William has gone from being a seagoing ship to being moved by slow tank treads, but is still a battleship.
Like what the Maus was supposed to be, only moreso.
Either that or he's a battleship with billions of little legs like the Luggage in spirit. Hairy Military Legs.
So many tiny boots.
Chitose could not remember pushing her planes this hard before. The ground flew past at a breakneck pace, the mountains looming ahead. And behind the rocky ramparts hung the swirling storm of an angry Princess.
The Admiral was right! This place was a natural fortress. Abyssal fortifications along the shore were difficult enough, but one harnessing the mountains? It would be a nightmare! A nightmare Japan might never recover from.
Her pilots, sensing their ship's distress, tightened their harnesses and firmed their resolve. They were ready to do what was necessary, no matter the cost!
Engines roaring, they put on a final burst of speed before cresting the mountain tops, ready to face the storm of incoming AA and enemy fighters.
But the hail of death never appeared. Instead...
Chitose gasped. Beside her, Chiyoda covered her mouth in shock.
A graveyard stretched out beneath their planes. Rokkasho was in ruins, razed almost completely to the ground. Burning wrecks of vessels littered the rubble, forming a semicircle around a burning pyre cornered against the side of a mountain. Then her pilots identified the shattered Pagoda Mast, the familiar shape of the vessel's hull, and the triple turret configuration.
"I... I see Musashi!" she gasped, half from exertion though mostly out of horror.
"What's her status?" Nagato demanded, her long stride continuing to lead them down the tracks.
Chitose shared a look with her sister, both of them unable to find words. "There's... there's barely anything left of her!"
Musashi's superstructure was torn to ribbons, half her bridge was gone, and one of her mighty turrets lay nearby in a burning heap. Her hull and rigging looked like a tin roof after a severe hail storm; whole sections had been blown away and what remained was so dented and warped it was almost unrecognizable.
Chitose had never seen a shipgirl so broken before. You would sink long before getting that badly mauled! She could hardly imagine the pain the battleship was going through.
And standing above the broken Musashi was the Princess. As Chitose's pilots relayed back information, a new trill of horror ran down her spine.
"And what of the enemy fleet?" Nagato demanded.
"Gone," Chiyoda gasped; she saw it too. "But the Princess is still alive... Nagato, it's Kirishima!"
Nagato stiffened for an instant, and then the reaction disappeared as firm resolve took its place. "So be it... and what do you mean the enemy fleet is gone? They couldn't have abandoned their assault!"
"Musashi gave as good as she got!"
Then Chitose's pilots radioed in urgently. Looking through their eyes, her heart sank. A large circle had been carved into the scorched earth, etched with runes and flowing patterns. It was huge, almost the diameter of a steel-hulled Destroyer! A summoning circle. A bastardized Abyssal rendition, but a summoning circle nonetheless. Energy seemed to crackle around it, heralding its imminent activation.
The two Tenders only had six Zuiuns each, twelve bombs in total between them. It might be enough to do some damage to... to the Princess. Chitose refused to acknowledge that thing as one of the Kongou sisters. It might be enough to distract her; buy enough time for Musashi to limp away, if she was even still alive. It was impossible to tell!
But the circle...
Their planes could feel the building energy in the air. Whatever the Abyssals were calling it was massive! They couldn't allow that to happen.
But that meant leaving Musashi at the Princess' mercy.
Chitose and Chiyoda shared a hopeless glance. They didn't have a choice.
"Nagato, there's a summoning circle! We don't know for what, but we're taking it out!"
"A what?!" Akashi gasped. She wasn't the first authority on summoning, preferring the more tangible art of mechanics, but she did know a lot about the subject. And judging by the way her face paled, the possible outcomes were worse than they feared.
Nagato actually flinched. "A summoning circle? Then it's worse than we thought! Destroy it, now!"
"Aim for the parts where the runes are thickest," Akashi spoke up. "You'll have a better chance of destabilizing it."
Chitose nodded with a heavy heart. Though her planes weren't picking up any radio transmissions, Musashi could certainly see the aircraft above her. She could only imagine how the battleship felt; watching her allies turn away from her plight. The Tender begged for forgiveness. Their planes were already turning; reconnaissance fighters and dive bombers lined up to bring all their weapons to bear upon the circle.
Suddenly, a pilot shouted out a warning. The Princess had turned, her malevolent gaze locking onto the modest flight of aircraft.
"No... No! NO!" she screeched, her anti-aircraft defenses swiveling into position. For a twisted Kongou class that was a lot of firepower. "You will not take this from me!"
"Evade," Chitose whispered.
And then the storm of lead was unleashed. Tracers and flak filled the air, her planes bucking and weaving to avoid the storm. It wasn't enough. One of her reconnaissance planes went down, trailing fire, while her connection with a Zuiun abruptly vanished. She found out why as the rear observer looked forward and saw the large hole in the canopy, directly in line with the pilot's head.
The rear observer gave Chitose a solemn farewell as the Zuiun pitched forward in a dive from which it would never recover.
Then an ear-shattering clang resounded through the air. The incoming fire ceased abruptly and the two tenders jumped on the opportunity. Their remaining dive bombers leveled out, carefully lining up on their target. Fully coordinated and unhampered, they dove upon the summoning circle, aiming for the areas where the runes were tightly clustered and released their payload.
The bombs fell with a screech and struck home. The air itself seemed to pop as the circle lost cohesion, the energies abruptly dissipating through the air. The summoning ritual shattered, taking the Princess' plot with it!
But there were no celebrations among Chitose's brave little pilots. As soon as they confirmed that the circle was destroyed, they wheeled their planes around and rushed back to Musashi's aid.
Immediately, they saw why the AA had stopped.
The Princess's face had been punched in; her beautiful, yet terrible features shattered like a pane of glass.
And of Musashi...
Chitose wanted to be sick.
The battleship had been flung away by the Princess' rigging. Hull plating had been torn away, exposing her bulkheads and support structure to the open air. Fragments of metal marked her path from where she had tumbled across the ground. For a regular human... it was comparable to having their skin ripped away.
And yet, despite her horrendous wounds, the battleship slowly pulled herself to her feet, squaring off against the Princess once again. She was going to get herself killed at this rate! Desperate, Chitose's planes dove upon the Princess. All bombs were expended and the Abyssal simply ignored the tracers bouncing off her skin. In fact, she ignored the planes entirely! Her hatred fixed solely on Musashi! One by one, Chitose's planes reported all rounds expended, without so much as scratching the monster.
Helpless, Chitose watched the Princess' guns lined up and fired a full broadside into the wounded battleship. The resulting explosion was hidden by a wave of smoke.
Suddenly, a shape burst through the billowing cloud. Musashi was running! Chitose gasped, horrified. Broken beyond repair, burning from within, and heedless of her injuries, the battleship charged with a deep, ragged roar.
The Princess' rigging howled back, the sound shaking the planes in the sky before galloping forward.
"Chitose? What's happening?" Evidently, Nagato heard her, but the battle dominated the Tender's attention as the two vessels collided. Sparks and metal flew everywhere as the battleships strove against each other, fighting to topple their opponent.
Then... trickery.
The Princess got down from her rigging and kicked Musashi in the back of her knee. The Yamato-Class trembled, then fell. Her rigging shattered against the ground as the Princess' rigging bore down on top of her.
"Chitose?"
Musashi shuddered feebly as the monstrous rigging slugged her across the face. Once. Twice. She was desperately trying to fend off the blows, but even more of her was getting torn away! The Princess' victorious shriek resounded throughout the mountains as her rigging raised its fist high for the killing blow.
But then... Musashi moved. Her last remaining turret rose, placing the barrels right over the monster's heart... and fired.
The explosion rocked the air; Chitose's planes bucked as a pillar of smoke engulfed them. From below, the Princess' rigging howled before it was silenced by a second explosion.
And then... everything went still.
"Chitose?!"
Nagato's shout jolted her back to the present. The flagship was looking back at her, more than a little concerned as the Tender's mouth flapped in the wind, unable to articulate what she'd just seen. The smoke was too thick, obscuring the ground from her planes completely. Chiyoda was no better, hopeless tears running down her cheeks at what they had just witnessed.
In the ruins of Rokkasho, not a single living thing moved.
"...we're too late..." she whispered.
----
"Desu! Desu!"
Coughing, the Captain crawled over a piece of rubble, ignoring the shouts of the Deck Officer behind her. Fat tears of determination rolled down her chubby cheeks as she charged headlong through the smoke.
Musashi! She had to get to Musashi!
Ignoring the jagged debris that tore at her uniform and stubs, she crawled atop the ruins of a house for a better vantage point, praying for a miracle. As if the Kami themselves heard her plea, a gust of wind blew away the smoke directly in her path, revealing her battleship.
Her wail of horror drew the others. Climbing up beside her, the Deck Officer fell to her knees in despair, many of the others following suit. The Captain just stared.
