slamming the folder back down on
Gotoh's desk.

"I am," Gotoh said. "I'm afraid that this is not an option for you,
Shinohara. It's only an option for Noa because of her injuries. These
orders come from the police commissioners office, itself."

Noa, curious as to what all the fuss was about, picked up the folder and
read it for herself.

"The investigation of the assault against the Quartermasters Corps. on the
20th of February by unknown forces has resulted in the discovery of the
theft of the classified technical documentation of a number of Shinohara
Heavy Industries productions, namely those for the Ingram, Peacemaker, and
various preliminary designs for the Mass Production models. It is
requested that you send officers Noa Izumi and Asuma Shinohara to liason
with Mr. Okami Shinohara of Shinohara Heavy Industries at his private
residence located at..."

So that was it. Asuma's father was involved. Of course he wouldn't want
to deal with this sort of assignment. Quickly, Noa skimmed the rest of the
orders- apparently, they were only supposed to discuss the details of the
case, and didn't necessarily need to figure out who it was who had engaged
in the theft. That was not so strange, but the selection of who it was to
ask these questions was.

"Captain Gotoh?" Noa queried. "Why are they asking US to conduct this
interview, anyway? I mean, we're just labor operatives- investigations
like this aren't our job."

Gotoh nodded. "You two were specifically requested, however. I suspect it
has something to do with Asuma's family connections."

Noa nodded. "That makes sense- it explains him. But why ME? What do I
have to do with any of this?"

Gotoh shrugged. "I don't know. If you want, you CAN refuse the
assignment...."

Noa shook her head. "No... I'm not able to pilot Alphonse, so I might as
well have something to do while I'm restricted to light duties."

Gotoh nodded. "Very well. You two might as well get going. I'll expect a
report when you get back on the third."

Asuma didn't look happy, but nodded and turned to leave. "Come on, Noa...
we'll take my personal car- it's more comfortable than the command car and
it's a six hour drive between here and dad's place."

* * * * *

Noa looked at Asuma in concern as he drove the car through the streets of
downtown Tokyo in silence. They'd been on the road for almost an hour and
a half already, and so far he hadn't spoken one word since leaving Gotoh's
office. His face took on a very dark look, and she was starting to get
worried.

"Do you mind if I turn on the radio?" Noa asked, trying to get him to say
anything, even if it was just the word 'yes.'

Without answering, Asuma reached for the controls to the stereo and flipped
it to some station playing 50's American Rock and Roll. Noa sighed- that
didn't work as she'd planned. It was time to be blunt.

"Asuma, what's wrong? I thought you and your father worked things out last
time you saw him...."

Asuma blinked. "No... we didn't work things out. We got along better than
we had in years, but we didn't really work anything out."

"Well... well, maybe that's a good sign. Maybe you'll get along this time,
as well?" Noa suggested hopefully.

Asuma half-smiled. "Maybe. I doubt it, though."

"Wouldn't it be easier to get along better with him if you go into your
meeting hoping for things to go well?"

Asuma nodded quietly. "Yes, it would. And, believe it or not, I am. But
there's something I'm even more afraid of than just us 'not getting along.'
A couple of things, actually."

Noa blinked. "Really? What?"

Asuma took a deep breath. "I'm afraid of what he might do to you- I'm
afraid he'll start controlling you like he's tried controlling everyone
else he's ever met. And I'm afraid that if he tries, I'll get into a
serious fight with him, and I don't want you to see me like that- it can
get rather ugly real quickly."

Noa's eyes widened, and she started looking straight ahead instead of at
him. She hadn't even considered the possibility of her presence CAUSING
fights between Asuma and his father- she'd always envisioned brokering a
peace that would END the fights between them. In fact, that was partly why
she'd taken this assignment instead of declining it to stay near Alphonse.

"I'm sorry, Asuma. I didn't mean to cause you any problems," Noa said
after a moment.

Asuma laughed. "That's okay, Noa- you cause me plenty of other problems.
I'm used to it by now- one more problem won't matter."

Noa glared at him. "Hey! That's not nice!" She wasn't really upset,
however- rather, she was relieved. Asuma was almost back to normal- well,
at least he was almost back to being a pretty normal jerk, which come to
think of it WAS pretty normal for him.

* * * * *

It was getting dark when Asuma drove up to the Shinohara Mansion and
parked.

Asuma stepped out and opened the door for Noa. "Come on- we're probably
supposed to go in through the side door. The front door is reserved for
'important' people. Tsukai will let us in."

