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London, 221B Baker Street in Marylebone near Regent's Park in the City of Westminster, the Monday after Redet Lum's expulsion from Earth, two hours before breakfast (Tōkyō time: Mid-afternoon)...
"You up, John?"
A groan escaped a certain retired Royal Army Medical Corps captain as he trudged out of his bedroom and came down to the living room of the flat in one of Westminster's high-end neighbourhoods, it overlooking the exposed part of the Underground's Baker Street Station. Stopping to look at the desk by the window, John Watson blinked in surprise on seeing his flatmate relaxed and quite alert, gazing nowhere in particular. "How long have YOU been up?" the doctor who helped chronicle the adventures of the world's first true private consulting detective demanded as he moved to make morning tea.
"Mycroft called me an hour ago to inform me that the incident Saturday afternoon in Alnwick has generated quite the delivery to the Specialized Warfare Fencibles," Sherlock Holmes calmly stated.
That made Watson blink before he gazed on the kitchen table to see that day's Daily Mail sitting there. Gazing at the full-sheet picture, he gaped. "That's...?!" he began, his eyes widening.
"Eleanor Catharine Smith, having been sworn in just after midnight our time this morning by Mycroft as an honorary commander in the Royal Naval Reserve," Holmes explained in his usual deadpan voice, his eyes not wavering from the point in the opposite wall he was gazing at. "The living kami of Royal Mail Ship Titanic, the wreck of which was transformed and Gifted yesterday evening at 8:27 PM Universal Coordinated Time. You'll note who's she depicted shaking the hand of, John."
Watson looked again. "Professor Robert Ballard."
"Correct. The good professor was leading an examination of the wreck site to see if others had caused damage to the hull sections since his last major survey of the scene in 2004. Of course, Eleanor's return was 'pushed' in a way by her elder sister's return on Saturday. It turns out that when the kami of Olympic became Sarah, the kami of the tender Nomadic and Olympic's youngest sister Britannic also decided it was time to 'return to service'. You know already of Nancy Rostron..."
"Carpathia."
"Right."
Watson nodded before he moved to finish preparing his tea. "How would civilian shipgirls be employed in the Fencibles anyway, Sherlock? Yes, the basic FISS powers are there, but they wouldn't possess the instinctual know-how concerning their bodies' offensive capabilities like the kami of a warship would automatically understand." Shaking his head, he came over to sit across from his flatmate, angling himself in such a way that he didn't distract Holmes from his current meditation.
"According to Nancy, Sarah has electrokinetic powers, Eleanor is a pyrokinetic, Charlene has empathic and telekinetic healing capabilities and Gwenaëlle has enhanced strength. Given what she was..."
"The Nomadic," Watson concluded. "French given name. Nomadic was registered in Cherbourg..."
"Sherlock! John! Ms. Rostron is here!"
Hearing their landlady call out, Holmes called back, "Send her up, Mrs. Hudson!"
Footfalls echoed from the stairwell leading down to Baker Street proper, heralding the arrival of a rather diminutive twenty-something dressed quite conservatively for the modern era...though back in the time Nancy Rostron was a steel ship sailing the New York/Fiume run to transport immigrants to America, what she had on would be seen as downright shocking: Black slacks and a white ruffled blouse under a cardigan done in the special tartan composed to honour her future fleet mate RMS Queen Mary when she was built at John Brown and Company in Clydebank during the Great Depression. "Good morning, Nancy," Holmes called out to the transformed liner. "Thank you, Mrs. Hudson!"
"I'll bring up some scones!" Martha Hudson called up from her kitchen.
"Appreciated, Mrs. Hudson!" Nancy called back before she passed the main door, then closed it; the widowed exotic dancer was not aware of the true nature of the adopted native of Newcastle upon Tyne.
"How are Eleanor and the others settling in?" Holmes asked as Watson made tea for the transformed liner who was now known on Yiziba as the Ursine Speedster of the Hills, Carpi-tuto ("Carpathia").
"Thank God for the telepathy that took the place of our wireless when we were steel ships," Nancy noted as she sat, also angling herself to ensure she didn't disturb her host's current meditation. Having worked for the effectively most powerful man in the British government since her rebirth as a shipgirl and Gifting around the same time the German destroyer KMS Z1 Leberecht Maass became Lieselotte Maaß, the spiritual adopted daughter of her most famous captain had found it very easy to adjust to life in the second decade of the Twenty-first Century. "Since Professor Ballard and so many others have visited Titanic's wreck site since she was first found in '85, Eleanor's taking to things like computers and cellular phones and all that quite easily. As for the others..."
Her voice trailed off as footfalls from outside heralded the arrival of the landlady with a plate of scones. Small chat was exchanged as Mrs. Hudson served everyone; the widow of a mobster and drug runner who had been executed in Florida for two counts of murder knew that Nancy Rostron worked for her tenant's older brother Mycroft in the government, but didn't know her exact duties. As soon as the older woman left, Nancy took a breath before nodding as Watson gave her some tea. "Thank you, Doctor. As for the others, little Gwenaëlle is just the eager beaver for your brother. Charlene's going to spend time with the Canadians at the Square to be accredited as a non-traditional healer. Sarah..."
Here, the transformed Cunard liner paused, shaking her head. "What about her?" Watson asked.
"She wants to go visit someone by Hyde Park later today, Doctor," Nancy explained. "Orphaned chap named Yorick Garvey; he was originally from the East End here in town. He's the one who taught Sarah, Charlene and Gwenaëlle how to properly fly after Charlene came back home..."
"Don't recognize the name," Holmes noted. "Battle name?"
"Centennial. Flying strongman."
"Did Sarah learn his tag line?"
A shake of the head responded. The term "tag line" was used to mark the sobriquet used by Named natives of the World of the Forge to describe themselves, like "Trickster of the Show" did Tariko Katabarbe or "Goddess Who Walks Among Men" did Kasuga Ayumu. "Sarah never got it..."
"John?"
Watson sighed as he flipped open his laptop, powering on the machine. "Right. Lucky thing Yotsuba gave me that list," he breathed out as he went into his documents files to draw up a spreadsheet containing known battle names of various lines that had existed on Yiziba since the Dawn of Power; as the Master Interrogator, Nyuosyo'o ("Bleachtaire"), Tariko's younger half-sister Yotsuba Dunn — a personal friend and once-student of the Holmes brothers and the younger brother's current flatmate — compiled the list for the consulting detective to reference whenever necessary.
"'Centennial'..." he repeated as he did a word search. "Alright, native name goes Byator'be-mimtumim. Tag line is 'Power of Legions'..." A snort escaped the Afghanistan vet. "Pretty arrogant-sounding..."
"Team?"
"Yotsuba marked 'HSKB' beside the name."
That made the detective's eyes widen as he took seconds to absorb that bit of data, then he slipped his hand into his pocket to pull out his cell phone. "Mycroft, it's Sherlock," he called into it when the other end answered. "We've got a situation. It's the one Yotsuba and all the others fear."
Both Nancy and Watson blinked with understandable confusion as they gazed on Holmes...
The End of the Circus: A Tale of the Yizibajohei
Side Story: Unending League United Kingdom: The Fall of Gashleycrumb
by Regina Magia and Fred Herriot
Based on The End of the Circus: A Tale of the Yizibajohei, created by Fred Herriot.
Inspired by The Gashlycrumb Tinies, written by Edward Gorey.
C&C by Rose Ash.
Based on characters and situations from Mahō Sensei Negima, created by Akamatsu Ken; The Seventh Carrier, written by Peter Albano; Azumanga Daiō, created by Azuma Kiyohiko; Kantai Collection, created by Kadokawa Games; Zenkoku Seifuku Bishōjo Grand Prix, created by Lyceen; characters created by World Wrestling Entertainment and its predecessor organizations, founded by Jess McMahon and Toots Mondt; Sherlock, created by Steven Moffat and Mark Gatiss (based on Sherlock Holmes, created by Arthur Conan Doyle); Sweet Valley High, created by Francine Pascal; Harry Potter, created by Joanna K. Rowling; Danganronpa, created by Spike Chunsoft; Urusei Yatsura and Ranma 1/2, created by Takahashi Rumiko; Suzumiya Haruhi no Yūutsu and its sequels, written by Tanigawa Nagaru; Sister Princess, created by Tenhiro Naoto and Kimino Sakurako; normalman, created by Jim Valentino; and Stargate SG-1, created by Brad Wright and Jonathan Glassner.
Also including characters and situations from Urusei Yatsura: The Senior Year, created by Mike Smith and Fred Herriot.
