What is dead may never die. Including fics I haven't touched in waaay too long. But finally the evil has been defeated, and writer's block banished for the time being. In short, Fubuki is back in action, and action is certainly on the way. Once again splitting this chapter since there is a pretty good stopping point, but hopefully the latter half won't be too far behind. (Also, thank you to Arbitracom and Argus Yomoflach for helping me with this!)
Chapter 4: First Sortie
(Or, 'Finding Your Sea Legs')
The armory was lit unevenly, spotlights in the corners illuminating the center floor in bright gold, while the far edges and ceiling were swallowed in deep shadow. While the exterior was quite aesthetically pleasing, the interior was all-business - heavy steel support arches running up and across the room at regular intervals were exposed, with the walls consisting of heavy-looking, slightly rusted slabs of metal, and the floor of hard grey concrete. There were also a handful of lockers lined up off to the left, for some reason. "If you've got anything you don't want lost, don't bring it out to sea," Sendai explained, letting Fubuki go. The destroyer nodded absently, still taking in her surroundings.
While the scent of saltwater permeated all across the base, it was much stronger in here; the entire far half of the room was filled with water. It sloshed and slapped gently against the concrete walls, the noise echoing strangely against the high shadowy ceiling. It was also quite humid, Fubuki realized, her shirt clinging to her back uncomfortably.
Painted yellow caution stripes marked out a rectangular platform at the edge, which had several sets of deep grooves spaced along its length; within each pair a set of keel-shoes waited, Fubuki recognizing her own among them. "Alright, go ahead and slip 'em on," Sendai said, already grabbing her pair and affixing them over her boots. Everyone else followed suit, and soon enough they were standing at the ready, one girl to each set of indents. An obnoxiously loud buzzer filled the space, feeling like it was drilling into her skull, before mercifully stopping; six sets of rigging suspended on chains descended from the darkened ceiling before coming to a neat halt beside their intended recipient.
Fubuki hesitantly slipped her arms through the backpack-straps of her smokestack section, half-afraid she'd be pulled back up into the air. Fortunately, though, the chains seemed to have a little bit of give to them, enough that she was able to get everything on without too much difficulty. Once the torpedo racks were affixed to her thighs, she looped the long strap of the turret over her head and shoulder.
"Alright, now," Jinstuu stated blandly, "Unhooking procedures. Fubuki-san, you're with Naka-chan."
Turning to her left, Fubuki found the idol giving her an expectant look, gesturing vaguely with her suspended arm. "I'll be able to help you once you've got me." Over her black elbow-gloves, she now wore padded forearm protectors topped with four small turrets to an arm, and due to the chains still hooked in, her movement was somewhat restricted. Fubuki freed those first. Next, the cruiser had a seaplane catapult mounted on a band around her left upper arm, and a belt tight around her waist that put a pair of torpedo racks atop her hips.
Then it was Naka's turn to lean in, detaching Fubuki's own rigging with a quick and practiced hand. "Alright, we're ready now." Everyone else was already well-prepared, to Fubuki's embarrassment, but Naka shot her an expression that somehow said Don't you dare blame yourself, or else I will hunt you down. "Remember you're new, Fubuki-chan; try not to sweat it."
After a moment of hesitation, the destroyer nodded affirmation, gripping her turret's handle tight as the platform began to lower. Subtly, she also crouched down slightly, shifting her weight forward in preparation. "Uh… you don't have to be so intense, poi." Yuudachi said from off to the right, but Fubuki didn't respond, her focus now on maintaining her balance at all costs.
The platform reached the waterline, liquid flowing into the grooves, and soon enough the destroyer felt the support of the concrete release, leaving her buoyant. She was managing to hold steady, somehow, though her knees were trembling slightly. As decent as the pose was for maintaining her balance without sacrificing agility too much, It left her legs at a difficult angle; she was unsure how long she could last. How far would they be going anyway?
Paired with another loud buzzer, the giant metal door began to raise before them, letting in cooler night air as the bright lights spilled out onto the water. "Alright," Jintsuu stated, somewhere between gentle and commanding as she pointed forth. "Torpedo Squadron Three, move out!"