Noa got out of the car. "Tsukai?"

"The chief of my father's servants. He's been around as long as I can
remember- probably since my grandfather was still alive and in his prime.
He and Jitsuyama were more like fathers to me than dad ever was."

Noa clucked, but didn't say anything. She'd noticed that he'd started
becoming more somber the closer they got to the house, but didn't know what
to do about it.

Asuma paused at the door and turned to her, but refused to meet her eyes.

"Noa," he said hesitantly. "Please... don't hold whatever happens against
me."

Noa blinked. "Huh?"

"I don't know what you think is going to happen this trip- you may be
expecting to have some fun, to find out what my father's really like, maybe
even to see if you can patch the two of us up. Well, I don't know what
it's really going to be like, either, but I suspect that there'll be a
number of times you won't see me at my best. Just... don't hold it against
me. That's all I ask."

Without waiting for an answer, Asuma rang the doorbell. Trying to answer
anyway, Noa reached over and squeezed his hand reassuringly. Asuma
tentatively squeezed back, but quickly dropped his hand the moment the door
started to open.

The elder of the two Shinoharas, Okami, stood there, smiling benevolently.
"Hello, son. Hello, Ms. Izumi. Welcome- I was expecting you. Come on in,
come on in...."

Asuma blinked. "Um... hi, dad. Where's Tsukai?"

Mr. Shinohara stepped aside, gesturing for his son and Noa to step in.
"Taking care of the last-minute details behind dinner. I know it's been a
long trip- you haven't eaten yet, have you?"

Asuma almost answered 'yes' just out of spite, but his and Noa's matching
stomach growls at the thought of food made it too obvious that they hadn't.
"Er, I guess we could eat a bite or two," he admitted, taking off his
shoes and putting them in the cubbies. Noa did the same.

Okami started leading them to the dining room. "After dinner, I'll show
you two to your rooms, where you can catch up on what I expect is some
much-needed sleep. Business can wait until tomorrow- there's no need to
rush. I know that you've been given several days to discuss the matter of
these stolen documents with me, which is much more time than we'll need."

Asuma wasn't sure how to answer. His father wasn't acting anything like
how he was used to him acting- this was incredibly strange.

"Here we are," Mr. Shinohara announced upon arriving at the dinner table.
"Asuma, you sit here. Ms. Izumi, you might as well sit here. I'll go
check with Tsukai to see how dinner is coming along and to make certain
your bags get taken to the rooms." With that, he left.

Noa turned to look at Asuma as they took their seats next to each other.
"He certainly doesn't seem to be as bad as you make him out to be."

Asuma nodded. "He's never acted this way to me, before. He's probably
trying to impress you." He paused. "I forgot to say that you should be
careful what you say here- Dad sometimes bugged random rooms to find out
what I or my brother were talking about when he wasn't around."

Noa raised an eyebrow in disbelief, but didn't say anything. A few moments
later, Okami returned with Tsukai and a number of other servants who were
carrying trays full of food and drink.

"Well, it looks like dinner's ready," he announced in his most gracious
voice. "I believe it is time for us to eat."

* * * * *

The meal itself was a rather peaceful affair. Mr. Shinohara avoided
talking to his son and instead concentrated on playing the gracious host
with Noa- not really talking about anything important, but discussion
little things like the dinner they were having, the weather, and various
things like that.

Despite the seeming innocence of all this, Asuma noticed something about
his father's behavior. While Okami was encouraging everyone to drink, he
himself was leaving the wine alone. Asuma, not certain what his father was
planning, decided that under no circumstances would he get drunk that
night.

Noa, herself, didn't notice that anything was wrong at all. She was
enjoying the meal, and while she preferred sake to the western wines that
Tsukai kept filling her glass with, she drank like you would expect the
daughter of a liquor store owner to drink- like a fish. She was long
passed tipsy by the time she'd finished the main course, and she was
downright drunk when she'd gotten through dessert- not that she realized
it.

Tsukai and the other servants gathered the dirty dishes and disappeared
with a nod to Okami. Standing up, the elder Shinohara said, "Well, why
don't I show you two to your rooms."

Noa tried to get up and follow him, but the wine quickly made its presence
felt, and she nearly collapsed onto the table. Asuma, who had no such
problems, quickly caught her before she fell.

"Thanksh, Ash'ma. How'd that 'appen?" she giggled.

Okami looked suitably embarassed for her. "Oh, dear.... Asuma, would you
kindly help her?"

