Hello guys! So here's the second chapter of my Taruru story. Also, I apologize for not detailing the whole "romance and angst" thing. By that I meant a slight romance with a tinge of angst, nothing too major. Just as close friends, maybe on the verge of a bit more? I don't know yet, but it will not be a full-fledged romance story, more friendship than romance.

Anyways, on the topic of the friendship story, I'll be using TaruToro, mainly because some people have messaged me about it and also the reviews that were given. It's also what I was leaning towards too anyways in the first chapter, so TaruToro it is.

In other news, I've been working on oc's out of sheer boredom, so updates might be a little slow.

anyways, hope you enjoy the chapter. r&r if you'd like, i'd really like to know how i'm doing with taruru being ic, it's a challenge for me to write someone being a chatterbox and annoying.

Taruru sat on the Hinata's couch and groaned at the thought of staying on Pekopon for a whole week. A whole week on this boring and dull planet would be a horrible experience. He could only hope that the supposed "wonders" were as wonderful as Keroro had made them seem. He recalled Keroro glorifying their names as he went teary-eyed in joyful anticipation of visiting each of the seven hot tourist locations. Keroro was probably exaggerating, and everyone probably knew the fact, but nobody dared point it out, lest they wanted to get a rather annoying scolding from the sergeant.

Taruru slumped to such a degree on the couch that he was practically lying down. Only his head was kept upright while the rest of his body was horizontal. To add to his stress, Keroro had pointed out that their first destination was a wall. When Taruru first heard this, he had to rub his ears and ask him to repeat himself multiple times before he allowed himself to believe what he was hearing. The thought of people praising a wall seemed dumb to him, even if these people were dim-witted Pekoponians. He expected better from them than to worship something as trivial as a pile of bricks in a single-file line. So far, the trip was going to be a total disaster as far as Taruru was concerned.

"Taruru!" Taruru looked up from the couch to see Garuru towering above him. Taruru quickly and clumsily went up to his feet, trying not to disappoint his leader. He did a quick salute and stood up straight.

"Why aren't you helping out, Taruru? Go help Tororo with lifting things onto the aircraft if you don't have anything to do. I think he could use some help."

"Y-yes sir!" he replied nervously. Taruru dismissed himself and quickly ran over to where the vehicle they would be using for transportation was set. Tororo was lifting things? Why would he be doing physical work when he could've been working on navigation or something that needed a techie like him for? Whatever the reason, he could see Tororo outside the ship with a as Garuru had predicted, Tororo was struggling to lift a medium-sized suitcase. It was a yellow, locked suitcase with the familiar swirl symbol engraved one top. Why Kururu placed his insignia on nearly everything he owned was beyond him. Regardless, Taruru would have no problem with this and he walked up confidently to him.

"Tororo, let me help you," Taruru offered. He reached out his hand to further convey his message, but Tororo continued to struggle.

"No, I got it. It's the last one." Taruru shot him a skeptical look, but Tororo was too distracted with trying to move the suitcase to pay any attention. "I swear that Kururu put rocks in his suitcase just to mess with me," he said glumly. I don't even get to do any navigation because Kururu told me that he could deal with piloting the thing all by himself, so he sent me to put away all the luggage!" Taruru disregarded Tororo's little rant and instead walked closer to him and the suitcase. It didn't look heavy at all, but Kururu was always a tricky one. Taruru propped himself up and lifted the suitcase, expecting it to be as heavy as a boulder. On the contrary, it felt as heavy as any other suitcase and Taruru lifted it above his head with ease, much to Tororo's amazement and embarrassment.

"Haha, weak!" Taruru yelled at Tororo. Taruru started to walk mockingly with the suitcase over his head around Tororo, whose face was tinged with a deep pink.

"Shut up!" Tororo countered. He tackled Taruru and both of them and the suitcase tumbled to the ground.

