Part 56
At least on paper, Major Mack Solette of the US Army Nursing Corps was refreshed and ready for duty. He'd showered—and after almost two days of letting his own stink ferment in a rumpled flight suit, he
needed a shower. He'd shaved and changed out of said disgusting flight suit and into a fresh set of ACUs. And they were
fresh.
Someone—Solette's money was on Tenryuu. The old chunniboat had a soft spot the size of Musashi's ego—had laundered his fatigues while he'd been enjoying the relatively warm water of the hotel shower. Not only was the speckled-gray fabric
clean, it still had that fresh-out-of-the-dryer warmth.
Top top things off, the major had a belly full of pancakes courtesy of none other than the Battleship
New Jersey herself. He'd barely made it halfway though the towering plate before calling it quits. For all her prowess on the water, Jersey apparently didn't have the faintest idea how much—or little—normal people ate.
Solette stifled a chuckle at the thought. He'd seen first-hand the limitless appetite of Nagato and Kongou. But according to the rumor mill, Jersey could eat them both under the table without breaking a sweat. And walk away without even the tiniest bulge around her belly.
And he'd
seen her bare midriff before. Admittedly, he'd been slightly preoccupied with helping her engineering crews mount a new range finder. But
damn, he'd seen
Green Berets who weren't as shredded as that girl's abs. No wonder that professor had the hots for her. He just felt bad for any female sailors who had to put up with her.
But that was a thought for another time. Solette turned to his mirror to make sure his uniform was sitting properly. At least, that was his intention. But try as he might, he couldn't bring himself to meet the eyes of the man in the mirror.
The man who'd taken an angle grinder to a scared little girl. Hell, he
knew he had to do it. But still. Little girl. Angle grinder. Just the thought of someone doing
that made his blood boil.
"Fuck" breathed the Major. If he wanted a cushy job with no moral quandaries, he'd have joined the Air Force. Right now, he had a follow up to take care of. He took a final second to make sure the velcro-backed patches on his uniform—including the unintentionally-lewd "1st Shipgirl Maintenance Command" patch Akashi had come up with—were solidly stuck in place. Satisfied, he opened the door.
And was promptly hit by a speeding freight train.
Even if the force of the blow
hadn't knocked every shred of wind out of him, it wouldn't have mattered. His body launched across the room, bounced off the mattress, crashed against the table—sending the leftover pancakes flopping all over his chest—and finally came to a rest against the carpeted floor. All before his mind had even realize he'd been hit.
Solette tried to say something to register his surprise in a manner befitting his rank and station. But all that came out was a small "Guh."
"Thank you!" squealed a loud, yet distinctly small and girlish, voice from somewhere around his midsection.
"You saved my sister!" said another voice. One very similar yet somehow even
more thunderously bombastic.
And then, suddenly, Solette felt someone plant a very,
very timid kiss on his chin.
"Uh…" Solette couldn't manage anything more lucid. Not until his mind
finally caught up with the situation at hand.
He was on his back covered with pancakes, syrup, and destroyer girls. Johnston—and the feathery headdress she always wore—was snuggling into his belly like her life depended on it. Beside her was Hoel—he'd recognize that fiery ponytail and sleeveless top anywhere. By the look of it, the Fletchers were frantically struggling to be the one to hug him the most.
Completing the trio was the very small form of Sammy. Unlike the others,
she was standing off by his side while her face slowly attempted to blush into infrared.
"Girls," Solette brought his arms around the two Fletchers in a hug. Mostly from lack of anything better to do. "You mind?"
"Hmm?" The two destroyers glanced up at him. Their eyes glistened jewels, and their faces all but glowed with unrestrained thankfulness.
"I kinda need to stand," said the Major.
Hoel blinked.
A second later, Johnston blinked.
Sammy slapped her hand to her blushing face.
"I don't follow," said Hoel.
"Oooh, syrup!" Johnston lapped up the puddle of pancakes and maple syrup splattered all over Solette's jacket with a contented smile.
Sammy's other hand joined the first in cradling her face.
"Mind letting me up?" asked the Major.
"Oh, sure," said Hoel.