Asuma glared at his father- he was fairly certain that the older man had
been trying to get them drunk, but Noa DID need to be helped to somewhere
where she could lie down, and so there was little he could say about it.
"Of course I will." Putting her arm over his shoulders and slipping his
arm under her arms, he helped Noa to stand up and supported her as they
walked after his father.

"I'm putting you two in the adjoining guest rooms- that way, if you two
want to talk about anything over the night, you won't have far to go."

Asuma knew better than to talk about anything important in his father's
house, but there was something about where he was being placed that
disturbed him. "A guest room? You're putting me in a guest room?"

Okami nodded. "Sorry, son, but I'm afraid there really isn't a choice.
The part of the house your room is in is being remodeled, so I can't put
you in there. Besides...."

"Besides?"

Mr. Shinohara coughed. "Er, nothing...."

Asuma growled. He knew his father was hiding his real reason for putting
him up in the guest room, but he also knew that it was hopeless to try and
get it out of the older man.

"Anyway," Okami said. "Here we are. I assume you can help her into bed on
your own?"

"Er...." That threw Asuma for a loop. He looked over at the drunken Noa,
but she was too out of it to understand what was going on. He looked back
at his father, who had already started on his way down the hall. "Right,"
he muttered to himself.

Struggling to continue supporting Noa, he opened the door to the closest
room and half-carried, half-dragged her inside. Setting her giggling form
down on the bed, he began searching the room. He found a few pieces of
luggage in the closet which, thankfully, were Noa's and not his- he'd taken
her to the right room.

Asuma walked over to Noa on the bed. "Do you think you can get yourself
ready for bed?"

"Yep. Yep- I think so, yep." Noa said, nodding enthusiastically before
passing out.

Asuma sighed, looking her over. "Great, now what do I do?" Blushing, he
considered changing her into her pajamas himself, but decided that she
probably wouldn't like it if he did that. Instead, he just slipped her
under the covers and made certain that she was lying in a comfortable
position. Then, just like he had every night when she was off duty, he
gave her a quick peck on the forehead to say goodnight.

* * * * *

Watching with surveillance cameras from another room, Okami Shinohara
raised an eyebrow. "Hmm. Yes, he definitely needs me to help get them
together."

Tsukai, sitting with him, cleared his throat. "Are you sure that's a good
idea, sir? You know that he has an inordinate amount of distrust in you
and your motives."

"He's still just an ungrateful kid," Okami argued. "He doesn't know what's
best for him, and I doubt he ever will. But it's obvious he likes this
girl- he surely won't mind if we get them together. And they don't really
need to know I'm doing it."

Tsukai shifted uncomfortably. "What about the girl, sir?"

"Eh?"

"What if the girl doesn't like Asuma, sir? She isn't your daughter- you
really don't have the right to interfere with how she acts."

"I'm the head of one of the largest industrial companies in all of Japan,
if not the world! I could BUY that girl if I so chose. I-"

"You are forgetting that we live in a society where people cannot be bought
and sold, sir," Tsukai admonished. "And you are forgetting that emotions
don't take kindly to being forced. You might have an easier time of it if
you find out how she feels about him, first."

Mr. Shinohara glared up at his servant. "You know, you're the only person
on this planet who could get away with speaking in that tone to me."

Tsukai nodded. "And sometimes you need me to say things in that tone, sir,
to prevent you from acting stupidly."

Okami nodded. "Sometimes." Looking back at the monitors, where Noa slept
peacefully and Asuma started getting ready for bed in his own room, he
sighed. "Okay, we'll do it your way. Tomorrow, I'll try and talk to Ms.
Izumi during breakfast, and find out how she feels. But as long as she
doesn't hate him, I'm going to put the two of them together. I could see
how my son feels for her- and you told me you found The Scarf in her
luggage, so I know he gave it to her. If a member of my family gets that
devoted to a girl, I'll make certain that he gets her. It's for their own
good."

Tsukai's face remained impassive, though there was a flicker of some
unidentifiable emotion in his eyes as he remembered Mr. Shinohara ignoring
his advice one time before- a time which resulted in the suicide of Asuma's
brother. At least he wasn't completely ignoring it this time, but unless
this Noa girl actually liked the younger Shinohara, this was likely to be a
rather nasty few days.

* * * * *

March 1, 2000

It was pretty early in the morning when Noa found that someone was trying
to shake her awake. It wasn't a very pleasant sensation... she had a mild
headache- no, make that a hangover- and her stomach wasn't feeling at its
best, either. There was only one person who would be rude enough to wake
her up when she was feeling like this, and she was ready to make that
person regret the day that they were born.