Musashi was little more than a pile of scrap, half buried beneath the hulking corpse of the Princess. His head and shoulders were just visible, flames crackling through rents in his hull brought on by the magazine detention. In a cruel twist of irony, his structure was so compromised that it couldn't properly contain the explosion to destroy him completely. That didn't stop it from blowing off the remainder of his plating, however. Great swaths of his skin, his hull, had been torn or blown away.
Where once a mighty warship had fought until his last breath, all that remained was a withered husk of a vessel; broken and almost unrecognizable.
The Captain swayed, faint at the sight.
Their warship, their vessel... their home... not even a week and he was gone!
No... not gone.
If Musashi was dead, then how were they still here? The Captain grasped onto that hope. Yes, Musashi couldn't be dead, otherwise his crew would have died with him! Weirdness and ugliness be damned, Musashi had to be alive!
"Desu!" she snapped, getting the attention of the remainder of her crew. It wasn't over yet! So long as they still drew breath then so did Musashi! With that, she led the charge across the devastated field of debris, desperation fuelling her every step. Her brave little crew followed close behind.
Getting back on board was easy; there were too many fairy-sized holes to count. Not a single bolt appeared to have survived the battle. Bulkheads and corridors were warped and burning. Broken pipes hung everywhere. Fearlessly, the Captain led her sailors through the mangled remains, shoving aside debris as she made a beeline for the one place she knew was keeping Musashi alive.
The ship's heart: His boiler room.
The door to engineering was jammed shut. Pushing with all their strength, the determined fairies shoved it aside and entered into a raging inferno. The entire engineering compartment was burning. Smoke filled the air, bringing with it the stench of fuel and cooked meat. Of the engineers and technicians, barely anything remained but charcoal. But peering through the flames, the Captain could just barely make out the state of Musashi's boilers. Three of the massive cylinders had been blown to scrap and the last was hanging on by a thread. Fuel poured from somewhere above onto the boiler's shattered internals, keeping the flame alive.
"Desu!" the Captain shouted over the inferno, pointing. There! They had to keep the boiler burning! Find fuel, wood, your own uniforms, anything and everything flammable; keep the ship alive, no matter the cost!
As the survivors rushed to save their vessel, the Captain hurried for the ruined bridge.
A radio! A radio must have survived. She was no engineer, but a burning boiler room would kill their vessel just as surely as a shattered boiler!
They needed help, fast!
----
Why... why wasn't he dead?
When the final shot had gone off, and the fire rolled over him, William didn't know what to expect. A choir of angels? A bright light? Hell, finding himself back in the Abyss? Hell itself? Who could say what dying was like?
Well, there certainly was a bright light; except there was nothing holy or comforting about it at all. It was orange, flowed like water, and burned everything it touched. Wind and the sound of tortured metal howled in his ear; the world sounded like it was ending around him...
And then silence...
Not total silence, though. Not like the Abyss; the crackle of flames intermingled with the popping of cooling metal.
His remaining eye fluttered open, and he stared up into a smoke filled sky.
Huh... he didn't expect to survive this at all. How was he still alive?
The question was baffling, in a detached sort of way. He'd been shot in the head; his lack of vision on one side was proof enough of that. Not to mention all the other injuries he'd accumulated were more than enough to put a man in the ground a dozen times over.
The question lasted up until he tried to lift his head.
Nothing.
Glancing downward, he tried again. His neck twitched but refused to move an inch. He was paralyzed. As he took stock of his body, he could still feel bits and pieces of his fingers, but they barely twitched when he tried to move. Entire swaths of his body had gone cold. It was easier to count what little sensation he had left rather than what was missing.
He could barely even breathe. Air was coming in but none of it seemed to reach his lungs; he could hear it whistling out through holes in his throat. Everything about him felt broken and torn. The only thing he still had control over was his one remaining eye, staring up into a desolate sky. His chest felt like it was on fire, but he couldn't look down far enough to see. Black, oily smoke emanated from below his vision where his chest would be.
His breath quickened, kicking up smoke and dust from where it was escaping his throat. What was going on?
Desperately, he tried to move anything, anything at all! It was hopeless. Nothing worked! He was locked in place like a mannequin; trapped in his own body, unable to move, unable to die! Tears escaped his eye. He could feel them roll down a tiny patch of skin before the sensation vanished into the cold numbness.
Why wasn't he dead?
Why couldn't he just die? What was going on?!
Too much... it was too much... He couldn't hold it in anymore; a scream tearing loose from his throat. Or, it should have been a scream. What came out was a strangled gurgle, mixed with the rattle of metal. If anything it made him try harder to howl as true despair settled in.
He had held on for so long, pushed his fortitude beyond what he thought possible. And now there was nothing left but the pain and hopelessness of being buried alive in his own body!
It was too much... just too much!
His strangled sobs of despair were lost amidst the crackling flames.
What had the Abyss done to him that he was stuck like this?! Had he done something wrong? What did he do to deserve this?
Suddenly, the sky was obscured by a dark shape. Gremlin, perched on his cheek, stared down at him, her soot-stained face almost as desperate as he was.
"Desu?"
'Please just kill me.' That was what he wanted to say. All that came up was a wheeze of air, followed by a round of choked sobs.
He couldn't bear it any longer! First trapped in the Abyss, now trapped in his own body?! He stared up at Gremlin, pleading for the little creature to just end him. Kill him, snuff him out, anything but this! Anything but dragging him back to the Abyss! Please, just let him die!
"D-Desu!!" the little creature shouted back over her shoulder, and William swore he could hear a returning 'desu' over the crackle of flames. An argument seemed to take place before Gremlin turned back to him, her chubby face set in a fierce mask of determination.
"Desu." She leaned in close, filling his vision. "Desu! Desu!"
William moaned. It was all too much...
'Please... just let me die... kill me... I don't want to live like this...'
But like always, Gremlin couldn't understand. She repeated her same phrase over and over again, words William likewise couldn't understand. But he could feel the intention behind them nonetheless, telling him that he was going to live.
'...no... please, no...'
----
Nagato ran like she had never ran before, pushing her boilers to the redline.
'We're too late...'
Chitose's words echoed in her mind. She had to coax the information out of the two stunned tenders, but when she finally had a good picture of the situation, it only fuelled her resolve.
They weren't too late! Musashi was alive, she refused to accept anything else!
The others were having trouble keeping up with the battleship, but none of them gave so much of a whisper of complaint as the train tracks trembled under their combined weight. Suddenly, the tracks ended with the mangled remains of a bridge. The gorge below was filled with its broken remains, piles of rock... and, most surprisingly, the wrecks of Abyssal Destroyers.
But that fell by the wayside as her frustration mounted. There was no way across. The bridge was out, and the gap was too wide to even consider jumping. True, shipgirls had physical capabilities that far outstripped a normal human's, but even they had their limits, and it was a rather long way down to the bottom.
As fairies toiled away in her chart room, hunting for an alternate route, movement on the other side of the gorge caught her attention. In an instant, a battleship's array of firepower was leveled at the shaking bushes, the others following suit. However, they all lowered as a man in a navy uniform stepped out of the brush, waving his arms frantically.
He appeared to be shouting at them. Nagato could make out his mouth moving, but his words were lost across the gap. Once again she cursed herself for not learning how to read lips.
"Can anyone make out what he's saying?"
"No clue," Akashi replied, squinting at the visibly frustrated sailor.
Excessive profanity was unbecoming of an IJN vessel, but right then Nagato was ready to curse up a storm. They didn't have time for this! She turned inward to focus on her chart room; her flustered crew working frantically to come up with a workaround. Annoyingly, while her oceanic charts were up to date, little thought had been given to acquiring a simple road map! A mistake she would have to correct post haste!
After failing to communicate his message again, the man turned and vanished back into the brush. He reappeared a few seconds later, holding a pair of branches like... semaphore flags! Genius!
Though the branches blended into the bush behind him, the man's short message was conveyed quickly.
R-O-A-D-2-K-M
Then he thrust the branches towards the east.
Nodding in thanks, and hoping he saw it, Nagato turned and sprinted along the gorge. The trees offered next to no resistance against thirty-two thousand tons of displacement and up to eighty thousand shaft horsepower. Wood splintered against her hull as she carved a path through the brush; the forest being no match for a determined battleship.
Where once the thunder of guns rolled over the mountains, now only a grim silence hung in its place. Akashi was trying the radio again and again, but only dead air came back.
Running at full speed, they reached the road in no time. Another, smaller bridge meant for automobiles spanning the gorge. Nagato skidded into a turn, tearing up the asphalt as she regained her lost momentum and powered across. Ahead, the road wound its way through a gap in the mountains toward the towering pillar of smoke.
She was no coward, but the sight chilled the marrow in her bones.
Musashi...
The distance melted away, she was only vaguely aware of it due to her chart room calling out landmarks. She was, however, broken out of her stupor by the howl of an Abyssal. Two transport class vessels came barrelling down the road towards the Pacific. Whether they were trying to flee or do as much damage as possible didn't matter; Nagato didn't slow. Her 16.1 inch guns fired.
