Captain Irons had always thought there was something singularly beautiful about American standard battleships. They weren't the fastest ships in the world, nor the sleekest, and while their rifles were mighty there were other ships like the Iowa sisters or Musashi who commanded a more potent chorus.
But there was something exquisite about a battle-line of matched siblings. Each ship had her own pugnacious beauty, but a fleet of sisters danced an intricate ballet of fire and fury that nothing else in the world could match. A standard battle-line was a thing of unparalleled beauty, and now that he could see the dancers with his own eyes…
They were more beautiful than he'd ever imagined. Short, yes, at least compared to the superhuman amazons of Jersey, Missouri, and Wisconsin. But beautiful and shapely and curvy in all the right ways. Even now as they awaited his orders, the sisters subtly shifted on the bombed-out concrete. Forming into proper battle-spacing with their bows pointed squarely at him.
For what felt like hours, all Irons could do was stare with rotating shades of awe, shock, and reverence.
Battleship Row was back!
…in Pearl Harbor.
…where Akagi and Kaga were playing a concert not a mile distant.
"Fuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuck," muttered Irons at a voice that not a scream soley because his new-found fright had paralyzed too much of his lung capacity to generate the required volume.
"Language!" said the rather buxom—they were
all buxum, why did Irons' mind find the need to add that qualifier?—blond with the long fringed-leather skirt. Nevada, his mind filled in belatedly.
Irons squinted. He hadn't known many of the kanmusume, and while not all of them were famously foul mouthed as the Black Dragon, none of them had any real problem with salty sailor talk. "Pardon?"
Nevada shrugged, her gloved hands settling on a old-west gunbelt slung over her wide-set hips. "'lest in front of Okie."
"I'm not a kid, you know," said the shorter-haired standard with a much shorter skirt. But her tone was more of grudging obligation than true annoyance, and she happily leaned in to her sister's hug.
"Right," said Irons, trying to mentally plot a course that'd deliver the standard battle line to the Admiral's office without putting them within spotting distance of Naka at any point. Even at night, the traffic cone couldn't be easy to miss. At least none of them could safely launch their seaplanes in the gloom. "Um… We need to see the admiral."
"You're not our admiral?" Said the bespectacled girl with the tiny pencil skirt and near-sheer thigh-highs. WeeVee, he recalled as she captured his arm between her refit-augmented bosoms.
"It's too bad," said Tennessee. She and her sister were the only ships to trade miniskirts for mini-dresses and stockings. How they weren't freezing when it was still unseasonably cold on Hawaii was beyond him. "You look like you've got potential."
"I guess," mumbled Irons, glancing forlornly across the harbor at a ruined hulk shoved to the shore.
"Your ship?" asked Nevada tenderly.
Irons nodded. "
Halsey," he said. "She got mauled pretty bad, somehow she got us home."
"What's she doing there?" asked Okie.
"Don't have the manpower to fix her," said Irons, guiding the battle line around the island towards the Admiral's office. "Or even scrap her. Just…" he trailed off.
Tennessee had fallen to the back of the line, her head cocked to the side and her ears twitching. "Is that… music?"
Irons gulped, and picked up the pace. "Admiral Kinsey will explain it all."
Okie opened her mouth, glanced at Nevada, then closed it again.
—|—|—
Sarah Gale sat down for her eleventh meal of the day, only to find that Crowning and Kirishima had interrupted whatever it was they were doing to stare gooey-eyed at her. Gale sighed and took a giant mouthful of dressing-soaked spinach before deciding that she did indeed have the patience for this. "What?"
"It's so cute," said the littlest Kongou, hugging herself and rocking from side to side in gentle waves. "The way you cradle your child."
Gale sighed and glanced down. Six months in and she was finally developing a noticeable baby bump. She'd actually been overjoyed when she first noticed how round her belly was getting. It was silly, but having an unmistakable physical sign of Wash's love for her paraded around for everyone to see made her happy. Happier than she would've been if she was
just having a baby out of sight. Of course, her brain was swamped with
all the hormones, so she figured it came with the territory.
Of course, her joy had only lasted until she tried to
sit up that morning. It was about then that the reality of her life came crashing home. "Kiri," Gale leaned forwards, hunkering protectively over her meal lest someone try and steal it while she wasn't looking. She didn't think that likely, but she was so hungry the animal part of her brain had taken over. "Do you really wanna know why I'm always holding my belly?"
