Pacific Ocean - October 17th, 2016 a.t.b - 2025 Hours
"So let me get this straight, we have confirmation that this is canon and not a fanfic universe?" Youko questioned Yuzuki who was lounging on one of their guns, and when the white-clad twin nodded, the black-clad sibling sighed in relief, "That's good. So when are we?"
Yuzuki yawned, "About the middle of October in the year 2016 A.T.B. Which I repeat is a stupid dating system. I'd rather with CE, at least that's less of a mouthful." She looked over at Youko, who in turn was staring at the massive 'fog bank' surrounding the ship, "We have a couple of months before the real action starts. Plenty of time to really put some pain on the Brits. Hmm, thats an interesting question actually; if the Britannians are Brits, then what are the British?"
"Poms." Youko answered as she continued staring at the cloud of nanomaterial, "And we're calling the new weapon the XM-1 Electro-Magnetic Mortar, EMM for short, NATO reporting name will be 'Emma' for casual reference." Yuzuki snorted and Youko nodded, "Yeah, because Emma is a bitch. Laugh it up." While Yuzuki did indeed start laughing, Youko focused her attention back on the fog, "Hey, we have a contact blundering into our fog bank."
Yuzuki stopped laughing as she checked the sensor feed, glowing markings lighting up on her face as Youko ignored the soft chirping, "Yeah, looks like a Britannian tanker loaded with Sakuradite. What do you want to do?" The ship began turning left and Yuzuki grinned, "Groovy baby, gonna go all Mary Celeste on their asses?"
Youko nodded, her own small grin forming, "I just finished work on a new toy that I want to test before we get to Pearl. And raiding a Sakuradite tanker is a perfect field test." She turned to her white-clad twin, "I want you to lead the boarding action." The port side gun array, a nest of bristling automatic beam guns, clanked as it reassembled into an EMM launcher battery but didn't do anything more, "Expand fog bank by 300 meters, and standby for boarding."
Yuzuki grinned, "Aye aye!" She hopped off the gun turret and melted into the hull, Youko watching her do so.
After several seconds, she brought her hand up and stared at it, "Am I still sane? Or have I passed the point of no return, and am simply continuing to go forward, deeper down the rabbit hole?" Lowering her hand, Youko turned back to the churning, dark waters as she continued to sail onwards, "Yuzuki."
-Yes?-
Youko's eyes narrowed, digital image enhancement showing the blocky shape of a Sakuradite tanker lost in the nanomaterial fog, "I'm sending you the specs for the boarding drones. Remember to avoid setting off the Sakuradite with stray laser fire. I'd rather not see how much energy my Klein Field can absorb from that kind of explosion." As she finished turning into her new intercept course, Youko began loading the small unit of prototypes into the 'Emma' and began adjusting the firing angle to intercept the ship when Yuzuki popped out of the deck, literally from a bubble of nanomaterial.
"Hup!" Youko stared as Yuzuki finished her leap out of the bubble and shimmied into the launch aperture of the EMM, "Okay, ready to go!"
Youko's jaw worked soundlessly as processes started, crashed, and then rebooted, "You want me to
launch you at the ship? Couldn't you just jump aboard when I draw close? Like a sane person?"
Yuzuki laughed, "Sane? Youko, dear twin sister, we have clearly reached a point where we needed to stop." Her expression turned maniacal,
"So let's keep going and see what happens!"
"If you say anything related to science right now," Youko intoned, "I'm going to reformat you."
Yuzuki giggled, "Kinky~"
Sighing, Youko turned her gaze towards the ship despite having high-resolution scans, "Firing boarding team now. Remember, I want that ship disabled so I can off-load the Sakuradite." Before Yuzuki could say a word, Youko pointed at the ship, "Firing now." There was a whine as the accelerators began spinning their deadly cargo, one of them cheering like she was on a carnival ride, before the EMM shifted and Youko felt the rapid
thudthudthud of the launcher firing, sending nine shapes cartwheeling into the dark sky.
Youko stubbornly tried not to smile at the excited scream that had come from one of the projectiles before turning back to prepare for the rest of the attack, before her grin broke through, "Yeah, let's keep going and see what happens." She melted into her hull before appearing on the bridge, now arranged with plush chairs and an array of screens, before plopping into the chair, "Avast me hearties, I'm coming for your booty."
