“...” A serious glint in his eyes, M0 motioned his chopsticks forward and clumsily tried to pick a piece of karaage and take it towards his plate, much like he had been instructed to do during the crash course of eating etiquette. His first try failed miserably, the way the round piece of fried chicken slipped out of his chopsticks and rolled around on the tray. His second and third try were the same struggle, always resulting in the loss of the karaage piece.

“Here,” said M1, motioning his chopsticks forward and picking a piece from the tray, dropping it in M0’s plate afterwards – his movements were almost as if he had been using chopsticks throughout his whole life and hadn’t learned of their existence not even an hour ago.

“As expected of you, M1...” mumbled M0, a small pout showing on his lips as he decided to give it one more try – which ended up in failure. “How come you can do it so perfectly already...?”

“As a perfect being, I’ll always successfully achieve whatever it is I want to do,” said M1, putting a couple more of karaage pieces in M0’s plate, aiming afterwards for some side dishes. “I like to feed you so you don’t need to learn how to use chopsticks. I can give you food for the rest of your life.”

“But that way I won’t be able to give you food...” pointed out M0, his gaze downcast as he intently looked at his plate, which was being filled little by little. He took a quick peek towards M1’s plate and found it empty, save for the rice bowl and the miso soup placed right in front of him. “I don’t like that thought.”

“You have plenty of time to learn how to use chopsticks properly, then,” pointed out M1, giving a quick peck to M0’s cheek. “I’ll teach you.”

“Thank you, M1,” acknowledged M0, a small smile on his lips. “Now please put food on your plate or you won’t have any food for yourself, the way Ikusaki-kun, M3 and M2 are devouring everything.”

“I gant hep it,” said M3 in the middle of munching and stuffing even more food inside of his mouth. “Tis i thoo gode!!”

“Why thank you,” acknowledged Eki, giving a quick, but extremely satisfied, smile to M3. “Shouichi and I did our best. Mizusaki was also quite the help in the preparation.”

“You did this?” inquired M2, putting little pieces of every dish around him in his mouth one after the other, making a brief pause every few seconds to chew and swallow the food.

“For the most part, yes,” answered Eki, picking up a paper napkin and motioning it towards M2, his seat on the table already a complete mess of crumbs and fallen drops of sauce or small pieces of missed chunks. “But as I said, everyone gave a hand in making t—“

“Eki-sama....!” called M2 all of a sudden, his large hands being slammed against the table surface and making the plates on top clank against one another.

“’S-Sama’...?” repeated Eki, his usual poker face breaking down a little bit and allowing a surprised demeanour to slip into it.

“Yes, Eki-sama,” acknowledged M2 with a slow nod of his head. “Eki-sama is Eki-sama. Eki-sama, will you continue to cook for me? I’ll... Hm... I don’t have anything to give you... Hmmm... Oh, I won’t let you get hurt! I’ll take the bullets for you so cook for me, okay?”

“Ah... That’s...” mumbled Eki, at a complete loss on how he should answer M2’s proposal. His hand unconsciously climbed up in the air and touched the overgrown fringe that half covered his eyes – or used to cover one of his eyes. “I don’t think... that’s possible...”

“Hm? Why?” asked M2, his head slightly tilted as he curiously observed the soldier.

“Oh c’mon! Don’t be stubborn and eat it already, M4!” admonished Mizusaki, a soft frown on his face as he looked over to M4, who had an even bigger frown on him. “Only little kids say they don’t like something before they even try it!”

“I will not eat this piece of white, squish... something!” argued back M4, looking at the tofu inside of the miso soup with a disgusted expression on his face. Anyone that saw him right now would be led into thinking that he was about to barf.

“It’s just tofu, it won’t kill you,” sighed Mizusaki, rolling his eyes around. “See? M1 seems to like it.”

“Yes, it’s indeed quite good,” acknowledged M1, putting a small square of tofu in his mouth and leisurely munching on it. “It has the same consistency as human brains.”

“...!” There was a collective wave of nausea running through the soldier’s stomachs, Ikusaki even going as far as slamming his chopsticks on the table and clutching his mouth shut to not be the one vomiting all over their food.