Note: This story occurs shortly after the events depicted in Part Twenty-nine of the main story, shortly after the events depicted in the fourteenth omake, Reborn From the Deep. The initial draft of this work was written by Regina Magia, while I expanded and deepened the plot, plus began crossing in other characters to make it merge with the timeline of the main story.
London, on Baywater Road overlooking Hyde Park in the City of Westminster, the Monday after Redet Lum's expulsion from Earth, an hour after breakfast (Tōkyō time: Supper)...
"There they go," remarked Ida Saint Clair as she crossed her arms, a lethal smile on her face while she and her friends watched the scene on the front courtyard play out. "Off to prison for life."
Five metres away, the screaming director of the Gashleycrumb Children's House, one of the last true orphanages in the United Kingdom, was being dragged off the grounds of the long-converted manor home for some forgotten noble family. Seeing this, the teens standing around the raven-haired Slavic-like fourth form honours student at the Westminster Academy on Harrow Road grinned as they heard the endless stream of profanity escape Tobias Lestrange's lips just before he was forced into one of the police cruisers sent by New Scotland Yard to have him transported to a waiting jail cell.
While the nearby crowd of reporters and photographers being cordoned away by bobbies shouted questions at the man now in the centre of a massive scandal concerning the operation of Gashleycrumb and the fate of many residents over the last decade, Yorick Garvey snorted as he reached around his girlfriend's torso to draw her close. "Pity they don't hang people anymore," the dusky-skinned native of the East End mused as he and Ida exchanged looks before they kissed. Given what was happening, the residents had been excused from school for a week while people from both the offices of the Secretary of State for Education and the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care went over the old manor with fine-toothed combs to learn what happened to over a hundred children ranging from preschool to teen years within the orphanage's walls. "Doubt the judges at the Old Bailey will take lightly to people who neglect kids and don't report their deaths so they can keep getting government funding."
"Not to mention most folks already in jail," Ida dryly noted, her eyes glittering with anticipation. "Most 'honest' crooks don't give a fucking shit when it comes to baby-killers."
Hearing that comment, Amy Wall found that she couldn't disagree with either of her friends. She personally had long lost count of how many children met unfortunate ends — from a fatal fall down the stairs to lethal alcohol poisoning of all things! — while the staff literally paid almost NO attention to them, covering up such tragedies in order to continue receiving welfare support from the government. Had things happened differently for twenty-six of those residents, the people now gleefully watching the small group of caretakers being led away in handcuffs could have become victims as well.
Back in the summer, the daughter of the second richest family residing in an old fish canning town in California came through Britain on her normal trip abroad to get away from the drudgery of Sweet Valley. Stopping in Oxford, Lila Fowler had the fortune to come across Prudence O'Hara and Úna Lurie while the third form girls were in town meeting relatives. After Prue and Úna were saved from some idiot magical when the Living Nuclear Reaction, Tarutote ("Cyclotron"), used her powers to atomize the fool when he attempted to use the Imperius to have his way with them, they learned of the Yizibajohei and moves to protect Earth from aliens like the Urusians who "invaded" the planet the previous fall.
Over the weekend as personal guests of the Fowler family in one of Oxford's most posh hotels, Lila was able to extract some of the horror stories concerning Gashleycrumb from Prue and Úna, including the death of the former's boyfriend from lye poisoning of all things a year before. After hearing nightmarish tale after nightmarish tale from the visibly-depressed middle school sophomores, the computer software heiress was quick to make them an offer, one both natives of Oxfordshire were happy to take.
Before they returned to Westminster, Prue had become the Swamp Ratel of the West, Nekrodikeo ("Honey Badger")...while Úna became the Shrinking Dynamo of the Islands, R'buosyuo ("Pixie").
The first publicly known members of the most feared — and by far the LARGEST! — battle team of metahumans to rise on Yiziba during the Dawn of Power.
Hor'betyuo-simnie Kuotyo'o-bier'be...
The Unending League of Super-Soldiers!
To say Lila was quite stunned by such Giftings was an understatement.
After all, as it was ALWAYS said on Yiziba...
Wherever the League walks, whole PLANETS tremble!
It began from there...
New Scotland Yard on Broadway (a half-kilometre south of east from Buckingham Palace), an hour later...
"Filthy muggles...!"
Shuddering as he found himself wishing yet again to have the power his younger brothers were given at birth, Tobias Lestrange tried to flex himself to loosen the restraints keeping him tied to a chair in an interrogation room deep in one of the basements of the current headquarters of the Metropolitan Police Service. It was one of the ones which had been magically warded by the Department of Magical Law Enforcement, the dispossessed eldest son of the late Viscount Augustus Lestrange of Barnet (one of the Dark Lord's supporters in the original Knights of Walpurgis, predecessor organization to the Death Eaters) was warned by one of the bobbies who dragged him here before he was tied down to await questioning. The others who had been arrested with him were normal people with no blood affiliation to the magical realms. All that happened to them was that they had been potioned by Lestrange's hidden employers among the pureblood gentry of wizarding Britain to ignore the deaths and disappearances of children at Gashleycrumb over the last decade and more since Voldemort's fighters openly moved against the subhuman filth on both sides of the magical security divide.
"Good morning, Mister Lestrange."
Hearing that chilly voice, Lestrange turned to look...
...then blinked on seeing a very dapper man in a Savile Row suit step out of the shadows, gazing upon him as if the dispossessed heir of one of wizarding Britain's most prominent families was a toad about to be dissected for science class in school. As Lestrange shuddered in indignation on being gazed upon THAT way, the newcomer moved to sit in front of him across the table from the former director of Gashleycrumb, his lips twitching into something of an amused smile.
"I should thank you, Mister Lestrange," he then stated. "Not only for giving my younger brother a lot of work as he helps investigate the crimes that befell your charges since you answered your late father's request for normal sex-slaves to sate the needs of Mister Riddle's fighters, you also have benefited Her Majesty greatly by allowing the United Kingdom to tap into a remarkable resource that will protect the Realm and her interests well for many years to come." His smile then turned icy. "I'm Mycroft Holmes, Her Majesty's Master of the Royal Specialized Warfare Fencibles. Since you've been living in the normal world..." He then nodded as Lestrange turned very pale. "Ah, you do understand, don't you?"
Shuddering as horror stories his parents told him about the battles between the War Hawks and the Übermenschen Gruppe in Europe during the Wars of Liberation replayed in his mind — many of those fights having occurred in magical districts across Britain, which caused more damage per capita than anything any of Gellert Grindelwald's Magische Reichsarmee EVER did! — Lestrange hissed, "So what, Master Holmes?! Do you think the Dark Lord will allow those muggle freaks to try to dominate the true masters of this land?! I may be without magic, but I know my loyalties! He'll lead...!"
"He was killed thirty-three hours ago in the Atrium of the Ministry of Magic due to the backlash of the Praeda Bellica benediction unleashed on him AND ALL HIS FOLLOWERS by the Duchess of Kyme Eau, Matriarch of the Very Noble and Most Ancient House of Slytherin, so confirmed by blood tests done per treaty with the International Mercantile Bank of Gringotts," Holmes cut him off, causing his guest to gasp in disbelief. "Among those who were rendered nimmibs were your brothers Rodolphus and Rabastan, who will soon be sentenced to life imprisonment in 'A' Block at Her Majesty's Prison Gonebren." Ignoring the horrified squawk from Lestrange on hearing the name of That Place, the most powerful man in the British government added, "By the way, you don't have Cornelius Fudge to hide behind. Once Her Grace the Duchess dealt with her distant cousin, she used her reserve powers granted her in the House of Lords Wizengamot to FIRE that dolt! As of now, Baron Xavier Leolin is the acting Minister for Magic thanks to the fact that Lady Alecto Carrow — who, if you don't know, replaced Professor Dumbledore as Chief Witch on his being deposed in the summer — was imprisoned in Gonebren..." — again, Holmes ignored the prisoner's frightened squawk on hearing That Name again — "...for torturing her nieces with Unforgivables, thus has been legally stripped of all hope of maintaining such a post. Elections for the new minister will be held sometime this week."
Lestrange shuddered as he tried not to succumb from such a waterfall of revelations. "You lie...!"
He then croaked as shadows seemed to writhe and change before a raven-haired woman stepped out of them, dressed in a sleeveless black jumpsuit with a turtleneck halter top design that displayed all the curves in her teenage body very well. "Oh, my..." she trilled as her stormy grey eyes focused on the prisoner. "Is this the abusive idiot that effectively delivered headaches to all of us on Yiziba by helping bring part of the Unending League back, Master Holmes?" she asked with an amused voice as she placed something the size of a paperback novel on the desk before the Master of the Fencibles.
