The Home Guard

Masaki Shrine, Okayama, Japan

At 7 AM, a woman and her daughter ran around a lake. Behind them were dragons, serpents, and a golem. It was a peculiar sight in most places...or would have been if anyone else were around. The sun rose and the chase continued. The woman shouted: encouragements, curses, promises, and threats. Of all the myriad beings involved in this affair, only she was used to doing it every day. It wasn't until they'd all moved to the region that she'd begun rousing them all for the chase.


"COME ON, YOU SLUGS!" Vina Sealander shouted, running backwards for a moment to watch her Pokemon.

A Zweilous, a Gabite, a Fraxure, a Dragonaire, a Gyarados, a Golurk, a Noivern, a recently-purified Arbok, and a Juraian girl all looked up from their impromptu rest break to keep running after their cruel mistress who insisted they train now that their other mistress, Rebecca, was off in space. Only Bruticus the Golurk failed to look winded and that was likely because nobody was sure if he even could be winded. The ambiguously-alive construct-like Pokemon simply stood in place before running again.

"Are you kidding me?!" Vina called out from a distance. "I'm an old lady! None of you should have trouble keeping up with me!"

The eight Pokemon and the girl looked at each other and nodded.

Then took off running.

"That's more like it!" Vina cheered, laughing as they all passed by. "Final stretch, buckos, then breakfast!"

It had been a few months since the Kobbers had scattered to the four winds and Rebecca had gone to space to battle the rampaging Decepticon armada. Vina, Sasami, and the Sealander Squad had stayed in Vegas for a time, leaving only once all of Yagren's Pokemon victims had been purified and adopted, save for Jorge the Arbok, who had elected to join the Squad, and Alakawhat, who preferred being a Lovecraftian demon who enjoyed exploring the other dimensions with his mind while sipping lemonade.

Alakawhat had also decided not to join the exercising.

Since then, they had moved their starship, the Royal Pain, to a remote rural area in Japan where Sasami's sister was living with a distant relation of some sort. Vina didn't understand the situation completely, especially when it also involved the relation's grandson and five other woman pining for him and...well, there were politics involved that'd threatened to engulf her until she'd shown off her wedding ring.

The morning was off to a good start though. Vina had gotten the rest of her workout done before the run and would make the Squad breakfast once they got home, followed by instructing Sasami in physics and history and...

And the house was on fire. Fortunately, the Royal Pain had been parked AWAY from there.

"I swear, this had better be an alien invasion and not..." Vina muttered.

"I SAW THE WAY YOU LOOKED AT TENCHI!" a voice shrieked. "THAT LEVEL OF LEWDNESS IS DEMEANING TO A MAN OF HIS STATURE!"

"Lighten up, Princess! Like you wouldn't look at him that way if nobody were watching!" another voice taunted back.

Vina sighed. It was, in fact, Princess Ayeka and an alien space pirate named Ryoko fighting over some imagined slight or more posturing for that boy Tenchi's affections.

"I shouldn't do this, but then they'd want to bunk on the ship," Vina groaned. "Iku, go douse the flames, then we do breakfast."

The Gyarados complied, spraying the house - and the two quarreling women - with her Hydro Pump as the rest of the squad settled in for breakfast. For a brief moment, long enough to bring a pang of longing to her heart, Vina wondered if Rebecca didn't in fact have the safer job at the moment. She shrugged the thought away, serving up sausage and eggs.

She briefly considered doing something about the quarrel, but chose instead to sit down and eat. Then she got a great idea. One that was surely great and wouldn't make Rebecca freak out if she knew about it.

"Say, Sammy, how would you like to start learning to use Power Armor today? I think I looted a suit from the Brotherhood of Steel that'd fit you..."