VNS ARC DD-51
EN ROUTE TO ANDYROS
"Sir we are in range of Andyros Defense Station." The comms officer's voice startled Jaune out of his 'bad feeling' thinking.
"Good. Get team RWBY up here and get me a secure com channel." Jaune brought out his command scroll to wait for the transmission to be patched through.
"Aye sir." The comm officer routed an audio transmission to Jaune's command scroll. "Channel secured sir. Go ahead."
"Andyros Defense Station this is Captain Arc of VNS Arc of the Vale Navy. Please respond." Jaune waited for a half minute before repeating his hail. "Andyros station this is VNS Arc of the Vale Navy. Come in."
After another 20 seconds, a low voice answered the hail. "We read you Arc, this is Major Lawson, commander of Andyros defense. If you don't mind, we have a minor pest problem. What can I help you with?"
Jaune chuckled lightly before responding. "Actually we're your exterminators. I have a huntress team here to deliver, and I've been ordered to help you rebuild your defenses. We're about three hours out from your port."
The Major sighed very lightly before continuing "That's good captain. We've got a few major breaches in the wall to patch up. The extra help will be appreciated." Before Jaune could question how the Grimm made even one breach, much less several, the sonar officer spoke up.
"Sir I have one-make that two sonar contacts, depth 10 meters, speed 18 knots, bearing 1-1-0. Sir they're heading for the bay!" Jaune made a mental note to dig into the breach issue later.
"If you'll excuse me Major, seems your pest problem has spread. We'll be in touch. Ensign, distance to targets?" Jaune ended the transmission before taking hold of the situation.
The sonar officer sent a manual ping toward the contacts. "Holding at about two kilometers, directly in front of us."
"Can you identify the contacts?" Jaune was really hoping for abnormally large schools of fish.
"Yes sir, reading two kraken-class Grimm. 30 meters and 50 meters in length." Jaune muttered a 'damn' before making a quick plan of action.
"Designate as Gamma 3-0 and 5-0 respectively. Load forward torpedo tubes and prep both cannons with AP rounds." Jaune turned to the deck officer. "Lieutenant Hughes, sound general quarters."
"Load tubes 1-4, prep deck guns with AP rounds, aye." The weapons control officer relayed the captain's orders to the CIC, reporting back an 'understood'. Alarm bells rang throughout the ship as Lieutenant Hughes' voice came over the 1MC. "General quarters, general quarters. All hands, man your battlestations."
"Tubes 1-3, target Gamma 3-0. Tube 4, target Gamma 5-0. Fire when ready." Again, the weapons officer relayed the orders. Within seconds four dull thumps could be heard reverberating throughout the ship. "All torpedoes away and tracking!"
The voice of the forward watchman echoed through the intercom. "Sir, two confirmed hits on Gamma 3-0! Gamma 3-0 is disintegrating! Gamma 5-0, one confirmed hit, but is still kicking! 5-0 is turning to intercept!"
"Lieutenant, brace for sharp starboard turn. On my mark; right full rudder, back full on screw two. Train both guns 90 degrees to starboard." Lieutenant Hughes sounded over the 1MC again, relaying the captain's order to secure for sharp turn.
"Right full rudder, full back on two on your mark, aye." The helmsman repeated as the weapons officer relayed orders once more.
Jaune grabbed the pair of binoculars to keep track of the kraken barreling toward his ship. At almost 400 meters, the kraken began to charge, lurching forward to upwards of 40 knots. "Right full!" Jaune shouted, the ship immediately began listing to the right. The entire bridge crew sat gripping consoles or their chairs to avoid being thrown into the bulkhead. The groaning of the right propeller could be heard on the bridge, struggling to reverse its momentum on such short notice.
The kraken dove slightly, only barely visible from the surface, hoping to punch a hole in the Arc below the waterline. As Jaune watched, the kraken passed about 10 meters aft of the ship, a pair of tentacles reaching out to grab the closest propeller. It succeeded, losing the limbs in the process. The tentacles wound around the propeller, slowing, and then stopping the screw's motion. "Screw two is jammed!"
"Shut it off. We'll put divers in the water to fix it later. Continue turn, deck guns fire at will." As the ship continued a lazy right turn, the kraken slowed slightly, angry on missing its charge as well as its limbs. 15 long seconds after, both cannons opened up, firing three rounds at a time into the dazed kraken. Two out of six rounds missed, but at close range, the remaining four tore into the Grimm's flesh, killing it on the spot.
"Sir, lookout reports Gamma 5-0 is dead in the water!" A cheer erupted across the bridge, before the captain silenced it. "Put another round into it. HE. Can't have it playing dead on us. Status of Gamma 3-0?" One more boom echoed from the forward deck gun, splattering black ooze over the Arc's bow.
"Close to fully disintegrated sir."
As Jaune got up to leave, he spotted team RWBY huddled in a corner, not sure what was happening. He had forgotten he called them up to the bridge in the orderly chaos of the engagement. "Good. Once 5-0 is disintegrated, send out divers to untangle screw two, and get a cleaning crew to work on the bow. Go to all stop and remain at Condition 2. As soon as work is complete, continue on course for the island." Before Jaune left the bridge, he gestured to RWBY for them to leave with him. At the hatch, he turned to the conning officer.
"Ensign Roan, you have the conn. And inform Andyros Defense we'll be a little late for our get together."
