From the Abyss of the Heart
Disclaimer I do not own MCU or KanColle
This chapter is dedicated to my fellow City Employees and the 12 friends we lost Friday 5/31/19. I may not have known them personally, but I am fairly certain that I probably met some them at various occasions. Whether it was at the annual/bi-annual Health and Safety Fair, at one of the many multi-department training classes, or just in passing. Today I am reminded that even though there are many departments within our organization, we are all a part of the same City. We will not allow this tragedy to define us. We are One City, One Community, One Family. #LoveForVB #VBstrong
Chapter 3: Rebirth, and an Encounter.
Location: Graveyard of the Atlantic.
Laura POV
For the first time in what felt like an eternity the pain and the orange void were finally gone. But I wasn't so certain that this alternative was much better. After all the bottom of the sea is a vast dark place where not even light reached, and the pressure could turn person into a pancake instantly. But I wasn't a pancake, as the pressure didn't bother me, and even though there wasn't any light down, it might as well been midday on a sunny afternoon with as clearly as I could see.
Felt something shift on my right wrist and that is when I noticed the shackles, and the ghostly chains attached to them. Chains that somehow actually seemed to gain and loose links as I moved. Following them with my eyes, I found myself stunned to see a massive hand on the other end. 'What on earth?' I thought to myself as I turned around to see the rest of the being I was attached to.
It was a massive beast, at least four times the size and mass of the Hulk and that was being conservative. The fact that it had two heads with a red glow coming from it's mouths wasn't even the strangest thing about it. No, that particular honor went to the four battleship turrets mounted on it's shoulders. They were massive things, with a pair of three barreled turrets in the back and a pair of double barreled turrets in the front, they gave me a feeling of invincibility.
Wait, what? I blinked for moment before a realization struck me. This thing, this bastion of power I was attached to, it was me! Ah, that word, Bastion, it felt appropriate for some reason. A small smile came to my face. Yes, I would name this extension of me Bastion. 'Fitting for a ship such as myself. After all I am BB-71 USS Louisiana.' I thought to myself with a sense of pride.
My eyes widened as I processed the significance of that statement. I was a ship! Bastion, though he was an extension of my being, was actually all my strength manifested into a separate entity! But at the end of the day, both of us were a single being. A single ship that was never actually built. The Montana Class Battleship USS Louisiana!
Wondering what exactly the rest of me looked like, I studied the rest of my new form, both with my normal eyes and Bastion's vision. Using Bastion's eyes I studied my face and noticed that while yes, it was MY face still there were major differences. Such as the single horn that now jutted out above my left eyebrow parting my now black and thigh length hair. My eyes were a now a glowing crimson red which contrasted greatly with my now pale blue skin, which was almost the color of a corpse. My new skin color was made even more obvious by the long black dress I was wearing, which had red frills on the inside. This was made even more obvious by thigh high leggings and black boots I was wearing.
Satisfied with myself inspection, I surveyed my surroundings. Not that there was much difference between one patch of mud and the next. 'Ugh, what a barren and desolate place the ocean floor is, yet here I am.' My gaze locked on to a small figure about a hundred yards from me, and I had to correct myself. 'Here we are', I thought to myself as I noticed the smaller form of my Son-turned-daughter, who was starting to stir.
I moved over to the young woman and took stock of my daughter's new form. She was a short thing about five foot two, with shoulder length white hair, pale skin, and a slightly developed figure. But the white hair was comparatively normal to the fact that she had hooves for feet and a massive tail coming out of the overcoat/dress she was wearing. I studied my neo-daughter's, ahem, risque outfit for a moment.
It consisted of a dark, almost black over coat/dress/hoodie that was unzipped down to her hips. Covering her small breast was a black bikini held together with a ring in the center.
The tail itself was a work of eldritch art. It was a thick gray mass for most of it's length with a airstrip running it's length. On it's tip there was a second head that was shaped like a aircraft carrier's bow, only this bow had a mouth full of teeth splitting it, and three battleship turrets on it's top and sides.
