Karl knocked on the articulate wooden door leading into Bismarck's office, just about a week and a half after the accident. His right cheek had a very noticeable streak of stitches down to the jaw just to under his ear. It wasn't too deep, but he had to be careful when speaking lest he open it up again. He let out a bit of a sigh as he awaited Bismarck to answer, which she did.
The knob to the door turned and the door itself opened, revealing Bismarck who of course looked down upon the relatively short Karl. She gave a warm smile.
She was wearing decently more casual clothing in the form of a black pencil skirt that wrapped quite nicely around her thighs, stopping right above her knees. For her top it was a somewhat beige-white sweater which covered her up well, though it didn't actively inhibit the view of her body, with curves overall in her outfit still plenty visible. On top of all of this she had her light blond hair in a ponytail and she even had a pair of what Karl guessed were reading glasses on. It reminded him of something near a 40 year old good looking school teacher, and due to his very vast set of tastes, this wasn't a bad thing by any measure.
"Ah, Bismarck. I like your attire." Karl commented and Bismarck chuckled, thanking him for the compliment and allowing him inside.
It was a decent sized room, about 20 by 20 feet in dimensions. In front of the door was a grey rug with the Ironblood insignia stamped upon it in white, which lead to the other side of the room with Bismarck's large wooden desk and office chair. There was a typewriter, a phone, some pens and pencils, and plenty of stacks of paper galore. Behind that on the wall were two windows on either side of the desk which were covered with dark red curtains which gave a dull, reddish light during the day. It wasn't too noticeable but it was certainly there. Along with this there were various Ironblood decorations, and what caught Karl's eye was a shelf of medals on the wall to his right alongside a piano which obviously was not in use. The shelf had various insignias and awards, with eagles and swastika's galore. So it was good to know the National Socialist branding was not completely phased out.
There was also a door on the left wall beside an Ironblood flag and bookshelf. Nothing much, probably leading to her bedroom.
"This is my humble abode, Kommandant." Bismarck said, smiling and standing back into the room, leaning near her desk. Karl's eyes widened a bit in curiosity as he surveyed the room, piquing his interest.
"I see. Very nice place, well decorated. Patriotic." Karl wasn't too sure what to say, but was certainly impressed.
"Patriotic, yes. One way to put it. You should see Roon's room sometime, it is filled with Nationalist imagery all around."
"Is that so?" Karl asked, looking back to Bismarck from the shelf of medals he was eyeing.
"Yes, yes. She holds true the values of the Fuhrer to heart."
"Good."
Karl looked around for somewhere to sit, and Bismarck, realizing this, yelped in realization. "Oh! I forgot to get you a chair!" She said, smacking her head to embolden the fact she did an oopsie. "Let me go grab one real fast."
"Go ahead, please. I'd appreciate it." Karl earnestly said, sitting down in Bismarck's office chair. Damn, that was comfortable. Bismarck apologized and like a mother who had forgotten to go grab something from the store patiently rushed out. Karl chuckled, realizing this girl behind her hardened persona of the co-commander was quite the nice lady. Very enjoyable to be around so far in this type of informal setting, unlike the other times they had met up.
During those types of formal meetings, Bismarck was always sitting or standing with good posture, a poker face strewn upon her, though obviously a bit tired which was noticeable in her eyes. She spoke clearly and concisely which was a good thing, especially in a military setting, but he also looked forward to how she was in private. He had seen glimpses, especially in the morning where Bismarck might say 'Mornin', Kommandant' instead of 'Greetings, Kommandant', especially if he caught her before her coffee.
Would he mention the fact he may or may not have stolen the brown sugar to indulge himself with? No. No, he wouldn't.
Soon enough, Bismarck arrived once again with a similar office chair to her own. Karl got out of hers as she laid the new chair next to the one she used, putting a few feet of space between them. Karl walked around the desk to sit in the new one, laying back in it a bit.
"Hmph... comfy.." Karl commented and Bismarck nodded, grabbing a few books off of the bookshelf and carrying them over, plopping them down on the desk.
"They are pretty comfortable, truth be told." She said, sitting down in her seat. The books she had grabbed seem to be two history books and a personal journal. The history books were in a series and about one-hundred-fifty pages each about Ship Girl naval tactics by G.W. Mann. Her personal journal could be guessed to be filled with personal experiences of hers fighting the Sirens. Karl examined them.
"This is my old journal from a few years back. I think this is when we began to finally push back the Sirens, if I recall correctly..." Bismarck remarked, opening the journal and flipping through. Each page seemed to be filled with personal writings and drawings, with everything from little doodles to in-depth battle plans.