"But first!" Johnston smirked. Then both Fletchers pushed up to plant kisses on his cheeks. Kisses that, in Johnston's case, were very
very sticky. Somehow, Solette didn't really mind.
"You're good people, Major!" said Hoel as she rolled off his stomach onto the floor.
Johnston grunted something along those lines, but the chunks of pancake and syrup hanging out of her mouth muffled her exact words.
"I'm sorry about your food," said Sammy.
Solette waved off her concerns with a glimmer of a smile that he just couldn't make go away. "Don't worry, kiddos. Those are just leftovers."
"Duh Guh!" said Johnston with a furious thumbs-up.
"Can say that again," said Solette. He frowned as he glanced at himself in the mirror. His jacket was throughly splattered with syrup and pancake shrapnel, though the damage was at least confined to that one article of clothing.
"How's Heermann doing?" Solette shrugged off his jacket as carefully as he could. Uniform regulations be damned, he wasn't wearing something that sticky around. Besides, he was an Army nurse taking care of Navy sailors. Who were also warships. Nothing here made sense.
"Better," said Sammy. The little destroyer escort stuffed her hands into the pockets of her wildly over sized jacket. "Her chief engineer said your work was, uh, 'not totally awful'."
Solette shrugged. Given how utterly protective of the Sovereign Nation of Engineering most chiefs—or at least most faerie chiefs—were, 'not totally awful' was high praise.
"She's really feeling better!" Hoel's face twisted into a playful smirk. "Good enough to start a splash fight."
"That she cheats at," Johnston's feathers slumped against her head as she grumbled.
"Because you cheated first," said Hoel.
"Did not!"
"You used your fire hoses," Hoel rolled her eyes so hard it looked like she was trying to unscrew them from their sockets.
"That's not cheating!" said Johnston. The little destroyer jolted forwards towards her sister, the feathers of her headdress bristling. "Doc! DocDocDocDoc! Tell her that's not cheating."
"It
is though!" said Hoel. "Doc, tell her it's cheating."
"Uh…" Solette blinked. He wasn't used to destroyer-girls being so… animated. "I'm gonna…" He raised a finger to make a point, then promplty discarded the idea. "Go."
—|—|—
"So, how's my favorite patient doing?" asked Solette—sans sticky syrup-covered jacket this time—as he knelt down next to Heermann's hot tub.
There were other girls present of course. Akagi happily floating on her back with a massive tub of ice cream balanced against her tummy. Musashi and Jersey were bellowing at one another while they fought the most spirited splash fight the Major had ever seen. Every so often, Mutsu would send a wave their way, then just smirk coyly until the super battleships resumed their endless war. Naka was off doing… something with the Japanese destroyers, and Nagato was staring at a soggy mass of pulpy paper with all the determination her boilers could muster.
But Solette didn't really
care about the other girls. Not right this second at least. As much as he—sometimes—enjoyed their antics, he had more important things to deal with.
"Wait?" Heermann leaned forwards in her hot tub, her sinewy little arms resting on the tiled rim. "I'm your favorite?"
"Well," Solette shrugged, "Yeah."
"Yessssss!" Heermann pumped her little fist in the air, her face splitting into an enormous grin.
"You going to answer my question?" asked the Major, but he already had an idea how she was going to answer. Destroyers were small, fast ships. They only had room for one emotion at a time, and they tended to throw themselves into whatever it was. If Heermann was this happy, she couldn't be in
too much pain.
"Oh, uh, sorry," Heermann blushed as she straighted herself out. "I'm feeling a lot better!"
"How's your pain?" asked Solette. The question was always hit-or-miss with shipgirls. He'd seen Inazuma crying from a skinned knee. But he'd also seen Kuma run headfirst into a wall fast enough to crack the cinder blocks, and
she just laughed it off.
"Um…" Heermann bit her lip and puffed out her cheeks. Her brows knitted together and the bridge of her nose crinkled. "Um… it… kinda tickles?"
"It tickles?" Solette couldn't muster up any kind of emotion to work into his voice.
"Mmhm!" said Heermann. "Like… like someone's poking me with a feather. But from the inside, you know?"
