October 10th, 2020 - Portsmouth- 15:02 Hrs - HMS Belfast
It was mid-afternoon by the time Belfast got back to Portsmouth, and as the car drew to a halt, Belfast slowly climbed out from the backseat, politely refusing any assistance from Gambia or Cavalier; ever since she accidentally summoned Duke of York she had been feeling surprisingly weak, and all she wanted to do was lie down and sleep, however, Admiral Clarke had ordered her to see Doctor Taylor for an examination, and as she had technically collapsed only a few hours ago, Belfast had chosen not to argue, however as Belfast entered Taylor's lab she found the doctor fussing over a pile of objects laid out on a table, holding an old Semi-acoustic guitar in her hands, a very familiar semi-acoustic guitar.
"Hey, that's mine! where the hell did you get" Belfast demanded, causing Taylor to jump as a result, fortunately though she didn't drop the instrument in question.
"Oh, Belfast, I wasn't expecting you so soon" Taylor replied as she placed the guitar back on the table before turning to face the cruiser, "So I heard about Duke of York and that you collapsed as a result, mind telling me what happened?" She asked picking up a pen and a notepad, no doubt to take notes.
"Only if you tell me how you have my stuff!" Belfast replied, moving to inspect the objects laid out on the table, which looked to be everything she'd kept with her during her time as a museum, her attention was however focused on looking for one old kit bag in particular, and noting that the knot holding it shut was still intact, she turned to face the doctor.
"Oh, well after you turned up Admiral Clarke sent some people to gather any evidence to explain what happened, and as well as Gambia, they found this lot" Taylor explained gesturing to the objects on the table, "I was just cataloguing your guitar when you arrived, you wouldn't happen to know what model it is?, I've got to list exactly what everything is" She added, pointing to a form listing most of what was laid out on the table, but as Belfast noted that the kit bag hadn't been marked down yet.
"As I recall, it's a Gibson ES-175, I only know that because the guy who owned the original guitar that one's based on, wouldn't shut up about it, which was ironic because he was shit at playing it" Belfast replied, picking up the form, getting a curious look from Taylor "I'll fill this out if you don't mind, it's my stuff after all so I know exactly what everything is" She explained as she folded the paper and stuffed into her pocket.
"Eh, no problem, less work on my hands, now I've been told you have been feeling weak after summoning Duke of York, is that right" Taylor replied, getting back on track, receiving a nod from Belfast in return, before she reached for a beaker of a dark black liquid and handed it to Belfast "Here drink this" She ordered Belfast, who whilst slightly concerned obeyed, only to immediately spit up the liquid the minute she realized what the liquid was.
"What the fuck! why'd you give me oil!?" Belfast demanded as she coughed up any of the oil left in her mouth, accepting the bottle of water handed to her by Taylor, so that she could rinse out her mouth.
"So that's a no to the oil then" Taylor muttered to herself as she made a note on the pad, before reaching for an intercom system that Belfast hadn't noticed before "can you send it in please?" she asked, causing Belfast to groan at whatever the good doctor had planned, only to be surprised and slightly confused when a sailor entered carrying a tray stacked high with plates and bowls packed full of food, "well? dig in already" Taylor explained to her as the sailor placed the tray down in front of Belfast, before leaving without saying a word, Belfast however simply sighed before picking up the cutlery on the tray and beginning to eat.
"I don't get what the point of this? I mean what's me eating food going to achieve?" Belfast asked in between mouths of food, Taylor however simply watched on a mixture of amusement and curiosity on her face; eventually, Belfast found that she could eat no more, and placed her cutlery down on the tray, she was about to say that this newest idea was as daft as the first, only for her to notice that she felt a lot better, like she had after she'd had a full resupply when she had still been just a warship.
"Better?" Taylor asked, receiving a nod from Belfast, confirming that she felt better, "Excellent! the only problem now is working out a way to support you girls with enough food to keep you operational" She noted, which surprised Belfast, why would they need to do that, there was more than enough food to go around, only for her to notice the now empty tray.
"Wait how did I do that? I thought I only ate one plate?" Belfast asked confused as to how she had consumed an entire trays worth of food, without even noticing.
