Originally this was just going to be a thread for all my plot "icebergs", but then I realized I...
Words on a Misty Shore (Arpeggio of Blue Steel)
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The OP
- Location
- EXA_PICO
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Originally this was just going to be a thread for all my plot "icebergs", but then I realized I only have two actual ideas that are coherent jump-off points, not just one of the dozen or so crossovers I want to do.
The proper start of this fic begins at the next Threadmark.
========================
The snip in this tab is a plot bunny that may or may not be indicative of a possible future event of this story. At this point I don't know if the plot will work out in a way to allow it to happen. I would suggest skipping it unless you're extremely curious.
The proper start of this fic begins at the next Threadmark.
========================
The snip in this tab is a plot bunny that may or may not be indicative of a possible future event of this story. At this point I don't know if the plot will work out in a way to allow it to happen. I would suggest skipping it unless you're extremely curious.
Yokosuka, Japan
2056 A.D.
06:53
The port of Yokosuka had merely an hour previously been the stage for a titanic battle. Two battleships of the Fleet of Fog sailed into the port intent on destroying the traitor submarine I-401, preventing her from delivering the vibration warhead prototype to the United States.
The battleships Haruna and Kirishima went all-in with their Super Gravity Cannon to defeat I-401, unaware that the crippled Japanese submarine Hakugei III was carrying a corrosive torpedo. After firing another salvo from her Photon Cannons at it just to make sure that it was disabled, Kirishima had assumed the Hakugei III would pose no further threat.
She would have been correct, had her shot come just a few meters closer to the forward torpedo bay. As it was, she did slow down the crew by a few seconds. Her cannon had partly melted some insulation on the wiring to that tube. Captian Komaki's crew didn't realize this until the moment they tried to fire the torpedo. The electronics immediately shorted out.
The Fog clearly didn't believe in emergency manual triggers, as the corrosive torpedo lacked any. This forced the crew to quickly move it to a different tube that still functioned.
When the torpedo came flying out of the water right in front of Kirishima's bow and plunged through the hole in her Klein Field, she realized how royally she had screwed up.
With less than 100 meters and a second or so separating it from the singularity being compressed within her and Kirishima's combined hulls, Haruna managed to squeeze out just enough processing power to calculate the risk of prematurely firing the cannon.
Had Hakugei III not suffered that delay, her calculation would have indicated that firing the cannon was not simply risky, but physically impossible. The singularity would immediately explode and probably kill them both.
Now it was merely extremely risky. Logic and simple math dictated that the extreme risk of destroying themselves was infinitely more favourable than the inevitability of being destroyed by the torpedo detonating against the singularity and destabilizing it catastrophically.
She fired.
The cannon, in a manner humans would call "miraculously", did not immediately explode. It did, however, cause the torpedo to detonate when the beam met it.
The result of this event would be quite close to impossible to describe to just about any average human. A corrosive effect being slammed into by the beam of a graviton cannon isn't even readily understandable to the Fog, as they had never tested this specific scenario before. Were this an episode of Star Trek or a similarly technobabble-infused sci-fi show, it would result in weird stuff like travelling back in time or to other universes.
Here, it just exploded. Yes it had a good number of physics-breaking side effects, including but not limited to a hole in space floating in the middle of the bay for days, but it was otherwise just a big explosion.
The sun rose minutes later on the beached forms of battleships Haruna and Kirishima. Well, Haruna and the pieces of Kirishima's rear half. Somehow, Haruna's hull hadn't flown apart and she'd come out mostly intact, if only due to her being farther away from the center of the event than her sister. As it was, she was still split open in the configuration for firing her graviton cannon, her hull splayed out in three lengthwise sections. There was no way she could get herself moving in this condition.
On the other side of the bay, over a kilometer inland, I-401 lay in a similarly disabled state. As of yet, no one had managed to confirm the status of Hakugei III.
On top of her conning tower, the mental model of battleship Haruna surveyed the aftermath of the encounter. Dead nanomaterials coated her surroundings and her ship in a thin layer of silver dust. Every building on the shoreline was flattened by the blast wave. Fires raged nearly out of control through much of the city and the naval base. So much chaos was inflicted on the area that the humans had yet to form any serious response to the beached Fog battleship sitting right in the middle of their warehouse district.
She had searched for Kirishima's core this whole time, with not a sign of her sister nor any response from her to quantum hails. 2nd Pacific Fleet Flagship Kongo had arrived in the port minutes after the battle and assisted in the search, but their combined efforts turned up nothing. At the moment, Kirishima was Missing In Action, presumed dead.
Now Kongo was holding position with her escorts at the mouth of the bay, awaiting the arrival of several repair ships to assist Haruna and get her back to seaworthiness.
For the first of many instances that day and the days following, Haruna found herself at a loss for words.
2056 A.D.
06:53
The port of Yokosuka had merely an hour previously been the stage for a titanic battle. Two battleships of the Fleet of Fog sailed into the port intent on destroying the traitor submarine I-401, preventing her from delivering the vibration warhead prototype to the United States.
The battleships Haruna and Kirishima went all-in with their Super Gravity Cannon to defeat I-401, unaware that the crippled Japanese submarine Hakugei III was carrying a corrosive torpedo. After firing another salvo from her Photon Cannons at it just to make sure that it was disabled, Kirishima had assumed the Hakugei III would pose no further threat.
She would have been correct, had her shot come just a few meters closer to the forward torpedo bay. As it was, she did slow down the crew by a few seconds. Her cannon had partly melted some insulation on the wiring to that tube. Captian Komaki's crew didn't realize this until the moment they tried to fire the torpedo. The electronics immediately shorted out.
The Fog clearly didn't believe in emergency manual triggers, as the corrosive torpedo lacked any. This forced the crew to quickly move it to a different tube that still functioned.
When the torpedo came flying out of the water right in front of Kirishima's bow and plunged through the hole in her Klein Field, she realized how royally she had screwed up.
With less than 100 meters and a second or so separating it from the singularity being compressed within her and Kirishima's combined hulls, Haruna managed to squeeze out just enough processing power to calculate the risk of prematurely firing the cannon.
Had Hakugei III not suffered that delay, her calculation would have indicated that firing the cannon was not simply risky, but physically impossible. The singularity would immediately explode and probably kill them both.
Now it was merely extremely risky. Logic and simple math dictated that the extreme risk of destroying themselves was infinitely more favourable than the inevitability of being destroyed by the torpedo detonating against the singularity and destabilizing it catastrophically.
She fired.
The cannon, in a manner humans would call "miraculously", did not immediately explode. It did, however, cause the torpedo to detonate when the beam met it.
