Chapter Three:
...
HMS Resource had been operating with the Royal Australian Navy when the British Isles had come under attack. She was somewhat disgruntled at the fact that her home was now in the filthy claws of the enemy.
Being a repair ship in her previous incarnation, HMS Resource, with the necessary equipment, medicines and ship supplies, could administer extensive repairs on Kanmusu.
The battlecruiser the Australians had picked up was in no danger of dying. Stalingrad was on-board HMAS Sirius, a replenishment tanker, and couldn't sink. The battlecruiser would not suddenly explode since she had taken off her rigging, and the fuel or ammunition she might have had with it was already used up anyway.
This meant HMS Resource could take the time to look at sketches of the battlecruiser's design and schematics before putting the battlecruiser through reparative surgery.
The Stalingrad-class battlecruisers had been designed with very different priorities in mind. HMS Resource had been around other battlecruisers and struggled to identify anything in common.
The design of these battlecruisers had been a protracted process. Designed to be the first ambitious modern capital ships for the Soviet Union as they emerged from World War Two, the design decisions had a mix of wartime experience and new expectations adjusting to the new times.
The Soviets had put an emphasis on a battlecruiser whose primary purpose was to fight closer to the homeland and whose intended targets were other cruisers. It could dedicate less internal space to cargo storage. There were more internal machinery and systems that HMS Resource would have to fix.
With the Soviet Union having little experience of building large ships, there had been many arguments over what they wanted to achieve with these ships.
All these small changes and modifications had made the battlecruiser's design very complex and HMS Resource did not have any experience to fall back on. So HMS Resource had to bury herself in reading over all the technical data.
"You've got this," says HMS Resource to herself as she orders the patient to be prepared for surgery, "Just think of it as an up-scaled heavy cruiser."
…
"The Mediterranean is still friendly and Abyssal-free," reports HMS Renown.
"Good," says Hood, "What is the situation of the fleet?"
"We'll need to wait at Malta for the slower Kanmusu to catch up."
The Abyssals and the countries they controlled could still continue their attacks. Those who still resisted them were facing the Abyssals attacking them from the seas and skies and humans from everywhere.
Just being able to take over those governments and then direct their militaries to attack their neighbours shortly afterwards was devastating the countries that still had not caving into their own rebels and the Abyssals.
…
It had taken a few minutes before things went very wrong.
HMS Resource had been cleaning up the Kanmusu's superstructure and had inserted new ribs.
The sedated Kanmusu had violently rejected the improper repairs and HMS Resource was afraid that she may have messed up the injured ship girl even further.
"Oh no," HMS Resource drops the cardiothoracic surgery tools and quickly rushes over to look at the internal scans and then compares them to the plastic schematic sheets taped next to the screens that display how the battlecruiser should be.
"Are you joking me?" she glares at the sheet showing the armour arrangement, "Why do you need different thicknesses and materials for every single bulkhead?"
…
"We will now attempt to break through the enemy's encirclement of Hawaii," Commander Cooke continues his briefing, "The longer we stay, the more assets the enemy can use against us. I want us out of here by the time they complete their takeover of the United States and redirect more forces to here."
The assembled Kanmusu still seem sceptical of the plan, especially when the fears of a traitor in their midst still linger.
"And if they follow us to Australia," asks Iowa, "what do we do then?"
"We try to lose them in the confusion around Asia," If this plan to regroup actually worked without somehow screwing up, betraying them or attracting the attention of the Abyssals at all, Cooke would shave off the rest of his greying hair.
"Are we going to go loud or stealthy as we break out?" asks Arizona, "I don't imagine we can escape unnoticed when the enemy has Nimitz on their side as well."
"We'll split up our forces," says Cooke, "I'll release the details when you need to know."
Even if the enemy had learned of their plan to regroup or had heard of them trying to escape, they didn't have to make it easy for the enemy to get them.
"Get ready to leave at any time," Cooke wouldn't even tell them the time they were going to escape.
…
Kiyoshimo took the battlecruiser's threats very seriously.
Kiyoshimo had committed a grave crime by handling one of Stalingrad's prized possessions.
She had visited Stalingrad's room when everyone was giving up Stalingrad for dead. She had read the little inscription on the medal. Hibiki should have been around to read the faded Russian words, but Kiyoshimo searched the internet for what the medal was.
The medal was awarded to those who had participated in the battles in Stalingrad. It was nice for the battlecruiser to receive this particular commendation.
Kiyoshimo thought it was very fitting for the battlecruiser to have been named after Stalingrad. She had taken a beating and kept fighting to the very end.
Kiyoshimo had taken and kept the little medal. The battlecruiser wouldn't need the medal now that she was gone.
But then the captain had told everyone on-board that Stalingrad had survived. And Stalingrad had been approaching something very close to fury when she had heard Kiyoshimo might have ruined the medal.
So now Kiyoshimo is restoring the medal. She put on a pair of clean gloves and handles the medal with all the care it deserved. She cut the little stitching to remove the ribbon holding the medal and cautiously cleans the ribbon. She flattens the ribbon between two papers moistened with distilled water, and paperweights. She scrubs and rinses metal. She polishes and lacqueres the surface until it shines. Then she puts the medal back together.