"Go away and let me sleep in, Asuma" she grumped, promising herself that
she'd get that revenge when she was actually able to get up.

Tsukai coughed. "I am terribly sorry about awakening you, but I am not my
employer's son. Instead, I am here to awaken you and prepare you for the
day- Mr. Shinohara believed that you might need my special hangover cure
before breakfast."

Noa's stomach churned at the thought of food. "Ugh... okay, okay. Let me
change first, though," she said, not even opening her eyes.

Tsukai nodded. "Very good, Ma'am. I'll be waiting outside to take you to
the tea room. You'll find your luggage in the closet, and the lavatory is
on your right." He slipped out of the room and closed the door with a
slight click.

Blearily, Noa sat up, using the caution gained from hangovers past to keep
herself from getting too noxious. Opening her eyes for the first time, she
noticed that, despite being under the covers, she'd slept in her clothes.
Carefully surveying her surroundings, she noticed that the room she was in
had a closet, a bed, a nightstand, and three doors. Otherwise, it was
incredibly sparse.

Thinking carefully, she started remembering the previous night. "Oh, yeah-
I'm being put up in one of the guest rooms. Poor Asuma, having to carry me
all the way up here... and then I passed out after I told him I could get
myself ready for bed." Walking over to the closet, she began going through
her luggage. "I wonder if he thought about putting me in my pajamas
himself." she giggled... and immediately regret it, as it caused her
splitting headache to almost double. Recovering, she completed her
thought. "I wonder what I would have done to him if he had."

Pulling out a fresh set of clothes, she disappeared into the bathroom.
Emerging a couple minutes later, feeling a little better though still
undergoing the effects of the previous night's alcohol, she walked to the
center of the room. "Now... which door is the one into the hallway?"

Deciding to go by trial and error, she opened the door on the left.
Stepping out, she quickly realized she had made a mistake- though not a bad
one, by any means. In fact, she almost thought of it as a happy mistake,
because she was able to see Asuma sleeping.

While he'd seen her sleeping a number of times, it was really the first
time she'd had a chance to watch him... well, to watch him sleeping in a
bed or some other item MEANT for sleeping on. During that stake-out,
niether one of them had succeeded in falling asleep. In the hotel room for
the engineering convention, he'd always fallen asleep last and woken up
first. In the hospital, whenever she opened her eyes he was in the chair
next to her- asleep or not. And any other time she might have had a chance
to catch him, well, usually he wasn't in a bed.

Greatly daring, she walked over to him and brushed the hair out of his eyes
with her fingertips. Then, mimicking his actions in the hospital (and,
unknown to her, the previous night), she bent down and lightly touched her
lips to his forehead. Then, blushing slightly, she rushed back to her
room, closing the door between them as quickly and as quietly as she could,
ignoring the hangover. Exiting out of the correct door, she nodded to
Tsukai. "Come on, let's try this hangover cure you say you have."

* * * * *

As Noa sipped the bitter tea that Tsukai had prepared for her, Okami
Shinohara walked into the room. Noticing her sitting at a small table, he
walked towards her and bowed formally.

"Hello, Ms. Izumi. I'm glad to see you looking so well... especially
considering how bad my servant said you looked this morning. My apologies-
I should have warned you about the potency of the wine we were serving."

Noa waved him off. "It's all right. This tea your servant gave me is
nothing short of miraculous when it comes to eliminating a hangover. Worst
tasting stuff I've ever drunk, though."

Okami smirked. He'd been given that same brew a few times in the past, and
he knew exactly how bad it was. "It is rather sour, isn't it?" Taking a
seat in the chair across from her, he continued, "It looks as though Asuma
is going to be sleeping in today. That son of mine is so lazy...."

Noa raised an eyebrow. "Usually, he wakes up before I do. He was probably
even more tired than usual, last night, having been up since early in the
morning, and having driven around for almost eight hours yesterday."

Okami raised an eyebrow. "Eight hours?"

Noa nodded. "He picked me up at the hospital, and drove two hours to take
me to base... then it was a six hour trip from headquarters to here. Come
to think of it, he was probably driving more than eight hours, since he had
to drive TO the hospital to pick me up."

Mr. Shinohara blinked. "You were in the hospital?"

