slow prison life
“Oi, Rachel! You, are you properly listening!?”
Elliott continued to preach to Rachel day after day since her attitude wasn’t getting any better at all.
“…………I’m listening. You’re talking about that time you scooped up an amazingly big fish while at a banquet.”
As prompted, she gave him some false praise.
“Who did that when!? From what I was just saying, where exactly did that topic appear in my story!?”
“Enough, you’re being too noisy and I can’t read.”
Elliott’s face was turning red as he continued to shout, but Rachel wouldn’t leave her bed and kept her eyes glued to her book. He was being completely looked down upon.
“While the Prince! Is Talking! You don’t read a book!”
“Can’t Your Highness come back later?”
While Elliott was stamping his feet around, Rachel was giving him half-hearted replies and ignoring the noise. Such arrogance towards a prince cannot be allowed. Elliott tried to yell at her even more…….but just as he opened his mouth
“Ooki!”
a monkey yelled at him from behind. Turning back he found Rachel’s monkey carrying a mountain of paper bags. Because he was carrying so much luggage, it looks like he was forced to take the front entrance and walk down the stairs.
“Wh-What is it?”
“Your Highness, isn’t he telling you to stop blocking traffic?”
“A, Ah. I see.”
Once Elliott had stepped out of the way, the monkey took a small bow in thanks before walking past him, and then pushing the goods he had brought with him inbetween the bars of his master’s cell. Rachel, who had been lying back reading a book until now, happily stood up because her monkey had returned.
“Welcome home Haley! Did you buy everything I ordered?”
“Ooki!”
When the monkey opened up the bag marked from a major retail store, one after another there were manga and light novels………..and the monkey started stacking these books he just bought up on the desk. And then he opened up a plastic bag he had been carrying, and pulling out two parcels wrapped in paper, he immediately handed one over to Rachel.
“Thank you Haley. I really wanted to eat this after how long its been.”
“Ooki!”
The one human and one animal unwrapped their little parcels, and with the still steaming contents exposed, they showed extremely poor manners and immediately sunk their teeth into it.
“Delicious~!”
“Ooki~!”
At the moment that Rachel and her monkey cheerfully cried out because of how tasty their food was,
“………no, a prince stepping aside for a monkey is impossible!”
Elliott returned to his senses.
“Your Highness, that was much too delayed.”
“Shut up!”
“And didn’t Your Highness tell me before that nothing is impossible for you?”
“Yes but!? I did but!?”
Elliott ground his teeth unable to retort……….when suddenly, he became interested in the items that the monkey had brought in.
“Oi Rachel, what is that you’re eating?”
“Huh?”
Rachel and Haley shared a glance.
“It’s just a normal doner kebab.”
“Where in our country do we usually sell doner kebabs!? Where the heck did this monkey go!?”
“Where……….”
Rachel tilted her head.
“Akihabara”
Elliott took a moment to digest Rachel’s words.
“Akihabara?”
“Akihabara.”
Rachel answered Elliott’s question with a very serious look on her face.
“This monkey, did he go all the way to Akihabara on his own?”
“Oh my Your Highness, are you doubting Haley’s awesomeness?”
“My doubts are a different problem. How did this monkey get all the way there?”
“Well Your Highness. Haley has a good head on his shoulders? Anyhow”
From on the desk, Haley pulled out a silver and green card out of his pouch.
“needless to say with his rail pass his switch between subways is perfect!”
“Ooki! Ooki!”
The monkey mimicked the motion with the card as if he were flashing it before switching rail lines.
“How about it, he can even use a Suica pre-paid card! Amazing!”
When Haley pulled out a silver and pink card, he jumped up so that he could violently throw it down on the ground.
“Ookii!”
“So! He enjoys the feel of dunking a Pasmo pre-paid card that much!?”
“No, he’s just not supposed have it.”¹
Rachel stroked Haley’s head after he rested it on her chest.
“But that’s not all. Haley can do even more amazing things!”
“Ooki!”
Haley took a stance with both his hands out as if he were holding the top of a ring.
“Haley is able to travel through the entire Shuto Expressway without a car navigation system!”
“Like a countryside bumpkin bragging about how they’ve mastered Tokyo……….wait, what I meant to say is, Hey! Is this monkey driving!? He wouldn’t be able to see out the front even if he stood on the seat!? And to begin with how would he work the accelerator and the brake!?”
Haley pulled out another card and swung his arm again to mimic a couple of swipes.
“Ooki!”
“How is it! Haley’s handling of an ETC card!”
