THE BROOCH

The war between the Fleet of Fog and humanity, as dictated by the Admiralty Code was over. Unfortunately, it had been replaced by something perhaps much worse: anarchy. Yamato's well-meaning last command that the Fleet should live according to their own will was, as Kongou had observed, annoying to say the least. Even before the Blue Steel had cleared the Arctic Ocean there were worrying reports.

Ships with Mental Models seemed to be dealing with living according to their own will well enough, but those without them were not. Some had attacked each other and fought grueling battles to the death. Others scuttled themselves, but most sailed or drifted about aimlessly. Gunzou's last request before going ashore was that Hyuga and Takao, Haruna, Kirishima along with Makie join Kongou, Hiei and the student council to save those ships.

Gunzou felt that those ships without mental models had no means to express themselves and grow as individuals: they were truly just weapons desiring to follow an order, any order! They had to be saved from themselves and from the unscrupulous who might try to use them. Haruna and Kirishima grasped the significance of Gunzou's concern faster than the others. And besides, Makie was safer at sea than she could ever be on land.

No sooner had the Blue Steel sailed beyond Yokosuka's defense barrier Gunzou, Sou, Kyohei, Lori and Shizuka were taken into custody. They were held separately, incommunicado and questioned. Every group that questioned him seemed to have its own agenda and none of them were talking to each other. There were a lot of questions and a lot of the answers were not appreciated: governments do not like 'meddlers' in what they consider to be, their affairs.

There seemed to be three main issues: the meaning of Yamato's last command, I-401 and Osakabe Makie. They refused to accept the sentience to the Fog Fleet and when Gunzou had informed them that Iona and I-401 had vanished after joining with Yamato, they simply didn't believe him. As for Makie, not only did they not recognize her sentience, one group failed to recognize her as human, referring to her only as DC-007.

It was his last request to the Blue Steel though that nearly got Gunzou and his friends indicted and jailed. It was the government's position, indeed all of the world's government's positions, that Fog Ships without mental models were the property of whoever could get to them first! Gunzou's small act of compassion to protect them was at odds with that position.

Their one friend in the government, Kamikage, had tried to run interference for them but he was in trouble himself for having failed to turn over the decryption key. In the end it was a letter to the editor of the Asahi Shimbun that did the trick. The Imperial Crown Princess, expressed her belief that Chihaya Gunzou and his crew were heroes, and should be honored. It had been the lightest, gentlest of touches, but in time, it achieved the desired result.

It had been a beautiful day for his first day of freedom but he'd spent most of it on buses, trains and on foot going to the Cemetery to visit the graves of his parents. In Yokosuka he'd picked up a small bouquet of flowers to place at the head stone. He'd long since come to terms with his parent's deaths but still there were things he wanted to say. After a bit of thought he knew exactly what he should say.

He walked up to the black granite marker, looked at the kanji's that spelled out his mother's name and said in a casual, matter of fact tone, "Mother, I brought father back." It was almost as if he'd picked him up at the train station and walked with him there. Gunzou's eyes then shifted over to his father's name and said with just a bit more feeling, "Father. It has ended."

It was then, as bent down to place the flowers, that he saw it: Iona's brooch. His heart stopped and along with it the passage of time as he remembered where he'd seen it last. He remembered it falling, tumbling through the air to land on the top of Yamato's number one turret and then bouncing gracefully into the rising sea that had already covered her main deck.

He hadn't tried to catch it. It didn't occur to him to try until after it was gone. He remembered how in Vladivostok Iona had stopped cold at her first sight of it in the shop window. He'd bought it for her because she so seldom showed interest in things beyond the crew and her immediate duties as his ship. But he remembered that when she had shown interest in things, they were usually important.

He remembered asking her if she wanted it. She'd said quietly, that it was "Not necessary." As if the instant Miso soup, the cola or the 2012 Protocol Analyzer they were looking for were 'necessary'. He remembered how the shop owner had tried to play up the brooch as if it were a vintage classic cameo, a bouquet pin when in fact; it was just silver plated base metal and plastic reproduction.

He remembered that he agreed to pay more for it than he should have simply because of the look on Iona's face, the way she held it in her hands. The reflection of it in her eyes was worth far more than he paid. The way she'd smiled up at him when he pinned it to the ribbon around her neck. Had it been a 5 karat blue-white, brilliant-cut diamond in an 18 karat gold setting it wouldn't have meant more to her!

And now, there it was lying on the ground at the foot of his parent's grave stone. He straightened up to the sound of a gentle rustling behind him. The thought that this could be the cruelest of jokes crossed his mind but slowly he turned to face whatever, whoever was behind him. Once he saw, it was hard, very hard, to contain himself as he spoke the words, "Welcome home."

There, her head haloed in the golden light of the setting sun stood Iona. She wore a resplendent white dress and was all grown up and filled out: a lasting benefit of having joined with Yamato. She smiled and tilted her head slightly and said, "Gunzou, I've waited for you: I am your ship." They stepped forward into each other's arms as naturally as if they'd practiced it a thousand times, and for the first time, they kissed.