"I… really don't." Solette shook his head, "Can you let me see?"
"Mmhm!" Heermann flopped onto her back and rested her stumpy legs on the side of the hot tub.Gone were the twisted gashes hemorrhaging more bloody oil than her body should have been able to hold. In their place was smooth, shiny flesh. And also smooth, shiny metal. It was like looking down the inside of a metal tube. Or a warship's hull, for that matter. There was even a--
Solette blinked.
Yup. There was even a batch of tiny faeries wearing welding gear busying themselves inside Heermann's legs. One of them even flipped her mask up to wave hello.
"I will never get used to that," muttered Solette as he returned the wave.
The faerie just flipped her mask back down and went back to work.
Solette shook his head. "Heermann?"
"Mmhm?"
"Can I talk to your chief?"
"Oh, sure!" the destroyer reached into the pocket of her rolled-up pants. A few minutes later, her hand came back bearing a tiny figure in grungy coveralls. A figure which was then deposited atop Heermann's head like a teeny, grumpy hat.
"Chief," Solette offered a salute.
The faerie responded with one of her own. Or at least the best approximation a faerie's tiny, stumpy limbs could manage. And than she launched into a full report of Heermann's condition. Complete with diminutive illustrations annotated entirely with variations on the word 'hey.' Solette wasn't sure how, but he understood every word the engineer said.
It was a very surreal experience for the Major. For all intents and purposes, he was being lectured to by his patient's immune system. It was… actually, a lot easier than having to diagnose things the old fashioned way. If
people had faeries, his job wouldn't pay
nearly as well.
—|—|—
Admiral Williams paced across the worn-down carpet in his video-conference room, his scowl deepening with each step. There were many things he hated about ordering kanmusu into battle.
He hated sending girls young enough to be his daughters—or granddaughters, in the case of some of the destroyers—into battle. He knew it was necessary, knew they'd endure more punishment than any human ever could and come back ready for more. But he hated it all the same. He'd joined the Navy to keep the ravages of war
away from children, not to send them into its bloody maw.
He hated the very war he was fighting. The abyssals struck where they wished, when they wished, without any pattern or reason. If they had a command structure, a logistical base, or
any kind of supply lines he could strike, they were shrouded deep behind the curtain of their own seas. There wasn't any 'soft underbelly' to this monster. His only option was to fight it on its own terms.
But most of all, he hated that he was all but useless. He was a sailor of the Information age. Combat networking, joint operations, and all the trappings of warfare in the age of the missile were his bread and butter. Years at the academy and decades of duty had honed his skills to a razor edge. But those skills were useless against abyssals. Useless in the age of the Big Gun.
He couldn't use
any of the sensor platforms at his disposal to help his girls. He couldn't even offer them advice. All of them—even down to miss Poi herself—knew more about gunnery tactics than he ever would. Giving them advice was like an Ensign lecturing a Master Chief.
But there was one thing left for him. One singular task that only an Admiral could perform: Organization. There weren't enough girls to cover every inch of shoreline. Finding out who to put where was the delicate game that Williams and his compatriots across the oceans had been playing for months.
He only hoped they were winning.
But before he could pace too deeply into brooding territory, the giant flat screen dominating the wall flickered to life.
"Admiral Goto," Williams offered a salute to the ragged-looking Japanese man. Technically, the two men held the same rank. But Williams only commanded a single ocean. Goto defended an entire nation.
"Williams," Goto returned the salute with a tired salute of his own. By the look of it, he hadn't slept much in the past few days. His chin was speckled with the scruff of several days without a shave. His eyes were lidded and surrounded by dark, weary circles.
Behind him, the command cruiser Ooyodo peeked out from behind a wall of monitors. Williams could only see her from the glasses up, but he could sense the concern radiating from her outwardly-stoic being.
"The Princess is dead," said Williams. Goto had to know by now, it'd been almost two days since the battle. But a little good news never hurt anyone. Especially one hanging so close to the end of their rope.
"I heard," A hint of a smile twitched at the corner of Goto's mouth, but only a hint.
"Your girls did excellent work."
"As did yours," said Williams, "Which brings me to our agreement."