Ruby was still in somewhat awe of Jaune as she followed him through the ship's corridors. She reflected on how easily he had ordered the bridge crew in combat. The Jaune she knew had been wimpy and skittish. This Jaune was defiantly more muscular (not that she had looked) and confidant, almost oozing charisma. "Where are we going?"
"I need to check in with command while we wait for the prop to be fixed. I also want to get your opinion on why kraken this far out from the island seem to be drawn to the bay." Jaune stepped through the hatch that led to his office, indicating a chair across from him when Ruby came in.
"Well it's got to be something drawing them in. They would be attracted by concentrated negative emotions. When Mountain Glenn started to fall, Grimm packs from miles away got drawn in due to the sheer panic of the people. Oobleck thinks they came from as far away as 100 miles or more."
"That's what I was afraid of. The major mentioned they have multiple wall breaches that are letting Grimm roam into the streets with almost nothing to defend them. I wouldn't be surprised if most of the people are holed up in the defense station and panicking." Jaune tapped his fingers on his desk before pulling out his scroll, flicking through a few menus before placing an audio call to someone.
"Command, this is Captain Arc, VNS Arc." Jaune waited a few seconds as the slower radio wave made its way to the receiver in Vale city.
"We read you Arc, how can we help?" The officer on the receiving end sounded a little panicked before his voice evened out.
"Is Admiral Monza available? I've got a report he should hear." Jaune looked up to see Ruby's confused scowl. "Admiral Monza is in charge of receiving and distributing reports for council assigned missions so he can relay them to the council when needed. Standard military procedure is to send through a full written report, but the council needs to be informed of most things as quickly as possible." Ruby 'ah'ed in understanding before going quiet again.
"The admiral directed me to patch you through. Stand by." The pair waited for almost a minute before a new voice was heard. "Arc, this in Admiral Monza. I understand you have a report for me?"
"Aye sir. I've made contact with the ADS. The major in charge informed me they have multiple wall breaches. It is my guess that most of the population is holed up in the station. Before I could get anymore, we got two contacts, both kraken-class Grimm, moving toward the bay. We engaged, destroying both. The second was able to jam a propeller before we dispatched him. My crew are removing the obstruction now and will get underway again, likely within the hour."
The faint scratching of the admiral's note-taking was heard on the other end of the line. "Very well. Make sure your full report is sent through as it's written."
"Aye sir, I'll get it done before we get to the island. I have a feeling we won't have much time for reports when we get there." The call cut out before Jaune locked the screen and returning it to his breast pocket. "You should get back to your quarters. Let your team know what happened then try to get some sleep. We may need you as soon as we get to the island, which may be pretty late."
"Man kraeken guts are a bitch to clean." The first crewman griped.
"You're just not scrubbing hard enough. See?" The second crewman punctuated his point by scrubbing a section of the dried ooze. "And it's kraken, not kraeken."
"I'm just saving my strength for when we get to the island. And I don't think it's kraken anyways. Always heard it said kraeken." The second crewman stopped scrubbing to look at his partner.
"With the long a?" The first crewman grunted. "Nonononono. Kroken was how it was pronounced in the original Mistralan, and kraken is closer to that." The first crewman stopped his own scrubbing to look at the second.
"Well we aren't original Mistralan, now are we?"
"Traditionally, it is pronounced with the long a, but it was changed to be easier to pronounce in an engagement." Both crewmen froze, looking up to the railing where the captain leaned, smirking at the two junior enlisted men. "Carry on."
"A-Aye sir!" both crewmen shouted before vigorously scrubbing the bow.
Jaune walked farther aft to the helo-deck where the dive crew was pealing their gear off.
"What's the status of screw two, Chief?" The chief engineer set down the scuba tank he just pulled off a diver before turning to the captain.
"The blockage is cleared, but that sharp turn put some strain on it. I don't recommend more than 20 knots for the next day or two, make sure it doesn't crack."
"Understood. That should put us in Andyros by nightfall. We shouldn't need it for the week or so then. Will that be sufficient to make sure it will hold out?"
"Aye sir. When we're anchored, I can have a dive team double check it as well. Make sure we won't be limping home."
"Good."
AUTHOR'S NOTE: So in smoothing out the plot for this fic, I kinda came up with the premise for another one. Not like I have too many fic ideas already amiright? Seriously, I like the ideas I come up with, it's just hard to say 'okay, cool idea, I'll write it down and come back to it' I prefer to take that idea and write some stuff for it immediately after I come up with the idea (I already have a kinda outline for the newest idea and some basic dialogue... HELP ME!). So yeah, another fic that I'm going to ignore for months on end.
On that note, I am trying to figure out why I'm not able to write episodical series as well as I would like. You may have noticed that most of my chapters include some form of reference or humor. I've found that it's a lot easier to write comedy than anything else, so that's what I'm going to do. I will try to maintain VNS Arc some, as it is fairly popular, but I make no promises that I will update any faster. In the meantime, I will try to write some smaller shorts or one-shots that are primarily comedy based. I will try to find prompts to help me come up with stuff to write quicker, so I might have a short comedy bit out pretty soon. Again, I won't know how long it will be between fics, but I will do my best.
AP - Armor Piercing
HE - High Explosive
1MC - 1 Main Circuit, the primary PA system for a warship
UPDATE 6/19/16: Noticed a few screw-ups here too, so made a few quick tweaks. I could really do with getting my shit together.