"Weekly's too frequent."
Flowers jerked in surprise at that flat, monotone assertion that came out of nowhere. Turning, he saw Maud staring up at him. "Wonder if I'll ever get used to you doing that?" he mused idly. "What do you mean?"
"I don't like going back and forth every week," Maud explained simply. "Make it monthly."
"You want me to renegotiate with Sarge about how often we fight over who you stay with?" Flowers clarified.
"I want you to change it," Maud corrected before turning and heading off, as though her simple declaration was all it took to make it so.
Flowers sighed. "Somehow, I doubt Sarge is going to be happy about this..."
"WHAT?" Sarge shouted out angrily. "We had an agreement you dam dirty Blue! And now you're trying to renege when you have the pony? I will not hear of it! The honor of the Reds will not let this affront stand! We will tear you apart and use your intestines to build pretty toys for Maud to play with!"
"But it's Maud who asked me to get this changed," Flowers pointed out. "She doesn't like shuttling back and forth so often. I don't think she'd take kindly to you deciding that you should try and kill us over that."
"Hrrrmmm..." Sarge mused, slowly digesting that. "You have a point. But it's still unfair! Because of the agreement, she still gets Blue influence even while in Red Base because she still sees your soldier as her father! How is she supposed to get Red influence to counter that? In the spirit of our original agreement, this inequality, this injustice...can not stand!"
"Hmm, I see you have a point there," Flowers allowed. After all, if I'm looking at Tucker and Grif as possibly tapping them to be new Freelancers, there's no reason not to see if Maud can influence the others that way too...if only for the sake of my primary mission. "So you want the Reds - yourself specifically, I assume - to have access to Maud even while she's staying at Blue Base?"
"Affirmative!" Sarge declared firmly. "She needs to be shown the superiority of the Reds even when with the Blues! It's the only fair way!"
"Well, what if you could show us up outside of battle as well?" Flowers suggested slyly. "Something that doesn't involve killing but is competitive?"
"Hmm..." Sarge stared off into the middle distance as he considered this possibility. "Well, it's unnatural to even consider such a thing with the hated Blues...but we're already fighting without killing, and the goal of winning over the pony is still worth it! What did you have in mind?"
"Some sort of activity that will let us show off non-combat skills," Flowers suggested. "Some sort of gathering, perhaps? Held weekly?"
"Of course!" Sarge declared proudly. "Whichever team is not presently hosting the pony will host a cookout once a week instead of the battle that's now moved to once a month! We'll have good food that will absolutely destroy the Blues, party games that we can crush you in, and funtime activities to show Maud how much better the Reds are! And we can get to know each other and talk! Just because you're our most hated enemies and I hate you all with a fiery passion hotter than a thousand suns and want to destroy you with every fiber of my being...is no reason we can't be friends off the battlefield and share a cold one!"
Flowers chuckled softly. "You never cease to amaze me with your 'logic', Sarge," Flowers offered in a bemused tone.
"See? Even in logic I trounce you!" Sarge declared proudly. "Our victory is assured!"
"Captain!" Tucker roared out as he raced up from the transport dock. "I've got a major bone to pick with you!"
"Tucker?" Flowers asked in 'shock'. "You're back early! It hasn't even been a full two days, let alone five. Why are you back so soon? Was the planet of the amazons not everything I promised?"
"Of course it wasn't!" Tucker snapped out angrily. "You tricked me!"
"How did I trick you?" Flowers asked, managing to sound offended. "Were the residents not entirely female?"
"Well, yeah, they were," Tucker allowed. "But-"
"And were they not incredibly attractive by your own personal standards?" Flowers continued.
"Well, okay, they were smoking hot," Tucker agreed. "But-"
"And did they not go about wearing very little?" Flowers pressed.
"Oh yeah, that was awesome!" Tucker crowed happily. "Some were only walking around in body paint and a fig leaf...literally! The figs were pretty tasty, too."
"And weren't they overjoyed to meet a warrior such as you?" Flowers asked playfully.
"Well...yeah, I was swarmed as soon as I got off the transport ship," Tucker allowed. "But-"
"Then I fail to see how I tricked you," Flowers concluded. "Plainly, the planet was everything I promised you."
"No it wasn't!" Tucker yelled out angrily. "You never mentioned they were cannibals!"
Flowers paused. "Okay, I know some people find that quite distasteful, but given just how open you are to such things - your over-under rule, for example - I didn't think a picky little detail like dietary habits would bother you that much."
"Yeah!" Sarge agreed loudly. "Suck it up and man up, Blue!"
"Suck it...I had to suck it up to stay a man!" Tucker snapped out angrily. "They weren't swarming me to welcome me to anything but the cooking pot!"
"While I admit it's a switch on the gender rules you're used to, I don't see why you're making such a big deal over them wanting you to make them dinner," Flowers observed playfully.
"Make them-they didn't want me to make them dinner!" Tucker roared. "They wanted me to be dinner! They were trying to eat me!"
"Bow chicka wow wow," Maud observed calmly from behind Tucker.
Tucker paused for several moments, then found himself chuckling. "Okay, I walked right into that one," he allowed, leaning down to pet Maud. "Not bad, kid."
"She is spending way too much time with you," Church growled flatly from behind Maud.