The Alpha & The Indonesian

Chapter 47: Just a Day

Apologies for the huge time skip. This chapter will start in year 2020.

***

Andrew POV

"Alright. I'll see you in a moment. Bye-bye," I said before I closed the phone. When I look up, Karll's looking at me with a wide smile, hands behind his back.

"What?"

"Guess what I got~" he sing-songed before showed me a huge book from his back.

"Ta-daaa... Disney Weddings sent you their catalogue of weddings~!" he cheered.

I groaned while facepalming. "Oh, Lord... remind me again why do I ever asked you to handle my wedding?"

"Because, Luna Andrew, is that:

1) your trusted bridestory website is not helpful enough for your wedding resources,

2) I am pregnant, and

3) you can't get married in Indonesia," he explained.

I raised my eyebrows and said, "Do you have any idea how much it hurts?"

"The fact that I am right?"

I replied, in Dorothy Zbornak style, "No, Karll. The fact that my country's marriage policies are much backwards than its invaders, and the fact that they can't accept the fact that Muslim people can accept gay marriages."

Karll looked at me with a stink eye.

"Besides, why does it have to be Disney?"

"You haven't heard? Starting last year, you can get married with Doraemon as your officator," he grinned extra wide, flipping pages of the catalogue before landed on a page where a lesbian couple kissed in front of Doraemon, Dorami, Mickey and Minnie Mouse, with Shanghai Disneyland's signature Enchanted Storybook Castle in the background. (And I thought P.R.China doesn't allow LGBTQA couples to marry in their territory...)

Unlike this time, it literally took me by surprise when I heard it for the first time.

Out of a blue, in the midst of finalizing the media-crazed acquisition of 21st Century Fox, The Walt Disney Company suddenly announced on NYSE that they bought Fujiko Pro (basically the owner of Doraemon, Perman, Esper Mami, Kiteretsu and more...) for US$ 19,3 million, or to be exact, 2 trillion yen, with antitrust commissions around the world and shareholders of both parties agreed to it.

Well, it was supposed to be, JP¥ 2.112.930.000.000, a symbolic purchase since according to Disney CEO Bob Iger, Doraemon was born in 3 September 2112 (which is correct), thus the gagging paycheck that make Hiroshi Fujimoto's widow and descendants live in luxury.

I am nevertheless gagged by the news, and so does everyone else in the world.

On the bright side, the anime and yearly movies still continue to air (Although the yearly movies can be accounted as a recurring income, it'll never beat Disney's box office income, but hey, I can watch them on Disney+ without dubbing!), Fujiko F Fujio Museum & Hometown Gallery is still managed independently (kinda like Walt Disney Family Museum in San Francisco), and there's a few dark rides are coming to Epcot and Tokyo Disneyland inspired by Doraemon movies. (Yay for Doraemon Secret Gadgets Museum Tour Ride on Epcot!)

Unfortunately though, except in Japan, Fujiko F Fujio's mangas are no longer distributed by Viz Media/Shogakukan, but by Disney's book publishing arm (unless translated into local languages).

It is quite unfortunate that Doraemon is more popular worldwide than Fujiko Pro's other characters, but there will be a revival of characters like Chimpui, Perman, 21 Emon or Esper Mami in some ways. After all, even if they got the fame, they didn't penetrate the Northern American, Oceanic, and Western European borders.