"Straight to the point," Goto sighed.
"If I could offer you my ships, I would. But the security of the home islands must come first."
Williams slouched back into a chair. The Admiral was right. But it didn't make him any happier, "Admiral, we can't win this war unless we can take the fight
to the abyssals."
"Which is why I'm sending you everything I can spare," said Goto. He leaned over towards Ooyodo and muttered something in Japanese the microphone didn't quite pick up.
"I've asked my secretary ship to join us. She knows my girls better than all of us."
Almost as soon as the words left his mouth, another window popped up on the flatscreen.
The image was noticeably lower quality, probably one of the waterproof laptops the girls were issued, but it was enough to make out the striking figure of battleship Nagato. She was clad in an… equally striking two-tone swimsuit, and judging by the blurry shapes behind her, she was missing out on quite the splash fight.
But the battleship's face was nothing but a mask of calm duty as she snapped off a salute.
"Konichiwa, teitoku," she said, "and good evening, Admiral Williams."
Both admirals returned the battleship's salute.
"As I was saying," said Williams, "We'll honor our agreement." He flipped open a notebook, skimming though the pages until he found what he was looking for. "We need heavies and you need escorts."
"I'm listening," said Goto.
"White Plains is too slow for any battle group." Williams scanned though his notes, more as a formality than to refresh his memory. "Sammy and England aren't built for surface combat either. And Borie, for all her bluster, is too old to fight with the Fletchers." The admiral glanced up from his notes. "I propose rolling them into a dedicated escort division, along with whatever ships you can spare."
"I recommend adding Musashi to that division," said Nagato as a splash crested over her back, damping her raven-black hair to her skull. The battleship huffed, her nostrils flaring minutely as she shook her hair back to its normal shape.
"What's your reasoning?" asked Goto, suddenly leaning towards his computer with a glint in his eye.
"Sirs," Nagato coughed,
"At breakfast, Musashi ate significantly more than myself and Mutsu combined. Sortieing her with any kind of regularity would be ruinous. But we can't simply confine her. Not now that the world knows of her return."
"Can't station her overseas either," grumbled Goto.
"Sending our greatest battleship away… morale would never recover."
"So stick her on convoy duty," said Williams with a smile. Clever battleship. "She's still 'defending Japan', but we'll pick up her tab when she's stateside."
Nagato nodded.
"So," said Williams, "Who else can I have?"
"Blunt as always, Admiral," said Nagato with a smile.
"Not many, I'm afraid," said Goto.
"Nagato, Mutsu, and their escorts are to steam for Japan the moment they're able. You'll have to make do with Kongou and Kirishima."
"Understood," said Williams. As much as he'd love to have the two super dreadnoughts at his disposal, the trade made sense. Kongou and her sister were exceptionally fast ships, but they carried painfully little armor.
They had to pick a fight on
their terms, or use their speed to disengage. Nagato and Mutsu had the belts to stand their ground no matter the circumstances. The super dreadnoughts could manage defense, while Kongou and Kirishima lived for fast, slashing offensive actions. "What about-"
Goto cut him off,
"I know what you're going to say, and no. Akagi will be returning to japan the moment she's able." The Admiral let out a ragged sigh and rubbed at his temples.
"The situation's deteriorating over here. I can't even offer you Ryuujou anymore."
Williams sighed. Honestly, it was a miracle he'd gotten the carriers long enough to sink the Northern Princess. Japan's carriers were the strongest part of a frustratingly fragile defense.
—|—|—
It took almost a full two hours for the two admirals—and one battleship—to finally haggle their way though dividing up the kanmusume.
Goto had other duties to attend to, so he left Nagato to advise the American in organizing his girls into useful fighting elements. It took the two of them almost another two hours to come up with a TOE that had even half a chance of working. But, at long last, the two had worked out something that looked winnable.
Williams tapped his pen against the hardwood table and scanned over the throughly-annotated legal pad one last time. Every decision he'd made made sense. Or at lest it did when he made it. Now it was time to check that he hadn't inadvertently walked himself into something moronic.