She looked around before sighing, "It's no fun making quips without someone to hear them."
***
Captain Ramon looked out at the fog that was engulfing the ocean around his tanker before turning to the rest of his crew, "Nothing?"
His communications officer shook his head, "Nothing. I can't reach Oahu, Los Angeles, San Francisco, no-one. I can't even pick up the BBC. It's like everything has vanished." He looked out at the fog his Captain was staring at, "Or we vanished."
"Cortez, stow that talk." Ramon snapped, "The tales of the Sargasso Fog and ghost ships are just that, tales, and we will escape this fog bank and get to Oahu, is that clear?" Murmurs of agreement reach his ears and Ramon smiled as he turned to his Navigator, "Matthew, are we still on track for Hawaii?"
The Navigator nodded, "So long as we keep sailing straight, we'll either hit Hawaii or beach ourselves in Mexico, no way we can miss an entire fucking continent Captain, let alone two and an oversized land-bridge." Chuckles from the rest of the crew broke the tension as Ramon looked out at the fog before Matthew continued speaking, "Captain, should we consider the possibility of boarders?"
Ramon nodded, "I was just thinking the same thing. Tell all hands to grab a rifle and ammo. I don't care if El Diablo himself shows up, we're not losing this ship without a fight." He turned to his bridge crew, "Helm, Full Steam Ahead and lock the throttle. We're not going to stop for anything. Communications, activate the emergency distress beacon and set it to full power. The rest of you, grab a gun and prepare for anything, and I mean anything."
Anything, as it turned out, proceeded to reveal itself as nine dark shapes slamming into the deck of the tanker hard enough to embed themselves into the steel, shocking the bridge crew into staring. Next to Ramon, one of the bridge crew crossed himself, before muttering a prayer in Latin. And then Ramon saw the dark shapes begin to move.
"Red Alert! All hands! Repel boarders on the surface deck!" The screamed shout of alarm from one of the crew into the intercom shocked the Captain into slapping the alert button and the formerly still air was filled with the wailing scream of the alert siren. Outside, black shapes extended long legs to pull themselves free while a white-clad form pushed herself out of the hole she made and pulled loose a strip of steel, nanomaterial running across it to reform it into a sword.
"Surrender your cargo and you'll live to see your homes and families!" Yuzuki called out towards the Bridge, "Resist, and none of you will live to tell the tale!"
A burst of gunfire, quieter than what Yuzuki's memories were accustomed to, and confirming that the guns were indeed basically tiny railguns from the electrical bursts, struck Yuzuki's Klein Field. With a disappointed sigh, she pointed her sword forward, "You have your orders. No survivors, no prisoners." She turned back to the hole she made upon landing as the boarding drone prototypes lunged forwards on spidery legs, an electronic banshee scream ripping loose from concealed speakers.
Kneeling as gunfire and screams began to echo from the ship, Yuzuki calmly began tearing open the hole she made, cutting away material with her new sword until she caught a glimpse of bright glowing pink and began melting into silvery liquid, squeezing through the hole into the cargo area itself. Landing on a catwalk, body reforming in seconds, Yuzuki stared at the glowing mass underneath her.
"Ooh."
As Yuzuki began locating a place for her twin to connect to the tanker, Youko was watching the feed from the Boarding Drone prototypes as frightened sailors emptied magazines of ammunition into the approaching drones, before with a mental flick across the quantum communications channel, a drone lashed out and impaled a man through the chest, before with a hiss the leg split open and tore the man in half as the newly-revealed shears casually snipped another man in half, his grenade falling underneath the drone.
Youko didn't even bother to engage the Klein Field as the device detonated and the drone strode forward, the sound of cicadas playing at a deafening volume. But that wasn't what Youko was focused on as she direct two Drones along the outside of the hull to the propellers, watching as lasers flashed and began cutting into the spinning drive shafts under a stream of super-heated bubbles.