"Wake up sweetie. Come on Cooper it's time to get up." I said to her as I lightly shook her. She groaned a bit and single pale gray eye glanced at me before closing again.
"It's too early, I want to sleep a little bit longer." She mumbled before curling up a little tighter.
'Ah, the joys of being a teenager.' I thought to myself with a wry smile, before devious thought entered my mind. "That's okay sweetie. So I guess you want your new name to be Aurora?" I asked, jokingly refering to Sleeping Beauty.
"Don't You Dare!" Cooper growled out, as she finally started to get up, shaking the sand(mud) off of her as she did so. "Don't you dare name me after Sleeping Beauty! Lila would never let me live it down."
I giggled a bit before noticing Cooper looking at me in wide-eyed shock. Knowing she was probably staring at Bastion, I gave her a soft smile. "No need to worry sweetie. He's completely harmless. Besides you have something similar attached to you."
My new daughter's eyes grew wide. "WHAT!?" She spun around and came face-to-face with her tail. "Oh, god I have a tail! And it has teeth and guns and planes?" Her eyes widened as stunned look crossed her face. "I have planes?" A toothy grin crept across her face. "I have planes!"
Despite the antics of my daughter, I found myself frowning. "Cooper?" I asked. "What kind of ship are you? I Know that I am a Montana Class, however you appear to be something else."
With a cheeky grin, Cooper popped into a salute."BBCV 65 USS KENTUCKY reporting for duty mom!"
'How about that?' I thought to myself with a smile as a feeling of pride went through me. 'My eldest is a battle carrier and my other daughter is a battleship.'
At that moment another, more frustrating thought came to me. And it involved Cooper forcing my hand. Not that I had much of a hand at the time. I scowled, at best I had nothing but jokers in my hand and that damn Entity held a Royal Flush. I cleared my mind of such thoughts just in time to see Cooper panic as a torpedo went sailing by.
'What the hell?' I thought as both Cooper and myself searched for the torpedo's origin. An eerie giggle came from the shadows. "Teh heh! Did I miss? I promise to do better with my next shot!" A girl's giggling voice said from the shadow. With that 'promise' another torpedo came howling out of the dark, barely missing Cooper, who had to crash dive to avoid being hit.
As my daughter stood up I heard the sound of metal clanking together and noticed that she was trembling nervously. "Mom? I'm really not liking this. We need to get out of here!" She said to me, the fear obvious in her voice.
The sight of my daughter shaking in fear, filled me with resolve, and any fear I had started to feel was pushed out of my mind. No one was going to ever threaten my loved ones or myself ever again and live to tell the tale. I glanced back into the darkness in time to make out a single shadowy figure launch another spread of torpedoes. Fortunately, the girl seemed to be a very bad shot, as yet again the torpedoes sailed past without either Cooper or myself having to evade them.
"What!? Why do you keep moving? Just stay still!" The girl's voice yelled out in frustration.
My eyes widened as did Cooper's as we looked at each other in surprise. "She thinks we're moving?" Cooper asked in a hushed whisper as to not alert the other girl, her tremors having lessened to an extent. "What? Is she blind?"
Suddenly, it clicked, and I nodded. "Sweetie, I believe that is exactly what is going on here."
Cooper's jaw dropped before closing and turning into a smirk. Her fear now gone, we scanned our attacker. I spotted the girl first as she dove behind a rocky out crop. As I prepared to have Bastion physically deal with the brat, Cooper stopped me as she moved her tail to where I could see it. She then revealed a single torpedo ready to launch from her tail's jaw. Seeing where she was going with this, I sighed, before giving her the okay. "Just make sure she doesn't suffer much."
My daughter looked at me with a determined look in her eyes. "Wasn't planning to." She said as she lined up a shot on the shadowy figure, and fired.
If there was one quality that all my children seemed to have inherited from their father, it would have to be his deadly accuracy. I say this because unlike our attacker, Cooper's fish swam straight and true, striking it's target in the chest. There was a loud scream of pain and horror followed by large blast of fire and air as the other woman simultaneously exploded and imploded. Her shattered form temporally revealing the wreckage of an old submarine. On her conning tower markings revealing her to be the wreck of the U-85. As the sub began to settle on the bottom, she started to the slowly fade out of view, only to reappear at litte ways off. But instead of looking as though she had been torpedoed, her wreck showed signs of having been in a fierce gun battle.