Starting from the top, he had…
KANBATDIV 1
-USS New Jersey (flag)
-JMSDF Kongou
KANBATDIV 2
-USS Washington (flag)
-JMSDF Kirishima
Two-ship divisions weren't ideal, but they were the best he could do with the ships he had. Divvying up the Kongous had been the hard part. Wash and Kirishima's night battle was legendary, and Williams had worried about bad blood.
He still did, but Nagato had insisted that Kirishima found the engagement more… romantic than horrifying. It worried him that that made perfect sense. In any case, Nagato had said in no uncertain terms that keeping Jersey and Kongou around one another was essential for their sanity, though she neglected to explain further.
At least the destroyers were easier to manage. They'd practically organized themselves into neat three-ship elements. Apperently it was in a destroyer-girl's nature to find two like-minded shipgirls and become best friends.
KANDESRON 1
-USS Hoel (flag)
-USS Johnston
-USS Heermann
KANDESRON 2
-USS Kidd (flag)
-USS O'Bannon
-USS William D. Porter
KANDESRON 3
-JMSDF Naka (flag)
-JMSDF Yuudachi
-JMSDF Fubuki
Looking at the list, Williams couldn't quite tell which squadron would cause him the most headaches. The taffies were… the taffies. Their antics went without saying.
But Kidd had gotten a reputation of running around the base with an entrenching tool 'looking for treasure'. And always being able to produce a bottle of Captain Morgan no matter how implausible the circumstances. And the less said about Dee, the better.
And then there was Poi.
At least Tenryuu's DesDiv six promised to be a pain-free unit. Despite her bombastic reputation, she and her kindergarten had a reputation for quiet professionalism at sea. The third-generation special-type destroyers had precious little aggressive combat experience, but their expedition record was second to none.
The Puget sound, and the long, confined Strait of Juan de Fuca that fed it, was perfect destroyer territory. Williams had no doubt the five girls could hold down the proverbial fort, leaving his other units free to push the offensive.
But there was something lacking. A hole that organizing out his girls had only made more obvious. He was
desperately short on cruisers. He could make do with the ships he had—he didn't have a choice not to. But he'd kill for a decent CRUDIV or two.
—|—|—
On paper, Yeoman Sarah Gale should be happy as a clam. It was just a few weeks until Christmas, and the streets of downtown Seattle were dusted with just the perfect amount of crunchy white snow. And it was
white. The snow hadn't hung around long enough to turn into the sludgy off-brown gunk citied turned it into.
No, on this gloriously crisp December evening, the snow was a perfect white blanket. It crunched under the sailor's calf-length leather boots like fresh apples. Gale loved the snow, but that wasn't even the end of the good news.
She was on her way to see her favorite band, with some amazing seats to boot, all on the Navy's dime. Her morale shouldn't have been
able to be higher.
But, as they say, no plan survives first contact with the enemy. Or in this case, with a certain friendly North Carolina-class battleship and her private clutch of destroyers.
Gale buried her face in her warm woolen scarf and glanced over at the cluster of shipgirls.
The destroyers were all clustered around Wash, and each one of them was bundled up with a knitted scarf. They were still wearing shorts, of course. But it didn't matter because
scarves. But that wasn't the cause of Gale's discomfort. She'd long since gotten used to the insanities of working around ship girls.
No, the source of Yeoman Sarah Gale's suffering was the battleship at the head of the little flotilla. A battleship who'd traded her usual skirt and thigh-highs for a 'casual' pair of jeans and a turtleneck sweater.
Gale had to force the word 'casual' into mental finger quotes just to hold her sanity. There wasn't a thing casual about that outfit. Wash's knit sweater did absolutely nothing to hide the bulge of her—if Gale was being hones there—enviably large chest. If anything, the subtle texture to the sweater only made the perfection of the battleship's curves that much more obvious.
And if Gale tried to walk
behind Wash to keep those North-Carolina-class torpedo bulges out of sight, she was treated to the image of Wash's stern in snug-fitting jeans. The way the tastefully-warn denim moved with each step was mesmerizing.
It was like watching poetry in motion. The battleship's broad hip would swing out, her butt tensing as her muscles swing her leg forwards. Then she'd repeat the process again. And again. And again. And again. It was an almost hypnotic kind of beauty.