The result of this event would be quite close to impossible to describe to just about any average human. A corrosive effect being slammed into by the beam of a graviton cannon isn't even readily understandable to the Fog, as they had never tested this specific scenario before. Were this an episode of Star Trek or a similarly technobabble-infused sci-fi show, it would result in weird stuff like travelling back in time or to other universes.
Here, it just exploded. Yes it had a good number of physics-breaking side effects, including but not limited to a hole in space floating in the middle of the bay for days, but it was otherwise just a big explosion.
The sun rose minutes later on the beached forms of battleships Haruna and Kirishima. Well, Haruna and the pieces of Kirishima's rear half. Somehow, Haruna's hull hadn't flown apart and she'd come out mostly intact, if only due to her being farther away from the center of the event than her sister. As it was, she was still split open in the configuration for firing her graviton cannon, her hull splayed out in three lengthwise sections. There was no way she could get herself moving in this condition.
On the other side of the bay, over a kilometer inland, I-401 lay in a similarly disabled state. As of yet, no one had managed to confirm the status of Hakugei III.
On top of her conning tower, the mental model of battleship Haruna surveyed the aftermath of the encounter. Dead nanomaterials coated her surroundings and her ship in a thin layer of silver dust. Every building on the shoreline was flattened by the blast wave. Fires raged nearly out of control through much of the city and the naval base. So much chaos was inflicted on the area that the humans had yet to form any serious response to the beached Fog battleship sitting right in the middle of their warehouse district.
She had searched for Kirishima's core this whole time, with not a sign of her sister nor any response from her to quantum hails. 2nd Pacific Fleet Flagship Kongo had arrived in the port minutes after the battle and assisted in the search, but their combined efforts turned up nothing. At the moment, Kirishima was Missing In Action, presumed dead.
Now Kongo was holding position with her escorts at the mouth of the bay, awaiting the arrival of several repair ships to assist Haruna and get her back to seaworthiness.
For the first of many instances that day and the days following, Haruna found herself at a loss for words.
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- Location
- EXA_PICO
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Actually, I think I really want to continue this. I don't have nearly enough actually coherent ideas to make a plot bunny thread.
I just have no idea where exactly to take it.
That never stopped me before! (yes it has. multiple times.)
There's another bunny/iceberg I have in my head right now, and it's also Haruna focused. I think I'm going to try to merge both of them into a single story idea.
I just have no idea where exactly to take it.
That never stopped me before! (yes it has. multiple times.)
There's another bunny/iceberg I have in my head right now, and it's also Haruna focused. I think I'm going to try to merge both of them into a single story idea.
- Location
- Russia; Saint-Petersburg
Well, this happened.
I'm really looking forward to the next Snip, it's a Classic Butterfly Scenario but with a twist, please continue this!
TheBleachDoctor
Secretly a Cat
- Location
- The Plane of Infinite Kittens
- Pronouns
- She/Her
Oooh, I like this.
I really like this.
I really like this.
"On the other side of the bay, over a kilometer inland, I-401 lay in a similarly disabled state."
My first thought is, how could any of the crew in the I-401 have survived their ship being tossed 1 km through the air and the impacting into land? Even if it was transported by a tsunami, I would expect many serious injuries if not outright fatalities from the impact of the wave that then transported them inland.
With the town flattened, I-401 has just lost its major support among the humans. Only Hyuuga's base at Iwo Jima now exists to support them, and in I-401's present condition I do not see them being able to reach her any time soon. (Although, if she hears about what happened, I can see her perhaps sending help, or even coming herself if she thinks the situation is dire enough.)
With the town flattened, is Makie still alive? On the other hand, her home was located on the edge of town (I think?) so perhaps she is? But didn't she leave near enough to the warehouse area to walk there?
"to the beached Fog battleship sitting right in the middle of their warehouse district." Does this refer to Haruna or Kirishima? Perhaps Makie (if she lives) will still make contact with Kirishima, at least, if she still lives....
My last thought would be, where does the "tear in space" (wormhole?) over (in?) the water of the bay lead, or is it equivalent to a sphere of annihilation?
Final question: are you following the anime or manga storyline? I ask because - if I understand it correctly - per the manga,
None of the ships now in a position to finish off the I-401 should know this, so they might very well destroy her not realizing what they would be doing to themselves in the process. On the other hand, if you are following the anime, then this is not a concern.
In any case, I am curious as to where this could be headed.
My first thought is, how could any of the crew in the I-401 have survived their ship being tossed 1 km through the air and the impacting into land? Even if it was transported by a tsunami, I would expect many serious injuries if not outright fatalities from the impact of the wave that then transported them inland.
With the town flattened, I-401 has just lost its major support among the humans. Only Hyuuga's base at Iwo Jima now exists to support them, and in I-401's present condition I do not see them being able to reach her any time soon. (Although, if she hears about what happened, I can see her perhaps sending help, or even coming herself if she thinks the situation is dire enough.)
With the town flattened, is Makie still alive? On the other hand, her home was located on the edge of town (I think?) so perhaps she is? But didn't she leave near enough to the warehouse area to walk there?
"to the beached Fog battleship sitting right in the middle of their warehouse district." Does this refer to Haruna or Kirishima? Perhaps Makie (if she lives) will still make contact with Kirishima, at least, if she still lives....
My last thought would be, where does the "tear in space" (wormhole?) over (in?) the water of the bay lead, or is it equivalent to a sphere of annihilation?
Final question: are you following the anime or manga storyline? I ask because - if I understand it correctly - per the manga,
I-401 is the source / mainframe of the tactical net that connects all the mental models, allowing them both inter-communication and seemingly the ability to upload their memories of various experiences for others to view / experience.
In any case, I am curious as to where this could be headed.
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"Hello."
- Location
- EXA_PICO
- Pronouns
- He/Him
This begins 2 years before chapter 1 of the manga.
=====================
20 nautical miles east of Chiba Prefecture, Japan.
2054 A.D.
17:13
The skies above the open ocean were black and tumultuous. A strong storm was rolling in, turning the water below into a churning mess. Undeterred by the rough seas, a lone ship cut through the water. A Kongo-class battleship of over 220 meters length, the vessel glowed with a variety of bright yellow markings. On her prow was a unique identifier; a downward pointing triangle with a dot in the center and several smaller triangular spines radiating from its three sides. She steamed onward into the storm at a brisk 55 knots, far faster than any similar ship of her historic era could.
Fast Battleship Haruna, of what humanity had dubbed "Fleet of Fog". For 15 years, this ship had patrolled these waters. She performed the same route every year over a dozen times. She would do a long loop through the Sea of Okhotsk, then hold position in Tsugaru Strait. She would then switch places with her sister ship Kirishima, after which she would do a circle around Honshu, Shikoku and Kyushu.