"So, what's first?" Karl asked.
Bismarck let out a 'hm' and stroked her chin for a second. "Well, lets go over a personal favorite..." She glided her finger across the width of the journal and stopped at a particular page, opening it up to said page and flipping once. It was a two-page diorama of a battle against the sirens, with various symbols and such standing in for individual units, arrows pointing for movements, lines dictating the evolution of battle, et cetera. It was quite complicated, and Karl was just barely able to grasp it.
"This was back in... Fifty-two? Yeah, I think so. This was off the coast of Spain back in 1952, we had encountered a sizable Siren fleet, and was one of the very few times we saw actual enemies to counter us."
"Enemies?" Karl gave a confused look of what she meant.
"Siren ship girls."
"Oh." The Siren's female fleet were something of a minor note in the history books he read. They were shrouded in some level of mystery and even secrecy, with not much being known about them. "What were they like?"
"Powerful." Bismarck stated plainly. "Very much so. We're not sure if they were created specifically to counter us and our forces, but there were very tough nuts to crack."
Bismarck pointed to a particular shaded bulge in the frontline, circling a symbol which led the strike. "This was one we've dubbed The Locust. Slippery little freak, she used far superior maneuverability to outflank us and hit out vulnerable sides. She delved a solid drive into our forces and defeated two U-Boats and an entire cruiser, before being countered by Hipper successfully. Though Hipper did take significant damage and had to stay behind the lines for quite some time after the fact to repair and rearm."
"Christ, and that was just one?"
"One of the weaker ones." Bismarck distinguished. "What we figured were their cruisers and battleships, we only met two, that being one of each. They were here - " Bismarck pointed to a smaller but wider bulge in the line " - And here, respectively" She did the same to a similar looking one.
"I see..." Karl's eyes narrowed a bit as he analyzed the paper.
"This battle right here was the one that I was involved in. It was me, Prinz Eugen, and Roon. Tirpitz was upwards towards the north and couldn't get there in time to support us, though she was able to deal with an attempted counter attack at our left. Anyhow, this single battleship was a damn pain in the ass to deal with. Though her armement wasn't the greatest damage wise, with my own salvo more powerful than hers, she could outrange me by almost 20 percent. From what I could tell, she had 2 main turrets with two guns each. They were quite large and had excellent muzzle velocities. At the cost of slightly less damage, she could basically bully us from afar. It took me and Prinz to tank some hits to help close the gap while Roon got as close as she could to go ballistic on her."
"Did it work?" Karl asked.
"Roon was covered in blood after the fact, and she had her arm in her hand. So, yes."
Bismarck gave him a simple look and Karl went wide eyed. "Oh, Christ."
"She doesn't believe in any value of mercy."
"I see." Karl scratched the back of his head and Bismarck continued on.
"The cruiser was the one who tried to flank us from the left. This is the one Tirpitz encountered, however alone. Apparently it was quite annoying to deal with, and damn near made Tirpitz call in for support. See, this cruiser was much like Prinz. At the cost of a 'meh' armement, she could tank many many shells from the Tirpitz and maneuver around her to dodge some as well. On top of the slightly superior accuracy of the guns, it forced Tirpitz to go on an odd criss-cross of defense and offense, having to switch between the two in a circular fashion."
"I see..." Karl nodded. "So, the Sirens normally use some sort of... confusing, asymmetric warfare to put their enemies off balance, then to strike during then."
"Just about, yes, and it's very effective. Plus the support from weaker, normal ships, which is always a real pain. However, they are prone to using the same strategies to confuse us, and we've begun to catch on. With the introduction of us - the Ship girl - the Sirens had continued to try the same old things, which is one of the reasons our counter attacks were successful. There's always exploitable order in chaos."
And thus, Bismarck went on and on to Karl, explaining to him her many exploits with the other ship girls under previous commanders, teaching him the ways of the schiffmachen. She told of times where she had to fend off two counter attacks at once, times where she had to form sudden defensive lines when things got sour, times where she herself was the one flanking around the enemy, times where she had to face Sirens head-on through narrow corridors and waterways.
This all interested Karl greatly, he honestly couldn't get enough of Bismarck's voice and explanations. The way her words slickly rolled off of her tongue, the way she described things slowly and intricately, but not in a boring or tiring way. Ah, it was just perfect for the crazy old Kommandant. He'd intentionally ask questions he knew the answer to, just to hear how Bismarck would describe them or her viewpoint on them.