The other Kanmusu watched the injured destroyer restore the medal and asked where she got it. Kiyoshimo is too concentrated on her task and only answers the questions enough to make the other leave. Only after the ribbon is crisp and the metal gleams, does Kiyoshimo stopp. Far from satisfied, she goes to find something appropriate to house the relic.
The passenger ship has a range of furniture that Kiyoshimo could use. She finds a mahogany table and asks the crew if she could commandeer it for her own purposes.
…
"The Russians really didn't spare any expenses," remarks HMS Resource as she tries to navigate and mend the battlecruiser's unique propulsion systems.
"This part of the leg goes… here… I think… Probably… Maybe… No it doesn't… At all…"
This was challenging for the repair ship girl. She hadn't even known all that many Russian Kanmusu or studied them in particular.
But the British repair ship girl was slowly managing to bring the battlecruiser back to shape.
It was fascinating just how unnecessarily complicated the Russians had made this battlecruiser. The arrangement of the inside was inefficient, but somehow sturdy. Although the battlecruiser had somewhat thin armour protection, the internal machinery could transition to backups should any be damaged.
Although the Soviets had kept their weapons tests secret at the time, HMS Resource had managed to find legitimate records after browsing around.
The bulkheads seemed very strange to HMS Resource. The bottom armoured bulges meant to protect against torpedoes was divided into four sections, two empty and two filled with oil. And some of the bulkheads were placed and shaped in incomprehensible ways.
The armour scheme for the Stalingrad-class was strange indeed.
On several weapons tests, Stalingrad had comfortably taken the then modern generation of missiles and shells. Stalingrad had taken seven anti-ship missiles on one occasion and had most of her compartments breached. But the damage didn't cripple or sink her.
It might work for Stalingrad.
But HMS Resource would have been tearing at her hair if it hadn't been under a surgeon cap.
She turns to look at the sheet concerning Stalingrad's armaments to see if there would be more sense there.
Apparently the Soviets didn't have to obey the laws of physics because Stalingrad's 12 inch/305mm main gun shells had an advertised range of 33 miles or 53 kilometres. A specially developed long-range shell could fly more than double that distance.
HMS Resource had wondered why Stalingrad hadn't showed up with any weapons when they had found her. Obviously these weapons had not been available. Or logical.
…
I woke up feeling really odd.
Took me a while to realise why it felt wrong.
I had received surgery and full repairs for the first time in both of my lives.
The Kanmusu that I recognised as Resource was sitting next to the bed I was in and was sifting through a stack of papers. She's wearing a doctor's coat now and not medical scrubs anymore.
She looks up.
"How are you feeling, Stalingrad?"
I consider that for a little while.
"It's not painful anymore."
Resource frowns at my wistful tone.
"You're a masochist, aren't you?"
"What does that mean?" People keep calling me that.
"A masochist is someone who really enjoys pain."
"… Why do you ask when you already know the answer?"
Resource looks really stern and shocked. She sets down the papers.
"That is not a healthy obsession at all."
People have always been concerned with my health. Was I still useful to others? Was I still useful enough to continue testing the latest firepower?
"I'm sorry."
Resource clears her throat (/harrumphs).
"Do you have a commanding officer I can speak to?"
I was going to be scrapped just after I was summoned. That means I don't have a commission or superior officer.
"I was discharged from the Russian military."
Resource stares at me.
"Then whose command did you refer to when you went into battle?"
"I told you I was with those other ship girls that fled from Japan."
"That's not what I'm asking."
"What are you asking then?"
Resource loses her patience and yells at me. It irritates me when people talk to me with an unfriendly tone.
"What kind of madness is this? You don't have any orders?"
Well. .. ...When I think about it, I'm a warship without a navy.
"I'm a pirate battlecruiser. You satisfied?" you slag.
"Well," now Resource seems more worked up about something else, "I suppose Britain will declare us all fugitives and criminals anyway."
…
"We still haven't been attacked," says Invincible, "at all."
"And none of the ship girls have started fighting each other," says Hood.
But the European nations were falling. They had to get past the Suez Canal or the enemy would find them in the Mediterranean.
"Heads up."
The heavy cruiser Seydlitz and a few German destroyers had gone ahead of the Kanmusu fleet.
"Turkey just surrendered to the Abyssals," says Seydlitz.
"Then we need to hurry up," says Hood.
…
Since I'm the only patient Resource needs to tend to, she continues to sit beside me and turned on the flat-screen television fixed to the wall.
Televisions have advanced beyond their bulky boxes on stilts that I remember.
We watch in full colour the events that are unfolding.
Well, the breaking news is that Turkey has allowed some Abyssal-loving crazies march into their government building.
"Hey, Resource."
"Yeah?"
"Is this what a hippie looks like?" Apparently I must have missed out seeing these gaudily clothed protesters in my last life.
"Close enough."
I know I shouldn't let my Soviet background skew my perception on the world but I still might reflect Russian bias from the time.