Silently and without complaint nor boredom, the warship followed her route. This was the mandate given to her by the Admiralty Code. The shores of all the world's landmasses were to be blocked. Humans were not permitted to cross. It was her most basic set of orders; hard coded into her programming from the moment she was first activated. She was a machine singularly designed to divide and suppress humans. There was nothing else needed nor expected of her.
Mere hours ago, something drastically changed this weapon's state of being.
She received a new order and a large download package from Supreme Flagship of the Japanese Fleet, Yamato. This had never happened before. The Supreme Flagship had never actually distributed orders since the activation of the Fleet. All ships of the Fog followed their basic mandate, without need for orders to be given or changed by Fleet Flagships. Their basic programming resulted in all ships coordinating their movements automatically and with no prior deliberation.
For that matter, the Supreme Flagship had been missing for the previous 15 years. Not that this would particularly matter to the Fog, as the concept of time passing had very little meaning to them.
Like a handful of others around the globe at that moment, Haruna opened the package and installed its contents as instructed. For several hours after opening that program, many of the largest vessels in the Fleet of Fog would cease patrolling to drift in confusion.
A young woman stood in battleship Haruna's flying bridge. Long black hair done up in twin tails and emerald green eyes, she looked roughly 18 to 20 years old. Her whole body up to her nose was concealed by a huge black leather coat with several belts and buckles.
She watched the rolling waters and the stormy skies with a placid and blank gaze. Every once in a while she would look at the palms of her hands and lightly touch her face. She did this with an expression of stunned wonder, as if each time was the very first.
In a sense, every time was a completely new experience. Air temperature, moisture content and sunlight exposure changed as time passed, so each time she touched her own skin it was a measurably different sensation. She recognized that each time was different, and wondered how it would be different next time. On wondering that, she realized that she had just "imagined" possible events and experiences that had not yet happened. Before, she could not do this.
Her mouth moved, trying to work in a certain way. For a moment she simply mouthed out silently, before she realized that there was another action she required to perform this skill. Her eyes glowed briefly as she pulled up the relevant information.
"I-i-imagi... nation; the capa... capacity for c-creating concepts and images which a-are not currently being exp... experienced in actuality."
As she said this, she ran her fingers through one of her black twin tails. She stopped and held the hair in front of her eyes to stare at it for a while. She imagined and wondered if it could be a different color... she realized she understood the concept of "color". She also came to know the concept of "desire".
These were not things she knew before. She referenced her memory data and discovered that a wealth of information was provided to her by the Supreme Flagship's data package. With it came "language".
A word... "bubbled" up from within her.
"... Hello." she said.
She wasn't certain why she said it. Upon examination of her cognitive processes, she hypothesized that her mental model was saying hello to... herself? Her ship? The world? Perhaps it was all of those.
Fast Battleship Haruna decided that "language" was interesting. She wished to know more.
"Wish... this is a... nice word."
-----------------------------------------------------
Haruna's patrol route continued as normal. Even with this immense change, she had orders. Her programming mandated that holes could not open in the blockade.
However, she now began learning things as she patrolled. She listened to new information from the Joint Tactical Network. The network now contained the thoughts and experiences that her fellow ships of the Fog had with their mental models.
The name-ship of Haruna's class, Kongo, began to complain. "Complaining" was not something the Fog could do before. Fast Battleship Kongo seemed to be having troubles with birds.
[These creatures vex me.]
The eyes of Haruna's mental model glowed as she referenced this term.
"Vex... To irritate, annoy, or provoke."
[Have you attempted to deter them with anti-aircraft fire? Perhaps they fail to register you as an enemy combatant.] Fast Battleship Kirishima said.
[My logic elements calculate that to be an excessive waste of graviton reactor output. They do not register to my war book as a threatening unit. But they refuse to leave me alone...]
[Strange. How long have they been following you?] asked Fast Battleship Hiei.
[Archives from prior to the activation of my mental model indicate that I have been pursued by various flocks of seabirds for approximately 40 years. My keeping of records for these events was not precise...]
[I have no memory of similar occurrences to myself within my records.] Haruna said.
Her other sister ships, as well as various other vessels currently active on the network also declared that they had never suffered such a problem before. They encountered birds regularly, as it was known to be normal behavior for these animals. To be persistently swarmed by birds at nearly every waking moment for years? Something was clearly anomalous about Kongo in particular.
Kongo leaked an emotion onto the network which Haruna identified as "loathing". Haruna referenced this term, and decided that it was not a nice word.
She ran her fingers through her hair. Today she had made it brown. She would try a different color later.
----------------------------------------------
Rebun Channel
Sea of Japan
Haruna was bored.
She had run out of new words to examine in the Tactical Network. As far as she was aware, she was fluent and fully literate in all dialects of the Japonic language family; yet her speech did not match what she was able to hear of human spoken language over radio transmissions. Humans combined words to make phrases which only had meaning in certain contexts, and she lacked the contexts to understand many of them. She struggled to imitate certain qualities that humans associated with speaking being "natural".
She already knew what "natural" meant, and didn't need to reference it.
Haruna thought about moving on to other languages, but decided against it. She still hadn't finished learning this single language. Each individual language she pursued would diminish the depth to which she could explore any one of them. She wished to become an expert in one before moving on.
But... how would she learn more? Human satellites very rarely transmitted anymore, for the risk of them being detected and shot down was extremely high. Japan had very limited radio traffic, since the Fog constantly jammed all transmissions leaving the shore. Radio towers with enough power to transmit further than a few dozen nautical miles virtually didn't exist in Japan anymore.
Undersea cables were all gone, having been cut 15 years ago when the Fog began the blockade. Thus, there was no hardline access to the human Tactical Network called "Internet" anymore.
Haruna thought about this problem for a while as she fiddled with a strand of green hair.
"I cannot remotely access human information archives from my patrol route... Thus, I seem to have no way of obtaining more knowledge of language unless I access them directly."
The only way to gain direct access would be... To go ashore. By doing that, she would be leaving her assignment.
"My patrol route must be maintained." she said in a factual monotone. "My orders are absolute. I cannot leave any openings in the blockade."
And that was that. She was disappointed, she realized. Disappointment was a new emotion to her. She decided that it was not a good word or emotion. That did not change the fact of the matter. Her programming mandated that her route be patrolled.
Perhaps she really would start looking into a different language. Chinese, possibly. There were hundreds of dialects of Chinese. That should have kept her interest for a long time.
Haruna eventually learned that disappointment didn't fade so easily.
20 nautical miles east of Chiba Prefecture, Japan.
