I looked down at my watch, and at the kanmuso group. It seemed that they had no sense of naval brotherhood. I had to resist the urge to call them out, but it wasn't time for that. If they couldn't take a joke, they wouldn't be able to handle any sort of long term operation. Ah, civilians. I remember the draft days when I had to turn modern young men into a navy combat team.
"Civilian," I said, quickly switching over to my full military bearing. I hated to use this, but I felt disrespected, and disrespect was one of the few things I would not tolerate. "Control your fleet and learn the rules of the road," I said, referring to both the book of regulations on ship navigation, and his fleet, the insult a well-practiced one from dealing with brats from the Naval Academy that had chips on their shoulder.
"Shipgirl", I offered you a hand in friendship. I'm sorry but I know nothing about this strange mixed up world, I see half the people here with the impression that this is fun. We are in an unknown warzone with alien creatures that apparently want to kill us. I was trying to have some levity, but if you want to talk down to me, I will treat you with the professional curtsey that I give the Soviet Union. Now, if you'll excuse me," I offered a proper salute, "I'm going to talk to my trusty second in command. By the way," I start to walk off, but I toss a coin at the man, "Here's a quarter. Go find your ship sense of humor."
I stared at his salute in confusion. "Why are you saluting someone you acknowledged as a civ...." My voice trailed off as I noticed that Jack, Cole, Atlanta, and Juneau were all returning the salute with a great deal of reluctance. "Oh, that's why." Then I processed the comment about 'rules of the road.' I dug my wallet out off my vest and pulled my driver's license out of that and held it up so he could see it. "What does THIS and driving on a road..." I pointed to the license for emphasis, "...have anything to do..." I gestured out to sea, "...with being in a warzone surrounded by Abyssals? I honestly have no clue what you're talking about though."
When the man tossed the coin, I did try to catch it instinctively with my bandaged right hand. However, without the depth perception of my right eye, I flubbed the catch and ended up dropping the coin. I glumly looked at the quarter on the ground, taunting me, and then looked back at this officer. After a moment, I processed the rest of his words, and I began to become a pressure-cooker of seething hatred. Still, I clamped down hard on that hatred, although I would to release it later -perhaps in some sparring with Jack- and spoke in a dull, flat voice devoid of my boiling emotions. "Ah, I'm sorry for misunderstanding your joke after nearly having died yesterday in combat with Abyssals and somehow recovering from most of my injuries overnight. I'm sorry that I apparently find having my legs shredded from sympathetic damage to my own warship as something
fun. I'm sorry that my first experience with actual naval combat was yesterday where I nearly got half of my division -including myself- killed, because I am a know-nothing, armchair-commander. I'm sorry that I
dared to feel offended when you alleged that I might abuse the trust and such of the shipgirls in my division
as an honest joke after one admitted to coming back from being killed."
I fixed my stare on him as Jack looked worriedly at me, "Hey, Tiger, calm down. This isn't worth getting angry o...ver..." Her voice trailed off as I pulled a pocket knife out from one of my pockets, flicked the blade out, and proceeded to use it to cut off the multitude of bandages covering the right side of my face. "Tiger! What are you doing? The doctor said you needed to keep your eye covered."
I looked at Jack and smiled with a sudden serenity that came from a surety of purpose even as freshly-exposed wounds began to bleed once more. "No need to be worried, Jack. I'm perfectly calm." I looked back at this Smith officer and put away my knife while I felt Jack immediately and frantically grab some gauze wrap from the first-aid kit in my pack and began re-wrapping the bandages over my injuries. "Now, I might well be a civilian, but we clearly have some issues since you're talking about the Soviet Union in the present-tense. For me, it only exists in the historical tense, so I would say that there's a good chance that we come from two different cultures and upbringings. With that in mind, I am an
engineer and that means I solve problems. I am very good at my job." I left the implications hanging as the officer's partner or friend walked up to him. Maybe we could all just walk away now with just implied, mutual hate or distaste on both sides and not come to blows. I was probably going to regret everything I had said earlier, but I hadn't taken any of my ADD medication today and was still probably under the residual effects of the painkillers with how little pain I had felt removing the bandages around and over my eye.
I give a proper facing movement as I walk away, meeting up with Klondike, "Even in this world there are some disrespectful girls," I say. "Can't do any favors, right?"
Klondike laughs, "Well sir, she's a cruiser. Cruisers are the brats of the fleet, without the pride of a battleship, without the poise of an aircraft carrier, and without the spirit of a destroyer." I smiled. She always knew how to make it up to me.
I'll admit the shipgirl partner had not done anything to draw the ire of my group until she opened her mouth. I wanted to say something witty in reply, but nothing came to mind before I had to grab hold of Cole while Jack held onto Atlanta and Aurora who had both gotten justifiably upset at this female-dog-reject insulting them without any idea as to how they had suffered and fought for humanity's sake. None of us noticed quiet, unassuming Juneau until it was too late to stop the light cruiser.
Even from the short time I had spent with these shipgirls, I had already grasped the core aspect of Juneau: she did not like or even want to fight. However, once you put her into a fight, according to a story Atlanta had told Jack as we had walked to the mess hall before this interruption, Juneau was an absolute terror in a fight, fully willing to dive in the thickest parts of a fight to rescue her friends and victims of the Abyssals. In short, I considered her a hero on the order of the nigh-legendary Sargent York of World War One fame. So, when I saw her somehow get around everyone and block the withdrawal of Mr. and Mrs. No Social Graces, well, I was worried that she was about to tear them apart physically or verbally.
Juneau bowed deeply with a kind, gentle smile on her face and spoke in a sincere voice, "Please allow this fellow Lieutenant to honestly apologize for any insult or disrespect that you felt was directed toward you by the members of this division. That being said..." She straightened up, and her simple smile shifted into a predatory grin with bared teeth. "...I would kindly advise you to cease inciting unrest and using insulting language against those who have nearly died in the..." She put a long, elegant finger on the corner of her mouth as she looked skyward in thought, "...Let's call it the past twenty-four hours in actual combat. Furthermore, I would request that you refrain from insulting my sisters and friends. I do not mind if you insult me, because I have been nothing more than a useless waste of effort and lives since the first time I was a steel ship crewed by the sailors of the United States Navy. However, I will not abide by you insulting those whom I treasure and value. Even someone as worthless as myself should be more than enough to deal with you. After all," Juneau looked them right in the eyes. "Better to be a mere 'brat of the fleet' than a self-entitled, prima-donna support ship who is completely ignorant of those whom she insults."
After that, she bowed to them as if she had not threatened to tear them apart or implied that they were worth less than herself. Then, she walked around them back to our slack-jawed division and grabbed Atlanta's arm -and the rest of us through our linked arms- and dragged us off to the mess hall while waving kindly to that admiral guy that the shipgirls all knew on our way but not saying a word. Once we got the the mess hall, she began to tear up, so everyone unlinked their arms while Jack and Atlanta went over to hug the poor cruiser spirit. Finally, she quieted down, we all went inside. I saw the familiar faces of Mike and Calcifer, so I waved to them both before proceeding with the rest of the group to fill up all of our plates and take up seats near Mike and Calcifer and eat in silence, hoping that none of us would set off again.
I looked tiredly at Mike and Calcifer. "Please tell me that your mornings have lacked a self-entitled, but not by me, officer named Lieutenant something-something Smith. Please say that your mornings have been better than mine." I absentmindedly wiped off some the blood trail remaining on my cheek from cutting off the bandages earlier. "You have had better mornings, right?"