"Ow, what'd you do that for, Tororo?" Taruru said as he rubbed his head. That was the first time he'd felt any sense of fun on Pekopon, and Tororo had ruined the moment by launching himself at him.

"You wouldn't stop dancing around me!" Tororo tried to explain.

"I wasn't dancing!"

"You know what I'm talking about! Don't lie!"

Taruru brushed himself off and walked back over to the suitcase. They were lucky that there weren't any scratches on it. He didn't want to become Kururu's next guinea pig for angering him. He placed his hands around it and lifted, but the suitcase wouldn't move more than a few inches off the ground. It had suddenly felt much heavier and bulkier than before. Tororo and he were the only ones there, and they were both on the ground in the aftermath of Tororo's tackle, so why did it feel much heavier?

"Tororo! What the heck! Why's the suitcase so heavy now?" he said as he continued to try to lift the heavy thing off the ground. Tororo smirked and laughed at his misfortune.

"Pu pu pu, who's weak now?"

"I'm serious! The suitcase is so much heavier than before!" he whined. Tororo grabbed one end while Taruru grabbed the other. They lifted simultaneously, but the suitcase was barely lifted above their knees. It was a hilarious sight to anybody who managed to catch the two, more specifically to Kururu, who was watching from his lab through the many hidden cameras located around the household. Kururu pressed a button a simple remote in his hand at the exact moment when the two young Keronians were going to heave. The now light-as-a-feather suitcase went flying through the air as they gave it their best efforts to lift that godforsaken piece of luggage. Kururu pressed the button again as the suitcase tumbled through the air towards a nearby window. Now that the suitcase was as heavy as a boulder again, it was no surprise that it crashed through the glass and into the house.

"Ku ku ku, that was fun. Now I'll go tell them to clean up the broken glass," he said amusingly.

o O o

Taruru and Tororo found themselves cleaning up the pieces of glass scattered after Kururu gave them a scolding. They knew something was up with Kururu's suitcase. That Kururu always found ways to mess with people even in commonplace situations such as loading a suitcase onto an aircraft.

"You two better clean this up before anybody down below comes up here, or else you'll get into even more trouble, ku ku."

Tororo spoke out in annoyance against Kururu.

"You and your stupid suitcase had something to do with this, Kururu!"

"You're right, which is why I'm here to help you by supervising you to make sure nobody gets hurt, ku ku."

Taruru, on the other hand, kept quiet; the slight sense of euphoria he had gotten when he was acting foolish with Tororo was long gone now, and he was back into his mildly pessimistic attitude. Kururu would never stop messing with them as long as he knew that he had power over them, and he did. The others didn't do anything about it probably because they knew that Kururu would never stop, no matter how much he was threatened or coaxed.

They finished cleaning and replacing the glass just in time; everyone else had returned from the base doing who-knows-what and frankly, Taruru didn't care. He'd almost cut himself cleaning up all the glass on the floor and Tororo was still grumbling to himself about how much he hated Kururu. Kururu had joined the others as they went on board the aircraft and acted like nothing had happened.

Meanwhile, Tororo was still sitting down pouting with his arms crossed. Were the others about to leave?

"Tororo, let's go! I think they're leaving soon!" Taruru said frantically. As much as he didn't want to go, he also didn't want to be alone with nobody else.

"No, I'm staying right here. That Kururu's gonna mess both of us up by the end of that trip and you know it. We're gonna be sleeping in the same room with him, and I don't want to know what he has in store for us there."

It was true. The aircraft that they were using was small and cramped; it was only made for one platoon, but with double the passengers, there was double the suitcases and half the space available for them to move around and sleep whilst the other half was for luggage, mainly Pururu's.