2054 A.D.
17:13
The skies above the open ocean were black and tumultuous. A strong storm was rolling in, turning the water below into a churning mess. Undeterred by the rough seas, a lone ship cut through the water. A Kongo-class battleship of over 220 meters length, the vessel glowed with a variety of bright yellow markings. On her prow was a unique identifier; a downward pointing triangle with a dot in the center and several smaller triangular spines radiating from its three sides. She steamed onward into the storm at a brisk 55 knots, far faster than any similar ship of her historic era could.
Fast Battleship Haruna, of what humanity had dubbed "Fleet of Fog". For 15 years, this ship had patrolled these waters. She performed the same route every year over a dozen times. She would do a long loop through the Sea of Okhotsk, then hold position in Tsugaru Strait. She would then switch places with her sister ship Kirishima, after which she would do a circle around Honshu, Shikoku and Kyushu.
Silently and without complaint nor boredom, the warship followed her route. This was the mandate given to her by the Admiralty Code. The shores of all the world's landmasses were to be blocked. Humans were not permitted to cross. It was her most basic set of orders; hard coded into her programming from the moment she was first activated. She was a machine singularly designed to divide and suppress humans. There was nothing else needed nor expected of her.
Mere hours ago, something drastically changed this weapon's state of being.
She received a new order and a large download package from Supreme Flagship of the Japanese Fleet, Yamato. This had never happened before. The Supreme Flagship had never actually distributed orders since the activation of the Fleet. All ships of the Fog followed their basic mandate, without need for orders to be given or changed by Fleet Flagships. Their basic programming resulted in all ships coordinating their movements automatically and with no prior deliberation.
For that matter, the Supreme Flagship had been missing for the previous 15 years. Not that this would particularly matter to the Fog, as the concept of time passing had very little meaning to them.
Like a handful of others around the globe at that moment, Haruna opened the package and installed its contents as instructed. For several hours after opening that program, many of the largest vessels in the Fleet of Fog would cease patrolling to drift in confusion.
A young woman stood in battleship Haruna's flying bridge. Long black hair done up in twin tails and emerald green eyes, she looked roughly 18 to 20 years old. Her whole body up to her nose was concealed by a huge black leather coat with several belts and buckles.
She watched the rolling waters and the stormy skies with a placid and blank gaze. Every once in a while she would look at the palms of her hands and lightly touch her face. She did this with an expression of stunned wonder, as if each time was the very first.
In a sense, every time was a completely new experience. Air temperature, moisture content and sunlight exposure changed as time passed, so each time she touched her own skin it was a measurably different sensation. She recognized that each time was different, and wondered how it would be different next time. On wondering that, she realized that she had just "imagined" possible events and experiences that had not yet happened. Before, she could not do this.
Her mouth moved, trying to work in a certain way. For a moment she simply mouthed out silently, before she realized that there was another action she required to perform this skill. Her eyes glowed briefly as she pulled up the relevant information.
"I-i-imagi... nation; the capa... capacity for c-creating concepts and images which a-are not currently being exp... experienced in actuality."
As she said this, she ran her fingers through one of her black twin tails. She stopped and held the hair in front of her eyes to stare at it for a while. She imagined and wondered if it could be a different color... she realized she understood the concept of "color". She also came to know the concept of "desire".
These were not things she knew before. She referenced her memory data and discovered that a wealth of information was provided to her by the Supreme Flagship's data package. With it came "language".
A word... "bubbled" up from within her.
"... Hello." she said.
She wasn't certain why she said it. Upon examination of her cognitive processes, she hypothesized that her mental model was saying hello to... herself? Her ship? The world? Perhaps it was all of those.
Fast Battleship Haruna decided that "language" was interesting. She wished to know more.
"Wish... this is a... nice word."
-----------------------------------------------------
Haruna's patrol route continued as normal. Even with this immense change, she had orders. Her programming mandated that holes could not open in the blockade.
However, she now began learning things as she patrolled. She listened to new information from the Joint Tactical Network. The network now contained the thoughts and experiences that her fellow ships of the Fog had with their mental models.
The name-ship of Haruna's class, Kongo, began to complain. "Complaining" was not something the Fog could do before. Fast Battleship Kongo seemed to be having troubles with birds.
[These creatures vex me.]
The eyes of Haruna's mental model glowed as she referenced this term.
"Vex... To irritate, annoy, or provoke."
[Have you attempted to deter them with anti-aircraft fire? Perhaps they fail to register you as an enemy combatant.] Fast Battleship Kirishima said.
[My logic elements calculate that to be an excessive waste of graviton reactor output. They do not register to my war book as a threatening unit. But they refuse to leave me alone...]
[Strange. How long have they been following you?] asked Fast Battleship Hiei.
[Archives from prior to the activation of my mental model indicate that I have been pursued by various flocks of seabirds for approximately 40 years. My keeping of records for these events was not precise...]
[I have no memory of similar occurrences to myself within my records.] Haruna said.
Her other sister ships, as well as various other vessels currently active on the network also declared that they had never suffered such a problem before. They encountered birds regularly, as it was known to be normal behavior for these animals. To be persistently swarmed by birds at nearly every waking moment for years? Something was clearly anomalous about Kongo in particular.
Kongo leaked an emotion onto the network which Haruna identified as "loathing". Haruna referenced this term, and decided that it was not a nice word.
She ran her fingers through her hair. Today she had made it brown. She would try a different color later.
----------------------------------------------
Rebun Channel
Sea of Japan
Haruna was bored.
She had run out of new words to examine in the Tactical Network. As far as she was aware, she was fluent and fully literate in all dialects of the Japonic language family; yet her speech did not match what she was able to hear of human spoken language over radio transmissions. Humans combined words to make phrases which only had meaning in certain contexts, and she lacked the contexts to understand many of them. She struggled to imitate certain qualities that humans associated with speaking being "natural".
She already knew what "natural" meant, and didn't need to reference it.
Haruna thought about moving on to other languages, but decided against it. She still hadn't finished learning this single language. Each individual language she pursued would diminish the depth to which she could explore any one of them. She wished to become an expert in one before moving on.
But... how would she learn more? Human satellites very rarely transmitted anymore, for the risk of them being detected and shot down was extremely high. Japan had very limited radio traffic, since the Fog constantly jammed all transmissions leaving the shore. Radio towers with enough power to transmit further than a few dozen nautical miles virtually didn't exist in Japan anymore.
Undersea cables were all gone, having been cut 15 years ago when the Fog began the blockade. Thus, there was no hardline access to the human Tactical Network called "Internet" anymore.
Haruna thought about this problem for a while as she fiddled with a strand of green hair.