"I should be feeling something." Youko muttered to herself, "But I don't. Why? Is it because of what happened to me? Some...modification to my psychology? Or am I just that jaded that real, human death, means as much to me as a dead corpse in a video game?" Shifting her attention to her course, Youko fired her maneuvering thrusters to bring herself in line with the tanker as it became visible, her thoughts wandering towards just what had happened to her.
Suddenly Youko slapped herself, "Get a fucking grip on yourself. This is you now, and you will do the job you were given, because maybe, just maybe, there'll be answers at the end of it all." Looking back up at the screens of the slaughter Youko focused on the Captain, staring in mute horror as she drew up alongside him, "There had better be."
Armour shifted to reveal harpoon before it fired into the hull of the tanker, punching through the thin hull and into the Sakuradite storage next to Yuzuki, who smiled, "Yatta. Hose docking confirmed, prepare for feed line insertion." Pulling off the penetrating head, the white-clad young woman easily yanked out several long hoses brought across via the armored umbilical attached the harpoon, before casually tossing them into the glowing liquid.
Pushing them towards the bottom of the tanks, Yuzuki sent the signal to the Youko, and her smile grew as she felt the pumps engage and begin draining the tanks.
On the bridge, there were no smiles, only panic and determination as one of the officers turned to Captain Ramon, "Captain! The levels in the Sakuradite tanks are dropping!"
Ramon nodded, "Ghosts don't send robots to kill a crew, this was always about getting the Sakuradite." As crewmembers fired on the approaching robots, which reponded with lasers that cut through steel and men easily, Ramon grimaced, "The Sargasso Fog, they must have used the legend to create some kind of jamming device, and then create their own fog. But how could that ancient battleship keep up with us?"
Suddenly the ship rocked; one of the drones underwater had finished cutting through enough of the drive shaft that the propeller simply twisted itself off the shaft and slammed into the hull before twirling down into the abyssal deep. Seconds later, the second joined it, punching a hole in the stern that let in a flood of seawater.
And like a switch had been flicked, or a set of reins pulled, the tanker began to slow down. That was when Ramon knew they were lost, "Activate the Dead Hand system." The crew stared at him, but Ramon remained firm, "We're lost. They won't let any of us survive to warn others. So we are to detonate the Sakuradite and hope the explosion takes the bastards down with them!"
One of the crew nodded, "Aye Captain!" Their decision to fight to the last man firmed, Ramon pulled away a panel connected to a circuit that was independent from the rest of the ship's systems, reveal a key-hole and a single button. Pulling out a small key from around his neck, Ramon's mind drifted to his family, before he turned the key and watched the green light turn on.
"If I'm to die here, you'll all join me." Ramon stated, before punching the button, expecting the explosives under the Sakuradite to detonate.
When the ship remained intact, then and only then did Ramon know he had truly lost, just as the Boarding Drone smashed its way into the room and fired its laser.
Meanwhile, Yuzuki watched the last of the Sakuradite get sucked into the hose linking to Youko over the Joint Tactical Network, "Didn't think we had enough space for this all."
-This ship is an independent merchant vessel, closer to a tramp tanker than anything. Expecting this stuff to be transported in supertankers like back Home was foolish.-
"Maybe." Yuzuki allowed, "But who's to say that military tankers aren't that big. A lot of this stuff seems dominated by military applications."
-Is that really a surprise to you?-
"Probably not." Yuzuki agreed, "Social Darwinists and Monarchies are a shitty combination. Good job with the explosives, that probably would have given our hull a beating huh?"
-Probable damage was about 15% Wave Force saturation. For a battleship, that's a big deal.-
"I hear that. Okay, the drones are starting the clean up now. Let her drift?"
-Yes.-
"Okay then, I'll make sure what corpses are left are tossed overboard and then we'll head back on board. So, how did your prototypes pan out, in your opinion?"
There was a pause from Youko.
-They performed adequately. I believe I will retain the design for future usage.-
Yuzuki grinned, "Groovy. So are you starting to get data from the Sakuradite?"
-Yes. And I found something.-
Yuzuki paused in walking out of the cargo area, "What?"
-We have a fifth EnigmaTech, not four.-
Yuzuki's jaw dropped as processes stuttered in shock.
"Well fuck."
I'm using a phone, pictures are shrunk.
