Place: Okinawa, Astrea Hill Airbase Mess Hall
Time: 13:10
“They’re late.” Lieutenant Kenjou Kaname commented, crossing her arms as she stood comfortably at the end of the table.
“Yes, we know. Now sit down and eat your lunch, will you?” the Captain brushed her blonde hair back from her high-browed face and gestured at her plate. “Don’t want it to get cold.” She attacked the linguine before her with precision, her fork rising and falling with determination.
From the Captain’s side, a third member of the squadron looked up and smiled. “It’s as Shion says, Kaname, come eat.”
Kaname scowled, but walked over to get her share of food served. She spared a small smile for the dark-haired women who served her, but the scowl returned when she took a small plate with a slice of cake on it from a short blonde. She stomped away from the servers, over to the table where the rest of her squadron tucked into the pasta happily. She sat down heavily next to a woman with short, dark hair. Kaname looked hard at her, before catching the Captain’s eye, and beginning to eat slowly.
“So,” Kaname began casually enough that she could feel the woman at her side stiffen, “are you still seeing that girl, Ohtori?”
Her hand suspended midair, a twirl of noodle on her fork, Ohtori Amane nodded. “Mm.”
Kaname looked pointedly at her watch.
The Captain jumped in before anything could be said. “Momoko, can you just check and see where…” but before she could complete her sentence, Kaname interrupted.
“And you think that’s okay, do you? I mean, for squadron moral and all. You seeing…ground scum.” Kaname’s gesture included the rest of the squadron, whose carefully blank faces were indicative of the attention they were paying the conversation.
“I….,” Amane struggled to find words with which to reply to this insult, when the noise of a throat being cleared came from the doorway. The pilots all turned to see that the captain of the Miator squad and a stranger stood there.
“I see that your squad’s morale is as high as ever, Shion,” Miyuki said as nastily as possible.
“Morale or not, we’re still the top squad here,” Shion shot back quickly.
“At the moment,” Miyuki said with maddening confidence. “I’d like to introduce to our new ace pilot, Hanazono Shizuma.”
The tall, silver-haired beauty bowed deeply. “It’s a pleasure to meet you all,” she said politely.
Kaname narrowed her eyes. It was hard enough getting any recognition with Ohtori in the way, but if Miator had a new ace…this could be problematic. And to make things worse, there were rumors that Hanazone was also seeing one of the technicians.
“Ace?” Kaname stood. “It’s pretty reckless calling someone the top pilot before we’ve even had a chance to see her in action.”
“Is that a challenge?” Shizuma asked, not taking her eyes off of Kaname.
Kaname panicked. She could feel the sweat running down her back as she struggled to find some meaning in her own actions. Finally, desperately, she pointed towards Amane. “Yes!” Kaname cried, “I challenge you to take on Spica’s top pilot, Ohtori Amane.” Kaname could hear and feel Momoko’s spit-take.
When Shizuma stopped laughing, she said, “So, what are we going to do? Put our girlfriends on some kind of tower and fly by and save them as they fall?”
Kaname opened her mouth, but after an awkwardly long pause, thought better of it. Taking a deep breath she said, “No, I guess that’s a really stupid idea, isn’t it?” She smiled and ignored the release of breath around the room.
“Oh, that’s a shame, I’d already made up their costumes.” Lu Lim squadron captain Chiharu pushed through the door, holding a frilly dress. “Are you sure?”
Kaname blinked rapidly, her mouth flapping open and closed, but no words came out.
“Kaname!” Momoko said, reaching for her, “Kaname!”
***
“Kaname, Kaname! Wake up!” Momoko’s voice was louder now. Kaname blinked, her vision foggy, clearing slowly.
“Oh god, you’re awake!” Momoko’s face was streaked with tears. “You collapsed and we were all worried.”
“Collapsed?” Kaname tried to remember. “Right, I was playing tennis with Ohtori and I…”
“Playing tennis?” Momoko looked worried. “What are you talking about?”
“Wasn’t I…? I challenged Ohtori to a tennis match to force her to understand that she was our star…” Or was that a dream? Now Kaname couldn’t remember. “I was dreaming that I was a pilot. It was really weird.”
“Kaname….” Momoko sobbed. “You don’t you remember?”
“I wasn’t playing tennis?”
“No,” Momoko sniffed. “You challenged Hanazono to a race, but Ohtori…she punched you.”
“She punched me.” Kaname thought about this. “Wait, where are they?”
“Racing, right now.”
Kaname was having a hard time putting two and two together. “Racing….?”
“The horse race, Kaname! The title of Etoile is on the line!”
“So…not jets?”
Momoko held out her hand and put it on Kaname’s forehead. “Are you okay?”
Moving the hand off her face, Kaname closed her eyes. “No,” she confirmed, “I am definitely not okay. But are any of us, really? I mean, have you considered global warming? It’s going to radically alter our diets and water use, among other things… is the fuel we use for our jets really justifiable?” Kaname opened her eyes. Finding that she was speaking to an empty room she closed them again.
In the distance she could hear the roars of the Etoile contest as ace Hanazono Shizuma won the day.
The Strawberry Panic! manga and light novels (which are out of print, sadly) ©Sakurako Kimino, MediaWorks, Seven Seas. The anime ©Studio Madhouse and Media Blasters. It is now streaming legally for free on TubiTV.