"Indeed he is, Your Ladyship," Holmes answered before he stared at the prisoner. "I doubt you'll know of her, Mister Lestrange, but this is Her Ladyship, Earl Countess Pansy Parkinson of Keerford. She has just formally ascended to her position when her father was arrested very early in the morning after being rendered a nimmib by Her Grace in the same incident that saw your brothers rendered nimmibs. I strongly doubt that you might know of your sister-in-law's daughter with the late Mister Riddle, but if you actually do know of her, know that she will NEVER inherit your family seat in the House of Lords Wizengamot since she is technically a bastard child." As the level of confusion on Lestrange's face deepened, the Master of the Fencibles smiled. "A much more worthy heir to the seat was discovered and claimed the family ring shortly after your father's passing four years ago. Due to your brothers' imprisonment in Her Majesty's Prison Azkaban, they were in no position to contest that claim."
Despite himself, Lestrange demanded, "Who?!"
"That would be myself, mein Herr."
Hearing that woman's voice with its rich Westphalian accent, Lestrange turned to his left...
...then gargled as a woman stepped into the light, dressed in the British Army's khaki Number 2 service dress uniform with the kilt and accoutrements of the London Scottish on her collars, buttons and glengarry bonnet, she slipping an ornate wand under the sleeve of her jacket. Gazing at her, Lestrange was quick to note the medals and qualification badges on her jacket and slung around her neck were German from the era of the Wars of Liberation: The Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross with Oak Leaves, Swords and Diamonds wrapped around her neck alongside the Orden Pour le Merité Magique, the first class Iron Cross on her left breast pocket, the undress ribbon of the second class Iron Cross tucked in under the top button of her jacket, the undress ribbon of the long service award for members of the Magische Reichsarmee above the left pocket, the qualification badge for a military combat witch in silver above that ribbon and the Wound Badge in gold to the lower left of the first class Iron Cross.
Once he read the word on her black name tag...
"YOU'RE DEAD!" he screeched.
The woman with the long wavy blonde hair tied in a simple ponytail at the base of her skull gazed dispassionately at him, her blue eyes seemingly boring right into Lestrange's very soul to find what was there VERY wanting. "If I was dead, mein Cousin..." she began, her words dripping with disgust, "...I wouldn't be able to wear THIS, would I?" she then asked as she held out her right hand.
Lestrange gaped at the beautiful family ring which was on this dark ghost's finger. Said now marked Andrea Slaed of Dortmund in Nordrhein-Westfalen, 1938 alumnus of the Nibelung School of Magic near Worms, captain in the Magical Army of the Greater German Realm, band mistress of the Schwartze Mädchen Brigade — who should have DIED at the Battle of Nurmengard in the summer of 1945! — as the new matriarch of the Most Noble House of Lestrange and the Viscounty of Barnet!
A horrified scream then escaped him...
Gashleycrumb House, noon...
"So...you think I'm good enough for WWE, Mister Austin?"
Hearing that question from Basil Ashbery, the native of Edna near the Gulf of Mexico coast of Texas who was the current incarnation of the Lethal Viper of the South, Tuone'e (the "Rattlesnake"), chuckled as he reached over to squeeze the shoulder of the balding muscular fifth form student who had become the current incarnation of the Slashing Bruin, Tona ("Orso"). "Yeah, kid, you got the stuff!" Steve Austin stated, which made the orphaned native of Rochester in Kent grin. "Just got to learn a ton of self-control if you ever want to do what some of us in the WWE do when they're Gifted. I'll introduce you to the Shield sometime. They can show you some meditation tricks they used in NXT."
"Cor! The Shield are Gifted?!" Ernest Wilder exclaimed, his eyes wide. The dark-haired native of Hammersmith in London itself was the current incarnation of the Mighty Prince of the East, Saku ("Rajah"). His Gift gave him mid-level FISS capabilities atop excellent leadership skills inherited from his first-self, a ruling crown prince of the eastern equatorial continent who had defended his land from invading metahumans in the Dawn of Power before he joined forces with the most powerful battle group to ever live on Yiziba. Of course, many of his friends soon noted that Ernest — who was as pure an Anglo-Saxon as there could be — had taken well to Indian cuisine after his Gifting. Then again, many knew that the homeland of the Mighty Prince, Ha'asaka, shared many cultural traits with the Maurya Empire that existed on the Subcontinent a century before Christ. "Love to train with them!"
"You'll get the chance, kid!" Steve promised as everyone moved to stream out of the gymnasium to head to the main dining hall and get a meal, making the younger metahumans both grin.
As they walked and chatted, the Texas Rattlesnake could only shake his head as he tried not to scowl on seeing the dilapidated condition of the orphanage that attracted Lila Fowler's attention back in the summer. Knowing Tobias Lestrange was the nimmib brother of two of the ass-kissers who followed that death cheater Voldemort that just got put down by Thérèse Peverell, the fact that so many kids died or disappeared from this place made a very cruel, grotesque sort of sense.
Cursing himself for being so utterly desensitized to such a concept even with his upbringing on Earth, Steve shook his head to concentrate on the here and now.
Still, it was quite hard given the primary downside of being Gifted.
The knowledge of the vast breadth of his adopted planet's history from that apocalyptic age to today had become the wrestler's thanks to his unintentional Gifting five years before, shortly after his referee duties at WrestleMania 23 in Detroit. With that came the bitter knowledge that child rape, child prostitution and child slavery had been a thing in the years before the Dawn of Power across much of Yiziba. Ultimately, it was because of the memories of such abuse among victims who later became the first generation of the Named that the tradition of getting children Gifted to defend themselves at the youngest age possible first rose when the Show got started in earnest after the Starvation Times.
Worse, the first generation of the Unending League of Super-Soldiers had been some of the most hurt victims of that abuse thanks to their being experimented by government agencies seeking to create metahuman combat forces before they were broken free and went on a worldwide rampage.
Reflecting on that, many on Yiziba soon understood what drove the first generation of the League to band together and become such a powerful force for both good and ill on the World of the Forge.
Given how much sheer POWER was welded by the kids who had been Gifted after Prudence O'Hara and Úna Lurie had met the current incarnation of the Living Nuclear Reaction, Steve didn't doubt for a moment that if anyone from the magical enclaves administered by that pack of morons calling themselves a "ministry" stepped out of line, a mud-stomp of EPIC proportions would result.
The sooner Rose Potter and her allies could make inroads with the group of orphans at Gashleycrumb to keep tempers down and prevent bystanders from being hurt if someone lost it, the better.
Fortunately, something was coming soon to help ease the transition...
The storage rooms in the basement...
"This is where the vanished children were teleported off to the allies of Lestrange's brothers?"
"Exactly," Zinnia Schubert answered as she crouched beside the famous consulting detective whose older brother would be the effective "commander" of Britain's metahumans if so called by the Crown to war. "After I was Gifted, I used my powers to scout around the place to see where all the kids were disappearing to. Once I noticed a lot of the staff seemed drugged for some reason — yet saw that the normal run of hallucinogens and other brain-altering medications were absent from the infirmary — concluding there had to be a magical side to things was easy. Especially after I learned the meaning behind the name 'Lestrange', then visited the Ministry after that death cheater Riddle broke his mates out of Azkaban on All Hallow's Eve. Thank God for Miss Hasegawa." Here, the dusky-skinned fourth form student with South Asian ancestry despite her German family name who was the current incarnation of the Stealthy Sleuth, R'bedirim ("Blacklight"), shrugged. "Followed that squib bastard into this room with one kid on Remembrance Day, then saw him teleported off; that's what convinced us it was time to go shut the arses down. Couldn't trace where the poor boy went, though."
"Yes, the magicals can be very annoying on occasion," Sherlock Holmes stated as he passed his fingers over the dusty floor, relaxing as he felt for anomalies. "Yes, here's the evidence of portkey use. Magicals don't realize that when you displace so much mass in any form of teleportation, it causes a vacuum in the immediate area until the air pressure stabilizes. That shifts dust around..."
"How can you tell it was a portkey and not side-along apparition, Sherlock?"
That was Elaine Savage, the auror of the DMLE who had been sent to the orphanage to monitor what was happening and ensure any links to the Death Eaters wouldn't cause too much curiosity towards discovering the existence of magic...which struck Holmes as an utterly stupid waste of time since one of the members of the War Hawks was openly known to be magical and there had been magical incidents in Tomobiki and Nerima over the last year, especially given what happened to the person now known as Hayashi Kanami! Given the administrator of Gashleycrumb was the nimmib sibling of the Lestrange brothers and that many horribly abused muggle children were now being found in the mansions of those Death Eaters who had fallen early the previous morning, Amelia Bones was quick to persuade Holmes' brother to allow her people to be present. Fortunately, Savage was a half-blood and had long come to respect the sleuth who lived at 221B Baker Street in Marylebone near Regent's Park.