Being part of a navy that were the sworn enemies of capitalists made for a very big surprise when I was first summoned. Where are all the countries that we communists and socialist fought so damn hard for?
Since I died in the early part of 1962, I could not witness the politics that directly followed. I would have liked to have been there when the Cuban Missile Crisis happened.
It's been a chore to adjust to the new status quo and world now that I'm back. My Cold War memories and habits are all I have. The inter-network and my colleagues only gave me a glimpse of what has changed in this world.
Turkey. I feel like a terrible person, because the first thought I had was that it was good that there government was gone. I remembered that they were hosting American atomic weapons pointed at my homeland.
I need to change my ways or I'm going to lose my mind if I meet the American military. As I am right now, I'm likely to just gun them down where they stand. It's also likely that I might vent my thoughts at them.
That would be a catastrophic diplomatic failure.
'Arming moderate religious terrorists? There never has been or will be moderate terrorists in the Middle East.' Or 'You should have sent air conditioning. Those units are better than the military units you sent against the Taliban.' Or 'You should have thought more about funding ISIS if they were going to be such a problem.'
I was expecting to be scrapped, so no one bothered to bring me up to speed. Someone needs bring some serious indoctrination to beat the Soviet propaganda out of me.
No. I can't look act like an American hater in this day and age. That role is for others to take now. Russia is America's friend now. Russia is not Soviet Union now. Russia is filthy capitalist -
...
!
HMS Resource became alarmed when the Russian battlecruiser suddenly began slapping herself.
"Are you okay, Stalingrad?"
The Russian battlecruiser did not seem to be able to concentrate very hard on reality. Resource had thought that Stalingrad would not pay much attention to the television and wouldn't mind if Resource watched.
"I'm fine," the battlecruiser rubs her eyes, "I was just thinking that I haven't adjusted well to this life yet."
Stalingrad is just as strange as the people who had designed her. She can give you nonsense answers and really upset someone, and then be disconcertingly honest afterwards.
Being strange was normal for Kanmusu. It was inevitable Stalingrad would want to avoid talking too much too others, because in her previous life, her only interactions with any other warships was getting shot. And those weren't really nice interactions to remember when you don't remember much else.
"We all had to get used to our new lives."
When ship girls were summoned, they were usually disoriented from being alive again and human all of a sudden.
They had a lot to take in. The horrifying and ugly Abyssals were the impetus needed to gently ease the ship girls away from old grudges and traumatic memories.
At least Stalingrad wasn't really hostile or mean to anyone. HMS Resource remembered HMS Hood's summoning. Many Kanmusu and important people had gathered in the room where they did the summonings when they were bringing back a ship girl.
Summoning a ship back from the dead could be a gamble. The navy could only hope to receive a ship they would want, there was a minimum amount of resources that would allow a ship to fashion itself a human body. Summoning a destroyer generally took a different amount of resources than a battleship, for example. Sometimes the more modern ships needed different materials than the older ships.
They saw the supplies in the summoning circles vanishing and played the music any British ship should know, Heart of Oak.
Then a ship girl pulled herself out of the small pool in the middle of the room and the Kanmusu began cheering when they recognised HMS Hood. When the other people were told who it was, the applause became even more joyous.
The cheering had broken down in confusion as the ship girl screamed in rage. They all stared, except for the guy who accidentally spilt some champagne on the ship girl commission forms and was hurriedly mopping the fluid from the papers.
"HAVE AT YOU GERMANY!" Then Hood yanked the nearest ship girls she recognised and was ready to go to war with the Germans. She had adjusted to being alive and human now, and it took the battleships HMS Warspite and Nelson to hold back the excited battlecruiser.
Only after having a stiff drink, a welcoming handshake from the Prime Minister, several recordings of the Allied Victory in World War Two and the coronation of the current British monarch, did Hood begin to come to terms with the changing times.
HMS Resource watched the Russian battlecruiser, Stalingrad, looking increasingly more distressed as she pondered something.
"You need help with anything else, Stalingrad?"
"Yeah," Stalingrad smacks herself on the forehead and closes her eyes, "It's a problem I'm having with the Americans."
"Language problem?" asks Resource, "I know their English is hard to understand."
"I'm afraid that I will react horribly and make them hate me."
HMS Resource knows the relatively new and masochistic Kanmusu needs to absorb a lot of new things.
"You don't seem to have a problem with the rest of us."
"I don't really hate all the enemies Russia had back then," Stalingrad massages her temples, "Russia cannot afford to lose any more allies. But I just feel really hyper whenever I think of the United States."
"I know that Ameri-"
"RED ARMY BRINGS LIBERATION!"
HMS Resource falls out of her chair as the battlecruiser suddenly starts screaming Soviet warcries.
Stalingrad swipes the television remote off Resource's vacated chair and throws it at the new President of America announcing the new regime changes and curfews on the television.
The television smashes and sparks a little as it dies.
Resource risks raising her head a little as she cowers away from the Russian Kanmusu.
The battlecruiser breathes heavily and then comes back to her senses. Stalingrad wonders what happened to the television.
...
"We'll work on that, Stalingrad."