I felt a pit form in my stomach, if that wreck was the submarine that had attacked us just now, did that make it an Abyssal too? If so, why did she attack us? Not wanting to upset Cooper, seeing as she had made the kill, I didn't dare say my thoughts aloud. Unfortunately, I didn't need to as Cooper was clearly thinking along the same lines as myself, for she gave me a horrified look, "Wa-was that another Abyssal? Di-did I send-d someon-ne b-back to that H-hell?"She asked me, as she shook with sadness, with tears of oil running down her face.
I wrapped my daughter in an tight embrace, kissing the top of her head. "Sweetie." I started, as I looked her in the eye. "Even if that was someone like us, you did the right thing."
A look of shock and disbelief crossed her face. "But I killed someone mom! I fired my torpedo without a second thought as to what might happen to her, and Sank her!" She wept.
Pulling her in tight as I could, I held her close. Sadness filled me as I realized that I had let my child become a killer. But at the same time I was proud of her for stepping up to the task of defending us from an attacker that, other than having Bastion beat the sub with it's bare hands, I had no counter to. And I told her as much "Cooper, it isn't your fault that you had to sink that poor soul. She attacked us first, you simply did what was needed for us to survive. And for that I am very proud of you."
She looked at me wide eyed, as she wiped the tears from her face with her arm. "Really? Your proud of me?"
I smiled at her. "Sweetie, if I had a way to fight her off, I would of sank her myself. But I don't have any countermeasures except to try and evade her shots or to have Bastion crush her with his bare hands. You, on the other hand did have a way to fight back. The fact that you were willing to do so makes me so very proud."
Her oily tears now dried she looked at me with puffy eyes. "Thanks mom." She said with a sniffle.
"Oh sweetie, there's no need to thank me. I'm your mother I'm allowed to be proud of my daughters." I said released her from the hug."Now how about we get going before someone else decides to shoot at us hmmm?"
Cooper nodded in agreement "Yeah, I'd rather not sink anyone else today if I can help it."
"Just one more thing to do before we go." I said smiled at her before reaching over and zipping up her dress. "There all set! No need to have your father go off about how his son-turned-daughter is under dressed when we get to shore." I said with a giggle
"M-Mom! Not funny" The white haired girl's face turned tomato red, and I laughed a bit at the sight.
Focusing my thoughts on Clint and Lila, I felt a pull in my heart. A course was plotted out on some mental chart table in my head, as I looked at my daughter. "Ready to go home?" I asked her.
She looked at me for a moment, before looking at U-85 with a sad look on her face. "Just about. I just want to do one last thing before we go." She said as she made her way over to the sub.
Placing her hand on the sub's shattered pressure hull she apologized to she poor soul she sank, before saying a small prayer for the sub. With that last sign of respect to her fallen foe, she kicked off the bottom and came back to my side. "I'm ready now."
Ruffling her hair with a smile, I said to her. "That was a kind thing that you just did. Now let's go home."
She nodded in agreement. "Yeah. Going home sounds nice."
And with a kick of our feet, our screws bit in to the cold Atlantic water. As we ascended I couldn't help but wonder what the future held in store.
AN: Okay a little history about the abyssal that attacked them. The U-85 has the distinction of being the first casualty of Operation Drumbeat, Germany's U-boat offensive off the eastern seaboard of the United States in 1942. She was sunk by artillery fire from the destroyer USS Roper (DD-147). Thus what attacked Laura and Cooper was a TRUE abyssal of the Ka-class, one of those 'Grudge' looking abyssal submarines. And just so you know U-85 will not be the last TRUE Abyssal to appear before this story ends. But she will probably be the last one during the Endgame Arc. I'm still on the fence about that.
Well that about wraps it up for now. So like Mike Arlo likes to say "Bicycle! Make it a great day!"