At this range, there was nothing the transports could do. With half a broadside each, they tumbled into the ditches on either side, burning and twitching. If they weren't already dead, the following fire from the Tenders and repair ship in their exposed flanks put an end to their miserable existence.
Nagato sped past, the transports already forgotten as she crested the final hill and halted on the edge of Rokkasho.
Despite Chitose and Chiyoda's descriptions, nothing could have prepared her for the sight.
The town had been razed to the ground. A thick cloud of smoke shrouded the area. Here and there, the odd building had survived, looming out of the haze like phantoms. Nagato had not seen such devastation wrought since 1945.
"M-Musashi?" she whispered, taking a few hesitant steps into the shifting haze. The others followed behind, scanning the area urgently. "Musashi!"
Nothing answered.
"Chitose, Chiyoda, where did you last see her?"
"Over here!" The two Tenders took the lead, guiding them over broken streets and piles of rubble.
Within a minute the first wreck appeared out of the smoke. The front half of a Destroyer, blown in half along the keel. Then another; a Cruiser; gutted from bow to stern. They came looming out of the smoke one by one as the Tenders led them onward. But Nagato ignored them all, searching desperately for their lost battleship.
Then the Tenders stopped at the largest wreck of all. The monstrous rigging of the Princess lay hunched upon the ground. A great hole had been blown out its back, revealing a broken citadel, scorched and burned from a magazine detonation. Next to nothing remained of its internals; the creature was well and truly dead. Although, the body of Kirishima was missing. Either way, she couldn't have gone far, not with this kind of damage.
And beneath it...
Nagato's blood ran cold. Without a second thought, she threw her weight against the wreck, shoving it aside to reveal the broken body of Musashi.
When she heard the Tender's descriptions, she thought - prayed, even - that they were exaggerating in the heat of the moment. As it turned out, they were being generous.
A mangled skeleton of a battleship lay at her feet, the armor stripped away by explosions and enemy fire, exposing the interior bulkheads. If not for the shape of her hull, Nagato would never have recognized the ship-girl at all. Her chest had been blown apart, revealing her decks down to her boiler room, which was engulfed in flame.
As Nagato stared, horrified, a single fairy pushed through a broken hatch, carrying a bundle of... something that it tossed into remnants of one of the boilers. The fires flared and Nagato jumped as Musashi shuddered with an awful rattle. Air wheezed through her broken ventilation system, creating a tortured groan that hung in the air.
One crimson eye was all that was left of her bridge, flicking around, listlessly.
She... she was alive!
Nagato almost wished that she wasn't. She had never seen such damage before in her life.
As she watched, more of Musashi's fairies rushed in and out of the boiler room, throwing whatever they could into the inferno; fuelling the boiler, desperately keeping their vessel alive. Then one happened to look up and caught sight of the rescue fleet. A ragged cheer came up from the survivors and they redoubled their efforts.
"Ak...Akashi?" Nagato's voice trembled. "Can... can you...?"
Save her? Salvage her? She didn't know what to say.
Hesitantly, as if afraid the battleship would fall apart at the slightest touch, Akashi knelt beside the stricken vessel. Her crew appeared in her outstretched hands; fairies in tiny overalls, armed with tool belts and welding torches. They too were at a loss for words, exchanging worried looks as if asking if the battleship could even be used for scrap.
A more intact vessel would have gone right to the breakers, but this?...
Nonetheless, they carefully climbed down and began their examinations, carefully stepping into Musashi's hull and making contact with what crew remained.
Nagato waited, breathlessly, until she got a sudden ping on her radar. The reading was faint... but she knew exactly what it was. The evidence all lined up.
"Look after her, I'll be back," she ordered, rising to her feet and heading off through the swirling smoke. She hated to leave, but the contact was something she couldn't ignore. The reason why became apparent as she broke through the smoke haze into a clearing at the center of the town. The summoning circle stretched out before her, as dead and lifeless as the ruins surrounding it.
Chitose and Chiyoda had commanded their aircraft masterfully. Large swaths of runes had been blown away, preventing the eldritch energies from coalescing.
The source of the contact lay on the circle's perimeter next to a bomb crater, scratching replacement runes into the scorched earth with all that remained of her strength. Even with all the Abyssal corruption, the lines of a Kongou-Class battleship were still recognizable.
Kirishima paused, sensing Nagato's presence, then resumed her carving with a shaking finger. She didn't have much time left. Her human body was relatively untouched, but her spectral hull told a different story. With her rigging dead, the battleship was living off what little power was left in her system.
"Just... just a little more..." Kirishima whispered, completing one shaky rune and moving on to the next. "Just... a little..."
"Kirishima."
The hand clenched, furiously. "So abandoning me... wasn't enough... now you're here to gloat..."
Nagato remained silent as the dying battleship wheezed for air.
"You're all traitors!... Cowards!... All of you!..."
"The war ended years ago, Kirishima."
The clenched fist began to tremble. Then Kirishima looked back and Nagato flinched at her shattered features. More than pure loathing, there was something desperate hiding behind the Princess' eyes. "Spare me... your platitudes... you human wench... destroy me now... or let me rebuild my country!..."
She turned back to her carving, her hand moving slower and slower with each passing minute.
"I shall restore it... to glory..." she choked. "You don't realize... what we could become... Japan... could have been the rising sun... once again..."
"And I imagine the results would be the same," Nagato said, trying not to growl as she readied her guns. "It was that same pride that brought about our downfall. Brought our nation to ruins and killed millions!"
"Why... would you even... care?..." Kirishima growled. "Humans... they aren't... like us... They're fleeting... fragile... spiteful..."
She gasped weakly, the life slowly draining out of her. Though she still simmered with hatred, her words were more pleading. "Come on, Nagato... you know what I mean... they left you... they used you... and when you were... too much of a threat... they burned you..."
Nagato didn't even flinch. "I am aware of my history. But pain and shame have taught me the humility to forgive past wrongs and not grow spiteful because of them."
Kirishima stared for a moment, then scoffed. "Heh... I feel... called out..."
Nagato sighed. This was going nowhere. She had hoped Kirishima could see reason... but she should have known better than to try and reason with an Abyssal. Regretfully, she aimed one of her turrets. "I shall let your sisters know they can expect you shortly. But... know that everyone will be willing to forgive you when you return."
Pausing, Kirishima looked over her shoulder once again. "Expect me?... to become one of you?... No... no, I'm not... coming back..."
Shakily, she pointed towards the east. There was nothing there but the slope of a mountain. "There's... no horizon... no way... to sink... into the Abyss..."
Laying her head down on the earth, she sighed. By now her voice was little more than a whisper. "One... can't sink... on dry land... where death... finally sets us free..."
Nagato's guns fired.
Without her rigging, the attack was devastating. Kirishima's upper torso vanished, and what remained would be impossible for the naked eye to identify. She didn't do it maliciously; in fact, she would be the first to welcome Kirishima back when she returned as a ship-girl.
...and therein lay the problem...
Return.
If the public knew exactly how many of the ship-girls were redeemed Abyssals the results could be catastrophic. Faith in their protectors could waver or shatter completely. And when it did, the war might very well turn against them.
The worst part was that their fears would be well-founded. If an Abyssal could be redeemed, could a shipgirl fall in much the same way? Such a revelation might just bring about total defeat as entire nations would doubt the veracity of shipgirls as a whole.
Kami... how she hated this war. At least back in the 1940s, sinking didn't feel like a revolving door of life, death, and loyalties.
But what was done was done.
Shuddering, Nagato forced those thoughts aside and rushed back to Musashi. If it was possible, the atmosphere had taken an even darker turn. Akashi's assessment teams were standing on the wounded battleship's shoulder, along with a fairy officer who could have only been Musashi's Captain.
From the way the Captain seemed to droop with the assessment team's every word, the results weren't good.
"Half a boiler," Akashi intoned with a haunted expression as Nagato knelt beside her. "Half a boiler... that's all she has left."
Nagato sucked in a breath, then worked to calm herself. She knew it was bad, but...
"Can... can you help her?" she whispered back.
Akashi didn't reply for the longest time, staring down at the wreck in her care. Then taking a breath, the cranes along her rigging began to spin. Her repair teams came out in full force. "I'm going to damn well try... I can't promise anything, though."
That was all Nagato could ask for.
Musashi shuddered as the repair teams entered her hull; a sound the likes of which only existed in Nagato's worst nightmares. Without thinking, she changed positions, kneeling at the battleship's head.
Instantly, Musashi's remaining eye locked onto her, wide with terror and pain. Nagato could feel the battleship's desperation. The fear that every warship felt at one point or another was magnified by a hundredfold. Fear of being useless, the fear of being relegated to scrap.
And now, as a fresh summon, straight from the distant past, still growing accustomed to her human body...
Musashi probably expected to be left behind. Sent off to be broken down for scrap, after everything she had done, everything she suffered; her country had no use for a broken wreck.
But thankfully, times had changed. Japan had changed.
Moving carefully, Nagato cradled Musashi's broken head in her hands, offering what little comfort she could. There wasn't much she could do, however, what with...