Noa nodded. "I was injured and had to have surgery- my colon was punctured
and needed to be repaired. It wasn't even in the line of duty, just a
silly softball game that was being taken too seriously." Pausing for a
moment, she thought to put in a word for Asuma while she was at it. "Your
son was the one who rushed me to the hospital, and he stayed with me during
the surgery."

Okami nodded. 'I wasn't aware you'd done that, Asuma,' he thought to
himself. 'You really seem to care about this girl, and you won't do
anything to win her? Boy, you obviously don't know to look out for
yourself or you'd be married to her by now... you'd better be thanking me
for what I'm trying to do for you.'

Smiling at the girl, he said, "That was nice of him. I wonder... you
probably know him better than I do, now- you've been working with him for
almost a year- what are your impressions of Asuma?"

Noa blinked- she wasn't entirely certain how to answer that one. This was
Asuma's FATHER- it wasn't one of her superiors in the police department who
would get them fired for their relationship, it was a close relative who
had a right to know something about his son's love life. Maybe it would be
safe to tell him about said relationship- and she was dying to tell
someone- ANYONE about their relationship.

Then again, this was ASUMA'S father. Who was THE Shinohara from Shinohara
Heavy Industries. Who created the two things she most loved in the world-
Asuma and Alphonse. Who might not like it if the simple daughter of a
liquor store owner from Hokkaido was dating his son. Asuma still had never
given her a satisfactory answer as to why he'd never made a move on her
before she confronted him that day- perhaps it was because he feared his
father's disapproval.

No, wait- Asuma wanted to defy his father, not seek his approval.

Well, if her boyfriend wanted to defy his father, maybe there was something
she could do to help him- and that would be to break the news that they
were dating.

"My impressions? He's a bit bossy at times, he's a bit of a jerk at times,
and he's a bit insensitive at times, but... but he's never steered me
wrong, he's mostly bossy for fun, he always comes through in a pinch, and
he accepts my odd little quirks." She looked Okami straight in the eyes.
"I think that's why I asked him if we could start dating."

That stopped the elder Shinohara in his tracks. "You... what?"

"Asuma and I've been dating for about two month now... well, actually,
we've been dating almost since we met, we just didn't realize that was what
we were doing until a couple months ago."

"That... would that happen to have been the same day he visited me last
time?"

Noa nodded. "Yeah... he told me about your conversation. But only after I
confronted him about our relationship."

Okami nodded. "So he told you about his concern with your affection for
your labor?"

Noa paused and didn't say anything for a moment. "What?" she asked coldly.

Okami cringed back, the ice in her voice intimidating even him. "He...
said that you seemed to care more about that labor of yours than anything
else, and that he feared your obsession with this... Alphonse... would make
any relationship impossible."

"He... did?" she asked. Okami nodded. "Excuse me... I have to go
somewhere right now. I think I need some fresh air."

Standing up slowly, Noa left the room in a daze.

'Hmm,' Okami thought to himself. 'I think I made a mistake...'

* * * * *

Asuma walked into the tea room, and spotted his father, looking a little
distressed. "Hey, dad- have you seen Noa anywhere? She wasn't in her room
when I went to wake her up."

The elder Shinohara hesitated. "Um... I think she said she was going to
try and find some fresh air."

Asuma sighed. "Well, I guess she doesn't have to be here for this... let's
get started with this interview."

Okami acted as if he hadn't even heard his son. "Asuma... why didn't you
tell me that the two of you had started going out?"

Asuma coughed. "It isn't any of your business WHO I'm dating. How'd you
find out?"

"She told me."

"Oh, well- we were trying to keep it a secret, but... but you ARE my
father. I guess it's all right for you to know. But we can talk about
this later- business first. Do you have any clue why those particular
plans were stolen."

Mr. Shinohara growled- he had something important to tell his son, and like
he usually did when he talked with his son he got angry. "Business?
Please- I can cover the business in a matter of seconds- I just pulled some
strings with the police commissioner to get you and Ms. Izumi here so I
could see if I could help you out with getting something started with her."
Asuma's eyes widened in shock. "Why would people take those plans? I
dunno- maybe because they include much of the advanced technology that we
include in all of our police and military grade labors. Who might do it?
Any other company building labors or looking into building labors. Only
people I could think of which would have the resources for that would by
Shaft Enterprises or one of their subsidiaries. Anything else you might
want to ask? No? Good. Now, back to that girl of yours; I think that
I've accidentally gotten you in trouble with her when I-"

"Wait a second!" Asuma cried, recovering. "You did WHAT? You mean this
whole thing is just you making one of your shady deals with the
commissioner? Why?! Did you stage the whole attack, too?" Suddenly,
something else his father said clicked. "And what the hell did you do to
get me in trouble with Noa?"