"Because you love your baby?" sang Kirishima dreamily, her whole body swaying side to side and bumping meaningfully into Crowning—who was clearly trying to have no part in this—"and you just want to hold it and cuddle it?"
"No," said Gale. "Well, yes, but…" she took another huge bite and chewed as quickly as she could. "Okay… I'm six months pregnant."
"Twenty-six weeks, four days, three hours," said Kirishima, her glasses temporarily turning opaque as they reflected the dining hall light.
Gale blinked. "What?"
Kirishima blinked and stuffed a tiny notebook into what passed for a bra with the Kongou sisters. "What?"
Crowning groaned. His head hit the table and he muttered something about "the sane one."
Both women choose to ignore that comment. Gale coughed and took another bite. "Anyway," she said, dabbing some dressing from her lips, "you know how much a baby weighs at six months?"
Kirishima opened her mouth.
"AH!" Gale waved a finger, "I don't wanna know. It's two pounds by the way."
Kirishima nodded, cradling her own much flatter stomach. "That doesn't sound that bad…"
"Oh," Gale shook her head. "Oh, you poor, sweet summer child. I said
a baby, not
my baby." The sailor glanced down at her growing middle and sighed. "This little shit weighs
eleven fucking pounds. I've got a lead fucking bowling ball in my belly that—" She suddenly sat up straight with a wince. "—Ah! Kicks me if she's not fed every hour on the hour."
"Oh," said Kirishima, putting a hand on Gale's in sympathy. It was clearly an act, and not a very good one, but at least the littlest dess was trying. "I'm sorry."
Gale sighed and shook her head. "You still want one of your own, don't you?"
Kirishima nodded. "Very much so, yes. Ideally three or four."
The two women fell silent and slowly turned to face Crowning, visibly tingling with anticipation. For his part, the professor just sighed and helped himself to a slice of toast. "Girls, I gave up on any control over my life the moment I got on that plane with Jersey."
—|—|—
Captain Irons slouched against a wall in what was left of the command building, too exhausted to even find a chair. He hadn't realized how close escorting that battle line a few miles had brought him to a heart attack. Ballerinas of death who'd watched their home turned to flame by the very carriers parting further inland, and
he had to keep them corralled.
And that wasn't all of it. Irons would freely admit—if only to himself—that… his mind hadn't been fully occupied with the task at hand. The Standards weren't just deadly, they were
dangerous in the truest scene of the word. Almost super-humanly gorgeous, and between Okie's earnestness, Nevada's gentle big-sister act, Cali's energy, and Tennessee's respect and discipline, they weren't bad company either.
Before he could finish his train of thought, the door creaked open and captain Irons struggled to his feet. The parade of standards filed out in perfectly military order, reflexively turning down the hall with synchronized precision that'd make the silent drill team look like a gaggle of confused toddlers looking for their crayons.
As they passed, Nevada looked back to give him a tiny wink, and Cali was clearly holding back a giggle. For some reason, that filled the captain with indescribable dread. It was almost like they were flirting with him, but that couldn't be, right? Didn't shipgirls only go after those of flag rank and above?
"Admiral," Irons stiffened at the weary face of Admiral Kinsey.
"Captain," Kinsey looked like hell, but there was…
something about the man's face. Some inner gleam that was getting him through the day. "I've briefed our new arrivals on the situation, they seemed to take it well."
Irons nodded. That wasn't surprising. They'd all—save poor Okie—lived to see the end of the last war.
"Unfortunately, with the reconstruction and defense proceedings I'm not able to give them the attention they require," said Kinsey. Kanmusume were awesomely powerful on the waves, but they demanded a degree of micromanagement, patience, and…
personal affection for lack of a better term. Just corralling them to the admiral's office had worn him out, he couldn't imagine trying to command them on a daily basis.
"Irons," said Kinsey, "You were on the track for rear admiral before the war broke out, correct?"
Irons squinted his eyes, indescribable dread starting to grow in his gut. "Yes?" After a moment, he added a hasty qualification. "But there haven't been any open positions with… all that's happened."
"One seems to have become available," said Kinsey. "I'm assigning the newly-returned battle line to your care,
Admiral Irons."
Irons gulped.
"Of course…" Kinsey looked out a picture window that had been—before the Abyssal attack—a wall. "With the damage we've suffered, you'd need to room with them for the time being. I trust that won't be a problem?"
Irons gulped again. "F-for the service, sir."