She froze, shuddering as something suddenly occurred to her.
"Akashi, why is she still awake?"
Her question drew the eyes of the entire fleet. With a new sense of unease, Nagato motioned down at Musashi's bridge. Burning, broken, and empty. Not a single fairy remained to man the helm... and yet Musashi was still conscious.
That should have been impossible.
"I... I don't know." Akashi turned back to her work, although her face was a shade paler than before. "Okay, uh... Nagato, Chitose, Chiyoda, I need your damcom teams. All of them. Start putting out the fires, but leave anything close to the boiler room burning. We're not going to risk snuffing her out by accident."
Musashi shuddered again as if agreeing with the sentiment.
The requested teams disembarked in droves, dragging fire hoses and other pieces of equipment. The fairies immediately went to work, but the sound that crawled out Musashi's throat sent a shiver down Nagato's spine.
"Shhh... shhhh..." she whispered soothingly, Musashi's eye snapping to her once again. "It's over now. We're not abandoning you, Musashi."
Musashi groaned, tears pooling in her eye.
"You did it, Musashi," Nagato continued to whisper, gently wiping the tears away. "You saved them. You saved Rokkasho. You saved Japan. We're not abandoning you, Musashi. You're going to live, you hear me? We're not giving up on you. Japan is a much better country than when we left."
"A-And the food is even better now!" Chiyoda piped up. "We have hamburgers, ice cream, a whole bunch of new stuff!"
And fanf-books, I meant books," Chitose added, ignoring her sister's scandalous looks. "There's so much to read now, we have manga – oh! - and anime! You're going to love it! And the Sake! It's better than you can imagine now. Just wait until you try it!"
Musashi's eye was flicking all over the place, trying to keep up with the conversation.
"Yamato will be so proud of you. We'll call her back from Truk Island as soon as we can. And then you can see her, talk to her, everything we couldn't do before." Nagato smiled, wiping away the battleship's tears. "You're going to love this new world, Musashi. I'm sure Yamato would love to show you every little piece of it. She's been waiting for you for so long."
But as her gentle soothing continued, assisted by the two Tenders, Musashi only seemed to grow more agitated. Shuddering and sobbing, eye pleading for something. All Nagato could do was keep talking, telling the wounded battleship everything about the new world.
As time went on, however, she noticed something odd. It might have been her imagination, or a horrific side effect of the damage, but Musashi's shoulders appeared... broader than normal.
And now we get William's first interaction with the ship-girls; while he's on death's door and can't understand a word of japanese. I know I wrote this to be a tragic scene, but I can't stop grinning at the circumstances. Anyway, the shipgirls remain clueless about the situation and it's not like william can let them know.
Next chapter is certainly going to be a banger. I've put off the blue-screening long enough.
Man, he must look like a ramsey snow/bonesaw victim if the indicator for something weird genderly was shoulder width.
I think the shipgirl-abyssal seesaw is worth worrying about. Most wars were fought between fellow humans, not inhuman monsters. Fear has no requirement for rationality.
"Yamato will be so proud of you. We'll call her back from Truk island as soon as we can. And then you can see her, talk to her, everything we couldn't do before." Nagato smiled, wiping away the battleship's tears. "You're going to love this new world, Musashi. I'm sure Yamato would love to show you every little piece of it. She's been waiting for you for so long."
But as her gentle soothing continued, assisted by the two Tenders, Musashi only seemed to grow more agitated. Shuddering and sobbing, eye pleading for something. All Nagato could do was keep talking, telling the wounded battleship everything about the new world.
So, apologies to those thinking this is chapter 14. Sadly, that is still in the works, but I hope you enjoy this all the same. It sprang into existence while I was trying to overcome writer's block and it feels like a shame to leave it collecting on the hard-drive. This is completely non-cannon. I might continue it if I need a break from the main story, but we'll have to wait and see.
For reference, this would take place immediately after William sang Flanders fields. Power returned to the battleship right when he finished and thus... Musashi snapped to awareness and instantly knew that something was wrong. Not because her boilers were cold or that her compartments felt emptier than normal. No, it was the bearded hooligan standing in her bridge. The uniform didn't endear him to anyone; the color of which resembled vomit.
He had a bottle of Sake raised to his lips, though the precious alcohol ran down his chin in a unbroken stream, a stunned expression on his face.
He stared.
Musashi stared back.
Silence filled her bridge; a silence that stretched for an awkwardly long minute. Then Musashi began to grow... concerned.
Why was this intruder still alive? He shouldn't have been on her bridge, let alone on board! Her crew would have skewered him on the spot! Where were they?
The man slowly lowered the bottle, which had started to tremble slightly. Musashi scoffed; the coward was as pale as ghost. As well he should be, standing on the bridge of an enemy warship! Although, she was unprepared as the bottle was tossed in her direction. It arced gracefully through the air... and struck her square in the forehead.
He might as well have thrown it at a mountain for all the good it did. The bottle bounced off harmlessly and shattered against the floor. Both sets of eyes stared at the shattered pieces of glass, then slowly rose to meet each other once again.
The man stared.
Musashi stared back, a grin slowly growing across her face.
She was... tangible. Hardly daring to believe it, he knelt and reached for a piece of glass. Instead of phasing through like the spirit she was, her fingers felt resistance. A shiver went down her keel as she raised the fragment to the light.
She... she wasn't imagining this. Through the clear piece of glass, the man took a wary step back as Musashi began to chuckle.
Forget her crew, she would handle this intruder herself.
"Well..." she grinned eagerly, dropping the fragment to the floor. "It seems I've kept you waiting."
The man shank back against the hatch, pawing blindly for the release, face wild with panic.
"I am Musashi, second of the Yamato class of battleships!"
He yanked the door open and fled.
"And you will not escape!"
Grinning from ear to ear, Musashi followed at a leisurely pace. She could feel him fleeing deeper into her superstructure, then duck into an empty officer's cabin. Had he been running from a regular human, the rouse might have succeeded. But you couldn't hide from a battleship in her own hull.
Musashi appeared behind him as he cowered behind a locker and grabbed him by the shoulder. "There you ar-"
He lashed out in a panic, his elbow catching Musashi squarely on the nose. It didn't hurt, she was a battleship after all, but the surprise of it loosened her grip, allowing the man to race off again!
But as she tracked his movements, Musashi's grin faltered. She feel the man sprinting throughout her hull... but... only him. The realization brought her up short. Come to think about it, the intruder shouldn't have been able to run unhindered. Her crew should have been alerted by the noise and caught him by now!
But... where were they?
A shiver crawled up her keel as a profound emptiness suddenly became apparent. She was a vessel crewed by thousands, and yet only a single part of boots thudded against her deck.
Where was her crew?
"What have you done?" This time she appeared right before him. His strangled scream was cut off as she grabbed him by the throat. "What have you done? Where are my crew?!"
She was unprepared as the man grabbed her wrist and twisted, throwing her over his shoulder. She vanished before hitting the ground, popping back into existence behind the man and slammed him against the bulkhead.
"What have you done?!" she snarled.
Nothing was right. Her crew was gone and this Western bastard was running free on an Imperial Japanese warship!
Staggering to his feet, the man resumed running, his breath coming in short, painful gasps as he made for a hatch leading him to outside. Musashi waited for him to run out onto her deck, then pounced. Appearing beside him, she grabbed him as easily as a kitten and tossed him over board.
His panicked cry was cut off by the splash as he hit the water.
Stretching languidly, Musashi strutted over and leaned against the railing. The man broke to the surface of the black waters, gasping for air and struggling to stay afloat. Although, Musashi had to question his sanity when instead of trying to flee out to sea he instead swam back towards her, pawing desperately against her hull to find a handhold.
"You know, I should kill you," Musashi called out in English. "But because I'm in a good mood I'll give a choice. Either you can drown slowly or you can answer my questions. Then I can kill you quickly."
The man was slowly regaining his composure, but he never stopped feeling up her side. Ugh, it made her hull crawl just thinking about it, let alone seeing it.
"Well? What say you?"
"Some choice," he spat, looking up at her. "What?... W-where the hell did you come from, anyway?"
"Stop wasting your breath. Now, what have you done with my crew?"
"Your what?"
"My crew." She straightened, looming imperiously over him. "Don't let your eyes deceive you, American. I might look human, but make no mistake. I. Am. Musashi. Battleship of the Imperial Japanese Navy made manifest... Somehow."
She would ponder about that later.
"Now answer my questions and I might kill you quickly. What have you done with my crew?"
He spluttered. "C-Crew?... What? I've been the only one here for months!"
"Lies!" she snarled. "Japan would never abandon of their greatest battleships, now tell me the truth! What have done with them, bastard?"
"Japan?" The man stared with bewilderment. "What? The war is over! Its been over for almost a century, what are you talking about?"
Over?
Something about that struck a cord inside her; a feeling that she vehemently shoved away.
"Oh?" she said, humouring him. Honestly, being able to actually speak was the best! "Then tell me, how did it end, hmm?"
