Fleetgirls at Floodtide (Azur Lane/1900s Alternate History)
- Thread starter Erien
- Start date
- Mature Alt. History Action
NuclearConsensus
Herald of the Thorned One
- Location
- the Philippines
[X] [Save the USS Cassin]
DB_Explorer
Purveyor of alternate realities.
- Location
- San Diego, California
- Pronouns
- He/Him
... ah smallboys even when they're 9000 tons they're a tad insane.
I blame how hard they get worked : P
No it's for his
....
.....
.....
fuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuu *sips drink* uuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuu
[X] [Save the USS Pennsylvania]
DB_Explorer
Purveyor of alternate realities.
- Location
- San Diego, California
- Pronouns
- He/Him
*rolls a 1d2*
[X] [Save the USS Pennsylvania]
[X] [Save the USS Pennsylvania]
Videogamer921
oh god it’s him
- Location
- 10th circle of Hell; Ohio
- Pronouns
- He/Him
The day that which will live in infamy.
Not because of the surprise attack, but because of all the waifus lost to sea.
[X] [Save the USS Cassin]
She's nice. That's the sole reason I'm saving her
- Location
- USA
A whole bunch of past tense usage here when the narrative so far has been in present tense. ("Could" is the past tense of "can".) And that last "was" should be "are" for CV-4 and CV-5, plural.
Some more past tenses, combined with an abrupt switch to second-person narration.
("had picked" is past perfect; simple past tense "picked" will be fine)
Some more past tenses here. "Would" is the past tense of "will"
[x] [Save the USS Cassin]
- Pronouns
- He
[X] [Save the USS Pennslyvania]
Big guns make monke go boom
Big guns make monke go boom
Erien
God's Weakest Soldier
- Location
- Georgia
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Fixed, thank you!
- Location
- Texas
[X] [Save the USS Cassin]
I couldn't make a decision so I flipped a coin. We save the tiny boatwife.
I couldn't make a decision so I flipped a coin. We save the tiny boatwife.
Erien
God's Weakest Soldier
- Location
- Georgia
- Pronouns
- He/Him
War sucks. Thanks for reading~
1.4 - Dec 7th, 1941
Erien
God's Weakest Soldier
- Location
- Georgia
- Pronouns
- He/Him
[Save the USS Cassin]
[Attack on New York City and on Pearl Harbor, Dec 7th, 1941]
Thanks to @Armoury for the beta!
The decisions have been made, and now, the war begins.
—
Cassin is many things, many, many things. But above all else, she is a friend. "Of course, I did promise after all."
Cassin beamed brighter than the Hawaiin sunset behind her. Then she sprinted past me towards the car, giggling all the while. I smile, watching her, then look back towards the golden sunset. It is good to be back.
From there it is a quick drive back to the ship, and… not a lot of convincing needed for the crew, those few that remained, to leave their bunks and head to a night of actual beds and more than a little alcohol. From there it is simply disconnecting the cabling running through the ship for the refit, and a quick call to the Captain of the Pennsylvania you had saved the life of some years before. Then, once all of that is done…
"Hahaha yes! I am the queen of this port!" Cassin cries, standing on the bow of the ship, arms crossed. Grinning at the various docked destroyers as she sails past them all. I watch a trio with a small smile on my face, three girls of the Clemson class looking up from a game of poker they were playing on the bow of the Perry curiously.
Rude gestures were exchanged between Cassin and the shipgirls, as is naval tradition. Then it is off around Ford Island. I stand beside Cassin, watching as we round the bend, a small smile on my own face. It is always a strange thing, to be on a ship that is, by all appearances moving on its own. The valves turned, the rudder moved, steam is monitored and the boilers were maintained. All by this young woman standing on the bow currently grinning like a drunken cat. Some viewed shipgirls merely as extensions of the ship, or a manifestation of it. They were both more, and less than that. There is no great philosophy behind it, and I didn't pretend to understand the science, I'm not sure anyone truly did. But Cassin simply is the ship, every bolt, every metal plate, and pipe, that is Cassin. She knew everything that occurred on the vessel, which did, admittedly, make the life of the engineers a fair bit simpler.