Like watching the northern lights dance and play in the sky. Swoosh… swoosh… swoosh…
Gale was so entranced by the battleship's sashay, she didn't even process that the little flotilla had arrived at their destination.
The menial part of her brain, the part that managed standing in formation while the rest of her caught a few more precious moments of sleep, must've handed over their tickets. The next thing Gale knew, she was settling into her seat with Wash on one side and Kidd on the other.
"Concerts certainly have changed," said Wash.
"Whu?" exposited Gale.
The battleship pointed to the massive LED screens at the back of the concert hall. But Gale wasn't looking where she was pointing, she couldn't tear her eyes of the way the battleship's sweater puckered around her chest. "It's all very fancy," said Wash.
"Oh, uh…" Gale wiped at her mouth. She wasn't drooling, was she? Please don't be drooling… "Yeah, uh they do really good shows."
"This is so
exciting!" Kidd bounced on her chair with a gigantic smile on her face and— And a bottle of Captain Morgan in her hands.
"Kidd?"
"Yarr?" Kidd spun around in her seat, her skull-and-crossbones bandanna whipping around behind her little head.
"Where'd you get that?"
Kidd blinked.
Gale scowled.
Wash stared at the empty stage with rapturous interest.
Bannie bit a chunk out of a raw potato.
Somewhere in the background, there was a loud crash followed by a quiet "Immokay."
"I found it," said Kidd as she
slowly slid the bottle behind her.
"I can still see it." Gale couldn't have rolled her eyes harder if she tried.
"Fiiiiine," Kidd huffed and handed her booty over to the sailor.
"You can have it back when we leave," said Gale.
"Okay," Kidd smiled and leaned over to give Gale the best hug she could manage without leaving her seat. "You're good people, matey!"
"Kidd," Gale shook her head, "You're not a pirate."
"But she
is a destroyer!" said Bannie around a good-sized chunk of potato.
"Mmhm!" said Dee. The klutzy destroyer had her hands shoved deeply into her own pockets, and by the looks of it, she'd improvised a seatbelt for herself out of duct tape.
"Basically the same thing," said Wash. The battleship was sporting a grin that was either knowing or teasingly flirty, but Gale couldn't for the life of her figure out which.
"Just…" Gale buried her hands in her face. "Watch the show, would you?"
"Okay!" chorused the destroyers.
"Sorry," said Wash with a surprisingly shy—or was it coy—nod.
The next few minutes played out in relative silence. Every few seconds, Bannie would take a loud bite of her potato before going back to blissfully chewing away. Dee'd let out inarticulate noises of glee every time she noticed something new, but she made sure to keep her hands to herself.
And Wash would… breath. Gale wouldn't have noticed if it wasn't for the rhythmic swell and ebb of the battleship's colossal torpedo bulges in that snug-fitting sweater. But at least she'd get to listen to some music soon enough. Just a few more minutes…
Gale was so fixated on Wash's breathing that she totally missed the band coming out on stage, and the roar of applause that generated.
But then the gentle plucking of a single cello cut though her distraction like a knife though snow.
The sailor couldn't help but smile as she let the music wash over her. The gentle, friendly strings danced like eddies in a peaceful river. And then…
The
orchestra arrived. Powerful, thunderous, driving. The music hammered away like a fleet of battleships smashing though freezing surf.
"CHRISTMAAAAASS!!!" Kidd stood on her chair, one little fist flung high in the air as she screamed with all her energy. Her face—somehow smeared with red and green warpaint—was the very picture of excitement.
Gale burst out laughing, as did everyone within twenty seats of them.
Then one of the guitarists threw his hand up. "Christmas!"
"Christmas!" echoed back someone from the crowd. Then another. Then another. Then
Wash was standing and belting out the word with all her voice. Then Gale found herself standing to her feet and throwing her fist in the air with all her might, "Christmas!"
And then the arena fell dead silent. It took Gale a second to figure out why.
There was a girl standing quietly on the stage. A girl who hadn't been there a second ago. A girl with raven black hair dressed in a navy uniform.
"Holy shi-"