The man opened his mouth, then visibly hesitated. He considered his answer for so long, Musashi was certain he was figuring out the best lie to tell. And she was right. "Japan surrendered in 1945, after they dropped the nukes on Hiroshima and Nagasaki."
Honestly, she had to laugh at his audacity. Japan would never surrender, especially not to... whatever a nuke was. The memory of each and every brave sailor that served aboard her rang with righteous indignation. Japan stood on the shoulders of the souls who fought united under its banner of divine providence. To even consider such was cowardice. She opened her mouth to viciously correct him, chest swelling with patriotic pride...
But the words died in her mouth as the final memories of her sailors played out behind her eyes. The roar of aircraft, the screech of falling bombs, and the ice cold water of the Pacific filling her compartments as she sank to the bottom of Leyte Gulf.
She... she'd been sunk. Destroyed.
But... that was...
How...?
If she had sunk... died... then where was she?
She tore her gaze away from the American and for the first time realized that she was caught in a fog bank so thick she could barely see past her own bow. The water was completely black and as smooth as glass. Not a single wave lapped against her hull, save for the man struggling in the water.
A chill crawled up her keel, crawling through her empty compartments. Something... something was missing. She gasped as she realized that her boilers, her flaming, burning heart, sat lifeless. She could touch, talk and be seen; something she had always dreamed of... and yet she felt as cold as a wreck on the ocean floor.
But, she couldn't be sunk. She was here; floating, unbroken and intact! Alive, dare she say it. But nothing could hide the gap in her memory from when she slipped beneath the waves and woke up here.
"Where are we?" she demanded, and though she spoke with all the authority of a battleship, the atmosphere sucked the life out her voice, smothering it under an all encompassing silence.
"If I knew that I'd tell you." he said, struggling to keep his head above water. "Listen, can you please just pull me up. I'll tell you everything I know, ple-"
Musashi vanished, appearing in her radio room. It was not a smooth transition. She stumbled, leaning against a bulkhead for support as the cold hollowness became more all the more real with the empty seats. Her radio operators should have been there! What was going on? She was a battleship, she wasn't suppose to feel like this.
Gathering herself, she stumbled to the primary radio and switched on the unit. It was strange going through the motions her crew went through daily, but the memories served her well. She had the device working in less than a minute. Turning the power onto its highest setting, she sent her message over the black waters.
"This... this is IJN Musashi. Any Imperial Japanese vessel, respond."
There was a thrill as she declared her presence. Not through an operator, but her personally. However, the feeling quickly died as no one replied. Dead air filled the silence as the seconds ticked by.
That... that was to be expected. She hadn't transmitted using the right codes! This strange place was making her uneasy. So she tried again; proper procedure, proper codes and waited.
Nothing.
Well... maybe they were confused at her voice? After all, there had never been a woman on board her hull when she set sail. Maybe declaring herself as Musashi hadn't been the best decision. Nonetheless, she kept trying, filtering through the dozens of known frequencies, using countless codes.
The returning dead air was as oppressive as the outside atmosphere.
Her breath strained, she flitted into her radar suite and powered up her array. Not a single return contact... not even an echo...
A new thought suddenly occurred to her. How was she able to use her equipment? Her turbines were completely still, not producing a single volt, but somehow she still had power.
What was going on?
A hand slapped weakly against her hull, reminding her about the intruder still struggling in the water.
She could just let him drown. And no matter how satisfying that would be... she needed answers. The slapping against her hull was growing more panicked by the second.
Grimacing at the prospect, she teleported back to her deck and was greeted with the intruders frantic cries for help. Taking her time, she grabbed a life preserver from a nook in her superstructure and lazily tossed it overboard.
It hit the water with a wet splat that was instantly swallowed up by the mists. Musashi felt the hands leave her hull as the drowning man dove for the preserver.
"I'm not doing this out of pity," Musashi snarled, her lip curling in distaste as the man hugged the vest like a baby, panting and coughing up water. "I expect answers out of you. And if you cross me, I can easily crush you. Or just toss you back in the drink. Understand?"
The American worm nodded, too exhausted to even speak.
Wow, Musashi is a bitch. And yet compared to the rest of Imperial Japan she's a Saint. Really says alot about those monsters.
Still with this attitude it's a good thing she isn't back.
'Help... help me stand.' It was a prayer and plea all in one. He couldn't feel his lips move, but he heard the words resound in his head all the same. A plea to God, the world, and even the tiny voices who seemed to pause and listen. 'Help me stand... one last time.'
But as her gentle soothing continued, assisted by the two Tenders, Musashi only seemed to grow more agitated. Shuddering and sobbing, eye pleading for something. All Nagato could do was keep talking, telling the wounded battleship everything about the new world.
It took two days to stabilize Musashi. Without a doubt, those were the longest of Nagato's life; comforting the broken battleship as the combined dam-com teams of the fleet worked tirelessly to bring her home. But Musashi was inconsolable, shuddering and sobbing as the fires around her boiler room were carefully extinguished.
The only real progress they achieved was when they made it inside. Each drop of water was aimed with the precision of a laser, gradually bringing the blaze under control. Mercifully, Musashi's consciousness faded with it. As the fire was contained to a single blaze in her remaining boiler, the battleship's eye closed and she drifted off into a dreamless sleep.
But the work was only half done; they couldn't move her, not in this state.
Like with her lack of a road map, Nagato cursed their lack of foresight. She had never thought this situation would occur, let alone witness it firsthand. Shipgirls possessed an endurance equal to that of their hull, just in a human shape. Though they could endure a lot before finally succumbing to their injuries, it was always over the vast expanse of the ocean.
The single greatest equalizer in this conflict.
The ocean was as unforgiving as the enemies they faced. It didn't matter if you were an Iowa or a PT boat; one lucky hit was all it would take to allow the ocean to rush in. Then you'd be fighting for survival on two fronts. As grim a fate as that was, the alternative was a battle where the only place you could sink to was your knees.
The ocean showed no mercy, but solid ground was equally apathetic. There was no water to drag you down to the depths and no distance to shield you; just the roar of guns. No quarter given, no room for withdrawal, and no mercy. Without the ocean, the only way to ensure the enemy's defeat was to completely grind them down to scrap. Blow out their boilers, break their shafts, and cripple their props. Break them until there was nothing left for their spirit to hold onto.
Yamato-class though she was, it was a miracle Musashi had survived.
Her structure was compromised to the point Akashi was worried she would break in half if they attempted to move her, compounding the issue of her boiler. With the fire exposed, all it would take was a stiff breeze blowing through the hull for Musashi's life to be snuffed out. There was only one thing for it; a new boiler had to be brought in.
Which was when they ran into new problems.
They didn't just leave boilers for a battleship lying around. Yamato would have instantly volunteered to transplant one of her own, but she was far away on Truk! And of the few people who could construct a new boiler from scratch, they were either countries away or desperately trying to keep Musashi alive.
Chitose raised the question of why not build an emergency repair bath. It had worked before. To her credit, Akashi considered the option for a long while before reluctantly shooting it down.
While it might have worked for ruptured armor, blown-out turrets, and even a bent drive shaft, none of the girls who attempted it were as damaged as this. It might – might – have worked, but Akashi wasn't willing to put her trust in it, not with Musashi's life hanging in the balance.
And so, she did the one thing she could: Ordering the fleet's damcom teams to scavenge from the surrounding wreckage, she began pulling materials together to build a new boiler from scratch. Although, it was less of a boiler and more of a protective cage around the flame to keep it from going out. A basic system of nozzles and pipes fed oil inside to keep Musashi alive.
And that was where Nagato found herself for the majority of the operation. Hoses ran from her rigging into Musashi's ruined chest, feeding oil into the broken machinery. Acting as Musashi's life-support, she had a front-row seat to every stage of the operation. More than once she had to look away to take a breath and ask herself how the battleship had survived this.
Finally, after two days of careful welding, the construction was deemed complete. Musashi was still alive, and the make-shift boiler was keeping her that way. For a life saving patch, it looked like a craggy tumour of mismatched steel, pipes, and welds.
But it wasn't over. Now they had to bring her back to Yokosuka for the real repairs to begin.
Nagato bulked at the prospect. It was another operation altogether, fraught with more peril than the first. Musashi was as fragile as a china plate; one wrong move would be enough to crack what was left of her keel, and that might dislodge the boiler. They walked the razor's edge of sending the battleship into a death spiral that she would never recover from.
And thus began to long and arduous inspection of her keel. The two Tenders looked a little green as they were recruited to drag Musashi's ruined turret housing and rigging closer so Akashi's teams could break it down into usable materials. Nagato didn't like it either, but again, they didn't have a choice. The only other option was using Abyssal steel, and no one wanted to find out what that might do to Musashi.
All things considered, the work was going smoothly with everyone giving it all their strength. On the dawn of the fifth day, Akashi finally deemed Musashi safe to transport.