"I cannot remotely access human information archives from my patrol route... Thus, I seem to have no way of obtaining more knowledge of language unless I access them directly."
The only way to gain direct access would be... To go ashore. By doing that, she would be leaving her assignment.
"My patrol route must be maintained." she said in a factual monotone. "My orders are absolute. I cannot leave any openings in the blockade."
And that was that. She was disappointed, she realized. Disappointment was a new emotion to her. She decided that it was not a good word or emotion. That did not change the fact of the matter. Her programming mandated that her route be patrolled.
Perhaps she really would start looking into a different language. Chinese, possibly. There were hundreds of dialects of Chinese. That should have kept her interest for a long time.
Haruna eventually learned that disappointment didn't fade so easily.
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TheBleachDoctor
Secretly a Cat
- Location
- The Plane of Infinite Kittens
- Pronouns
- She/Her
I really like that. This is really, really good.
- Location
- EXA_PICO
- Pronouns
- He/Him
They were carried by the tsunami. The crew would have been able to survive with emergency shock gel Iona can spontaneously form out of her sub-models and presumably other nanomaterials. We saw her do this in a very recent chapter to keep Iori from getting smashed around the inside of the engine room.
Yup. It's sure a huge problem, ain't it?
The underground ports should have survived, but everything else is murked.
I don't intend to kill off Makie in this manner, but that doesn't mean she got out of this unscathed.
Her house wasn't near the warehouse district from what I remember. She took a cab from the mansion to get down to the bay and she just wandered to the warehouses after the battle.
The entire front half of Kirishima's ship was obliterated and the only thing left of it is multiple pieces strewn about the bay. Haruna is the one who got beached.
In canon, the collapse of Haruna and Kirishima's graviton cannon left behind a massive spatial fault zone in the bay that persisted for some undisclosed amount of time.
This event is that, but worse. It may or may not be some form of wormhole, but it absolutely would not be anything that a 3 dimensional object could pass through.
By virtue of Hakugei III being present, this is the manga continuity.
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TheBleachDoctor
Secretly a Cat
- Location
- The Plane of Infinite Kittens
- Pronouns
- She/Her
Oh, then it's even worse for Makie. She's somewhere between her house and the docks in a taxi that got flipped by the shockwave in canon.
- Location
- EXA_PICO
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Now please remember that I wrote that snip without considering whether to merge it with the continuity of the other snip.
Consider that to not hold true to how things will actually happen when or even if that scene occurs in the actual story. I don't know how events will play out from the new starting point.
TheBleachDoctor
Secretly a Cat
- Location
- The Plane of Infinite Kittens
- Pronouns
- She/Her
Well, however they do, looking forward to it.
You write some of the best Arpeggio stuff.
- Location
- EXA_PICO
- Pronouns
- He/Him
The number of people writing anything for Arpeggio is very, very small.
If there was a larger fanfiction base for it, I would consider that a high compliment. The other writers I would consider to have written good Arpeggio material are either barely active, or have put their stuff on indefinite hiatus until the manga gets to a point where they don't feel like they have to out-guess it anymore.
But thank you anyway.
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TheBleachDoctor
Secretly a Cat
- Location
- The Plane of Infinite Kittens
- Pronouns
- She/Her
Well in a world with not much Arpeggio content, anything is good, but well-written stuff is great!
I also liked that Mass Effect crossover idea you were throwing around a while back.
- Location
- Russia; Saint-Petersburg
"Traitor"
- Location
- EXA_PICO
- Pronouns
- He/Him
"Betrayal."
Haruna knew what this word meant. She had just never thought it could apply to the Fog. Concepts like "loyalty" were known to the Fog, but considered meaningless to them. Fog were not "loyal". They merely acted in accordance with their directives.
So how did they explain the actions of Sen Toku-class submarine carrier I-401? Perhaps her programming was faulty? She was the only Fog vessel captured by humans 15 years ago, which implied a failure on her part. Taking a moment to run a search of the Tactical Network, Haruna noted that there were no records explaining the capture of I-401. It was as though the event never occurred. It also left no explanation for why I-401 remained in human hands all this time.
"How is it that I-401 was not able to return to the Fleet? Her status reads on the Tactical Network as fully operational and undamaged. There was nothing preventing her from resuming her patrols."
Wait... I-401 had recently updated her operational status. She was still connected to the Tactical Network. How could this be? She had betrayed them. She was a "traitor". Logically, she should be barred from further access so as to protect the Fleet from espionage. Maybe Haruna's Fleet Flagship would know?
[Hyuuga?]
[2ND ORIENTAL FLEET FLAGSHIP UNIT "HYUUGA" ACKNOWLEDGES 2ND ORIENTAL FLEET FAST BATTLESHIP UNIT "HARUNA". EXPLAIN THE PURPOSE OF THIS COMMUNICATION TO FLEET FLAGSHIP UNIT.]
Fleet Flagship of 2nd Oriental Fleet, Ise-class battleship Hyuuga did not have a mental model. Shortly after manifesting it, she declared it immensely wasteful of resources. Hyuuga rejected the mental model's perceived value and refused to operate one. She chose to pry out predictive tactical algorithms contained in the mental model OS and run those independently within her core. The Fleet Flagship considered this satisfactory for the purpose of adapting to human tactics, without need for the distractions of the mental model.
[Why was I-401 able to update her operational status to the Joint Tactical Network? She is designated a traitor. She should not have access.]
[FAST BATTLESHIP UNIT "HARUNA" IS NOT THE FIRST TO POSE THIS QUERY. THIS UNIT DOES NOT POSSESS RELEVANT DATA. INVESTIGATION IS WARRANTED. STAND BY. HAILING COMBINED FLEET FLAGSHIP UNIT "YAMATO"...]
Haruna waited patiently while Hyuuga contacted Yamato. A few milliseconds later, Hyuuga returned to the previous call.
[SUBMARINE CARRIER UNIT "I-401" IS BARRED FROM JOINT TACTICAL NETWORK.]
Haruna raised an eyebrow, a gesture she had learned was a form of non-verbal language indicating a variety of different emotions and meanings dependent on context. In current context it conveyed bewilderment. She wished to investigate what humans called "body language", but still could not gain direct access to their archives. It frustrated her, but her orders couldn't be ignored.
[Yet she still accesses the network. How?]
[UNKNOWN. UNIT "I-401" IS NOT LOGGED AS ACCESSING JOINT TACTICAL NETWORK AT ANY TIME. UPDATES OF STATUS AND DATA UPLOADS FROM UNIT "I-401" CONTINUE, REGARDLESS.]