Quietly, their screws hummed to life, and they set forth out into the night. The cool air outside was a slight relief when the door of the humid armory had opened, but proved far more refreshing in full. A soft breeze rippled across the harbor, bringing with it the faint sounds of city traffic and combining with the spray they kicked up to cool her feverish skin. The moon hung low to the west, a narrow golden crescent pointed straight down, leaving a dim shimmering trail across the waves that threatened to be overwhelmed by the much brighter lights along the shore and beyond.
Feeling at peace, Fubuki took a deep breath in - and then stumbled a bit. The others were already pulling ahead, gracefully turning northward, while she wavered and struggled to make up for the lapse and regain that temporary perfect balance. She somehow managed to avoid completely toppling over, but it was more down to dumb luck and a series of almost comedic contortions than actual skill, and by the time she'd regained her bearings, the rest were already up by the end of the big pier. "Whaaa! Hey, wait up!"
Thankfully they heard her, slowing to a crawl until she finally drew level again, and then gradually throttled back up to full speed. Fubuki could tell they were giving her crouching pose questioning glances, but nobody said anything.
As they followed the curve of the island further from harbor, Fubuki realized just how dark it was out here. She could see the lights from the shore on either side, and a glow on the horizon to the northeast that likely came from Tokyo, but the moon and stars cast little illumination of significance, and the further out they sailed, it felt like they were wading deeper into darkness. It seemed like it should be getting colder as well, but she somehow felt fine in that regard at least; perhaps a side effect of the Protection her rigging offered. The dark landmasses on either side, dotted by tiny specks of light, slowly fell further and further away on each side; they were approaching the mouth of the bay.
Unfortunately, this was also where the waters began getting choppier. Fubuki once again wavered, muscles straining as each push and pull from the waves threatened to topple her over. Her firmer stance allowed her to keep upright despite it, but her legs were shaking from maintaining it, and she was beginning to fall behind again. Still, she stayed silent, determined to bear this as long as possible; if she was lucky, she would last the whole patrol without the others noticing.
So naturally, her luck only lasted a couple more minutes. It was Naka who glanced back to check up on her, only to be alarmed when the new arrival was trailing behind several dozen yards and slightly off-course, barely visible in the gloom. "Uhh, I think there's something wrong with the newbie-chan," she said, alerting the others. "Should I go talk to her?"
"Please do so, yes," Jintsuu confirmed, fixing Fubuki's distant form with a curious frown. "We'll hold position for now." They slowly eased off, bobbing in place while Naka turned around to retrieve the wayward Destroyer.
For Fubuki's part, she didn't even notice Naka's approach, too busy fighting the ocean to realize how far she'd strayed from the group this time; so it was that she nearly jumped a foot when from her side came a loud "HELLO?"
"Oh, hi…" She muttered meekly, taking another wave before finally glancing up at her squadmate. "Hello, Naka-chan. Is something wrong?" Almost immediately after, she noticed how far away the other four had gotten, and let her head sink again.
"That's what I wanted to ask you," the cruiser confirmed. "No offense, but while newbies take some time getting used to things, they aren't usually..." She hesitated, struggling to find a tactful phrasing.
"A total failure?" Fubuki answered, mentally kicking herself. This was a bad idea, all of it; she should have just swallowed her pride and explained the situation earlier...
Naka patted her reassuringly, nearly pushing the destroyer over by accident. "I was just going to say 'quite so slow'," she assured, but somehow it didn't make Fubuki feel any better. "Here, grab on to me, and we can meet back up with the others."
If there was one saving grace to this moment, the destroyer thought to herself, it was that her humiliated flush was invisible in the darkness. Grabbing onto Naka's outstretched arm to allow herself to be towed along, she was surprised by how strong it was in spite of her soft appearance. Even the fleet idol was more prepared for this than she was, it seemed... Once they got within earshot of the others again, she let go of Naka's arm to sail the rest of the way under her own power again. The others probably saw anyway, but nobody gave any sign if so.
Instead, Jintsuu fixed her with a surprisingly hard stare, little trace of her usual timidity on display. "I'm not expecting you to be a master sailor right away, but you should at least be able to keep up. Explanations. Now."