And when she had it under her full…
The ship roared around the island, the stern fishtailing as she swung it around at a good twenty knots.
"Keep it under control Cassin."
"Please Captain, I'm the best destroyer in the fleet. Wanna see me squeeze through battleship row?"
I think about that for a moment. "No, while I don't doubt your ability I wish to not be executed until I'm at least an Admiral, when an Admiral is executed it sends a message, a mere Captain is just a footnote."
"Smartass," Cassin snorts.
"It did go to Annapolis, yes." I reply. "When you've had your fun, settle off next to Yorktown alright?"
"Aye Captain, back to drydock in the morning then?"
"You need that refit done, your rust squeals when you walk."
"Oh I do not!"
—
ELSEWHERE.
Dec 7th, 1941, 1230
Brooklyn Navy Yard.
"And I'm telling you DiMaggio is overrated compared to Dickey you stupid mick!"
"Oh you wouldn't know a proper player if he batted you upside the head, literally! Who in the hell is caring about catchers when you've got Joltin' Joe!?"
"Oh just shut the hell up and toss me that tank would ya? Got to work in the forward turret this morn-" The man stopped, and looked up towards the sky. "What in the hell's that?"
The other man looked, along with many others as dozens upon dozens of planes roared past the Brooklyn Bridge then split into two groups. One headed for lower Manhattan, the other for the Navy Yard. The men continued to watch, even as the planes came closer and closer.
"That the Nav-" the first man started. He never finished, the cannons from the leading plane ripped into him mid sentence.
He is the first death that day, but not the last.
—
Dec 7th, 1941 0700.
Pearl Harbor.
*BANG*
My eyes snap open just before I hit the floor. My vision flashes white, and for a moment I don't move, processing the sudden change in location and the fact that the entire ship is moving around me. My first thought, my immediate thought as most of my belongings tumbled off the shelf around me and onto the floor is that I needed to yell at Cassin immediately. My second thought wa-
*BANG*
*BANG*
*BANG*
is trying to find out the source of that noise. I move out of my cabin dressed in naught but the pants I had been wearing the night before. All around me I could hear loud repeated bangs, within a few seconds, they were joined by another sound that I knew. The chatter of guns. My walk turned into a run, then a sprint as I hauled myself up the ladder and onto the bridge. I nearly fall back down it a moment later as my vision is assaulted by a bright white and a explosion, far louder than the rest rings out.
View: https://youtu.be/fZ__LK7GNpg
Cassin appears in front of me, grabs me by the shoulder, and hauls me onto the bridge. I stumble for a moment, then turn my attention towards the source of noise and light.
I wish I didn't.
There, burning, is the USS Yorktown. Fire is tearing across her flight deck, and a large gaping hole is sucking in at the waterline. I push past Cassin, making my way to the bridge wing, watching as men dive off the flightdeck and into the water. Some men are aflame, tumbling, screaming over the edge, others don't even make it that far, stumbling near the edge before falling onto the flightdeck itself. Around them the guns along the catwalk fire up into the sky, she isn't the only ship doing so. Enterprise is doing the same right besides her, and the Leviathan joined up a few seconds later.
"What… Cassin?"
Cassin appeared beside me, and we both watched as a plane tore down the Enterprise's flightdeck, with the carrier docked it didn't have a chance or actually gaining enough speed for takeoff, not even the Hellcat could do it. But it rumbled along regardless, and for one, brief moment it became airborne.
Only for it to burst into flames as a white plane went screaming past it. It is thinner, sleeker than the Hellcat, and as it turned to go past the north side of Ford Island. My eyes caught the roundel on the wings.
"Captain it's the Japs!?" Cassin shrieks.
I run to the opposite wing, sprinting through the bridge as the sounds of explosions ring the harbor. My hands catch onto the railing, and I look out towards Forward Island. There dozens, hundreds of planes circle, dive, climb, bomb, torpedo. Fighters, bombers, and other shapes, familiar shapes. Black, half-biological things of metal and flesh dive through the air, unleashing payloads onto targets beyond the island you could not see.