Hearing that question the alumnus of Hufflepuff from the NEWT class of 1982 who lost her normal-born father to Voldemort's people, Holmes gazed at the reborn detective whose first-self hailed from the Isle of Luoridi off the coast of the western equatorial continent, one of the few true democracies on Yiziba before it all went to hell. "Explain it to her," he bade before moving to examine the rest of the room.
As Sally Donovan muttered something — which earned the sergeant a disgusted look from Savage — Zinnia's dark eyes rolled. "Alright, Elaine, it's simple. Think of what you NAME that particular act!"
Savage blinked, then she repeated, "Side-along..." Her eyes then widened. "Side. Beside." Her hands came up to form a space about a foot apart before she clapped her hands. "Dust would shift inwards as if an elevator door was closing. Portkeys..." A laugh escaped her. "Portkeys are all-around spells!"
"Exactly!" Holmes stated with an approving nod. "Even if you don't have Alastor's delightful artificial eye, Elaine, always keep a watch on the floor if you can't make use of the tracking spells you have to find out what happened. What else can you deduce from the movement of dust?"
That made the auror think for a moment before she nodded. "Size of who was taken away. A child is smaller than an adult. But how can you determine that when a portkey is used, Sherlock...?"
Her voice then trailed off. Holmes smirked, waving to the place on the floor which he examined minutes before. As Savage joined him, Zinnia grinned before she walked out of the room, not sparing Donovan a glance even if the urge to deck the mouthy bitch flowed through the veins of the Stealthy Sleuth. Walking up the stairs to the main reception hall, she soon spotted her target. "Doctor Watson!"
Holmes' flatmate perked, then he looked over before smiling as the native of Catcombe near Somerton in Somerset came to join him. Both then headed into the cafeteria to be fed. The cooks were members of 167 Catering Support Regiment in the British Army's Royal Logistics Corps, who had come from their barracks in Lincolnshire to prepare meals for the orphans over the next week; the House's cooks had been swept up and were at New Scotland Yard facing a tonne of charges, including TWENTY counts of murder thanks to food poisoning. Proving that would definitely be easy since Zinnia's boyfriend Neville Wolf had become the current incarnation of the Master Programmer, Tamser'ba ("Admin"); he was a master technopath who could easily retrieve lost and erased data of any sort with terrible ease. As soon as he had been Gifted at the start of fall, the native of Hackney in London had been quick to used his abilities to fully subvert the orphanage's security systems to his own control.
"Sherlock's interested in you," the retired Royal Army Medical Corps surgeon warned as they drew trays, then waited to be served in the wake of some off-duty police officers. "You're actually not so different from another Gifted person we know, one of the sisters of Tariko Katabarbe to be exact."
Zinnia chuckled. "Yotsuba Dunn, you mean? She's Bleachtaire."
"Same person," John Watson said, nodding thanks to the corporal who was in charge of the serving line before he guided the Somertonian metahuman detective/shadow weaver over to an empty table close to the windows. As they sat and began to nibble on the food, Watson spared a glance at the television by the windows, one of the few modern appliances he had seen since he came to this dreary place. ITV News was on, showing replays of the recent destruction of many parts of P'yŏng'yang in North Korea, such having been transmitted thanks to the Voice of the Great Show of Life, Bo'odurba ("Windtalker").
"You ever met her?" he then asked, thumbing the television.
She perked. "Who?"
"Miss Asakura?"
Zinnia shook her head. "No, not really. If you don't know this, being part of the Unending League will put some stigma on us, Doctor. We don't want to worry every damned metahuman on the planet that we've gone through the casting change and allowed our wing of the League to return. It scares people."
"Doctor Destructo, you mean?"
"Yes, sir," the would-be detective breathed out as she considered what to say further, then she sighed. "If we've been allowed to do casting changes into what we are now, he or she is DEFINITELY back. Especially now that Yotsuba's brother is Rake." As Watson gazed in curiosity at her, Zinnia smirked. "The first incarnation of Rake was one of Destructo's Chosen, Doctor. One of the people who got themselves Gifted thanks to the guidance of the third incarnation of the Doctor to show normal people how to protect themselves by becoming metahumans. That got the Freedom Parade going, which launched the first fight scenes of the Dawn of Power in countries like Kutotuto and Taletuto."
The retired surgeon blinked as he considered that before he grimly nodded. "Your equals of Nazi Germany and Imperial Russia if I recall from what Yotsuba told me about those times." He shook his head, then turned to see the destruction of the massive Ryugyŏng Hotel in Pot'ong-gang, about seven hundred metres southwest of where the captured American Cold War spy ship USS Pueblo — now a shipgirl named Marlene Bucher-Flanagan — had been moored close to the Victorious War Museum. "Oh, dear! Looks like the Yank shipgirls had a tonne of fun," he noted.
"Pity we couldn't get in on that!"
Heads turned as Caitlyn Strictland walked over to sit beside her friend. The current incarnation of the Slaughtering Axewoman, Ruobo ("Labrys"), was one of the most powerful of the newly-constituted wing of the Unending League living in London; she hailed from Swansea. She had become pre-Gifted a week before she was taken from Gashleycrumb by Voldemort's supporters, then was imprisoned in a hidden camp close to her hometown where a platoon's worth of Russian ice giants had been secretly quartered, sufficiently far from the sea to prevent whatever had caused the Whitby Werewolf Massacre just before Hallowe'en from getting to them. One lieutenant of the late Fenrir Greyback wanted to turn Kate into a werewolf to begin rebuilding the packs who had been slaughtered by the just-reborn Lieselotte Maaß. When he scratched her on attempting to rape her, the Gifting began and said werewolf was physically torn in half by her bare hands before she used her just-recovered battleaxe — such weapons were automatically stored in the Weaponeer's dimensionally-displaced armoury in the same pocket universe as the Doll House when their owners were not alive; those devices were always teleported back to the new incarnations of their last owners after Giftings — to hack the giants to bits!
Of course, the British Ministry of Magic didn't find out what happened outside Swansea a week ago until this very morning when Kate passed on what she did to Elaine Savage to be eventually relayed to Amelia Bones for further action by the DMLE and other parts of the Ministry of Magic.
"Why didn't you fly there?" Watson asked the Swansean fifth form as she sipped her tea. "Captain Hyde..." — there, he spoke of the Black Dragon, the just-transformed American battleship USS New Jersey, now Captain Kathy Hyde of the United States Naval Reserve — "...did call a public fight scene."
"What if whoever sent those monsters against the shipgirls decided to do some distance attacks like what Hitler tried to make his own Übermenschen do on North America that needed the War Hawks to cull them before we could hit the Continent on D-Day?" Kate wondered in return.
That made Watson blink before he grimly nodded...
The outdoor swimming pool by the back porch...
"Right, on three, girls! Three, two, one...PULL!"
Four sets of hands instantly yanked apart the large crack that had been cut into the swimming pool floor by Olive Verburg's battle spear. That yank also pulled up a considerable layer of dirt that that helped separate the pool from a chamber that had been detected by Olive's boyfriend Hector Eliot...though the current incarnation of the Guiding Thinker of the North, Kuodo ("Luminary"), hadn't been able to scan inside that chamber, much less find a way to get into it from elsewhere on the grounds. "Alright, lads!" Greg Lestrade barked out from nearby. "Let's get the excavator over so we can clear away this mess, then we'll let Miss Verburg go at it again with her spear to see what's there!"
Hearing that command, one of the bobbies who had been standing guard over the back lawn nodded before he turned to wave at a nearby excavator. As the driver guided the machine over to dip his claw-tipped bucket into the hole made in the pool floor, the people in there quickly climbed or elevated themselves clear. Of course, the four women who helped pull apart the pool floor weren't any of the orphans living here who had been Gifted. Despite their being in form-fitting battle suits, they wore over their revealing tops dark blue V-neck sweaters with cloth shoulder patches and epaulettes derived from the Number 3C general duty rig worn by members of the Royal Navy, they bearing slip-ons displaying the rank of commander. As soon as the last of them were clear, Lestrade waved the excavator in.
"Two metres down, Inspector," Hector stated from a bench that his girlfriend had hand-carried over from the porch to allow the Guiding Thinker to do his work with some hand-made scanners. "Don't see anything that might be a trap as our friend's digging down. Wish we had a geokinetic in our croup...!"