Thankfully, Goto had been brought into the loop long before then and transport had already been arranged. An entire convoy of trucks had set out from Yokosuka the day before to bring their wounded hero home. And food. Lots of it. Though the scent of pre-packaged beef stew made Nagato's mouth water, one final task remained, and it was the most nerve-wracking of them all.
Working together, the fleet hoisted Musashi onto the bed of the waiting truck, trying to ignore the broken plating flaking off her sides. It was far easier than they expected, what with almost a third of the Yamato's displacement strewn about the town in twisted fragments.
Her shattered rigging came next. Due to her role as Musashi's life-support, Nagato couldn't help with that. Watching her fleet load up the broken pieces was a heart wrenching experience. While Akashi worked in an exhausted haze, Chitose and Chiyoda were far worse. Guilt hung about them like a cloud as they lifted the broken pieces of rigging onto the truck bed.
Though Nagato tried to comfort them, they only shook their heads. They kept saying they could have saved her or bought her more time. Not even the fact their actions were pivotal in defeating the Abyssals could break them out of their stupor.
If only they could have been faster.
If only they had more bombs.
If only they were carriers, with more aircraft and everything. Helping to bring Musashi back from the brink of death didn't help their mental state. Days later they still believed they were partially responsible for her condition, no matter how often Nagato told them otherwise.
"She could see us," Chitose had sniffled, eyes haunted. "She watched our planes turn away."
After what felt like an eternity, the final pieces were found and loaded. Akashi climbed up, taking her place at Musashi's side; her crews performing final checks on the boiler to ensure it was as solid as a rock.
As the Tenders climbed into the cab of another truck, Nagato settled next to Musashi's head, grunting as her stiff knees popped from days of kneeling. As the truck got underway, she dug into the enormous pot of beef stew brought for her with gusto.
It was almost over.
----
"Oh my god..."
Shime clutched at her husband as they followed the lines of people out of the tunnel and into the town they once called home. Her knees trembled and it was only Seto's arms that kept her from falling. Her husband was likewise stunned speechless, but was somehow able to keep his composure.
Around them, hundreds of others were in similar states of shock. It was only the gentle prodding of the soldiers that kept them moving through the rubble.
She had known the damage would be severe... but still, she never expected this!
Everything was gone!
In a daze, she clutched at her husband, allowing herself to be led through the devastation. She didn't know when she started to cry, but the tears refused to stop. Burying her head in Seto's chest, she refused to look up as they passed by the street they once called home.
The cozy little lane they had fallen in love with, lined with beautifully trimmed bushes and whitewashed brick walls. She couldn't bear the thought of seeing it in such a state. And their house... the cozy, two-story dwelling they had both worked so hard for, the one they hoped to grow old together in...
Gone... all of it, gone.
When Commander Gengyo ordered everyone to hide in the woods, she was convinced that her life was over. Those tense minutes of waiting in total silence, hiding in a bush with Seto, watching the open mouth of the tunnel for what would emerge were the worst of her life.
And then the battle began. It sounded like the world was coming down around them. The crack of guns blasted out of the tunnel and drifted down from the mountains, reverberating through her bones again and again. And though she had never heard a navel gun in her life, it was impossible to mistake the booming retort of Musashi's guns as anything else.
Shime had once heard the guns of a Yamato were some of the largest ever put to sea, but she had never truly believed that until now. Each time they thundered over the mountains it brought back a spark of hope; that their protector was still fighting. Until the battle ended with a final shot... and then silence descended over the valley.
Everyone waited with dread.
But nothing happened.
No Abyssals appeared, but Musashi didn't return either.
For what felt like hours, no one felt brave enough to come out of hiding, waiting breathless for whatever would happen next. Until the roar of aircraft and helicopters came from the south.
Shime remembered sobbing in relief as Gengyo met the first helicopter as it landed in the station's parking lot, delivering the news that Musashi had done it. The Abyssal fleet had been utterly destroyed. For a moment, Shime felt that everything would be alright, until more helicopters landed, dropping off soldiers who blocked off the entrance of the tunnel.
They were told Musashi had sealed the entrance on the other side to keep the Abyssals from getting to them. Until the rubble could be cleared and the tunnel's stability confirmed, no one was going through.
That was when the first seeds of unease were planted in her soul, especially when no one could find out about the state of Rokkasho. Everyone still had their phones, but information was in short supply. The only helicopters overhead were military and barred any camera crews from entering. And the news stations were little help either, saying they too were still waiting for updates on the situation.
The days that followed passed in a blur. Tents were quickly established and food and water were dropped off by helicopter. The logistics of it escaped her, but everyone was saying it was far cheaper to keep them fed until the tunnel could be cleared instead of trying to evacuate the valley by air. Shime appreciated the thought; she would never set foot in one of those deathtraps willingly. Besides, there was no point in flying them all to Misawa when Rokkasho was right on the other side of the valley.
Though Shime had never witnessed an Abyssal attack before, she had seen the broadcasts and had lived through her fair share of earthquakes. All the widespread destruction was horrific to see. But... the Abyssals were using guns! They were nowhere near as powerful as an earthquake, or as all encompassing.
Besides, their house was just one of thousands; small and barely consequential. There was a chance that it would be ignored, and she could simply walk back through the tunnel and sleep in her own bed again. A lot of the town would need to be repaired, but they were hardy folk. Moreover, they had a strong community. Already a committee had been formed, debating on the fastest and safest way to rebuild, how to acquire funds, and other necessities.
Attending their meetings and hearing them lay out their recovery plans eased her worried spirit.
But Seto was more pessimistic. In private, he said that it was all pointless without knowing the state Rokkasho was in. The JSDF wasn't telling them anything, and their planning could all be for nothing. It was a respectful disagreement, but Shime couldn't help but resent him for his negativity.
Japan had rebuilt Iwaki. They had rebuilt Nagasaki, Sasebo, Hamamatsu, and even Hachinohe! Rokkasho would be no different! What was he afraid about?
All the same, everyone waited in anticipation for days. It warmed her heart to see the town coming together, reminding her of fond memories as a little girl. The consensus was that people whose houses were still intact would open their doors to those who hadn't been so fortunate. And just in time; it was reported that the blockage had been cleared and the tunnel was undergoing a final inspection. However, the army promised that it would be ready in the morning.
Shime prepared for sleep that night smiling, though when Seto was nowhere to be found she stayed up waiting for him. When he finally returned to their tent, it was with a grim expression. He had already heard about the tunnel but had gone looking for answers of his own. Then he revealed that he had been talking with some of the soldiers at length and learned that buses were coming to ferry them all to Misawa in the morning.
Of course, Shime had demanded to know why. It couldn't be that bad, could it?
Seto could only shrug, saying they hadn't been very forthcoming. But they almost seemed to pity him.
Shime's cheer evaporated as she laid down with her husband, the cold unease settling in her gut once again.
Surely, it couldn't be that bad?
Now, stumbling through the rubble, it was impossible to deny. There was nothing left of Rokkasho to rebuild. To make matters worse, the buses couldn't make it to the tunnel due to all the debris. They were required to walk through the devastation wrought upon their lives to reach them.
With every step she took, Shime could feel rubble catch on her shoes. Each time she stumbled it was like the world driving the point home. They had nothing left. Their home was gone, their town in absolute ruins, and they could do nothing! By now, Seto's shirt was soaked by her tears and still they wouldn't stop.
They walked for what felt like miles until Seto stopped with a gasp. For a man such as himself, it was a rare sound. Shime couldn't help but look up.
Her eyes widened. It was Nagato!
The member of the Big Seven was unmistakable, her rigging deployed in all its splendor. And yet, the battleship incarnate didn't seem to notice the crowd of civilians, too caught up in her work.
Around her was a small group of Kanmusu, the names of which escaped her. They were beautiful, as all shipgirls were, with bodies that Shime could only be envious of. Their natural radiance, however, was offset by the dark bags under their eyes and a surrounding gloom as they prepared to lift a pile of scrap metal onto a truck...
Shime felt her blood run cold.
It wasn't scrap metal. The broken form sagged at the waist as it was gently hoisted up, arms and legs distinguishing themselves from the mass. That was about all she could recognize; the rest she couldn't even describe. Metal... miles upon miles of metal that seemed to compress and bulge before her very eyes. It hurt just looking at it. Too much in so little space.
Musashi... or rather, what was left of him.
As the body of their protector was lifted to safety, Shime couldn't help but feel a touch of shame. They might have lost everything, but they were still alive. All of them. And Musashi had paid dearly for it.
She hadn't even thought of him, that was the shameful part. Throughout all the talk of rebuilding their home, not a single word had been said about the man who kept the Abyssals at bay. Could he be fixed? Shime didn't know. The news never reported on such things, but surely there must be a way. They wouldn't just leave him like that, would they?
The procession of refugees had stalled, watching with a sense of reverence as the broken battleship was secured on the truck.
At that moment, despite it going on for years, the war had never felt so real when one of their protectors lay dying before them. Some took pictures, others prayed, and even more could do nothing but watch as the truck began to creep across the broken town, braving the potholes and craters to ferry its precious cargo to safety.