"Eh, at this point anything is possible with you girls" Taylor answered, only for Minerva to burst in, looking concerned.
"Hey, Doc we might have a problem?" Minerva explained as Gambia and Duke of York followed her in, looking slightly sheepish "it turns out this pair can't summon their rigging for some reason" she continued, as Gambia and Yorkie milled around awkwardly.
"Hmm, well they were scrapped, so that could explain it, but fixing this issue is going to take time, from the chemical analysis I performed on the other sets of rigging, the structure is made up of oil, steel and a specially treated kind of bauxite, now the first two we can get easily, but the bauxite is going to take some time as we need it to be imported over and to be treated so that it is useful, and in a quantity that we can use" Taylor explained, causing the pair's shoulders to drop in disappointment, they had been hoping for a quick fix.
"Excuse me, ma'am, am I interrupting?" a lieutenant asked as she entered, her eyes glancing around the room before settling on Belfast, "It's just that Admiral Clarke needs to see Belfast immediately" she explained, leaving Belfast to wonder exactly what the admiral had planned for her.
October 10th, 2020 - Portsmouth- 15:25 Hrs - HMS Belfast
When Belfast arrived however, she found that along with Clarke, Captain Walker was also present, and by the shit-eating grin on his face, whatever she was about to be told clearly benefitted him, the question was however, how was this going to affect her?
"Ah, Belfast please take a seat, would you care for a drink?" Clarke offered, gesturing to a bottle of Rum on his desk, which Belfast nodded, signifying her acceptance of the offer, even she knew that you never turned down the offer of a drink by a superior, before taking a seat opposite Walker "Now I suppose you're wondering why I called you here" he continued, pouring a glass and handing it to Belfast, who having never drunk any alcohol before, but knowing what it was capable of, took a tentative sip of the dark gold liquid, gagging as the liquid made her mouth momentarily feel like it was on fire, only for the feeling to dissipate as quickly as it had taken hold, leaving only a pleasant aftertaste in her mouth.
"You're correct there Admiral" Belfast answered as she took a larger sip of the rum, Clarke however nodded before standing and walking over to a large wall map detailing the entire planet, the oceans and seas of which were shaded in a mixture of orange and red ink, with some streaks of yellow and a few tiny areas in green.
"This as you can see is a map of the world's oceans, now red is areas in which nobody can operate due to the threat of attack, now the most important areas of note are the Baltic, which is so packed full of enemy submarines and aircraft, that even our own subs daren't operate there due to the shallowness of the water and risk of attack, the Black Sea for the same reasons as the Baltic, and the area surrounding the Island of Midway, which intelligence believes is a major abyssal base; however, we haven't been able to get perfect information due to a massive storm that's been raging over the area since the bastards seized the place a few months back" Clarke explained, stopping to check that Belfast was following, which she was. "Anyway, the orange and yellow areas are ones where abyssal's are present, but that we can operate in, with the two signifying the level of abyssal presence there, with orange being high and yellow being low, areas in which the colours overlap are somewhere in the middle of the two. Finally, of course, you may have also noticed that there are a few speaks of green dotted around, these are some of the few areas that the abyssal's don't operate in, the largest being the area around Bikini Atoll, scientists think it's because of the background radiation, but since nobody has become desperate enough to use nuclear arms, its theoretical at this point!" he continued leaving Belfast with one question, why was she being told this.
"Um, Admiral, might I ask why you're telling me this?" Belfast asked, Clarke however, glanced at Walker before returning to Belfast.
"Well, it's because you and the other shipgirls are possibly the only chance that humanity has against the abyssal's, but we are going to need all hands on deck for that, and to do that we're going to need to summon as many combat capable shipgirls as possible as soon as possible" Clarke answered, giving Belfast a very good idea of what was planned for her.
"And to do that, we need to summon every WW2 vintage museum ship there is, and we have decided that you should have that honour!" Walker explained as he rose from his seat, "So pack your bags Belfast because your heading stateside!" he gleefully added, leaving Belfast wondering one thing, if she was going to be summoning the American's, what the hell was going to happen when she got to Texas?
Authors notes
So writer's block is still the bain of my existence, but I think I've got through it so that's good. Anyway feel free to comment and review as usual, and I'll try to get the next chapter up on time