Lestrade nodded as he moved to sit beside the native of Kensington, waving the four women who had helped tear open the pool deck over to the other bench that Olive brought over. "It doesn't feel right," Charlene Smith-Bartlett confessed as she took a seat, followed by her sisters Sarah and Eleanor while Gwenaëlle Laniece remained standing, hovering close to the transformed Olympic-class liners to be ready and serve them when asked. "Something about what's under that pool..."
"Magical?" Lestrade wondered.
"Most likely. Quite smart to get people over here who were read in on THAT little secret, Inspector," Hector finished as his brown eyes twinkled, readouts appearing on the lenses of his goggles while he took in information from several scanners in his hand and in his bedroom.
"Well, instant Director Bones warned us this was formerly a magical mansion whose owners died out during their side of the bloody Spanish Armada, it was the best thing to do," the native of Weston-super-Mare in Somerset whispered; even if people working this case DID know of magic, the habit of keeping one's voice lowered when speaking of that topic to not get the Obliviators out from under Northumberland Avenue to do their work was a hard habit to shake off.
"What family was it, Inspector?" Sarah Smith asked as she looked over.
A shake of the head responded. "Records were lost during the Second World War when Captain Slaed's friends raided the Ministry to destroy that loyalty stone thing that hurt too many in the colonies." He paused at the sounds of the bucket ripping into the torn concrete of the pool floor deafened people before carrying on, "Doubt the captain would be able to give us answers, but I'm glad her friends are willing to help keep an eye on the kids while they're either fostered off or move on with their lives."
Silence fell as the excavator continued to dig, ripping up the rest of the pool floor to get to its goal. Watching that happen, Hector blinked before he looked at Olive. The Dutch-descent native of Chalfont Saint Giles near the Chiltern Hills in Buckinghamshire was standing tense and ready, her gloved hand gripping her battle spear as if she was expecting someone to attack right away. The third of the group of orphans to be Gifted after Prudence O'Hara and Úna Lurie a few weeks after the start of the new school year, Olive became the Raging Hoplite of the West, Damnir'be ("Ascalon"). Once she was armed and empowered — Olive was an upper-level FISS, capable of giving Yorick Garvey a good and decent match — she was quick to cause several accidents with food shipments that came in from questionable grocers; over the last year, many orphans had quickly noted that when certain types of food were brought into Gashleycrumb, one or more of their number would either die or disappear. Sadly for some of the people Olive and her friends wanted to save, those who were Gifted couldn't make a real impact until Hector Eliot and Neville Wolf had been empowered.
While Olive had yet to do what Kate Strictland did when the native of Swansea was Gifted...!
"Greg!"
Lestrade perked, then he looked over his shoulder, a delighted smile crossing his face. "Kingsley! Dora!" He then breathed out on seeing the third auror who had just arrived. "Master Auror Moody! Thank bloody God YOU came here! We got us quite the mystery here!"
"Something you need looked at 'special', eh, Lestrade?!" Alastor Moody cackled as he marched over to take the normal detective inspector's hand in his own. The native of the magical side of Edinburgh — given his paranoia when it came to potential threats against his life due to his chilling success tracking down dark magicals, nearly NO ONE knew where the man now lived — was dressed in modern normal clothes which definitely passed muster in Lestrade's eyes. That had been courtesy of Yotsuba Dunn, who had gone after dozens of aurors and other Ministry of Magic personnel in the wake of her Gifting as the Master Interrogator to get them to "dress PROPER"! Over time, the half-Japanese native of London was effectively adopted by instructors in the Corps of Law Aurors as a "special lecturer on muggle interactions"; one had to pass by her scrutiny to be seen as qualified whenever dealing with incidents beyond the magical enclaves. "Any of the kids here have the right skills to see inside this damned thing?" he then asked as he waved towards the wrecked pool.
"Sadly, I'm not too familiar with magical energy matrices to penetrate the walls of whatever is under the pool, Master Auror," Hector stated as he stood up, waving Moody over to stand close to the edge of the pool. As the soon-to-retire Edinburger gave the pool and the ground underneath a detailed look with his enhanced artificial eye, Kingsley Shacklebolt headed into the orphanage building to get updates from Elaine Savage. Nymphadora Tonks was quick to position herself close to Lestrade...though the metamorphmagus junior auror had seen the scowling look on Olive's face, giving her a wide birth on noting she was armed and looked ready to skewer someone with that spear of hers.
"Tell me what you do know, lad," Moody commanded.
As the Guiding Thinker pointed out various things he had been able to detect on the grounds while the excavator cleared more earth from the now-wrecked pool, the youngest of the Olympic-class liners was quick to peer intently at the elderly auror, her own empathy reaching out to scan his scarred and ravaged body. Her brown eyes widened in horror as the sheer scale of what the poor man before her had endured in his career as a law enforcement officer; thanks to the knowledge and memories of the doctors, nurses and other medical personnel that had served on HMHS Britannic during her brief time of life as a ship, Charlene was able to detect and comprehend every damned wound Alastor Moody received. Before any sort of conscious thought could muster in her brain to make her stop and think, the transformed hospital ship was on her feet and moving towards the Edinburger.
Moody was quick to sense her approach, he turning around to gaze her way. "What is it, lass...?"
His voice was cut off as Charlene's fingertips landed over the bridge of his nose, then they GLOWED! Before either Sarah or Eleanor could lunge over and pull their sister away from the man, a surprised squawk escaped Moody as a torrent of quite soothing energy ripped through his body from that contact, making his scars and the empty pit where his left eye had once been also glow.
"Bloody HELL...!" Tonks croaked out as that power seemed to clear up the scars on her instructor's face, making him seem a decade younger in the virtual blink of an eye. "She's a HEALER...?!"
"Former hospital ship, Miss Tonks," Lestrade stated.
That made the native of Petersfield near Portsmouth in Hampshire gape...
"DAMN!"
"Alastor!" Tonks gasped as she moved to keep her teacher on his feet just as he reached up and yanked out the magical eye from the now-glowing socket...
...the energy within then solidifying into a perfectly healthy normal brown eye!
"Charlene! Stop, for God's sake!" Sarah barked as she moved to pull her sister back from the man, who was now blinking in surprise as the reattached nerves began relaying information into his brain that perfectly matched what his artificial eye had done for him. "Are you alright, Master Auror...?!"
Moody's free hand came up. "I'm fine, lass!" he assured the raven-haired adopted native of Belfast and Alnwick before he felt his vision clear, then he focused directly on Charlene, his left eye GLOWING!
"What the bloody hell did you just do to him, Commander?!" Lestrade demanded.
"As Miss Tonks just said now, Charlene is a touch healer, Lestrade," a voice hailed from the direction of the main house, making people turn as Mycroft Holmes came over to join them, escorted by his chief aide Anthea McAllister. Nancy Rostron was also with them, now in her fighting uniform with the dark blue Navy sweater over her top. As the reborn Cunard liner exchanged polite nods with her old White Star rivals, the Master of the Fencibles gazed intently at Moody's restored eye. "Amazing! She gave you a normal eye back but allowed you to keep the abilities of your artificial one!"
"Is she trained, Mycroft?!" Moody demanded.
"Well, unless you consider the knowledge she inherited from all the doctors and other personnel who served on her when she was His Majesty's Hospital Ship Britannic being 'trained', I'd say 'no', Alastor!"
Silence.
More silence.
Still more silence.
Then...
"'Britannic'...?!"
That was a wide-eyed Tonks as she gaped on the adopted native of Belfast and the isle of Kéa in the Cyclades archipelago of Greece. As Charlene gave her a sheepish smile in turn, the metamorphmagus turned to gaze on her two obvious sisters before a squeal of disbelief escaped her.
"TONKS!"
She was nearly blasted down by Moody's bellowed cry. As the others stared at him, the master auror shook his head. "Investigating crime scene first, young lady!" he snapped with the same tone of voice he used on recruits during the first day of training. "You can fan-girl over these poor lassies later!"
Snickers echoed from some of the bobbies nearby who had heard this as Tonks madly blushed in embarrassment, her head cycling through several interesting shades of colour...
The cafeteria, an hour later...
"Magically resistant?"
"Aye," Alastor Moody snarled before nodding his thanks as Zinnia Schubert handed him a cup of tea. "Damn! I have to confess, young lady, you even worked improvements in my eye when you regrew it!" he noted after doing a quick scan of the tea before sipping from it, immediately sensing the reborn HMHS Britannic blush madly at that compliment. "So?! Am I still healthy, Poppy?"