The Sirens…
The Sirens and the Japanese were at Pearl.
Bombs fell and detonated onto the island, in the water, and on ships. I watch them, my mouth agape, unmoving. Only for a hand to grab me by the back of the trousers and yank me back into the bridge as bullets tear across Cassin's deck. The sound of screeching, tearing metal fills my ears as the planes roars overhead, and I push Cassin off of me the moment they pass, my feet carrying me to the bow windows. "Cassin, is anyone else onboard?"
"I… is that-"
"Yes or no Cassin!?"
"No sir, just you sir!"
My next order came with little thought, just instincts. "Cassin, take full control, we're getting this ship out of Pearl. Now."
"Captain, but they are…" Cassin goes quiet, raising a hand to point at the Yorktown.
"There are rescue vessels Cassin, right now I need to get you out of this port. We are a sitting duck next to the carriers."
Cassin says nothing, staring at me.
"Cassin you can either control the ship or you can rescue men in the water, my order is to get out of Pearl, you cannot do both and you know it."
The ship vibrates beneath me, and I hear the familiar roar of Cassin taking over the engines. Cassin disappears, reappearing a moment later on the bow, her hand stretched out over the water. Then the chatter of guns erupts around me, the .50s along the deck firing on anything, everything. There were targets in every direction. I stayed on the bridge, it isn't a safe place to be, but it is safer than the deck, and Cassin could hear me regardless. Then the ship jerks to the side, tilting in the water, my hands stab out, grabbing onto the bridge railing. My eyes snap to movement, and I watch as two furrows in the water shoot past the Cassin, a good ten feet of separation and speed towards the Hornet. I watch, even as the Cassin rights herself. Hornet's boilers were running, smoke is rising from her stacks. But she is still moored as they come in.
The first torpedo disappears, doing nothing. The seco-
*BANG*
Hornet lifts a good half foot out of the water by her bow. The sound of screaming, men and metal, fills the air somehow louder than the fireball erupting from her side. The Hornet crashes back down into the water an impossible amount of time later, planes, men, and carts falling into the water below.
The Cassin charges on. The tinkle of brass casings hitting the deck compete with the machine guns firing from the planes overhead. Every gun on the Cassin that could fire, is. The main guns, the anti aircraft guns, the machine guns. It isn't enough. It isn't near enough. Fireboats raced past, their crews hurried and half-dressed. Men shouted in the water, oil burned, men were dying. Pearl is dying. One of the fireboats is hit nearby, a black machine, half biological made of pulsating black tumors and tentacles, half obsidian black metal roars overhead just past it. Cannons chattering. Men simply cease to be. My eyes fixate on the lone sailor on deck, he is dressed in nothing but his skivvies and his hat. He is still walking, stumbling, even though there is a giant gaping, bleeding hole where his stomach had been. He tip over the side into the water, and I look forward. Cassin is rounding Ford Islan-
*BANG*
The ship lurches, jerking in the water as a column of water erupts off the port side. The sound of shrapnel hitting the hull fills my ears. The windows shatter around me, broken glass flying into the bridge.
"Cassin, report."
"The bastard missed us with a bomb, Captain!" Cassin replies over the intercom. "Going ahead fla-"
Cassin stops then, cutoff mid sentence.
I force myself to stand from where I have ducked, ignoring the pain I is feeling along my side. My uniform felt wet, I didn't much like the idea of finding out why. "Cassin?"
She doesn't respond. But she is still standing on the deck, arm outstretched. Only, she isn't looking forward anymore. She is looking to port. I follow her gaze.
I wish I didn't. Battleship Row is gone. It has been replaced by a flaming, choking, screaming hell. The California, the foremost battleship and the closest to the harbor exit, looks like she tried to get out. She is resting on her side, her entire superstructure melting in an oil fire as men scramble along her hull. I don't see the shipgirl, Oklahoma, however I do see across the channel, she was completely turned over, her hull glinting in the morning sun. Oklahoma herself is walking along the hull, she pauses here and there, then, as I watch. She reaches down and rips out a chunk of her own bottom, reaching down a hand, she pulls trapped sailors out of the burning, capsized wreckage. She takes another step, ready to do it again, only to pause and tilt over the side, disappearing into the water below.