----
The shock of the lightning attack had gripped Japan like a vice. Less than an hour after the first shots were fired, sirens began to blare across the country. From Aomori to Sesabo, daily life had ground to a halt. The Navy considered the sirens worth the risk. Until they could confirm this was an isolated attack and not the heralding of something worse, the people were better off in the bunkers and shelters rather than being left as easy prey.
For almost the entire day, the nation held its breath. But when the all-clear was given, it did not bring the immediate relief many had hoped. There was a lingering sense of unease as people poked their heads out of their safe refuge. Prolonged war had made them wary. Though life across the nation resumed, everyone kept a cautious eye to the east, expecting to see the black smoke of warships coming over the horizon.
However, as hours passed and no further disasters occurred, tensions began to ease. People dared to breathe a sigh of relief.
Soon statements were released by the Navy, publicized by the media, and heard by everyone across the country: Japan had faced its darkest hour. A lone Abyssal fleet had snuck beneath their radar and attempted to gain a foothold on Japan itself. However, they were stopped dead in their tracks by a lone battleship, answering the call when her country's need was most dire.
Musashi had finally returned.
The announcement was met with the gratitude of a thankful nation. However, unlike every other shipgirl that had appeared, information about the new arrival was scarce, which made people suspicious. The Navy never failed to publicize every new shipgirl that returned, so getting a name and nothing else was strange. There wasn't even a picture of the returning battleship.
Well... there was.
Sort of.
But if the rumors surrounding the image were true, then...
----
Admiral Suzu blinked, stupefied. He glanced down at the dog tag on his desk, then to the hastily written report next to it. Finally, his gaze settled on Gengyo, who stood at attention before him. He had always known the Commander as a level headed individual. While not exactly career orientated, his sense of duty was unquestionable. Not to mention that he would never waste his breath on something as ludicrous as this if it wasn't true!
But somehow that made it even more impossible to believe. Right then, the only response he could come up with was...
"What?"
Gengyo shifted as Suzu poured over his report again in disbelief. "Uhm... you're saying that Musashi is a... a..."
"A man. Yes, sir." Gengyo finished the question.
Musashi... A man. Suzu didn't know how or even why that particular topic was dominating the inquiry. He'd had an entire list of questions written out, demanding to know how an entire fleet had made it under the radar station's nose. As the Commanding Officer of the radar station network, his neck was on the line as much as Gengyo's.
But this dominated his mind. The very idea was just so... alien and wrong he couldn't focus until he got to the bottom of it. Still in a state of disbelief, he quickly typed at his computer.
The original image was almost impossible to find just days after it was posted. Most likely replaced or deleted by a spiteful hacker for daring to question their waifu. As sad a reason as that was, Suzu was forced to acknowledge it. Such was the nature of the internet these days.
But the Kanmusu Corp's Media team was on top of everything. They had managed to save a copy, distributing it to all senior staff of the JSDF and decried it as a hoax.
Suzu had been thankful for their prudence. The email had crossed his desk mere hours before a press conference where the topic had eventually come up. He told them exactly what he thought it was; a hoax. A prank.
Now, though...
The email was buried under reports and demands for information, but eventually, he found the... controversial image.
When it had first been posted mere hours before the attack, it had been largely brushed off. Though in a new record of only thirty seconds, it was almost drowned out by artists and rabid fans alike posting images of what the real Musashi would look like. A lot more cleavage, too much skin, and less hair on the chin. People called it out as a joke, claiming it was photoshopped to include a fairy. It came from an out-of-the-way school, after all. Whatever voices argued that it was real, including the original poster, and dozens claiming they were eyewitnesses, were drowned out.
And really, who could blame them? A shipgirl coming back as a man? Moreover, a Japanese battleship wearing a Canadian flag?
Preposterous!
Of course, before the attack people were willing to just pass it off as a joke in bad taste or an attention seeker; but in the days following, the commentary had taken a darker turn.
Theories of the man trying to take advantage of Musashi's sacrifice to conspiring with the Abyssals for fame ran rampant. And all the while, people posted images of the real Musashi, urging others to not give this bastard the attention he was hoping for, stifling any mention of him altogether. The official notice from the Kanmusu Corp, citing it as a hoax, settled the matter for a good many people.
The whole situation was topped by another image that tugged at the heartstrings. No one knew who took it - one of the refugees from Rokkasho, probably - but it quickly rose to prominence. It was of Nagato and her rescue fleet, gently lifting a mass of scrap metal onto a truck. The rising sun was peeking over the mountains in the foreground, throwing the figures into sharp relief.
It had taken Suzu a long minute of staring before he finally identified the mass as the broken body of Musashi. Barely recognizable as human.
Such slogans like 'Honor her sacrifice' were everywhere. Now it appeared that the trend had shifted away from hating the man towards wishing the best for their fallen protector. 'Get well soon' wishes, prayers, and general encouragement begged the battleship to hang onto life. A fair number of them even begged the Kanmusu Corp not to give up and scrap her. For better or for worse, the public appeared to be ignoring the original cause of the controversy.
The only reason Suzu deemed this situation worthy of his attention was that damned flag on the man's shoulder. Eventually, word would reach their allies across the ocean, and what a shitstorm that would be. May the Kami have mercy on that poor soul, because his country certainly wouldn't.
But then... this had to happen.
"You mean this man?" He turned the monitor around, revealing the photo of the Canadian infanteer wearing rigging and a bewildered expression surrounded by school kids. "This man is Musashi?"
"Yes, sir," Gengyo said without hesitation. "In fact, that's exactly where we found him. He wandered into the schoolyard sometime after our search for the Kanmusu began. He didn't say much, just asked to be put in touch with the Canadian Embassy."
Suzu's mouth hung open like a fish. "It's real??"
The Commander nodded, resolutely. "I can testify to it myself. The rigging was certainly real, as was the fairy. I spoke to it personally. One of our wounded, Private Hiroaki, witnessed Morgan tear apart an Abyssal Destroyer with his bare hands, saving his life. I have included a transcription of his account in the references."
"Who's Morgan?" Suzu demanded.
"That's what he called himself, sir. He... doesn't believe himself to be Musashi. I don't know what's going on, but he claims to be a Corporal William A. Morgan."
But Suzu was leaning back in his chair, massaging his temples. For all the confusion this new... development brought about, the important part was that it wasn't his concern. This was a Kanmusu issue and therefore it fell squarely in Admiral Goto's lap. Despite everything, Suzu couldn't help but smirk. It would appear the young Admiral would be getting a rather strange addition to his harem.
If Musashi even made it.
That wiped the smirk off his face. If Gengyo was right, then that man deserved far better than what the internet was dealing out.
Another thought occurred to him, against his better judgment. They had far more important issues to discuss, but... ugh, he couldn't get it out of his head.
"Who else knows about this? Did you tell Nagato? Are the shipgirls aware of him?"
Gengyo shook his head, but there wasn't a shred of remorse on his face. "My immediate concern taking care of the refugees."
"Delegation exists for a reason."
"I am aware, sir. However, when I learned that the Kanmuso retrieval team had already reached Morgan at the battle's conclusion, I no longer considered it a priority. He's male, after all. I would assume they knew the moment they laid eyes on him."
Suzu sighed, massaging his temples again.
"I'm going to have to talk to Goto about this. Whether they know or not, you're still the first Officer Musashi-"
"Morgan, sir."
Drained as he was from the proceedings, Suzu merely cocked an eyebrow at the interruption. Gengyo stared back, unflinching.
"After all he suffered to keep us safe, using his real name is the least we can do."
Suzu stared for a long moment, bewildered. "Uh... Musashi's real name? Please.... elaborate."
The very definition of an explanation was to help clear up any misunderstanding and dispel any confusion. That's what it was supposed to do, but by the end, Suzu was ready to pull out what remained of his hair trying to make sense of what he was hearing.
Finally, he just sagged back in his chair, exhausted.
Well... if the Kanmusu Corp hadn't already gotten the biggest shock of their lives, they better be ready for this one. For a long while after Gengyo was dismissed to recover from his ordeal, Suzu stared at his keyboard, at a complete loss of where to begin. The story was just... too ludicrous to believe. A missing Canadian embodying a Japanese warship?
Eventually, he managed to put together a few cohesive paragraphs and fired the email off to Goto. For such a simple action, the click of the mouse echoed in his ear like the cocking of a revolver. He needed to confirm this tale with the young Admiral before passing it on to the rest of the Maritime Staff Office.
For all of Gengyo's confidence, Suzu wasn't ready to put his reputation in the hands of one report, even if the evidence was stacked in its favor. It was just... Musashi... a man?! A claim like that would get him laughed out of office. And he was already on thin ice as it was!
But if it was all true... if Musashi was this man, then the situation was far more complicated than he dared to admit.
----
The convoy rumbled on, dozens of police cars and even a few APCs forming a tight security cordon around their charge as they crawled down the highway. The Fuso Type 74 truck was barely making seventy down the highway, roaring and spluttering under the combined weight of two battleships, a repair ship, and their rigging. And yet it strove on with a dogged determination as though the Kami of trucks itself was watching over their journey.