A hand playfully batted his balding head of greying brown hair. "You're practically ten years younger now, Alastor!" Poppy Pomfrey declared after doing a deep scan of the auror with her own wand and magic. "If Charlene put a little more power with that touch, she could have easily regrown your leg!" She then pulled a bottle out from her first aid kit to hand to him. "Drink that."
He nodded his thanks, having scanned it immediately to see it was a combination potion with many nutrients to stabilize his internal chemistry; regardless of how good Charlene Smith-Bartlett's empathic healing powers were, the regrown tissue couldn't be conjured or grown out of simple nothingness, but other elements of Moody's body. After drinking it down, he then gazed on the transformed hospital ship. "So who exactly at Canada House is handling your healing apprenticeship, lass?"
"Lieutenant Colonel Scott Denham, Master Auror," Charlene answered.
"Forester?"
A shake of the head responded. "He's part of the Royal Canadian Air Force, though serving in the Royal Canadian Medical Service and mustered into the Specialized Warfare Regiment. An active member of Number 19 Canadian Specialized Warfare Unit. He has the same type of powers I received."
"I know Scott," Pomfrey stated as she did a final scan of the veteran of the Blood War. "Properly accredited medical and naturopathic doctor. Even trained under Professor Raeburn's friends at Watari-shima, rated a chūnin in the Tensei-ryū." As people hearing this nodded in appreciation and approval of the doctor's extracurricular educational path, she added, "You listen to everything he teaches you, Commander Smith-Bartlett. You'll be having the scarlet between your rank stripes soon enough."
Charlene's cheeks were now as red as poppies. "Yes, ma'am!"
"Alastor!"
Moody looked over before a delighted grin crossed his face. "You sure you can trust the new lass with the kids all alone, Albus?" he wondered as Albus Dumbledore, dressed in a conservative business suit with his long beard tucked under the jacket, came over to join them.
"You know the truth about Thérèse, Alastor," the headmaster of Hogwarts stated before nodding his thanks as one of the logisticans from 167 Catering Services Regiment handed him a cup of tea. "Oh, thank you, my dear! Do need a spot of that after last night." He then came over to sit by the table Moody was now occupying with Charlene and Pomfrey. "Despite all of Tom's problems, one thing that was most agreeable about his attitudes is that he saw Hogwarts as his true home. Thérèse has those feelings in spades. Besides, given the fact that our PROPER hosts are members of the Unending League of Super-Soldiers, one can't be too cautious about keeping the walls up."
"Hirosaki's granddaughter warned you of some things?"
"As did Tariko, Rose and a few others," Dumbledore stated before sipping his tea, then he looked around. "Oh, if I may ask, who exactly is the specific team leader here?"
"That would be me, Headmaster."
Everyone turned as Ida Saint Clair came up, she accompanied by Yorick Garvey. Now that the headmaster and staff of Gashleycrumb had been carted off to gaol, the Gifted orphans residing here had donned their battlesuits. As the Power of Legions, the dark-skinned East End Londoner had a white jumpsuit with bright golden boots and belt, what appeared to be a two-headed eagle in the style of the Holy Roman Empire in gold on his chest. His girlfriend had been Gifted as the Empress of the Deep Oceans, Imtaelem ("Salacia"); the high-level hydrokinetic — it had been her who cleared out the water of the pool before people could dig around on it, sending said liquid over in a single mass to pour into the Thames — had a dark sea blue uniform with dark grey belt and boots, a dark grey sea horse-like being insignia on her chest intertwined with branches of seaweed. "An honour to make your acquaintance, my dear," Dumbledore said as he rose, offering his hand. As Ida allowed him to give her hand a courtly kiss — though she blushed at such Victorian Era courtesies — he added, "I also bring greetings from Madame Warlock, Madame Thaumaturge and the members of the Cosmic Mage Guild who are currently students or staff at Hogwarts at this time. Not to mention Master Vinclozolin, Madame Silhouette and Madame Dragonheart; all three are students there as well."
Yorick crossed his arms. "That's quite surprising. While Dragonheart's as neutral as the Dragoness, Silhouette and Vinclozolin are normally heels. Can your castle stand that sort of thing, Headmaster?"
Dumbledore chuckled as they move to sit around an empty table close to where Moody was relaxing. "Pansy Parkinson and Neville Longbottom — Silhouette and Vinclozolin respectively — are more anti-faces in this incarnation, young man. You'll find them quite delightful to be with."
"Longbottom and Parkinson?" Ida repeated. "If I understand how your branch of the House of Lords works, the Longbottoms have a marquessate down on the border between Dorset and Hampshire and the Parkinsons have an earldom up in Lancaster. Given the way you people love to divide your society into 'light' and 'dark' ways of thinking, Neville would be on the light side and Pansy on the dark. We know of a Malcolm Parkinson; he was one of that death cheater's friends..."
"Pansy was long sickened by her parents' support of Voldemort, madame. Even more, she owed a Magical Life Debt to Tariko Katabarbe; Tariko saved her once from a broom riding accident a year before Pansy began attending Hogwarts. Also, Pansy is magically married to a muggleborn peer, Hermione Granger; she's the Enchantress. Thus, an alliance between her and the Mage Guild..."
The members of the Unending League sitting in the cafeteria nodded in understanding. "Makes more sense," Neville Wolf stated as he looked up from his personally-constructed laptop before sipping his tea. "Do you still have the Rittmeister's wand, Headmaster? Neither Hector nor I have been able to penetrate that whatever-it-is that's shielding that bunker or dungeon or whatever under where the pool was." Here, the Master Programmer waved out towards the back yard.
"It's magically shielded, Albus," Moody added as the headmaster turned to gaze outside with his mage sight to see what was the issue. "Quite old and complex wards as well. Ties right into one of the ley lines that cris-cross London. Both these ladies tried to crack it open with their weapons, but couldn't scratch it." Here, he waved to both Olive Verburg and Kate Strickland in emphasis.
Seeing the menacing sharp devices in the two orphan girls' hands, Dumbledore's eyebrow arched. "Created by the Weaponeer, I believe, ladies?" he asked.
Affirming nods answered him. "Who else would our first-selves turn to after the first Weaponeer came, Headmaster?" Olive asked with a bitter smile; she had her theories about that whatever-it-was under the pool and whatever could be contained within, but hadn't said anything.
"Jim tried to change it," Kate added as he waved to a frail young man appearing to be in second form.
Dumbledore turned his mage sight to scan James Bellairs for a second to ascertain the younger fellow's abilities, then he nodded. "You can transmute matter, young man?" he asked.
"All the way to atomic transmutation...but only by physical touch, Headmaster," the native of King's Lynn in western Norfolk who was the youngest of the Gifted now residing at Gashleycrumb answered. He was the current incarnation of the Purifying Alchemist, Hyato-simtumlokro ("Albedo"); noting that, the others of the League currently in the cafeteria then recalled that the famous "leader of the light" who had dealt with Gellert Grindelwald during World War Two himself was an alchemy master who had studied under the long-lived Nicolas Flamel. "When I tried to shift the state of the roof of that chamber to make it breakable, I felt too much ebony mesonium shielding the material from me. I don't know who on Earth forged that, but whoever he or she was, they were either geniuses or lunatics."
"Or most likely both. So we need ebony mesonium to fight ebony mesonium." With that, the elderly arch-mage finished his tea, then drew out his wand, nodding in understanding. "Well, let's see if whoever created this had the ability to defy the power of Rittmeister von Taserich."
With that, Jim got up from his chair to escort Dumbledore outside, with some of the others following...
The outdoor swimming pool, minutes later...
"Kōchō-sensei!"
Albus Dumbledore blinked on hearing that cheerful voice with its mix of Hichiku Kyūshū Japanese and Tâioân Bânlâm-gú Min Chinese accents, then he looked up as a brown-haired figure in a white jumpsuit with dark blue belt and boots flew down from the sky, having approached the scene from the north. "Ah, Commander Yuhara! I thought you'd be heading back to Japan with Tariko!"
Landing, Yuhara Yukiko giggled as she scratched the back of her head. As people stared at the reborn eighth of the Kagerō-class "cruiser-type" destroyers, the woman now known on Yiziba as the Typhoon Blizzard, Rikebo'o ("Yukikaze") bowed her head. "Yukikaze is sorry, Kōchō-sensei, but Shirē wanted Yukikaze to come here to give a message to the members of the Unending League who are based here so that Shirē's sister Yotsuba-shirē wouldn't bug her about learning all of the League's secrets!"
Hearing that, Ida Saint Clair walked up, offering her hand. "No doubt, Miss Katabarbe wants to keep the fight scenes to a minimum," the native of Sunderland near Newcastle upon Tyne mused as Yukiko formally saluted her, then took her hand, conserving her first generation battle doll-enhanced strength as she politely shook it. "I'll get Hector to compile a list of our battle group to pass on to Miss Katabarbe; you've been probably told why we refused to communicate with either Miss Asakura or..."