"She did say she got sick and missed a day at camp," Mutsuki defended, but Jintsuu shot her a silent glare, and she clammed up.
Fubuki wished the ocean would just swallow her up right now instead of facing this awkwardness, but somewhere within herself she found enough willpower to straighten her spine and face the flagship head-on. "I… It's not that," she said, keeping her tone carefully even. "When I was at the camp, they found that I couldn't sail right. I think Akashi-san said it had to do with my past life, when I was first built; the design was too top-heavy. It got fixed eventually, but they aren't sure how to do it for me now."
"So you're stuck like this?" Jintsuu raised a skeptical eyebrow, while Mutsuki and Yuudachi gave their fellow destroyer pitying looks. "They shouldn't have sent you here, then." Her tone wasn't unkind, but the matter-of-factness to the statement was stinging in its own way.
Fubuki wanted to wilt away to nothingness, but forced herself to keep grinding out the explanation. "I can work around it; it just means a different style of sailing from everyone else. I started training on that at the camp, but there wasn't enough time to master it before we got sent off. If I hadn't done any of that, I wouldn't have even made it this far out here."
Jintsuu sighed tiredly, but the steel in her eyes loosened up. "So you just need more time to train and improve, yes?" At Fubuki's nod, she stroked her chin thoughtfully, exchanging a wordless glance with Sendai. "Does the vice-admiral know about this? I can't imagine he'd have sent you out so early if he'd been made aware."
"That's the thing;" Fubuki muttered, feeling self-conscious again. "We did talk about it. There must have been some sort of mistake, or maybe it got delayed, but you were supposed to be told about this. I was going to be stuck on shore for a whole week…"
She braced herself for anger, or disappointment, or betrayal, but none of the above came. Jintsuu nodded in agreement, while the others gave her looks of understanding and sympathy. "That must have sounded awful," Mutsuki said, "I don't know what I would do if I couldn't sail for that long." She could still detect a bit of pity in the redhead's tone, but on the whole, everyone seemed… supportive. She still felt self-conscious in the face of that, but a small warmth entered her chest as well. This was going far better than she had feared.
After more silent deliberation with her sisters, Jintsuu spoke up again. "Well, there's no point in turning back now; since this is just a patrol tonight, we're unlikely to encounter the enemy… Besides, the further we get from shore, the easier the sailing will get. If you think you can make it," she cast a concerned glance down at the newcomer's slightly wobbly knees, "We'll keep going as-is, and give support as needed once we return through this area. Does that seem agreeable?"
Fubuki could have collapsed with relief, if the action wouldn't have cost her her fragile balance. Instead, she nodded fervently, barely able to comprehend how well this had turned out. "Yes, it does. And… thank you."
Jintsuu gave a graceful nod. "We can discuss your situation more once we get back, but for now, just try to keep up a bit better, alright?" With that, she turned neatly and started revving up her screws again. "Torpedo Squadron 3, let's resume. Half-speed for now."
Setting sail again, she found it easier to keep up, though still buffeted by the rough waters. It was still embarrassing to have everyone else slowed down on her account, but she wasn't going to look a gift horse in the mouth if it meant not falling behind again. Within a half-hour they had passed from beyond the bay, the coastline nothing more than a dark line against an equally dark horizon, the crescent moon hovering low and large just above it; sure enough, true to the flagship's prediction, the smaller waves had given way to wider, gentler swells that proved much easier to navigate.
Once it was clear Fubuki was holding up fine, Sendai shifted her angle slightly, sidling up beside the destroyer. "Hey, so you said you accidentally skipped out on a day back at the camp? I may be able to fill you in on what you missed, if there's anything you need to know."
"It… was a lot more than one, actually," Fubuki winced. "I was so busy trying to figure out how to stay afloat that everything else kinda fell by the wayside."
Despite herself she still shied away from the light cruiser's response, but once again Sendai surprised her by grinning widely. "Well, I'm definitely sorry to hear that, but hey, look on the night side! I can just teach you the whole thing, and we'll know for sure you won't be missing out on anything by the end!"