"Sir, Pennsylvania's making a break!"
My eyes snap to the drydock where Pennsylvania had been moored. She was sailing free, her guns firing into the sk-
I didn't even see the plane that hit her. One moment Pennsylvania was there. The next is only fire as something impacts her forward turret. I watch as the entire forward superstructure rockets into the air as the Pennsylvania disappears in a cloud of smoke and flame.
Cassin's wail of anguish carries over the speakers.
But I only pay attention to that for a moment, "get us out of the water!" a voice cries out to starboard. My head snaps back to the right, there sat, listing to her side in a spill of her own oil is the USS Helena. Men are leaping off the side of the ship and into the oily muck, the Helena is aflame, her superstructure alight and a gaping torpedo wound along her side. The oil hasn't lit, only by the miracle that her superstructure had yet to hit the water. A good fifty men are in the water, I didn't have the time or the manpower for them.
…
"Cassin, full stop. Get Helena's crew out of that oil."
"Aye sir!"
I feel the boilers die down, and the ship turns hard to starboard. In the space of a hundred yards the Cassin was already down to five knots, and I have never been more grateful for Shipgirl nonsense.
"Leaving the ship!" Cassin calls out.
And then she is gone, leaping off the side to land on top of the water, I for my part run to the starboard wing. By the time I do, Cassin was already back, carrying a sailor covered head to foot in oil. She drops him onto the bow, then darts off again. "Sailor?" I ask, looking the man over.
"This thing have guns?"
A point of my finger towards the nearby mount, and the nearest .50 starts up again, even without Cassin being on the deck. The sailor was half naked and covered in oil, but that didn't stop the anger. Then there is another, and another, Cassin moving as fast as her mystical body could take her until there wasn't a soul left in the water.
"Where's the rest!?" I shout over the sound of the guns firing around me, Cassin isn't in control of them anymore. It was all the crew of the Helena now.
"On the Port!" Cassin shouts. "They got Helena herself off too! She's hurt bad but she's still with us!"
"Then take us out of here Cassin!"
"Aye aye sir!"
The ship thrums again, and Cassin turns through the now burning oil. I move back to the bridge, ignoring the broken glass underneath my bare feet. The ship finishes swinging around, then with the ring of a bell she begins her charge once more. Only this time… we aren't alone. Two gargantuan ships are making their way down the channel. The first, the closest, is the Nevada, she was burning from bow to stern. But she was fighting. Tracers erupted along her length, firing at anything, everything. Japanese or Siren. Men fought the sky as well as the fires along her deck. The further one, smoking on her stern was the… Arizona. The twin giants were sailing together, charging down the same channel Cassin is.
"Cassin, lead. We'll follow the battlewagons the moment they are out of harbo-"
Nevada veers off, turning towards the shore. With a crash she slams into it, just shy of Hickam Field.
Fuck.
"Follow the Arizona when we are out of harbor, in the meantime we're going to be a prime target in this channel… Think you can handle it?"
The ship's horn roars and Cassin surges past Arizona.
"Come on you fucking bastards! I'm right here! The USS Cassin! I'm right fucking here! You can't fucking sink me you bastards!" Cassin howls over the intercom. She isn't the only one. Arizona is screaming rage into the sky, the shipgirl standing atop her own bridge firing her rigging towards everything that dares to enter her airspace.
It is a half mile to the Pacific.