"Girls always bring too much stuff," Taruru thought to himself. Tororo still hadn't budged, so Taruru had to lug him over to the ship. It was surprisingly easy and took no effort on Taruru's part. Tororo didn't put up much of a fight, much to a grateful Taruru's relief. As the pair entered the aircraft, the others' eyes stared at the two, wondering why Taruru was pulling Tororo by the hand to the ship. Kururu looked as well, but with a devious smile. Nobody else saw this grim foreshadowing displayed by Kururu, so Taruru kept quiet, threw Tororo on the nearest bed, and made his way to the next bed to fall asleep. The other frogs just turned away, returning to whatever they had been doing before the two entered.. It was none of their business, so they left them alone, except for Keroro, who had to be restrained by Giroro and Dororo from waking up the kids.

Taruru woke up and stretched. He'd had a pleasant dream about things non-Pekopon, but waking up brought him back to the cruel reality of the accursed planet. Taking a peek at Tororo's bed, it appeared he was still sleeping, but he couldn't really tell; his glasses were in the way. He lifted his arms in the air, stretched his muscles, and then walked over to where Keroro was sitting. He was building one of those Gundam models that were prevalent all over Pekopon. Taruru wanted to try, but was too exhausted to put forth any effort. Instead, he asked how close they were to the wall; he disliked being in cramped spaces and the air inside had become a bit musky with all the frogs inside.

"S-Sergeant Keroro?" he asked timidly. Being in front of his superiors always made him a bit nervous if not scared.

"Yeees?" he asked with his eyes trained on his unfinished Gundam model.

"Where are we, if I may ask?" Keroro looked up at Taruru and then to Kururu, who was busy steering them towards their destination.

"Sergeant Major Kururu! Where are we?" Oh great. Taruru didn't want to hear that frog's voice again. He could only hope that Kururu wouldn't try anything humiliating at the moment. He pushed a button, most likely turning on a temporary autopilot setting, and turned his chair towards him.

"Hello Taruru, how was the sleep?"

Taruru said nothing as he started sweating. Keroro interrupted the silence.

"Kururu, I asked you something!" Keroro's interruption brought a wave of thankfulness towards the sergeant. At least now Taruru didn't have to reply to that sick-minded frog.

"According to these coordinates, we should be nearing China right now. We would be a bit further if it were just us, but the luggage's weight is overwhelmingly… feminine, ku ku," he said, hinting towards Pururu, who was administering health examinations to the others in a small room on the other side of the ship. She needed to make sure that they were prepared for some of the risks and hazards they would be encountering on the trip.

"Sergeant, c-can you tell me more about this "Great" Wall of China?" he asked.

"No, I'll let Kururu do that for you. I'm busy," he said, dismissing him and focusing his attention back on the toy in front of him.

"Ku ku, quite curious aren't you Taruru? I thought you didn't want to be here."

Taruru went on the defensive and spurt out excuses to the sergeant major.

"I don't want to be here! I'm just curious is all. Is there something wrong with that?"

"You're so touchy, Taruru, ku ku."

"Just tell me," he pleaded.

"Begging now are we?"

"Never mind," he said as he walked back towards the bed he had been sleeping on. Tororo was sitting up on his bed. Having just woken up, Tororo yawned and as Taruru approached, he did a light wave in his direction. Taruru returned it with a slight smile as he sat back down on the mattress.

"What were you doing over there near Kururu?," Tororo asked curiously.

"Nothing. It doesn't even matter, but apparently we're near China and its "great" wall." He made sure to emphasize the word "great"; he still didn't know how a wall could be considered great. It was a wall for frog's sake! A pile of rubble and pebbles, nothing more.

"Yeah well, I heard that this wall is more than 50 kilometers long!"

"Doesn't matter," he said dismissively. "A wall is a wall, no matter how long it is, but still, it is impressive to know that Pekoponians are dumb enough to build something that long. I bet they got bored of building it and went away."

"The men were forced to work the whole day and a whole lot of them were killed by exhaustion and buried in the construction of that thing if they tried to run, pu pu. I don't think you should be saying that," Tororo said with a smug grin.

Taruru cringed.

"You're such a killjoy," he said, playfully punching Tororo in the shoulders.