«Yukikaze...?»
Yukiko and the civilian shipgirls who had been helping with the excavation of the swimming pool perked. "I heard that!" Sarah Smith called out. «Hello, this is Olympic. Who's signalling, please?»
Silence.
More silence.
Still more silence.
Then...
«O-o-o-Olympic...?!»
Yukiko's brown eyes widened as her mind quickly interpreted what she could recognize of the signaller's accent. It was mostly Kansai Japanese, though it had the undertones of Chūgoku which had been spoken around the Maizuru Naval District where four of her sisters had been constructed as part of the Third and Fourth Naval Armaments Supplement Programs to rapidly expand the Imperial fleet in the lead up to the Greater East Asia War. However, there was also the hint of tones more common to the Solomon Islands in that voice. Yukiko learned from her other fleet mates that for shipgirls who had been sunk during that war, they sometimes were influenced by the native languages of whatever culture whose land was near where they foundered. Of course, there was the cases of both herself and Akamatsu Himeko, the reborn spirit of the only other Imperial Navy destroyer to serve in another country's maritime warfare branch after VJ Day. While Yukiko still saw herself pretty much as Japanese, the silver-haired adopted native of Maizuru and Nakhódka in Russia now known on Yiziba as the Faithful Fountain of Sound, Behete ("Hibiki"), viewed herself as both Japanese AND Russian.
Quickly recalling whom of her sisters had sunk during the Solomons campaign...
«Kagerō, you should identify yourself. We ARE in England now.»
Yukiko gasped. «KAGERŌ-NĒSAN?!»
"Commander...?"
That was Dumbledore, who was gazing in concern at the adopted native of Sasebo and Jīlóng. Yukiko flustered as she got herself back together, then she scratched the back of her head again in embarrassment. "Yukikaze is sorry, Kōchō-sensei! But Yukikaze is hearing Kagerō-nēsan's voice right now! Yukikaze didn't know that Kagerō-nēsan had returned to duty as a shipgirl as well!" She looked off to the southeast. «Kagerō-nēsan, who's with you right now?!» she telepathically thought out.
«Other than you, Isokaze, Hamakaze, Hayashio and Natsushio, we're all here!»
Eleanor Smith gazed at the transformed destroyer. "How many of your class are there, Commander?"
Yukiko blinked as she felt her eyes tear. "There were nineteen of us...!"
«Who are you with right now, Yukikaze?» the voice of the shipgirl that had urged the reborn destroyer Kagerō — Yukiko knew her human name was Yuhara Minami — then asked, making the eighth of her class blink in confusion on noting the sheer lack of emotion in that question even if the accent hinted that she had been built in or around Yokosuka, though such was mixed with what strongly sounded like Tagalog; several of the destroyers found by Saeru Hinako over the previous year who had sunk around the central part of the Philippines during the war had the same type of undercurrent in their own voices.
«Royal Mail Ships Olympic, Titanic and Carpathia, Steamship Nomadic and Her Majesty's Hospital Ship Britannic,» Sarah transmitted out as she focused towards the southeast. «I hope you do remember, young lady, that there's no war now between our empires.»
Silence.
Ditto.
Ditto.
Then...
FFF-WOOOSH!
Everyone standing around the shipgirls were literally knocked off their feet as a typhoon-strength gust of wind seemed to swirl around Yukiko and the Smith sisters for a moment before the air solidified into fourteen teenage girls with the same general body builds the eighth of her class of destroyers possessed. Like Yukiko, they were dressed in the halter-top form-fitting battlesuits with the bare shoulders that most of the current generation of Named Yizibajohei donned; the colours spanned the spectrum, though there were several girls who had white gauntlets covering their hands. As people gasped while they tried to pick themselves up from the ground — it was a sheer MIRACLE the excavator that had been used to dig up the ground around the swimming pool hadn't been knocked over by the sudden arrival of Yukiko's sisters — all of them seemed to peer at the Western girls in the battle uniforms with the pullover sweaters displaying commander's rank in the Royal Navy. One of them — Yukiko was quick to spot the kanji 秋雲 in two-tone burgundy over a sphere depicting a cloudy autumn day on her chest — instantly locked on Eleanor Smith, then she blinked for a moment...
...before everyone watching this save the shipgirls staggered in shock as the reincarnation of the last of the Kagerō-class destroyers whipped out a SKETCHBOOK of all things from nowhere! Her free hand pulled out a mechanical pencil before she dipped her head down to start drawing...
...before she yelped in shocked surprise as a gloved fist smacked her in the head, nearly knocking her face-first into the dirt! "OW!" the being who had been hailed as Yuhara Tokimi when she had been reborn and Gifted off the coast of the Zamboanga Peninsula on Mindanao in the Philippines a month before yelped before she stared teary-eyed at the first of her class. "Taichō...!"
"Not...NOW, Akigumo!" Yuhara Minami snapped as she glared intently at her youngest sister to ensure she would comply. "You didn't ASK Titanic-sama for PERMISSION to draw a portrait of her...!"
KK-KKRACK...!
Everyone jolted, then Greg Lestrange looked in the direction of the large pit that had been dug up under the pool. "Oh, bloody hell...!" the inspector groaned as several constables moved in to look...
...before the exposed roof of whatever secret space had been placed under where the pool was installed centuries before exploded outward, allowing a miasma of dark energy to billow out into the sky overhead, such instantly transforming into a small troupe of VERY familiar creatures in the eyes of all the magicals who had come to this place this day. "DEMENTORS!" Nymphadora Tonks cried out, whipping out her wand just as the air around the scene began to noticeably chill.
"EXPECTO PATRONUM!"
A triumvirate of spiritual animals instantly leapt forth from the wands of the three more experienced magicals present, the phoenix, lynx and bulldog representing Albus Dumbledore, Kingsley Shacklebolt and Alastor Moody immediately swarming around the dark creatures that had just freed themselves from their underground prison. Soon joined by Tonks' jackrabbit, the four beings began to push against the hissing dementors as Lestrange barked orders to his subordinates to pull people back from the pit. As several people — including Mycroft Holmes and Anthea McAllister — dragged dazed policemen back, the rushing sound of air whipping past a human body made Dumbledore look up to see Amy Wall race down, her gauntlet-covered hands glowing. "FRY, YOU SOUL-SUCKING BASTARDS!" the native of Canterbury who was the current incarnation of the Gay Dancer of the Skies, Leyokuo ("Free Bird"), screamed as bolts of burning energy lashed out to punch through one particular dementor.
The creature squealed as it was nearly ripped apart by that attack...
...then it hissed as it REFORMED itself, making Amy gape in shock on noting that THIS particular soul-sucking beast hadn't been made ashes. YOU DAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARE, MUGGLE...?!
The creature screamed again as a jet of concentrated flame ripped into it from Eleanor Smith's direction, making the just-arrived Japanese destroyers gape in shock on seeing the reborn Titanic of all people use FIRE! "LEAVE THAT POOR CHILD ALONE, YOU FILTHY BEAST!" the second of the Olympic-class liners snapped as shouts echoed from the main building to herald the arrival of other members of the Unending League living at Gashleycrumb as well as Steve Austin.
YOU HAVE NO POWER OVER US, SHIP SPIRIT! another of the dark creatures snarled as two broke away from Moody's attempt at containing them to surge at the reborn spirit of the famous passenger liner, they instantly sensing her buried grief at the failure in carrying out her basic task of transporting people across the Atlantic on her maiden voyage a century before. GIVE US...!
The creature then squealed in mortal agony after someone literally teleported onto its back, snaring it by the neck. "Shut up and DIE!" Francine Stoker snarled as she allowed her powers as the Forger of Cadavers, Suonaei ("Lamia"), to DRAIN the dementor of whatever power that was keeping it effectively "alive". "You're not dealing with 'mere muggles' NOW, aren't you?!"
THIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIEF...!
"I must borrow this."
A surprised yelp from Dumbledore made people's heads turn...
...then Yukiko — who had been busy using her cryokinetic powers to protect some of the helpless policemen from the dark kami that had just surged up from the pit as well as seal it off to prevent any more critters from emerging to cause havoc — gasped in horror on seeing an aqua-eyed sister with pink hair in a high ponytail literally flip herself over the aged arch-mage to snare the Elder Wand, then she raced at the creatures at flank speed. "SHIRANUI-NĒSAN, WHAT ARE YOU...?!"
"Kontō...!"