Another siren screams past, followed by two white planes. Bullets hit it, causing it to go spiraling towards the water howling, its dying screech a mix of an engine and a screaming beast. Limbs shoot out as it passes mere feet by the ship, colliding with the railings along the side, tearing them and one of the .50 gunners in half. It passes into the water a split second later, leaving nothing behind but flaming wreckage and another bloodstain on the deck. I look forwa-
*BANG*
Metal whistles and whips around me as I fall through the air to land on the deck below. What was until a moment ago the bridge was now a broken mess of twisted metal and fire. Men are screaming around me, howling, shouting, guns are firing. Horns are blaring. But… it is decidedly hard to focus. Why was that? I saw another then, another plane. It is carving its way down the the strait. Men cry for their mothers, for their fathers, for their god. Their voices muddle, join together, it was hard to… seperate them all.
The plane begins to fire, and I watch as holes begin to puncture Cassin's beautiful deck. The bullets get closer, closer. Then she's in front of me like a guardian angel, Cassin stands in front of me, one leg kicks me back into cover as bullets bounce off her flesh. A hand raises, the rigging in her hand fires, and I watch as the plane disintegrates. Then she looks back to me, and her face goes white.
I wonder what made her so upse…
My vision cuts out, I feel… far away now. "Cassin… ship… safety…"
Safe…
Have to… protect… the ship…
Safe…
Saf…
…
—
[To be Continued]
[Attack on New York City and on Pearl Harbor, Dec 7th, 1941]
Thanks to @Armoury for the beta!
The decisions have been made, and now, the war begins.
—
Cassin is many things, many, many things. But above all else, she is a friend. "Of course, I did promise after all."
Cassin beamed brighter than the Hawaiin sunset behind her. Then she sprinted past me towards the car, giggling all the while. I smile, watching her, then look back towards the golden sunset. It is good to be back.
From there it is a quick drive back to the ship, and… not a lot of convincing needed for the crew, those few that remained, to leave their bunks and head to a night of actual beds and more than a little alcohol. From there it is simply disconnecting the cabling running through the ship for the refit, and a quick call to the Captain of the Pennsylvania you had saved the life of some years before. Then, once all of that is done…
"Hahaha yes! I am the queen of this port!" Cassin cries, standing on the bow of the ship, arms crossed. Grinning at the various docked destroyers as she sails past them all. I watch a trio with a small smile on my face, three girls of the Clemson class looking up from a game of poker they were playing on the bow of the Perry curiously.
Rude gestures were exchanged between Cassin and the shipgirls, as is naval tradition. Then it is off around Ford Island. I stand beside Cassin, watching as we round the bend, a small smile on my own face. It is always a strange thing, to be on a ship that is, by all appearances moving on its own. The valves turned, the rudder moved, steam is monitored and the boilers were maintained. All by this young woman standing on the bow currently grinning like a drunken cat. Some viewed shipgirls merely as extensions of the ship, or a manifestation of it. They were both more, and less than that. There is no great philosophy behind it, and I didn't pretend to understand the science, I'm not sure anyone truly did. But Cassin simply is the ship, every bolt, every metal plate, and pipe, that is Cassin. She knew everything that occurred on the vessel, which did, admittedly, make the life of the engineers a fair bit simpler.
And when she had it under her full…
The ship roared around the island, the stern fishtailing as she swung it around at a good twenty knots.
"Keep it under control Cassin."
"Please Captain, I'm the best destroyer in the fleet. Wanna see me squeeze through battleship row?"
I think about that for a moment. "No, while I don't doubt your ability I wish to not be executed until I'm at least an Admiral, when an Admiral is executed it sends a message, a mere Captain is just a footnote."
"Smartass," Cassin snorts.
"It did go to Annapolis, yes." I reply. "When you've had your fun, settle off next to Yorktown alright?"
"Aye Captain, back to drydock in the morning then?"
"You need that refit done, your rust squeals when you walk."
"Oh I do not!"
—
ELSEWHERE.
Dec 7th, 1941, 1230
Brooklyn Navy Yard.
"And I'm telling you DiMaggio is overrated compared to Dickey you stupid mick!"
"Oh you wouldn't know a proper player if he batted you upside the head, literally! Who in the hell is caring about catchers when you've got Joltin' Joe!?"
"Oh just shut the hell up and toss me that tank would ya? Got to work in the forward turret this morn-" The man stopped, and looked up towards the sky. "What in the hell's that?"
