DAY 1, 0938 hours
Off the coast of Truk Island
No. 467 Harekaze, Kagerou-class destroyer, kanmusu
Abyssal carrier battle group assaulting forward base
Akeno woke up to the buzz of piston engines flying overhead, greeted by the sight of bursts of flame and streaks of light under a squall. Her school uniform provided little protection from the icy winds blowing from the north. A turbulent sea stretched beyond the ensuing battle from afar, forming a troublesome pair with rain-heavy clouds.
"Where…where am I?" Akeno looked around, only to see more water. Save for the distant battle, all seemed normal. She recalled being at sea, after all, but perhaps not this close to the water.
She looked at her hands, sporting some clunky gear, much to her surprise. "Huh? What is this?" she saw her feet, waist, and her back all carrying more of the said gear. "Why do I have these?"
The largest piece strapped on her back shouldn't be too hard to remove. But when Akeno attempted to do so, she found it to be too heavy, which only raised more questions. Why could she carry a huge rig when she couldn't lift it off her back? When that failed, she went for her pair of water skis on her shoes that kept her afloat.
A sudden, distant voice told her that it was a bad idea. "Hey! What do you think you're doing?"
Akeno turned to a green-haired girl also wearing some rigging, albeit a bit larger and different. "I, well…um, you see…"
"Taking off your rigging in the middle of the ocean?" the girl continued. "What are you thinking?"
"My…rigging?" a confused Akeno looked at her gear again.
"You'll drown if you don't have that when you're out at sea. Are you fresh out of Kanmusu School?"
"W-Wait, I…I don't understand. Why do I—?"
The ominous whistle of freefalling bombs interrupted the exchange. To the girls' relief, the bombs only made harmless columns of water, but the buzzing of jet black aircraft above freaked them out. The girl grabbed Akeno's hand and made a mad dash for safety. "Come on! We have to meet up with the others!"
Despite their best efforts to get away, the hostile aircraft caught up with ease. Diving down on their prey, the aircraft let loose with tracer fire, scoring some hits on both kanmusu before buzzing past them.
"This is bad," the girl watched the aircraft turn around for another run. "We can't outrun them. We'll have to fight them right here."
"Fight? H-How?" Akeno replied.
"With our guns! What else?"
"Our…guns?"
The girl showed hers, fitting just nicely on both sides of her rigging, and started filling the air with flak. As soon as Akeno looked at hers, a glaring similarity hit her. "This is…the Harekaze's old main gun?"
"Beats me," the girl continued firing away. "But if you don't start firing, we'll be history."
Following the girl's example, Akeno raised her main gun and fired away, as well. With more black aircraft joining the hunt, the girls filled the sky with their shells as fast as they could. Several aircraft took hits and went down flaming, but swarm tactics proved too much for two kanmusu to handle. Firing from a single spot only gave them an easier target to bomb.
The squadron became a swarm in a span of minutes, with ten more to replace one lost in anti-air fire. The columns of water splashed the girls ever closer, warning them of one lucky kanmusu that would get hit hard.
"Argh! There's no end to them!" said the girl with tattered clothes and damaged rigging.
Out of fear, Akeno threw accurate fire out the window. The constant shifting from one front to the next put a strain on her arms. Never the consummate athlete, she dropped her gun just after firing a desperate shot that missed an aircraft diving toward her. Two bombs under its wing loomed close to the killing blow.
The aircraft finally released one of its bombs, only for both to be strafed by gunfire out of the blue. The resulting fireball blinded the girls but managed to break up the vultures circling around them. Akeno caught a glimpse of white piston-engine aircraft buzzing past her, the fireball radiating their decals.
She had seen it firsthand: heavier-than-air flight. This world teemed with the knowledge of flying. Back in her world, telling this tale may as well dismiss her as insane.
Then, from a break in the clouds, more of the white aircraft descended with the sun on their backs. Barreling through the black hostiles, the white aircraft challenged them for air superiority.
"More of them?" Akeno said.
"Don't worry," the girl replied. "The white planes are on our side."
More of the girl's companions arrived, all carrying unique riggings. One of them even carried a bow and a quiver of arrows. "Yuubari-san, thank you for your support," said the girl with the bow.