People gasped as a blazing nōdachi of pure white energy erupted from the gloved hand of the second of the Kagerō-class destroyers, its hilt completely cloaking the first of the Deathly Hallows created centuries before by the Undying Lord. The dementors, stunned that this impudent ship spirit would charge them head on, all moved to swarm the adopted native of Yokosuka, reaching out with their own powers to overwhelm her soul so they could feast on it; given that Yuhara Seiko was the reborn living spirit of the destroyer Shiranui, she had been touched by the souls of HUNDREDS from the moment she was laid down to when she sank with all hands two days after Leyte Gulf...!
NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO...!
A second later, a geyser of shredded dark energy exploded into the sky!
To Be Continued...
WRITER'S NOTES
As stated after the title card, this story is set after the events of the Battle of P'yŏng'yang in the main story, in the wake of Part Twenty-nine. Please consult the writer's notes of the main story to get an idea as to the general plot of the story as well as background information concerning each of the contributing series who provide characters and situations to the main story as well as this short.
Shipgirls introduced or mentioned in this story:
Commander Nancy Rostron RNR (Royal Mail Ship Carpathia [pendant A274])
Cdr Sarah Smith RNR (Royal Mail Ship Olympic [pendant A400])
Cdr Eleanor Smith RNR (Royal Mail Ship Titanic [pendant A401])
Cdr Charlene Smith-Bartlett RNR (Her Majesty's Hospital Ship Britannic [pendant A433])
Cdr Gwenaëlle Laniece RNR (Steamship Nomadic [pendant A422])
For the above former passenger liners and tenders, please consult the writer's notes for the fourteenth omake, Reborn From The Deep, as to how each of these girls look like and what inspired same. All of them, as noted in the teaser scene, were made members of the Royal Naval Reserve (RNR), the part-time element of the United Kingdom's maritime warfare service.
Fregattenkapitän Lieselotte Maaß KMDR (Kriegsmarineschiff Z1 Leberecht Maass [pendant Z1])
See the writer's notes for Part Five of the main story to describe how German ships were addressed as in the universe of my stories. Note also that the Type 1934 destroyers (of which Leberecht Maass was the first) were the first true destroyers built for Germany; all craft constructed before were designated "torpedo boats" (in German, torpedoboot) and would get pendant superior "T" before their specific hull number. Of course, FKpt Lieselotte Maaß would resemble her Kantai Collection interpretation.
Captain Katharine "Kathy" Hyde USN (United States Ship New Jersey [BB-62])
Lieutenant Marlene Bucher-Flanagan USN (United States Ship Pueblo [AGER-2])
CAPT Kathy Hyde is based on the interpretation of a shipgirl version of USS New Jersey as introduced by TheJMPer in his KanColle fanfic story Belated Battleships. LT Marlene Bucher-Flanagan first appeared in Part Twenty-seven of the main story.
Akamatsu Himeko-chūsa DNKR (later Kapitán Vtoróvo Ránga Khímeko Khagémiovna Akamátsu VMFRF [ex-VMFSSSR]) (Tennō Heika Gunkan Hibiki [DD-174], later Èskádrennykh Minonóstsev Vérnyj [pendant 575])
Yuhara Minami-chūsa DNKR (Tennō Heika Gunkan Kagerō [DD-203])
Yuhara Seiko-chūsa DNKR (Tennō Heika Gunkan Shiranui [DD-204])
Yuhara Kunie-chūsa DNKR (Tennō Heika Gunkan Kuroshio [DD-205])
Yuhara Chikako-chūsa DNKR (Tennō Heika Gunkan Oyashio [DD-206])
Yuhara Hayako-chūsa DNKR (Tennō Heika Gunkan Hayashio [DD-207])
Yuhara Natsumi-chūsa DNKR (Tennō Heika Gunkan Natsushio [DD-208])
Yuhara Hikaru-chūsa DNKR (Tennō Heika Gunkan Hatsukaze [DD-209])
Yuhara Yukiko-chūsa DNKR (later Zhōngxiào ZHMH) (Tennō Heika Gunkan Yukikaze [DD-210], later Zhōnghuá Mínguó Zhànjiàn Dānyáng [DD-12])
Yuhara Amako-chūsa DNKR (Tennō Heika Gunkan Amatsukaze [DD-211])
Yuhara Tokiko-chūsa DNKR (Tennō Heika Gunkan Tokitsukaze [DD-212])
Yuhara Utako-chūsa DNKR (Tennō Heika Gunkan Urakaze [DD-213])
Yuhara Izumi-chūsa DNKR (Tennō Heika Gunkan Isokaze [DD-214])
Yuhara Hama-chūsa DNKR (Tennō Heika Gunkan Hamakaze [DD-215])
Yuhara Taniko-chūsa DNKR (Tennō Heika Gunkan Tanikaze [DD-216])
Yuhara Norie-chūsa DNKR (Tennō Heika Gunkan Nowaki [DD-217])
Yuhara Arisa-chūsa DNKR (Tennō Heika Gunkan Arashi [DD-218])
Yuhara Hiromi-chūsa DNKR (Tennō Heika Gunkan Hagikaze [DD-219])
Yuhara Mai-chūsa DNKR (Tennō Heika Gunkan Maikaze [DD-220])
Yuhara Tokimi-chūsa DNKR (Tennō Heika Gunkan Akigumo [DD-221])
Of the Japanese shipgirls listed above, only THG Hayashio (Yuhara Hayako) and THG Natsushio (Yuhara Natsumi) have yet to be implemented into Kantai Collection. All remaining shipgirls listed above resemble their game interpretations.
Sweet Valley High character notes: Lila Fowler (Cyclotron) was a background character throughout the book series, though she did star in several volumes and even had a Magna Edition dedicated specifically for her, plus another looking at her family history.
Harry Potter minor character notes: The late Augustus Lestrange (his given name is my invention) was first mentioned in Half-Blood Prince; of course, Tobias Lestrange is my own creation. Note that all noble titles are my invention; see the writer's notes for Part Ten of the main story to see how the houses of the Wizengamot are divided. Of course, Voldemort and the Death Eaters were forever dealt with by Rose Potter (né Harry Potter) (the Warlock), her wife Thérèse Peverell (the Thaumaturge), Pansy Parkinson (Silhouette), her wife Hermione Granger (the Enchantress), Ginny Weasley (Soulfire), her wife Luna Lovegood (Prophecy) and Neville Longbottom (Vinclozolin) in Part Fifteen of the main story. Captain Andrea Slaed of the Schwartze Mädchen ("Black Maidens") would have appeared in the third Wizards and Avalonians side story to Phoenix From the Ashes. Elaine Savage (her given name is my invention) was also mentioned first in Half-Blood Prince.
Sherlock minor character notes: Detective Sergeant Sally Donovan first appeared in A Study in Pink, which is where Anthea McAllister (her family name is my invention) also first appeared.
Translation list: Fregattenkapitän — Frigate Captain (short-form FKpt), the German rank title for a Navy commander (NATO rank code OF-4); KMDR — Short for Kriegsmarine des Deutschen Reiches ("War Navy of the German Realm"); Kriegsmarineschiff — War Navy Ship (short-form KMS); Nimmib — Phonemicization of the letters NMMB ("non-magical magic-born"), the politically correct term first coined in Canada in the 1910s for squibs; Chūnin — Middle-rank ninjutsu-ka; Tensei-ryū — School of the Star of Heaven; Chūsa — Mid-rank Field Officer, the Japanese rank title for a Navy commander, Army lieutenant colonel or Air Force wing commander, which is translated into Mandarin as Zhōngxiào; DNKR — Short for Dai-Nihon Teikoku Kaigun ("Navy of the Greater Japanese Empire"); Kapitán Vtoróvo Ránga — Captain of the Second Rank, the Russian rank title for a Navy commander; VMFRF — Short for Voénno-Morskój Flót Rossíjskoj Federátsii ("Military Maritime Fleet of the Russian Federation"); VMFSSSR — Short for Voénno-Morskój Flót Sojúz Sovétskikh Sotsialistícheskikh Respúblik ("Military Maritime Fleet of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics"); Tennō Heika Gunkan — Warship of His Imperial Majesty the Heavenly Sovereign (short-form THG); Èskádrennykh Minonóstsev — Squadron torpedo boat (short-form ÈM), the Russian type name and ship prefix for destroyers; ZHMH — Short for Zhōnghuá Mínguó Hǎijūn ("Navy of the Republic of China"); Zhōnghuá Mínguó Zhànjiàn — Warship of the Republic of China (short-form ZMZ); Shirē — Commander (in Yukiko-speak); Taichō — Captain/Boss; Kontō — Soulsword.