“I-I lost my appetite...” croaked Ikusaki, his face as pale as a ghost as he tried to not think about the graphic and horrific images spiralling around inside of his brain. “I’ll never eat or touch tofu ever again in my whole life...”

“Please tell me that you never ate human brains,” beckoned Murayama, suddenly feeling as tired as if he had run ten marathons in a row with that one single sentence spewed out of M1’s mouth.

“Of course not,” readily denied M1, giving a quick shrug with his shoulders. He lifted his gaze from his miso soup bowl and sideways glanced Murayama, a mischievous smirk on his lips as he purred his next words while biting into another piece of tofu. “I only played around with them a dozen times.”

“Oh shit, I’m gonna throw up...!” yelped Ikusaki, hastily getting up from his seat and running off in the kitchen’s direction, always keeping his mouth well sealed with the help of his hands.

“M1, you shouldn’t say things like that,” softly admonished M0, a glint of disapproval in his expressionless demeanour.

“Yes, M0 is right,” acknowledged Murayama, softly clearing his throat to try to forget that this conversation even happened in the first place. “This is not something to be discussed while ea—“

“Tofu is actually more similar to other types of soft tissues, like the intestines or the lungs,” continued M0, his expression ever remaining the same as he spoke. “Some of the desserts over there seem to resemble more the human brain in terms of consistency and texture than these small squares of tofu.”

“You’re right, M0,” acknowledged M1, tentatively squeezing one of the remaining pieces of tofu with his chopsticks. “Human brains take more strength to turn into a pulp than tofu.”

“Okay, enough with this conversation already!” yelled Miue, feeling his stomach continuously turn inside out as he listened to the back and forth discussion between M1 and M0. He released an exasperated sigh and picked up his glass, filled with cold water, to try to permanently seal the already ingested food in his stomach. The corner of his eyes caught the reappearance of Ikusaki in the dining room – lucky him, for having missed the rest of the conversation. “Geez, you guys say the weirdest of things...”

“Um, Miue-senpai?” suddenly called M5, who had been uncharacteristically calm and well behaved for a long time now.

“Hm?” hummed Miue in acknowledgement, giving a couple more of gulps to his drink.

“What’s a ‘boner’?” inquired M5, his head slightly tilted to the right as he exchanged his gaze between the two oldest soldiers sitting at the table.

“ACK!!” choked both Miue and Murayama at the same time, the former while drinking his water and the latter as he munched on a piece of tonkatsu. A loud thud shook the entire room around as Ikusaki bumped on a table on his way back to his seat, his face as red as a tomato.

“Ahahahahahahahaha!!” burst out laughing Mizusaki, one of his hands continuously tapping the table’s surface as his body squirmed around in amusement at that innocent question, one that would be expected of a little child and not of a young adult.

“Um... M5, that’s... not something you talk about during meal time...” tried to explain Eki, even his cheekbones lightly smeared with pink. When he saw M5 tilting his head even further due to his words, the expression on his features telling him that he had absolutely no idea why such a question was taboo during dinner time, Eki was about to open his mouth once again to try to explain it to him in the most eloquent way that wouldn’t get any of his squadmates dying from embarrassment. But his words were quickly cut short.

“Don’t worry, Eki-san, I already educated them in the names of kisses, I don’t mind also explaining to them what a boner is~” announced Mizusaki with a sing-song voice, cleaning the tears in the corner of his eyes with the back of his finger. “They would need to have a sex ed pep talk eventually, right?”

“Mizusaki, be quiet already...” groaned Murayama, half hiding his blushing features with his hand. Don’t give M1 even more reasons to kill me...

“A boner is an informal name for erection, which is what happens further south in the male body when they get sexually aroused or attracted to someone,” started Mizusaki, after having softly cleared his throat and straightened his body in his seat – you know, for formality’s sake.

“Mizusaki,” tried to call Murayama once again, feeling that his life was about to achieve its ending much sooner than it had probably been programmed to happen.