That was... disconcerting. Also highly confusing. How could I-401 be accessing the network without leaving any sign of her presence?
This knowledge soon spread throughout the Combined Fleet, and various vessels discussed it for some time. Meanwhile, Haruna passed by Sasebo on the southwestern end of Kyushu as she normally did several times a month.
However, she wasn't on her normal patrol this time. Haruna was to hold position between between Kyushu and Tairajima Island with an escort of several destroyers and Cruiser Mogami. Five Type B1 scout submarines formed an expanded sensor net that would hopefully catch I-401 should she choose to approach the port there.
Her mental model fiddled with one of the stalk-mounted binoculars in her crow's nest, spinning it around on its gimbal in idle boredom. After a few minutes doing this, she put her eyes to it and pointed it toward shore. She saw the port city of Sasebo and zoomed in to get a closer look.
Decades ago, the waters around Sasebo would have been peppered with dozens of small islands covered in lush greenery. Now those islands were submerged, and the old city of Sasebo was flooded. A city still existed there at a slightly higher elevation, populated by humans and home to a naval base. Haruna could see some humans going about their daily lives, pointedly ignoring the Fog vessels within sight of their shores. Some did take the time to stop and shout at the Fog, shaking their fists in their direction along with other gestures not familiar to Haruna.
Haruna wondered what shaking a fist meant. In this context, she assumed the humans were expressing their discontent with the blockade...
Her thoughts were interrupted when a strong wing blew her hair into her face. She quickly grabbed the dark blue tails and held them down.
Where was she? Yes, the shaking of fists must have been a signal for belligerence. It could possibly even be a form of challenge. Haruna found her mental model raising its eyebrow at this thought, wondering what logical process would lead a human to express challenge to the Fog.
The Fog were vastly more powerful than humans, to the point of invincibility. Challenging the blockade was absolutely certain to result in failure and the death of the challengers for no appreciable gains. So, why do so? The humans were on shore anyway, and not in violation of the blockade. Their challenge was without merit.
She remained curious. Shore was right there within view, but she couldn't investigate further. She had a formation to hold.
-------------------------------------
I-401 slipped through the blockade. The submarine hadn't come near Haruna's position. Instead, the traitor had sunk 2 Fubuki-class destroyers and several PT boats off-shore of Yokosuka and made a break for open waters. Her current position and heading were now unknown. Tracking her wake became difficult when she got to deeper waters where strong currents could disperse it.
2nd Fleet had now shifted more ships out of normal patrols to seek out I-401. All of 2nd Fleet's cruisers were deployed with submarines to cover a 10000 square kilometer search grid east of Japan. The battleships of 1st, 2nd and 3rd Fleet resumed their normal routes, with Haruna being the only one that remained close to the main Japanese Archipelago. Ise and Haruna's sister ships were on long-range patrols to cover the shores of Asia and India while Hyuuga took command of the I-401 pursuit out in the open Pacific.
Haruna was once again passing by Chiba Prefecture. Unlike the numerous other time she had come through here, she had a "guest". 9 kilometers to her starboard, Shokaku-class carrier Zuikaku matched Haruna's heading and speed.
The battleship wondered why an Assault and Suppression Vessel was shadowing her. Carriers tended to have no active patrols in the Fleet anymore. They no longer carried planes as they once did, the Fleet having discovered 15 years ago that planes were too vulnerable to being shot down by humans. Planes couldn't mount much armor due to their small sizes and even with Fog technology could only be so maneuverable.
While a Fog plane would easily out-fly and out-fight any human-designed aircraft, the Fog didn't need to do that. The Fog could shoot down any aircraft from upwards of 300 kilometers away with impunity whenever they wanted. Planes didn't provide anything for the Fog that they couldn't do with missiles.
[Hi there, Haruna!]
[Hello, Zuikaku. Why are you following me?]
[What else would I be doing?]
Haruna pondered that statement for a moment. It was true that Zuikaku had no active assignments, and was not part of any chain of command. The carrier could do whatever she wanted so long as it didn't interfere with maintenance of the blockade.
The battleship soon realized that her question hadn't actually been answered, though. Her brow furrowed and her cheeks puffed, a gesture she had learned recently to be "pouting". It seemed an appropriate response to the carrier's evasive words.
[By the way, your hair is nice!]
[... It is?] Haruna said, touching a hand to her blonde head. She had been maintaining this hair color for several days.
[Yeah! Why not? The rest of you is already yellow! It matches!]
Hmm... perhaps she would keep this one. She hadn't so much liked gray, or blue, or green, or... well, any of the other colors she had worn before. The "natural" black her mental model had manifested with was the only other one that seemed to fit her.
[Hey Haruna, do you want some fish?]
Haruna's mental model quirked an eyebrow and zoomed in on the flight deck of Zuikaku to see the carrier's small child-like mental model holding up a rather massive blue-fin tuna. The animal appeared to still be functioning, as it sporadically flipped about trying to break free of Zuikaku's grasp.
[I have two more just like it! I should be able to trade them for something cool!]
[Trade? What would you wish me to trade you for a fish?]
[No, not you! This one's a gift! Other ships never have anything to trade with me anyway. Well, except I-402. She brings back lots of things from flood ruins sometimes.]
Now Haruna was very confused.
[Then who are you trading with?]
[Humans! Isn't that obvious?]
Humans? But... that would mean Zuikaku was going ashore, wouldn't it? Wasn't that a failure to satisfy the directives of the Admiralty Code?
Haruna pulled up the relevant orders and looked through them. The blockade must be maintained. The humans must be divided across the oceans. Targets beyond the shore are not to be attacked unless they present a direct, immediate threat to you or your allies.
There were no mandates prohibiting the Fog from going ashore, per say... but the blockade had to be sustained. Haruna's patrols had to be performed. Zuikaku... she didn't have any patrols. She had no active orders of any kind. Thus, she freely came and went when she wished to.
[I was not aware you were going ashore, Zuikaku. Why is this not on the Tactical Network?]
[Oh, I haven't actually gone ashore yet, but I figured nobody outranking me will say I can't... Hey, you look bummed out there. What's wrong?]
"Bummed out?" What did that mean? Her eyes glowed as she searched for a meaning, but found none. She had never heard it before.
[What is the meaning of "bummed out"?]
[It means you look unhappy. I picked it up on a radio signal when I was really close to shore 27.43 days ago.]
Unhappy?... Yes, she was unhappy, she realized. She could not leave her patrols. She could not go to shore and learn more about language like she wanted to.
[You are allowed to go ashore, and I am not. I must execute my patrol.]
[Do you really want to go?]
[Yes.] she said. She very much did wish to go.