"Uh, thank you? I think…" Night side…? Wishing to escape the embarrassing trajectory this whole discussion had taken, she glanced about at the rest of the squad, and the open ocean all around them. "Well, I am kind of wondering what's with this patrol. If we aren't likely to run into any enemies, what are we even doing out here at all?"
Sendai nodded approvingly. "That's a good point!" Raising her arm in an overly dramatic manner, she spoke up loudly. "Sendai-sensei's lesson number one!" Yuudachi, sailing off to the cruiser's other side, covered her mouth to stifle giggles, and Fubuki buried her face in her hands. "There are really four different types of seafaring missions we do, outside of exercises back in the harbor. Expeditions and convoys are essentially different forms of the same idea. With the first, we're going out to specific sites, like small ports up the coast, or offshore drilling platforms we've reclaimed, to cart supplies back to base and check in to make sure everything's fine and dandy out there. It's pretty safe and easy work… these days, anyway, so it tends to be left to mostly us smaller ships to take care of."
"I hate expeditions, poi" Yuudachi muttered. "They're really boring, and carrying the barrels and stuff tires me out. So glad I got moved up to a Torp Squad, poi…"
"Convoys, meanwhile," Sendai continued, rolling her eyes fondly at the grumpy blonde, "are a lot more dangerous, and tend to get the bigger ships assigned to them; but they're much less frequent. Basically, while Japan is pretty big, there are still some supplies we can't produce ourselves; before the oceans were taken, we relied a lot on trade and imports, and still need many of those things. So other countries we're friendly with, mainly Russia and Australia, send us big ships or caravans with a lot of those supplies, and then we send them some stuff back in exchange. Of course the Abyssals don't like that; they want to starve us out. So, they go after those convoys pretty hard, and we shipgirls need to be there to fight 'em off. Preferably at night…"
"It's mostly the other bases that take care of the convoys since they're nearer," Mutsuki supplied from ahead of them, having evidently been listening in, "But since they have smaller fleets, Yokosuka still tends to get called on to send some more to help out pretty often. I've never been on one of those away groups, thankfully; it would be no fun to have to go all that way from home." Yuudachi stuck her tongue out in agreement.
"You've only been around for two months," Sendai pointed out. "I love Yokosuka, don't get me wrong, but personally I could really use a change in scenery."
"You just want to go somewhere where everyone isn't already used to you sneaking up on them, poi." Yuudachi grouched. "I don't know how you don't get tired of startling people all the time, poi." Somehow, Fubuki suspected the other destroyer had been a frequent victim of this.
"Oh, trust me," Sendai smirked, "It never gets old."
"Anyway," Mutsuki butted in here, "Weren't you saying something?"
"Right!" The cruiser nodded, refocusing on Fubuki. "Where was I… So, expeditions and convoys are all about the resources, right?" The destroyer nodded uncertainly. "Then there's sorties. That's where we go all-in, sailing straight into the Shroud to kill Abyssals and take back territory. In fact, Carrier Division 1 should be out and about right now doing that; I think they were set to head out not too long after us. Is that right, Mutsuki?" Up ahead, the redheaded destroyer shrugged wordlessly. "Anyway, we've been mainly focused on island-hopping, since open ocean is harder to efficiently reclaim and maintain control of. I'll be honest and say that sorties can be pretty rough; seeing as we're fighting on their turf rather than ours, but really, it could be worse. While taking them head-on is never what I'd call easy, they also don't give you too much trouble unless there's a Princess around."
"Which, unfortunately, there is one right now," Mutsuki pointed out. "It's been harder-going than usual, because of that."
"Than usual?" Sendai snorted. "Oh, you sweet summer child. You should consider yourself lucky to have been summoned when you were. Let me tell you-"
"Uh, weren't you going to explain patrols?" Fubuki interrupted. Sendai seemed to be gearing up for a long-winded discussion of Mutsuki's apparent naivety, and the newcomer wasn't sure she wanted to spend the whole night listening to their inevitable argument. "Expeditions and Convoys are for resources, Sorties are about taking back territory…"
"And Patrols are about keeping it." Sendai finished, nodding, "Essentially, we go along the border, make sure the Shroud hasn't shifted back forward again, and kill any subs or destroyers trying to slip across on the sly. It's usually pretty simple work; you'll encounter maybe an enemy or two, but that's pretty much it."