"Akagi-senpai, are we glad to see you," replied Yuubari.
"We're pushing the enemy back from the main front. We're tasked with flanking them in a hammer-and-anvil maneuver."
"Leave it to the Admiral to think of crazy strategies."
"Can you still fight, Yuubari-san? You seem to be in bad shape."
"We took some cannon fire, but fortunately no bomb hits. We're still good to go."
Akeno watched in silence but soon had the spotlight. All eyes now trained on a kanmusu they've never met, let alone seen. "Let me introduce you," Yuubari started. "I'm the light cruiser Yuubari. Here are my fellow kanmusu: carrier Akagi, light cruisers Kitakami and Ooi—"
"That's torpedo cruisersto you," Ooi retorted.
"Fine, torpedo cruisers Kitakami and Ooi," a slightly annoyed Yuubari continued. "And destroyers Shimakaze and Kagerou."
"Um, it's a pleasure to meet you all," Akeno greeted. "I'm Akeno Misaki, captain of the Harekaze."
"Harekaze?" Out of respect for personal space, Yuubari took a closer look at Akeno's rigging. "Now that I got a closer look, your rigging looks similar to Kagerou's. Is she your sister?"
"Yuubari-san, don't be stupid," Kagerou answered. "I don't recall having a Harekaze as a sister ship."
"Yuubari-san, where did you find her?" Akagi asked.
"She was all alone around this area, trying to take off her rigging," Yuubari explained. "After meeting up, the Abyssals came out of nowhere and attacked us."
"Well, this is the worst time to be alone," Kitakami remarked. "Oh, who am I kidding? Any operation is the worst time to be alone."
And leave it to Ooi to complete the one-two punch line, complete with arm grabbing. "Fret not, Kitakami-san! I won't let you go on an operation alone!"
Again, from the sidelines, Akeno watched a whole new world unfold before her. She now wore the culture of the world of the kanmusu, where ships take form of people, yet sail and sink just the same. Further details, however, would have to take a backseat for now. More explosions just off the group of kanmusu caught their attention. More of the black jet aircraft came to avenge their fallen, this time with Abyssals of various forms rushing to meet them.
"We'll have to save the pleasantries for another time," said Akagi. "For now, prepare for battle!"
~O~
Akeno knew how to command a ship, but the world she was in right now required learning how to be a ship. Hanging back for most of the battle, as per Akagi's advice earlier, she watched the others make short work of the disorganized Abyssal forces. Their human bodies operated the weapons, down to firing the right type of shell, as well as the skis that allowed them to move with grace on the water. Indeed, this was no longer her world.
Hours of ruthless slugging later, the Abyssal attack faltered and died. From a large battle group that took the kanmusu by surprise, only a handful of destroyers and light cruisers escaped certain death. The carriers, the greatest threat to the kanmusu, had all been sent to the bottom where they belong. Cheering could be heard amidst the ranks of the battered kanmusu, happy to both have repelled the attack and survived to tell the tale.
A handful, however, didn't feel like celebrating. Among them was a distraught Mutsuki, who hurried to Akagi to ask: "Akagi-senpai, have you seen Fubuki-chan?"
"Wasn't Fubuki-san part of the main front?" Akagi replied. "She wasn't among our group."
"We were beside each other when we fought the Abyssals. I turned around for a second to engage a destroyer, and after that she was gone."
The few kanmusu who picked up the bleak news feared for the worst. Even Akeno felt the gravity of the situation, despite not knowing who Fubuki is. None were aware that she had been transported to another universe, not even the Harekaze kanmusu. For them, there was only one explanation for a missing kanmusu, one whose fate involved returning to the sea.
"She couldn't have…" Akagi's heart sank.
"Fubuki-chan…" Mutsuki followed.
The fate of a fellow kanmusu hit them hard enough for a shadowy figure underwater to get within range without being detected. Two streaks of bubbles flew from the figure, no doubt torpedoes on a collision course with a grieving Akagi.
Akeno picked them up with the Harekaze's sonar and sprang into action. "LOOK OUT!"
She got in between Akagi and the torpedoes. The shocked carrier and her planes have been saved, but at what cost? Akeno wouldn't be able to see her friends again.