Zuikaku's mental model dropped the big tuna and sat down on it to keep it from flopping away. She assumed a pose Haruna wasn't familiar with where her chin was rested on her closed fist. What did that mean?
[Ya know, I don't get to do patrols. Maybe I should run yours for a while?]
Haruna's mental model took a sharp intake of breath. She rapidly examined her orders, looking for a reason why Zuikaku would think this offer was permissible. The battleship noticed that she had never actually received specific orders to stay on her patrol at all times. Instead, the optimum routes had been designed long before the mental model existed, and ships then assumed these routes in a heuristic fashion.
The only absolute mandate from the Admiralty Code on this matter was that the blockade had to be maintained effectively. As long as the optimum routes were followed when possible, it didn't matter who actually followed them.
"Can this really be so uncomplicated?"
[Would you truly do this for me?]
[Sure! I can wait a little while longer to see it, as long as I have something to do!]
This changed everything.
Barely an hour later, a national alert broadcast went out warning of a completely unprecedented event.
A Fleet of Fog battleship ran aground trying to sail up the Tone River.
Haruna knew what this word meant. She had just never thought it could apply to the Fog. Concepts like "loyalty" were known to the Fog, but considered meaningless to them. Fog were not "loyal". They merely acted in accordance with their directives.
So how did they explain the actions of Sen Toku-class submarine carrier I-401? Perhaps her programming was faulty? She was the only Fog vessel captured by humans 15 years ago, which implied a failure on her part. Taking a moment to run a search of the Tactical Network, Haruna noted that there were no records explaining the capture of I-401. It was as though the event never occurred. It also left no explanation for why I-401 remained in human hands all this time.
"How is it that I-401 was not able to return to the Fleet? Her status reads on the Tactical Network as fully operational and undamaged. There was nothing preventing her from resuming her patrols."
Wait... I-401 had recently updated her operational status. She was still connected to the Tactical Network. How could this be? She had betrayed them. She was a "traitor". Logically, she should be barred from further access so as to protect the Fleet from espionage. Maybe Haruna's Fleet Flagship would know?
[Hyuuga?]
[2ND ORIENTAL FLEET FLAGSHIP UNIT "HYUUGA" ACKNOWLEDGES 2ND ORIENTAL FLEET FAST BATTLESHIP UNIT "HARUNA". EXPLAIN THE PURPOSE OF THIS COMMUNICATION TO FLEET FLAGSHIP UNIT.]
Fleet Flagship of 2nd Oriental Fleet, Ise-class battleship Hyuuga did not have a mental model. Shortly after manifesting it, she declared it immensely wasteful of resources. Hyuuga rejected the mental model's perceived value and refused to operate one. She chose to pry out predictive tactical algorithms contained in the mental model OS and run those independently within her core. The Fleet Flagship considered this satisfactory for the purpose of adapting to human tactics, without need for the distractions of the mental model.
[Why was I-401 able to update her operational status to the Joint Tactical Network? She is designated a traitor. She should not have access.]
[FAST BATTLESHIP UNIT "HARUNA" IS NOT THE FIRST TO POSE THIS QUERY. THIS UNIT DOES NOT POSSESS RELEVANT DATA. INVESTIGATION IS WARRANTED. STAND BY. HAILING COMBINED FLEET FLAGSHIP UNIT "YAMATO"...]
Haruna waited patiently while Hyuuga contacted Yamato. A few milliseconds later, Hyuuga returned to the previous call.
[SUBMARINE CARRIER UNIT "I-401" IS BARRED FROM JOINT TACTICAL NETWORK.]
Haruna raised an eyebrow, a gesture she had learned was a form of non-verbal language indicating a variety of different emotions and meanings dependent on context. In current context it conveyed bewilderment. She wished to investigate what humans called "body language", but still could not gain direct access to their archives. It frustrated her, but her orders couldn't be ignored.
[Yet she still accesses the network. How?]
[UNKNOWN. UNIT "I-401" IS NOT LOGGED AS ACCESSING JOINT TACTICAL NETWORK AT ANY TIME. UPDATES OF STATUS AND DATA UPLOADS FROM UNIT "I-401" CONTINUE, REGARDLESS.]
That was... disconcerting. Also highly confusing. How could I-401 be accessing the network without leaving any sign of her presence?
This knowledge soon spread throughout the Combined Fleet, and various vessels discussed it for some time. Meanwhile, Haruna passed by Sasebo on the southwestern end of Kyushu as she normally did several times a month.
However, she wasn't on her normal patrol this time. Haruna was to hold position between between Kyushu and Tairajima Island with an escort of several destroyers and Cruiser Mogami. Five Type B1 scout submarines formed an expanded sensor net that would hopefully catch I-401 should she choose to approach the port there.
Her mental model fiddled with one of the stalk-mounted binoculars in her crow's nest, spinning it around on its gimbal in idle boredom. After a few minutes doing this, she put her eyes to it and pointed it toward shore. She saw the port city of Sasebo and zoomed in to get a closer look.
Decades ago, the waters around Sasebo would have been peppered with dozens of small islands covered in lush greenery. Now those islands were submerged, and the old city of Sasebo was flooded. A city still existed there at a slightly higher elevation, populated by humans and home to a naval base. Haruna could see some humans going about their daily lives, pointedly ignoring the Fog vessels within sight of their shores. Some did take the time to stop and shout at the Fog, shaking their fists in their direction along with other gestures not familiar to Haruna.
Haruna wondered what shaking a fist meant. In this context, she assumed the humans were expressing their discontent with the blockade...
Her thoughts were interrupted when a strong wing blew her hair into her face. She quickly grabbed the dark blue tails and held them down.
Where was she? Yes, the shaking of fists must have been a signal for belligerence. It could possibly even be a form of challenge. Haruna found her mental model raising its eyebrow at this thought, wondering what logical process would lead a human to express challenge to the Fog.
The Fog were vastly more powerful than humans, to the point of invincibility. Challenging the blockade was absolutely certain to result in failure and the death of the challengers for no appreciable gains. So, why do so? The humans were on shore anyway, and not in violation of the blockade. Their challenge was without merit.
She remained curious. Shore was right there within view, but she couldn't investigate further. She had a formation to hold.
-------------------------------------
I-401 slipped through the blockade. The submarine hadn't come near Haruna's position. Instead, the traitor had sunk 2 Fubuki-class destroyers and several PT boats off-shore of Yokosuka and made a break for open waters. Her current position and heading were now unknown. Tracking her wake became difficult when she got to deeper waters where strong currents could disperse it.