For all she knew, the vehicle was becoming the Kami of trucks. Certainly a fitting reward.
The drive south had been an exercise of faith in every deity that existed. They were powerless to keep the wind from rushing through Musashi's shattered hull. Each bump in the road was cause for concern. A stiff breeze could kill the battleship right then. The cage was holding; the blaze inside holding steady, but one wrong jolt was all it would take. Throughout it all, Nagato kept Musashi's head cradled in her lap, silently urging her to hold on just a bit longer.
They were almost home, almost to Yokosuka. Just a few hours longer.
Mercifully, Musashi hadn't stirred throughout the entire trip. Soon, the green fields of the open country transitioned into the organized chaos that was on the outskirts of Utsunomiya. They were on the final stretch now, and no one was taking any chances.
One by one, the police escort turned on their sirens, but they were hardly necessary. It seemed the entire police force of Tokyo were on the streets to ensure Musashi's safe return. Ramps onto the highway were blocked off by flashing lights, streets had been barricaded, and not a single vehicle remained on the road to bar their path.
But what struck Nagato the most were the people.
She should have known by then that information spread a lot quicker than it did in the 1940s, but the speed of it still caught her off guard sometimes. As she would find out later, word of Musashi's deed had spread like wildfire. There was no hiding the Abyssal invasion, and everyone who had lived through the Blood Week was keenly aware of what their enemy was capable of. And while they had weathered marauding fleets over the years, the damage had always been superficial. A razed village or town, burned cities, displaced residents, and condolences for those who perished.
But none of them had ever struck as close to the heart as this. While the Navy was keeping their cards close to the chest, everyone knew this had not been a simple raid; you wouldn't sound alarms all over the country for that. Despite the Navy's assurances, everyone was aware this could have been the beginning of the end. This, fuelled by public paranoia had created a grim prediction of the future had the Abyssals been allowed to take root on Japanese soil.
But one lone battleship had held that dark future at bay; answering the call in Japan's greatest hour of need. Willing to make the ultimate sacrifice to keep her country and its people safe.
That alone drove Musushi's reputation past mere heroism.
Admittedly, the Navy's stance on OPSEC hadn't helped matters. Shipgirls might have been celebrities and heroes worldwide, but they were still military personnel. Their deployments and operational status were shrouded in mystery. No one knew how the Abyssal's intelligence gathering worked or if they even had an intelligence division, but they weren't going to grow complacent because of assumptions.
However, they also couldn't completely isolate the shipgirls from the public eye like a piece of equipment. They were heroes! Walking morale. As popular - if not more so - than many idols across the country. That left threading the gap between appeasing the public and maintaining operational security. And however much rabid fans raged when they couldn't readily get updates or pictures of their favorite shipgirls, the war effort always came first.
It was safe to say that the public never knew if a shipgirl was damaged or not; just wild speculation based on when she was last seen in public. It propped up Japan's protectors as indomitable pillars of strength, fighting tooth and nail for the country they served. They were legends in and of themselves; a belief the navy reinforced at every opportunity.
Legends never died, after all. For those in the know, it was less of a metaphor; but the saying held true.
But Musashi's actions had shaken that indomitable image in the best way possible.
For the first time since the war began, people saw a dying Kanmusu. Saw what their protectors were willing to suffer for their safety. And they came out in droves to respect that.
As the convoy progressed through Tokyo itself, thousands began to line the sidewalks to pay their respects to the wounded battleship. Banners were strung across the gates of every school they passed, the entire city seemed to have turned up to watch. And yet, it reminded Nagato far more of a festival than a funeral procession. Though the atmosphere was solemn, and though grief was written across a fair number of the upturned faces, they were in the minority.
Japan had faith in its protectors, and this attack only affirmed their trust and tempered their resolve. All the same, it was strange to see Shino priests run out to purify the road with buckets of water before the police pulled them back.
All too soon, the convoy pulled up to the front gate of the Navel District and was waved through without issue. Then they were surrounded by a crowd of a different sort. Task Force Cutback had come home, and what felt like every shipgirl in the fleet lined the road. Nagato could feel the weight of their gazes, horrified at the state Musashi was in. And yet, they followed the truck until it stopped at the wide doors of the repair baths.
A little confused, Nagato glanced at Akashi. "Shouldn't we bring her to your workshop?"
But the repair ship only shook her head, sadly. "Her entire frame needs repair before I can do anything. If the repair baths can't do that... I don't know what to do."
Nodding solemnly, Nagato prepared to disembark. It was a delicate procedure, painstakingly sliding Musashi toward the edge where dozens of hands waited to carry their wounded vessel. Nagato found herself pressed between Kongou and Iowa, holding up Musashi's torso and waist. A few other battleships took her legs while destroyers dutifully kept her arms and head straight and level.
With their precious cargo secured, they carried Musashi into the steam-filled room and reverently lowered her into a bath.
As soon as the water touched her steel, Musashi shuddered; letting out a croaking gasp. Then her body relaxed, settling down into the warm repair fluid with, what sounded like a groan of relief.
All eyes in the room looked up at the timer hanging from the ceiling. It spun wildly for a few seconds before solidifying into one of the longest repair times Nagato had ever seen. More than a month. However, that didn't stop everyone from letting out a deep sigh of relief.
It was then the exhaustion, both physical and mental, caught up with Nagato. She sagged and would have fallen if Kongou hadn't caught her, pulling her into a warm embrace.
They had done it.
Musashi would live.
----
Far away in the Pacific outpost of Truk, a tray clattered against the ground. Porcelain plates shattered, spilling a small mountain of food across the mess hall's tiled floor. Everyone jumped in surprise, but the culprit was too absorbed with the TV hanging in the corner of the room to even notice.
All day the news announcers had been repeating the same story, but now something new had finally appeared.
The shot was from a helicopter high in the sky, following the small convoy racing through Tokyo. And in the back of the truck...
Yamato wailed, covering her mouth as she fell to her knees. She had been told the damage was severe, but this?! Horrified, she was barely aware of the Destroyers snuggling up against her, their assurances falling on deaf ears. The awful scene was fixed in her mind and she couldn't look away.
Musashi...
Her sister was dying!
She had to get home! Her sister needed her!
A/N: So this chapter feels like a bit of a weird one. But this, honestly, is why I enjoy writing in the 3rd person. Trying to capture the grand scope is hard in 1st person when you have to work within the confines of the POV's head and need to come up with contrived ways for how they would know this information. Plus, its less jarring if I want to portray the story in a purely narrator's sort of perspective. It's like an RTS; I can zoom into the main character when its needed then zoom back out to view the repercussion without breaking the flow.
Anyway, hope you all enjoy the coming trainwreak and thank you for commenting and supporting me!
EDIT Dec 11, 2023: Fixed grammar and spelling mistakes.
The thing that strikes me most, and most often, about this story is just how finely it threads the difference between 'grim' and 'grimdark'. It is grim - because the situation is - but it's not carciatured. It's not 'grim for the sake of it'.
I love this story. @DisgruntledJaege - if you think you're hearing a nearly inaudible squee shortly after every time you post, well...
You are. That'd be me, celebrating another page in this excellent tale coming along. And I'm dearly excited to see what comes next. Thank you for sharing this with us!
This is still a superb story, if only the price for a new chapter wasn't a few weeks of anguish and teeth gnashing about the bloody confrontation re Kanmusu existing and all that catharsis finally coming. ;P Thanks for sharing! Hoping that it'll be only a few days of anguish to pay for the next chapter.
Poor Morgan, I can see the Japanese treating him like shit even after this. He's a Gaijin who dare steal the name, rigging and spirt of Musashi from her. Plus he's a ugly man so he deserves to suffer.
At least that's what the fanbois, who worship their new idol despite knowing nothing about them, will think.
Poor Morgan, I can see the Japanese treating him like shit even after this. He's a Gaijin who dare steal the name, rigging and spirt of Musashi from her. Plus he's a ugly man so he deserves to suffer.
At least that's what the fanbois, who worship their new idol despite knowing nothing about them, will think.
We should also consider a possibility of hardcore denial to the level of perception filter.
"What are you talking about? How can Musashi be a man and a foreigner? Musashi is Musashi!"
And so, she did the one thing she could: Ordering the fleet's dam-com teams to scavenge from the surrounding wreckage, she began pulling materials together to build a new boiler from scratch.
Nope, no Abyssal steel in this patch. Unfortunate, the only ready source of steel was William's own shattered rigging. Which didn't do the tenders mental health any favors.
Thank you to everyone who commented! Your engagement and speculation are what keep me going. Thank you!
But the unbroken wall of mist shattered any resolve he could muster. What was the point? Was there even anything out there? Was he just doomed from the start?
I'm not even two chapters in, and I wanted to say: WOW! This is an excellent story; the writing is great, the plot gripping, and the tone and atmosphere are positively beautiful. Very glad you posted this here!
