Apricot Sakuraba

Infobox animanga character
name = Apricot Sakuraba
series = Galaxy Angel


caption =
first = Galaxy Angel III Zettai Ryouiki no Tobira (video game)
Galaxy Angel 3rd (manga)
Galaxy Angel-rune (anime)
last =
creator =
voiced by = Yuna Inamura
age = 14
born = May 5

nihongo|Apricot Sakuraba|アプリコット・桜葉|Apurikotto Sakuraba is a fictional character and one of the protagonists of the dating sim/ strategy game series Galaxy Angel. She debuts in (2005), the first of the sequels to the original Galaxy Angel game trilogy.

Apricot (referred to her nickname of Rico by virtually every other character) is the younger sister of Milfeulle Sakuraba, a former pilot of the Moon Angel Troupe. She is a member of the Rune Angel Troupe and pilots the Emblem Frame Cross Caliber.

Appearances

Prior to the release of the Galaxy Angel III game on 22 June 2006, Rico was among the first of the new characters to be announced by Broccoli. Her voice was first heard on 2 CDs released shortly before the game's release date. The first contained her image songs and a short message from Rico herself. The second was a duet CD with her older sister Milfeulle which featured two duets, two question and answer sessions and a mini-drama.

She is the first of the new Angel Troupe encountered in the game, and acts as a guide to the Luxiole. She is also one of the three initial team members selectable to take into battle in the early stages.

Besides the game, she is also a major character of the ongoing "Galaxy Angel III" manga and in the currently airing "Galaxy Angelrune- Galaxy Angel III", an anime based on GAII.

Characteristics

Rico is a typical anime heroine, a generally sweet and kind girl who cares deeply for her friends and family. She adores her older sister Milfeulle and tries to emulate her as much as possible. This can be seen in her choice of headwear, which bears a strong resemblance to the hairpiece Milfeulle sports in the various Galaxy Angel series. In the manga, Tequila compares Rico's adoration for Milfeulle to how the moon (Rico) receives light from the sun (Milfie).

Like most anime heroines, she is shy about her feelings for the main character (in this case, Kazuya Shiranami).

She also has a fear of males, which manifests itself as superhuman strength. Should a male touch her, she nearly always hurls the unfortunate soul bodily into the air. A frequent victim of this reflex is Takuto Mayers. This reflex appears to be triggered solely by the gender of the victim rather than threat level, as even males Rico trusts such as Tact and Morden (the Luxiole's doctor) are not immune, with the sole exception of Kazuya.

Personality

Rico is a kind and soft-spoken girl, and looks out for her friends aboard the Luxiole. In many parts of the game, she is found either helping out other crew members (often the ship's cook Ranti) or carrying out research that could help the team in future.

If chosen by Kazuya

Zettai Ryouiki no Tobira

At a point of the game, while the Luxiole undergoes repairs and resupply the Rune Angel Troupe are given leave on the resort planet Hokkori. Takuto gives Kazuya a specialty pass that gives the bearer free run of the pace. The wily commander, knowing full well the power of an Angel in love, bades him to sort out his feelings for his teammates and decide who the one he loves is.

If the player spent time developing Rico and Kazuya's friendship, she will be one of the three Angel Troupe members to invite Kazuya to the resort planet.

Kazuya knocks on Rico's door and hears her trip over things in her haste to answer. Thrilled that Kazuya's accepts her invitation, she happily prepares for the vacation.

On the resort planet, she and Kazuya are happy to spend time together and their mutual attraction (hinted at since their first meeting) grows. Unluckily, while Kazuya is gone to buy drinks Rico becomes the unwilling interest of a trio of surfers. By the time Kazuya returns, the lead surfer has already put his hand on her shoulder, triggering her fear of males and sending the hapless youth flying into the sea. While Kazuya attempts to rescue him, the other two surfers attempt to grab Rico. This attempt only results in them being hurled skywards as well. Unluckily for Kazuya, they happen to land on him, knocking him out. As he was swimming towards the first surfer at the time, Rico is forced to drag him back to the beach and gives him mouth-to-mouth resuscitation (and inadvertently stealing his all-important first kiss).