“That’s not how ETC cards even work!?”²
“In addition, Haley’s recently started using a rare manual transmission car these days.”
“So he has to work even even the clutch and a shift knob!? A team!? Do you have a whole group of animals gathered together to work this thing!?”
In front of Elliott who was getting tired out from yelling so much, the monkey suddenly remembered something and started fishing through a handbag from an electronics retailer. When he found what he was looking for, he pulled out a cardboard box. He then presented said box to Elliott.
“Ooki”
“A souvenir for His Highness. Buying souvenirs even for people you don’t care about in the slightest, Haley’s such a good boy!”
“Don’t care, Rachel you………..”
While thinking to himself, “I’m going to kill this woman,” Elliott reflexively took the box the monkey was offering him. When he looked, a bunch of cute girls were drawn on the package in vivid pastel colors with the title scrawled across the front in big bubble letters.
Simply Petaism 2 ~A Maiden’s Romance Continues!~ [18 YEARS AND OLDER]
“……….Monkey”
“Ooki!”
“You, what kind of man do you think I am buying an adults only game for me!?”
“Ooki?”
The monkey tilted his head to the side, now sure what the prince wanted him to say as Elliott furiously pointed towards the box in his hand.
“And it’s a half-baked joke as well! Wolanski is the petaist, not me!”
“No, doesn’t Your Highness have those tendencies as well?”
“Shut up George. And why is it ‘2’ anyway!? Only idiots abruptly buy the sequel, so you should have bought ‘1’ instead!”
“If you don’t want it, I’ll take it. I’ve been meaning to get 2.”
“You be quiet too Wolanski. Moreover Monkey. This shit game came out three years ago, so did you just pick something up from the bargain bin!? Are you making fun of me!? Or are you just too simple to have picked something out from the new stacked shelves area!?”
“This monkey, he’s definitely trying to put you down.”³
“Shut up Sykes! ……….And back to what we were originally talking about! The game has a completely linear story, only giving you a choice of three options at the very end, so how dare they call it a grand adventure game with multiple endings!”
“As expected of Your Highness, the weight of something a man has to say is certainly different after someone’s stepped on a landmine.”
“Outsiders should keep quiet!”
Elliott threw the game box back at his aides who kept making unnecessary comments behind him. But once his back was turned, a chilly voice asked him a question from the cell.
“Your Highness. How do you know so much about a game after just seeing the title………?”
“Putting that aside”
“How about we leave it right where it is and discuss it a little more instead?”
Anyhow it looks like the blonde idiot is dissatisfied with the souvenir he got. Haley figured it couldn’t be helped, so he pulled something else out.
“Ooki”
“Hm?”
Once again Elliott took what Haley was offering without a thought. It was a CD for a girls band whose headquarters rested in Akihabara and whose numbers stood at a static 48 although if you included secondary groups that rose to around 4 to 500 members.
“Hoh, the monkey actually has good taste………..is what I’d like to say, but why is it already open?”
“Ooki”
“You’ll give me the CD because you just needed the ticket for the handshake event? You, isn’t that the most valuable………!?”
While Elliott started protesting, the monkey walked over with a small pile of CD’s and started handing them out to the hanger-ons as well. It was the same one that Elliott had received although none of them had been opened yet. But in the middle of handing them out, he ended up scratching his head when he saw there were still some disks left even after everyone had already gotten one. And so the monkey asked Wolanski.
“Ookii!”
“No, even if you say you’re giving me three because some are leftover………I wonder if I need three of the same thing.”
“Ooki…………..”
“So His Highness has fewer friends than you thought? Even though I told you………”
I give up. Feeling that way, the monkey glanced over at Elliott.
“Ooki?”
“So you’re just going to give me the leftovers, you idiot! Why is it that these guys all get my favorite CD while I get this shit video game!?”
“So Your Highness, that story about that shit video game you were telling………..or rather Haley you too, just how much did you buy with the money I gave you?”
“No Rachel, how much pocket money did you give to a monkey!?”
“Wasn’t he going to Akiba!? No matter how much money I gave him, it wouldn’t have been enough for him to go rummaging around!”
“I actually agree!?”
Rachel narrowed her eyes in nostalgia as if she were opening a new vinyl record.
“But, these days Akihabara has been changing………it’s so different than it was in the past.”
“I wouldn’t think you’d feel that way after this last trip……….I mean certainly the area around the station has undergone some redevelopment, but it’s still the Electric Town.”
Rachel inflated her cheeks at Elliott’s denial.