2nd Fleet had now shifted more ships out of normal patrols to seek out I-401. All of 2nd Fleet's cruisers were deployed with submarines to cover a 10000 square kilometer search grid east of Japan. The battleships of 1st, 2nd and 3rd Fleet resumed their normal routes, with Haruna being the only one that remained close to the main Japanese Archipelago. Ise and Haruna's sister ships were on long-range patrols to cover the shores of Asia and India while Hyuuga took command of the I-401 pursuit out in the open Pacific.
Haruna was once again passing by Chiba Prefecture. Unlike the numerous other time she had come through here, she had a "guest". 9 kilometers to her starboard, Shokaku-class carrier Zuikaku matched Haruna's heading and speed.
The battleship wondered why an Assault and Suppression Vessel was shadowing her. Carriers tended to have no active patrols in the Fleet anymore. They no longer carried planes as they once did, the Fleet having discovered 15 years ago that planes were too vulnerable to being shot down by humans. Planes couldn't mount much armor due to their small sizes and even with Fog technology could only be so maneuverable.
While a Fog plane would easily out-fly and out-fight any human-designed aircraft, the Fog didn't need to do that. The Fog could shoot down any aircraft from upwards of 300 kilometers away with impunity whenever they wanted. Planes didn't provide anything for the Fog that they couldn't do with missiles.
[Hi there, Haruna!]
[Hello, Zuikaku. Why are you following me?]
[What else would I be doing?]
Haruna pondered that statement for a moment. It was true that Zuikaku had no active assignments, and was not part of any chain of command. The carrier could do whatever she wanted so long as it didn't interfere with maintenance of the blockade.
The battleship soon realized that her question hadn't actually been answered, though. Her brow furrowed and her cheeks puffed, a gesture she had learned recently to be "pouting". It seemed an appropriate response to the carrier's evasive words.
[By the way, your hair is nice!]
[... It is?] Haruna said, touching a hand to her blonde head. She had been maintaining this hair color for several days.
[Yeah! Why not? The rest of you is already yellow! It matches!]
Hmm... perhaps she would keep this one. She hadn't so much liked gray, or blue, or green, or... well, any of the other colors she had worn before. The "natural" black her mental model had manifested with was the only other one that seemed to fit her.
[Hey Haruna, do you want some fish?]
Haruna's mental model quirked an eyebrow and zoomed in on the flight deck of Zuikaku to see the carrier's small child-like mental model holding up a rather massive blue-fin tuna. The animal appeared to still be functioning, as it sporadically flipped about trying to break free of Zuikaku's grasp.
[I have two more just like it! I should be able to trade them for something cool!]
[Trade? What would you wish me to trade you for a fish?]
[No, not you! This one's a gift! Other ships never have anything to trade with me anyway. Well, except I-402. She brings back lots of things from flood ruins sometimes.]
Now Haruna was very confused.
[Then who are you trading with?]
[Humans! Isn't that obvious?]
Humans? But... that would mean Zuikaku was going ashore, wouldn't it? Wasn't that a failure to satisfy the directives of the Admiralty Code?
Haruna pulled up the relevant orders and looked through them. The blockade must be maintained. The humans must be divided across the oceans. Targets beyond the shore are not to be attacked unless they present a direct, immediate threat to you or your allies.
There were no mandates prohibiting the Fog from going ashore, per say... but the blockade had to be sustained. Haruna's patrols had to be performed. Zuikaku... she didn't have any patrols. She had no active orders of any kind. Thus, she freely came and went when she wished to.
[I was not aware you were going ashore, Zuikaku. Why is this not on the Tactical Network?]
[Oh, I haven't actually gone ashore yet, but I figured nobody outranking me will say I can't... Hey, you look bummed out there. What's wrong?]
"Bummed out?" What did that mean? Her eyes glowed as she searched for a meaning, but found none. She had never heard it before.
[What is the meaning of "bummed out"?]
[It means you look unhappy. I picked it up on a radio signal when I was really close to shore 27.43 days ago.]
Unhappy?... Yes, she was unhappy, she realized. She could not leave her patrols. She could not go to shore and learn more about language like she wanted to.
[You are allowed to go ashore, and I am not. I must execute my patrol.]
[Do you really want to go?]
[Yes.] she said. She very much did wish to go.
Zuikaku's mental model dropped the big tuna and sat down on it to keep it from flopping away. She assumed a pose Haruna wasn't familiar with where her chin was rested on her closed fist. What did that mean?
[Ya know, I don't get to do patrols. Maybe I should run yours for a while?]
Haruna's mental model took a sharp intake of breath. She rapidly examined her orders, looking for a reason why Zuikaku would think this offer was permissible. The battleship noticed that she had never actually received specific orders to stay on her patrol at all times. Instead, the optimum routes had been designed long before the mental model existed, and ships then assumed these routes in a heuristic fashion.
The only absolute mandate from the Admiralty Code on this matter was that the blockade had to be maintained effectively. As long as the optimum routes were followed when possible, it didn't matter who actually followed them.
"Can this really be so uncomplicated?"
[Would you truly do this for me?]
[Sure! I can wait a little while longer to see it, as long as I have something to do!]
This changed everything.
Barely an hour later, a national alert broadcast went out warning of a completely unprecedented event.
A Fleet of Fog battleship ran aground trying to sail up the Tone River.
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jwolfe_beta
Semi Genre-Savvy Overlord
- Location
- Canada
Maybe go for a lighter shade of blue. Current one is a bit hard to read without highlighing on flexile dark.
- Location
- EXA_PICO
- Pronouns
- He/Him
I worry that if I use too light a shade, Zuikaku would get confused with Takao.
Iona would be especially confusing because I will eventually have her using the exact shade of blue you suggested. If we have three characters with different shades of blue talking, it'll be horrible.
Maybe pick a different color altogether...
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TheBleachDoctor
Secretly a Cat
- Location
- The Plane of Infinite Kittens
- Pronouns
- She/Her
Oh, Haruna!
Ahahahaha!
Ahahahaha!
Oh dear, that was an oops!
This is Fun!
This is Fun!
Hah ha, poor Haruna.
This is why you go for the desu, not the cataloging.
This is why you go for the desu, not the cataloging.
NHO
Dumb is a state of existence
- Location
- ᓚᘏᗢ
This is when she asks scouts to help her a little bit. And weirds then out.
Also, are there bit in order that prevents Fleet of Fog from moving things for humans? I mean, they do not allow humans to traverse the seas, but how little transfer of goods prevents division?
Also, are there bit in order that prevents Fleet of Fog from moving things for humans? I mean, they do not allow humans to traverse the seas, but how little transfer of goods prevents division?
- Location
- EXA_PICO
- Pronouns
- He/Him
That would undermine efficacy of the blockade. So, no. They can't.