The other man looked, along with many others as dozens upon dozens of planes roared past the Brooklyn Bridge then split into two groups. One headed for lower Manhattan, the other for the Navy Yard. The men continued to watch, even as the planes came closer and closer.
"That the Nav-" the first man started. He never finished, the cannons from the leading plane ripped into him mid sentence.
He is the first death that day, but not the last.
—
Dec 7th, 1941 0700.
Pearl Harbor.
*BANG*
My eyes snap open just before I hit the floor. My vision flashes white, and for a moment I don't move, processing the sudden change in location and the fact that the entire ship is moving around me. My first thought, my immediate thought as most of my belongings tumbled off the shelf around me and onto the floor is that I needed to yell at Cassin immediately. My second thought wa-
*BANG*
*BANG*
*BANG*
is trying to find out the source of that noise. I move out of my cabin dressed in naught but the pants I had been wearing the night before. All around me I could hear loud repeated bangs, within a few seconds, they were joined by another sound that I knew. The chatter of guns. My walk turned into a run, then a sprint as I hauled myself up the ladder and onto the bridge. I nearly fall back down it a moment later as my vision is assaulted by a bright white and a explosion, far louder than the rest rings out.
View: https://youtu.be/fZ__LK7GNpg
Cassin appears in front of me, grabs me by the shoulder, and hauls me onto the bridge. I stumble for a moment, then turn my attention towards the source of noise and light.
I wish I didn't.
There, burning, is the USS Yorktown. Fire is tearing across her flight deck, and a large gaping hole is sucking in at the waterline. I push past Cassin, making my way to the bridge wing, watching as men dive off the flightdeck and into the water. Some men are aflame, tumbling, screaming over the edge, others don't even make it that far, stumbling near the edge before falling onto the flightdeck itself. Around them the guns along the catwalk fire up into the sky, she isn't the only ship doing so. Enterprise is doing the same right besides her, and the Leviathan joined up a few seconds later.
"What… Cassin?"
Cassin appeared beside me, and we both watched as a plane tore down the Enterprise's flightdeck, with the carrier docked it didn't have a chance or actually gaining enough speed for takeoff, not even the Hellcat could do it. But it rumbled along regardless, and for one, brief moment it became airborne.
Only for it to burst into flames as a white plane went screaming past it. It is thinner, sleeker than the Hellcat, and as it turned to go past the north side of Ford Island. My eyes caught the roundel on the wings.
"Captain it's the Japs!?" Cassin shrieks.
I run to the opposite wing, sprinting through the bridge as the sounds of explosions ring the harbor. My hands catch onto the railing, and I look out towards Forward Island. There dozens, hundreds of planes circle, dive, climb, bomb, torpedo. Fighters, bombers, and other shapes, familiar shapes. Black, half-biological things of metal and flesh dive through the air, unleashing payloads onto targets beyond the island you could not see.
The Sirens…
The Sirens and the Japanese were at Pearl.
Bombs fell and detonated onto the island, in the water, and on ships. I watch them, my mouth agape, unmoving. Only for a hand to grab me by the back of the trousers and yank me back into the bridge as bullets tear across Cassin's deck. The sound of screeching, tearing metal fills my ears as the planes roars overhead, and I push Cassin off of me the moment they pass, my feet carrying me to the bow windows. "Cassin, is anyone else onboard?"
"I… is that-"
"Yes or no Cassin!?"
"No sir, just you sir!"
My next order came with little thought, just instincts. "Cassin, take full control, we're getting this ship out of Pearl. Now."
"Captain, but they are…" Cassin goes quiet, raising a hand to point at the Yorktown.
"There are rescue vessels Cassin, right now I need to get you out of this port. We are a sitting duck next to the carriers."
Cassin says nothing, staring at me.
"Cassin you can either control the ship or you can rescue men in the water, my order is to get out of Pearl, you cannot do both and you know it."