Upon regaining consciousness, Kazuya resolves to help Rico overcome her fear. To this end, he rallies a number of the men aboard the Luxiole Rico is familiar with, including Tact, Kazuya's friend and ship's chief cook Ranti and the ship's doctor Morden. They take turns touching Rico on the shoulder in an attempt to help her get used to a male's touch. Despite many painful landings, the men refuse to give up. A touched Rico offers her hand to Ranti to pull him up, prompting everyone to cheer she was finally able to touch a man without throwing him into the air. Tact happily puts his hand on her shoulder as he congratulates her, only to be thrown into the air. The men conclude the experiment was a partial success: at least Rico could now shake hands with men without her reflex action kicking in.

Shortly thereafter, however, Kazuya begins to notice Rico is studiously avoiding him. On the other hand, he sees her happily conversing with other male crewmembers and begins to wonder if he did something to offend her. Ranti jokes that perhaps she only originally hung around with Kazuya because he was the only male that didn't trigger as violent a reaction as others (Rico would only shove Kazuya, while she would bodily hurl other males into the air). Now that she wasn't as afraid of men anymore, he wasn't that necessary.

The resulting discomfort between Rico and Kazuya quickly becomes apparent to Tact, who assigns them to a mission to the planet Celdar. They are to pick up Forte, who travelled there to confer with the Emperor of Celdar (and by association NEUE). Tact clearly hopes that the journey there, with the two of them on their own, will force them to iron out their problems.

Unluckily, the shuttle is bombarded with debris from the earlier battle against the Crust Breakers threatening Celdar. Soon, Rico warns that the shuttle's engines have been damaged and are going to detonate. Both Kazuya and Rico decide that the only course is to don spacesuits and abandon ship.

However, Kazuya quickly realises that the debris field he and Rico find themselves in is extremely dangerous, as the explosion from the shuttle will send shards of metal all over like shrapnel. He moves to embrace a surprised Rico, then maneuvers himself so that he is between her and the explosion. Rico immediately knows what he intends to do, but is unable to act before the shuttle explodes.

As Kazuya feared, the explosion sends the debris flying. Some shards strike him, piercing his suit and badly wounding him enough that he coughs up blood. Rico manages to seal the tears in his suit, but it is very clear Kazuya is in bad shape. Kazuya, believing he's going to die, confesses his feelings for her before blacking out.

When he awakens in the medical bay of the Luxiole, Rico scolds him for thinking she had lost interest in him. She had simply been trying to get to know other male crewmembers better, since because of her fear she only had limited experience with them. Rico then asks if there is anything at all she can do for him, and continues to insist despite Kazuya's assurances he's fine. Finally, Kazuya half-jokingly asks her to lie down with him. To his surprise, she shyly agrees.

While lying side-by-side, Rico asks Kazuya if he remembered what he said as he was blacking out before admitting her own feelings for him. The two share a quick kiss before Nano-Nano bursts in to check on Kazuya, causing the two to attempt to leap apart (forgetting that they were on a bed and causing them to crash onto the floor).

Later, in unison with Emperor Zeldan of Celdar Kazuya and Rico's feelings are used to force open a gate to ABSOLUTE, where the enemy commander Pareru has fled with the captive Milfie. With Milfie gone, travel between EDEN and NEUE is impossible as ABSOLUTE (with Milfie as gatekeeper) is the only way between dimensions. This means that people from EDEN, such as Tact and Rico, are essentially stranded without a way home. Using the power of Kazuya and Rico's feelings, along with that of the Emperor, Tact plans to lead a strike force into ABSOLUTE to rescue Milfie and put an end to Pareru's insurrection.

Something goes wrong, however, and only the Luxiole makes it through the gate. While Forte and the Moon Angel Troupe sneak into the Master Core of ABSOLUTE to rescue Milfie, Tact and the Rune Angels engage Pareru's forces. Pareru reveals his trump card: the Shadow Moon (as opposed to the White Moon that created the Emblem Frames and the Black Moon used by Eonia during his coup d'etat).

Just when all seems lost, the Elle Ciel emerges from the EDEN gate and so the Rune Angel Troupe finally has the opportunity to fight alongside their predecessors the Moon Angels. After a fierce battle with both the Shadow Moon and Pareru's personal flagship, peace is finally restored.

In the epilogue, Kazuya demonstrates his cooking talent to Milfie, who teases Rico by offering to feed Kazuya some food.

External links

* [http://galaxyangel.wikia.com/wiki/Apricot_Sakuraba Apricot Sakuraba] on [http://galaxyangel.wikia.com/wiki/Main_Page The Galaxy Angel Wiki] at [http://www.wikia.com Wikia] .