"I told her something you should have talked with her about months ago- I
told her about your concerns regarding that labor of hers."

Asuma blinked. "You told her WHAT? Dammit- why the hell did you say
something about that?" Turning away, he said, "We'll be leaving by
lunchtime. If you ever want to see me again, you'd better hope I can patch
things up with her."

* * * * *

Noa, sitting on a rock outside of the mansion, watched as Asuma spotted her
and ran up, waving.

"Noa, there you are," he said breathlessly. "I've been looking all over
for you."

"Why, hello Asuma," Noa said with forced calm. "You'll never guess what
your father and I talked about not too long ago."

'Oh, damn- she's pissed,' Asuma thought to himself.

"See, you told your father something you should've told me a long time ago.
And he told that thing to me."

Asuma nodded. "Yes, I did. And I'm sorry."

Noa glared at him. "Is that all you have to say- I'm SORRY?"

"What more can I say? I was afraid that Alphonse was too important to you
for you to let me into your life. It wasn't even something I was aware of
consciously, until my father asked me why I wasn't making a move on you.
But now I know you ARE able to care about me, and not just Alphonse. It
wasn't an issue any more, and I was afraid you'd take it the wrong way. So
I never brought it up."

Noa raised an eyebrow disbelievingly. "Not an issue any more? Are you
sure about that? Are you COMPLETELY certain that you aren't even the least
bit jealous of Alphonse? Are you?"

Asuma opened his mouth but clamped it shut before he said anything. He
just couldn't bring himself to answer 'yes.'

Noa sighed. "See? It's an issue still. You should have told me about
it."

Asuma sighed. "Well, what do you expect? You spend so much time and
lavish so much attention on that labor, I STILL don't know if you care more
about it or me. You've already said that he fills a part of your heart I
don't- of COURSE I'm jealous! But I don't want you to get rid of Alphonse
or anything- it's part of who you are. Just like you accepted me being a
jerk to you sometimes, I accepted having to be jealous over a labor. So
what is talking to you about it going to do?"

Noa tensed, gathering herself. "Maybe talking to me is going to reassure
you. Asuma... if we ever... if we ever get to the point where we get
married and have kids, will you react the same way if I lavish attention on
them instead of you, the same way I do with Alphonse?"

Asuma shook his head. "No, but we aren't married."

"And Alphonse isn't a kid- he's a labor. At most, he's a pet. I love him,
but there's no way I could care more about him than I could care for a
person. If I had to choose between Alphonse and you, believe me- I'll
choose you."

Asuma took a deep breath, closed his eyes, and then slowly let it out.
Re-opening his eyes, a slight smile appeared on his face. "Hmm... is this
our first official fight?"

Noa blinked. "I think so...."

Asuma's smile widened slightly. "You won. Don't get used to it, though-
you can bet I'll win the next one."

"What do you mean I won?"

"Noa... I think, for the first time, I really know that you like me more
than Alphonse. Thank you." Pulling her into his arms, he tenderly kissed
her forehead. "Now, according to everything I know about fighting with
girlfriends, the best part is making up. So whadya say to leaving this
place and having a night out on the town? My treat?"

Noa blinked. "But our job-"

"Is taken care of. Come on- pack your bags. We're leaving. We've don't
need to be back at headquarters for several days- we've got plenty of time
for a date. That's an order, from backup to forward!"

"Yes, sir!" she said, saluting with a smile.

* * * * *

Viewing the scene outside from another of his hidden cameras, Tsukai
smiled. "See, sir? Talking to her DID help."

"Help? I damn near ruined it!" Okami said.

"Yes, but only because you brought something out into the open that would
have festered and weakened their relationship if nothing had been done
about it," Tsukai noted. "Asuma won't appreciate it, but you did a good
job today, sir."

"Asuma wouldn't have appreciated it, anyway," Okami noted gruffly. "But
thank you, Tsukai."

Watching Asuma put his arm around Noa and lead her off on the monitor,
Tsukai smiled. "It was worth it, sir."
-------------------------
Next Episode: Shinohara's Ex-girlfriend from high school, Kashima, shows
up after he gets a little nervous and cuts things off rather abruptly when
he and Noa are getting a little romantic. Why is he so nervous, and why
did she decide to show up now?

------------------------------------------------------------- --------------
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