"It's a bit boring too, really," Yuudachi added, "especially since this is what we do the most of, poi. But you can still get some fighting in, poi!" She punched the air a few times, making Pshewww noises with her mouth as she aimed her turret at imaginary targets. "Take that, Abyssals!" Ahead of them, Mutsuki facepalmed.
"Patrols can be plenty dangerous, actually;" someone else said; Fubuki jumped in surprise as Jintsuu sailed up behind them. Hadn't she been leading the formation? It seemed Sendai wasn't the only sneaky one among the sisters. "Constant vigilance is of utmost importance for a mission like this. After all, it was a patrol getting taken unawares by an unexpected Abyssal incursion that left us with Anchorage Princess taking Aogashima all over again, and landed Nachi in the hospital." Turning to Yuudachi in particular, she added "While I appreciate your eagerness, I expect you to be paying better attention once we reach the barrier."
With that settled, she slowly advanced to retake her position at the front, leaving Yuudachi cowed, and Fubuki, Sendai, and Mutsuki all much more sober.
"Don't mind her, she's just fearmongering," Naka said, startling Fubuki all over again. The idol had been trailing in the formation's rear position, but had advanced to just behind them undetected. "Okay, maybe you could all be a bit more attentive than this, but still. I'm willing to bet nothing particularly dramatic will happen at all tonight. Just a quiet routine check, nothing out of place!"
Sendai shot her a withering glare. "Great, now you've gone and done it. Thank you so much."
"Done what?" Fubuki asked, alarmed by her tone. Naka, meanwhile, just stuck her tongue out unrepentantly, rolling her eyes at her sister's superstitions.
"Quiet down, already!" Mutsuki hissed back at them; "We're here."
Looking up, Fubuki didn't see anything out of the ordinary at first, just more darkness. It took several moments to realize what she was looking for - absence. The stars shone distant overhead, but the entire quarter of the sky before them was completely dark, devoid of anything. Up ahead, Jintsuu lit a spotlight, a small but bright circle of light that swept across the water - before disappearing, absorbed by a wall of clouds that lay several dozen more yards forward. Jintsuu swiftly turned off her spotlight again, and nodded to herself.
"Alright, we'll turn east and circle clockwise. Destroyers, you're screening ahead running sonar; Mutsuki, you're at pole position, keep the wall at forty-five degrees vertical visibility. Fubuki, you're at forty degrees, Yuudachi at fifty. Sendai, Naka, we'll be doing radar sweeps in turn, I'll count off. Make sure none of us are broadcasting too long each time. Again, I'll take position behind Mutsuki; Sendai, you're at forty-eight degrees, Naka is at forty-two. Keep an eye out behind us as well, and especially keep watch for subs." Fubuki's head spun as she took in the directions, but the others seemed to know what they were doing, repositioning themselves so Sendai and Yuudachi were off to the left, Mutsuki and Jintsuu were up ahead, and Naka was off to the right. It didn't take long for Fubuki to figure out where she was meant to go, and she scrambled quickly into place ahead of Naka. Jintsuu gave her an approving nod, before speaking up again. "Alright, we'll be taking it a bit slower tonight, so it'll probably be about nine hours round trip, give or take."
"Nine hours?" Yuudachi complained, "It's usually only seven, poi…" Fubuki glanced down uncomfortably, once again suppressing the feeling of being a burden. At least she could be grateful for the nap she'd taken earlier.
"It'll be nine hours again once we reclaim Aogashima, so shush." Sendai said, tactfully avoiding why it would take so long this time around. Thankfully, realization seemed to dawn for Yuudachi, and she quickly shot the newcomer an apologetic look.
Fubuki just shrugged, wishing they'd move on from this point. "The sooner we start, the sooner we can get done," she muttered. Nodding in agreement, Sendai gestured them forward; Torpedo Squadron 3 setting off alongside the eerie wall of pure, empty darkness.