“It’s almost completely different, now it’s almost entirely meant for otaku. Thinking back……….back when you’d fish through street stalls with no signs looking for junk parts, or wandering through those buildings with multiple stores in them looking for vacuum tubes.”
“Are you pretending to be older than you are!? Do you think you’re older than your father here!?”
“Does Haley remember?”
“Oi, don’t ignore me!”
Haley thought for a moment after Rachel asked him and started throwing out gestures as the memories came to him.
“Ookii. Ooki, ooki!”
“Ah~, standing in line in the middle of the night for the countdown event the day a new OS is released huh? That’s right, recently there haven’t been any of those. It’s lonely right?”
“Ooki~”
“How old is this monkey!?”
When a break in the conversation formed, Elliott beckoned Haley over to his side.
“Ooki?”
When Haley reached Elliott’s feet, Elliott crouched down and whispered into his ear.
“Oi Monkey, you’re gathering tickets for a handshake event……..who are you a fan of?”
“Ooki………..”
Haley whispered back into Elliott’s ear……..and then the man and monkey shared a firm handshake.
“……….the two of them are the same?”
The two of them suddenly started to hit if off? A slightly shocked Rachel wanted to ask, but she then fiercely shook her head.
“Don’t say something stupid Rachel! We’re not the same!”
“Ooki!”
“……….huh?”
Elliott and Haley both objected to Rachel’s rare surprise comment, but neither of them seemed to notice how excited they were getting.
“Some guys refuse to accept another person’s opinion. But we can’t all be number one! Otherwise there’d be a war between fans!”
“Ooki!”
“Ri………right……….”
Not noticing that Rachel was slowly drawing further away from them, Elliott and Haley were slowly becoming more and more excited.
“Monkey you, are you going to next month’s live event?”
“Ooki”
“I see, you have the ticket, but you can only go if it fits into Rachel’s schedule? Oi Rachel, try enjoying your vacation without relying on the Monkey from time to time. A boss’s generosity means finding ways to work around a subordinate’s circumstances doesn’t it?”
“Right………I never thought I’d hear Your Highness say something like that though.”
Rachel was falling behind in this talk as Elliott, who had reached a high after finding a brother who shares the same interest, pulled out a glow stick as if it were his saber.
“So then Monkey, allow me to show you the results from my special training.”
“Ooki!”
“Huh? What?”
Leaving behind Rachel who didn’t know what was about to start, Haley hurriedly brought out a boombox and inserted a CD. All the hanger-ons pulled out their own glow sticks, one for each hand, and lined up spectacularly behind Elliott who had struck a pose.
“”Um? What’s going on?”
“Ooki!”
“And, START!”
There was no explanation. Right in front of Rachel who had a large question mark floating above her head while seeing the incomprehensible………and as the first note popped into existence from the speakers, the men all raised their glow sticks at once, and began dancing the Wotagei⁴ in high spirits. All so they could show off to a monkey.
“What!?”
“Ookii!”
“Haley, could you explain this, just a bit!? What are they doing!? George too!?”
“We’re doing all three songs in one goooooooooooo!”
“WOooooooooooooooooooo!”
“What’s wrong with His Highness!? George!? Sykes!? Haley, um, explain thiiiiiiiiiiiis!?”
The Prince and his group of noble sons continued to dance as if in some sort of trance before a bewildered and captive noble daughter as a monkey leaped for joy. Inside the dimly lit dungeon, the dazzling gleam of the glow sticks cut through the darkness and was truly beautiful.
As something she had no idea about unfolded before her eyes, there was just one thing Rachel understood.
This, I have no intentions of trying to understand these people…………
So with a lone girl getting left behind, the men’s revelry continued on.
1. Suica and Pasmo are two different type of commuter passes. They look similar, and the only difference between them is what stations you get them at. But when you’re finished you’re supposed to return the cards to get a deposit back.
2. The Shuto Expressway is a complicated toll road in Tokyo. There are a lot of sharp turns and on-ramps, so you have to be careful while driving it. An ETC card is an electronic payment card that you can use to pay the tolls on the Shuto Expressway without having to stop. The reason why Elliott shouts that this isn’t how you use one is because you have to insert the card like a chip card rather than swiping it like a subway card.
3. So I’m pretty sure this is meant to be a joke here. Mounting in katakana can refer to how Haley is making fun of Elliott, but it might also be referring to the ‘mounted’ displays you’d have for new games.
4. A type of energetic dancing people do for idols at their concerts.