“It will probably be easier for you guys to understand if I explain it in a somewhat more scientific way so...” continued Mizusaki, giving a quick thought on how he should put his next words to make the conversation the shortest possible and quickly end it. “You get an erection when a large amount of blood flows into your penis and it gets ready for action. And by action, I mean ready to have sex. You know, mating, procreating, making babies, spreading your seed through the world~”

“Mizu—“

“It’s a physiological reaction that happens to every male and it’s impossible to control, though that doesn’t necessarily mean that it happens all the time,” added Mizusaki, nodding his head in agreement to his own words. “Well, it doesn’t happen all the time unless you’re a pervert, that is. Usually, you only get a boner because you get turned on by the thought of someone that attracts you in a physical or emotional sense. For example, the person you’re in love with or have a crush on. Then again, if you’re a pervert, you can get turned on by the thought or sight of pretty much anyone or anything.”

“Hmm... A pervert, huh...” repeated M1, his voice completely void of emotion and gaining a monotone shine to it as he coldly glared at Murayama, his grey eyes violently flickering red for a couple of seconds. “And what do you usually do to those so-called ‘perverts’? Cut that ‘boner’ off of their bodies?”

“...!!” A massive shudder ran down Murayama’s spine. He felt that, even more than towards his own life, he would have to keep a lookout around him in order to maintain his manhood fully intact and operational, even if not to be necessarily used with M0 in any form or shape – the reason why it took him a bit more to return to his squad members was to uphold the necessary time to fully extinguish the boner currently being discussed at the dinner table without needing to take any actions towards it.

“So nasty~” taunted M5, a sneer on his face as he sideways glared at Murayama. “As expected of lowly forms of life.”

“Disgusting...” mumbled M4, adjusting his glasses on the bridge of his nose as he averted looking at any of the males sat down on the table. Why exactly had the human body such unnecessary characteristics? Truly, why couldn’t he have been born as something other than a human, even if only in the beginning stages of his life?

“Way to get yourself killed...” snickered M3, a smirk painted on his lips as he casually glanced to Murayama.

“Dirty~” managed to spew M2 in between all the food that he was presently munching on in his mouth, crumbs falling out from its insides as he spoke.

C’mon, keep going... Keep hitting where it hurts..., inwardly mumbled Murayama, half hiding his face with his hand even further as he hollowed himself in guilt. It’s not like I have any pride or anything.... Go on, only one left. Put the last nail in my coffin, M0!

“Isn’t it better to be a pervert than a murderer, though?” suddenly spoke M0, his eyes stuck to his plate as he was once again trying to pick a piece of karaage with his chopsticks. Though with very trembling hands and chopsticks, he finally was about to hold it in between the two wooden sticks and lift it from the plate. It went without saying that his face immediately brightened up in happiness. “M1, here.”

M1 acted almost on autopilot at the call of his name, readily turning his face in M0’s direction and greedily putting the juicy piece of fried chicken in his mouth. After deliciously munching on it, M1 gave a long kiss to M0’s cheek, a smile on his face. “Well done. I told you that you would do it if you just gave it a little bit more of time.”

“Let me try again,” readily announced M0, his eyes once again focusing on another piece of karaage and chopsticks cautiously taking a hold of it, so that it wouldn’t slip out of his grasp like all the other failed attempts.

“Reward yourself this time,” said M1, lovingly gazing at M0 as he studied his learning evolution in terms of ‘human food’. “You should taste them too, M0.”

“But I want to give it to you, M1,” confessed M0, a satisfied and happy smile on his features as he slowly motioned the piece of fried chicken towards M1’s mouth once again. “If you want to feed me, then I also want to feed you. I quite like it too, after all.”

H-He’s an angel...!, inwardly screamed all of the present soldiers, observing half flabbergasted at how innocent in general M0 was. Even though he had given them front row seats to how deadly he and all the other Ms could be when in ‘super soldier mode’.

“Y-You can’t think like that, M0!” yelped Miue after having broken himself out of his shocked demeanour. “Or else, you’ll end up being preyed on by some dirty old man!”

“Ugh...” At hearing those words, Murayama couldn’t help but groan and let his head fall against the table surface.

There it was... The last nail to his coffin dealt by his second-in-command.