The ship vibrates beneath me, and I hear the familiar roar of Cassin taking over the engines. Cassin disappears, reappearing a moment later on the bow, her hand stretched out over the water. Then the chatter of guns erupts around me, the .50s along the deck firing on anything, everything. There were targets in every direction. I stayed on the bridge, it isn't a safe place to be, but it is safer than the deck, and Cassin could hear me regardless. Then the ship jerks to the side, tilting in the water, my hands stab out, grabbing onto the bridge railing. My eyes snap to movement, and I watch as two furrows in the water shoot past the Cassin, a good ten feet of separation and speed towards the Hornet. I watch, even as the Cassin rights herself. Hornet's boilers were running, smoke is rising from her stacks. But she is still moored as they come in.
The first torpedo disappears, doing nothing. The seco-
*BANG*
Hornet lifts a good half foot out of the water by her bow. The sound of screaming, men and metal, fills the air somehow louder than the fireball erupting from her side. The Hornet crashes back down into the water an impossible amount of time later, planes, men, and carts falling into the water below.
The Cassin charges on. The tinkle of brass casings hitting the deck compete with the machine guns firing from the planes overhead. Every gun on the Cassin that could fire, is. The main guns, the anti aircraft guns, the machine guns. It isn't enough. It isn't near enough. Fireboats raced past, their crews hurried and half-dressed. Men shouted in the water, oil burned, men were dying. Pearl is dying. One of the fireboats is hit nearby, a black machine, half biological made of pulsating black tumors and tentacles, half obsidian black metal roars overhead just past it. Cannons chattering. Men simply cease to be. My eyes fixate on the lone sailor on deck, he is dressed in nothing but his skivvies and his hat. He is still walking, stumbling, even though there is a giant gaping, bleeding hole where his stomach had been. He tip over the side into the water, and I look forward. Cassin is rounding Ford Islan-
*BANG*
The ship lurches, jerking in the water as a column of water erupts off the port side. The sound of shrapnel hitting the hull fills my ears. The windows shatter around me, broken glass flying into the bridge.
"Cassin, report."
"The bastard missed us with a bomb, Captain!" Cassin replies over the intercom. "Going ahead fla-"
Cassin stops then, cutoff mid sentence.
I force myself to stand from where I have ducked, ignoring the pain I is feeling along my side. My uniform felt wet, I didn't much like the idea of finding out why. "Cassin?"
She doesn't respond. But she is still standing on the deck, arm outstretched. Only, she isn't looking forward anymore. She is looking to port. I follow her gaze.
I wish I didn't. Battleship Row is gone. It has been replaced by a flaming, choking, screaming hell. The California, the foremost battleship and the closest to the harbor exit, looks like she tried to get out. She is resting on her side, her entire superstructure melting in an oil fire as men scramble along her hull. I don't see the shipgirl, Oklahoma, however I do see across the channel, she was completely turned over, her hull glinting in the morning sun. Oklahoma herself is walking along the hull, she pauses here and there, then, as I watch. She reaches down and rips out a chunk of her own bottom, reaching down a hand, she pulls trapped sailors out of the burning, capsized wreckage. She takes another step, ready to do it again, only to pause and tilt over the side, disappearing into the water below.
"Sir, Pennsylvania's making a break!"
My eyes snap to the drydock where Pennsylvania had been moored. She was sailing free, her guns firing into the sk-
I didn't even see the plane that hit her. One moment Pennsylvania was there. The next is only fire as something impacts her forward turret. I watch as the entire forward superstructure rockets into the air as the Pennsylvania disappears in a cloud of smoke and flame.
Cassin's wail of anguish carries over the speakers.
But I only pay attention to that for a moment, "get us out of the water!" a voice cries out to starboard. My head snaps back to the right, there sat, listing to her side in a spill of her own oil is the USS Helena. Men are leaping off the side of the ship and into the oily muck, the Helena is aflame, her superstructure alight and a gaping torpedo wound along her side. The oil hasn't lit, only by the miracle that her superstructure had yet to hit the water. A good fifty men are in the water, I didn't have the time or the manpower for them.
…
"Cassin, full stop. Get Helena's crew out of that oil."
"Aye sir!"
I feel the boilers die down, and the ship turns hard to starboard. In the space of a hundred yards the Cassin was already down to five knots, and I have never been more grateful for Shipgirl nonsense.
"Leaving the ship!" Cassin calls out.
And then she is gone, leaping off the side to land on top of the water, I for my part run to the starboard wing. By the time I do, Cassin was already back, carrying a sailor covered head to foot in oil. She drops him onto the bow, then darts off again. "Sailor?" I ask, looking the man over.
"This thing have guns?"
A point of my finger towards the nearby mount, and the nearest .50 starts up again, even without Cassin being on the deck. The sailor was half naked and covered in oil, but that didn't stop the anger. Then there is another, and another, Cassin moving as fast as her mystical body could take her until there wasn't a soul left in the water.
"Where's the rest!?" I shout over the sound of the guns firing around me, Cassin isn't in control of them anymore. It was all the crew of the Helena now.
"On the Port!" Cassin shouts. "They got Helena herself off too! She's hurt bad but she's still with us!"
"Then take us out of here Cassin!"
"Aye aye sir!"
The ship thrums again, and Cassin turns through the now burning oil. I move back to the bridge, ignoring the broken glass underneath my bare feet. The ship finishes swinging around, then with the ring of a bell she begins her charge once more. Only this time… we aren't alone. Two gargantuan ships are making their way down the channel. The first, the closest, is the Nevada, she was burning from bow to stern. But she was fighting. Tracers erupted along her length, firing at anything, everything. Japanese or Siren. Men fought the sky as well as the fires along her deck. The further one, smoking on her stern was the… Arizona. The twin giants were sailing together, charging down the same channel Cassin is.
"Cassin, lead. We'll follow the battlewagons the moment they are out of harbo-"
Nevada veers off, turning towards the shore. With a crash she slams into it, just shy of Hickam Field.
Fuck.
"Follow the Arizona when we are out of harbor, in the meantime we're going to be a prime target in this channel… Think you can handle it?"
The ship's horn roars and Cassin surges past Arizona.
"Come on you fucking bastards! I'm right here! The USS Cassin! I'm right fucking here! You can't fucking sink me you bastards!" Cassin howls over the intercom. She isn't the only one. Arizona is screaming rage into the sky, the shipgirl standing atop her own bridge firing her rigging towards everything that dares to enter her airspace.
It is a half mile to the Pacific.
Another siren screams past, followed by two white planes. Bullets hit it, causing it to go spiraling towards the water howling, its dying screech a mix of an engine and a screaming beast. Limbs shoot out as it passes mere feet by the ship, colliding with the railings along the side, tearing them and one of the .50 gunners in half. It passes into the water a split second later, leaving nothing behind but flaming wreckage and another bloodstain on the deck. I look forwa-
*BANG*
Metal whistles and whips around me as I fall through the air to land on the deck below. What was until a moment ago the bridge was now a broken mess of twisted metal and fire. Men are screaming around me, howling, shouting, guns are firing. Horns are blaring. But… it is decidedly hard to focus. Why was that? I saw another then, another plane. It is carving its way down the the strait. Men cry for their mothers, for their fathers, for their god. Their voices muddle, join together, it was hard to… seperate them all.
The plane begins to fire, and I watch as holes begin to puncture Cassin's beautiful deck. The bullets get closer, closer. Then she's in front of me like a guardian angel, Cassin stands in front of me, one leg kicks me back into cover as bullets bounce off her flesh. A hand raises, the rigging in her hand fires, and I watch as the plane disintegrates. Then she looks back to me, and her face goes white.
I wonder what made her so upse…
My vision cuts out, I feel… far away now. "Cassin… ship… safety…"
Safe…
Have to… protect… the ship…
Safe…
Saf…
…
—
[To be Continued]
DB_Explorer
Purveyor of alternate realities.
- Location
- San Diego, California
- Pronouns
- He/Him
.... and this is why the US has machine cults now
didn't Nevada not make it in the OTL?
Doesn't make it here either
Arizona is doing MUCH better
Anderson [and 70% of Pearl].... less so