Soon enough it was 5 PM. They had been talking for a solid 2 and a half hours at that point, now with several books and journals strewn about. Karl was resting back in his seat, head tilted and arms crossed as Bismarck was explaining peace treaties. There was a few beer cans strewn about as well, with Karl getting a good drink and Bismarck putting some in her coffee.
"Something very important Karl -" She had long dropped the 'Kommandant' after getting pretty comfortable with talking with him " - Is the fact that ship girls can't be used in normal combat."
"I know that." Karl said, crossing his legs. "The 1949 London Conference. Laid out that ship girls cannot and will not be used in non-siren related combat."
"Yes, well. Do you know why, exactly?" Bismarck asked.
"Either they physically can't be used to attack humans, or its some sort of agreement set to keep diplomatics not too tenuous."
"Well, the ladder is correct, and part of the answer. See, Karl, the last thing the Azur Lane coalition needed was another arms race, and the creation of the Ship-Girl was a massive sudden step forward. That conference also put restrictions on ship numbers, placements, tonnage, ammo types, among other things. This was done in part to keep most nations somewhat equal, but also for another pretty major reason."
"That being...?" Karl looked at her with intrigue.
"The fact that the use of ship-girls in normal combat... well... there wouldn't be any competition. We have the same resilience to damage and damage potential as that of our ships, so for me a battleship. I can tank pretty much anything thrown at me by conventional means, especially stuff in the hands of the average soldier. Bullets, rockets, even tank ammunition. That, and the fact that my riggings would practically be a weapon of mass destruction on the battlefield. Imagine a nimble and extremely fast soldier gliding across the lines, firing salvos of shells equivalent to the power of a 15cm man gun, at decently high rates of speed, and able to take anything you throw at it. It'd accelerate the arms race already between many of the countries in the coalition ten-fold. The Soviet-German Air Race would be nothing in comparison."
"..." Karl was taken aback. He knew the ship girls were powerful, but not the literal female manifestation of warships, with the same power they hold - and then some. He now genuinely began to fear the idea of a land-based ship girl warfare. What if one of our own decided to attack him? He would have no way at all to counter it if he was caught alone.
"Thats... Thats..."
"Crazy, huh?" Bismarck smiled a light smile, looking into Karl's eyes with her own crystal blue irises.
"Thats a scary thought..."
"Well, no need to worry. The only thing fending off other countries from using them is the enemy also having them. Mutually assured destruction in a way."
Karl let out a sigh and reached over and grabbed his beer, taking a sip. "If I was given that kind of order... christ. It'd be like dropping a bomb on an orphanage, huh?"
Bismarck shrugged and shook her head. "You won't get it anytime soon, I can assure you. The upper levels of the Kriegsmarine somewhat fear the British Navy's girls. I've seen them in action - they know what the hell they're doing. And if we attack them with our women, they'd most certainly counter in-kind."
"...Moreso, imagine how'd the girls feel." Karl mentioned.
"What do you mean?" Bismarck quizzed.
"Like. Erm. For example, I don't think Hipper would be able to handle that. She's combat effective and damn tough but I doubt she'd have the stomach to practically mow down soldiers. Sirens are this, like, faceless enemy. But people are people."
"Good point." Bismarck sipped from her coffee. "But you also have people like, say, Friedrich Der Grosse, or Deustchland, or Roon. They'd be willing to. Hell, Roon'll take pleasure from it."
"Roon creeps me the hell out." Karl thought back to that time she cut off a piece of his hair. Weird.
"Same here. Something about that vacant look in her eyes puts me off. Like she's listening to every word you say, but she's constantly thinking of something else." Bismarck stirred her coffee with her pinkie finger a bit, setting her feet on the desk, getting more and more casual.
"Exactly that!" Karl put his feet down and sat more forward. "There's always something beyond the words she speaks, I swear."
"Something malicious, that's for sure." Bismarck took another sip from her coffee and decided to change the topic. "So, you've met Akagi I heard?"
"Oh, her? Yeah, what about her?"
"What'd you think?"
"Think...? Hm." Karl took a few seconds to, well, think about it. "She's very alluring. Talks very fluidly, uses a lot of euphemisms and such. Every sentence out of her has some sort of meaning to it. I like it, honestly. I didn't talk to her for too long, but it was an enjoyable conversation."
"Oh? How'd you meet?"
Karl gave a 'meh'. "On the flight deck. Caught her stargazing or something, wanted to thank her. Ended up finding myself kind of staring off into the sea while she did so about 20 minutes later."
Bismarck chuckled. "That's something she can do, yeah. Get you distracted."
"Oh?" Karl's head tilted.
"It's a combat tactic of hers to distract the enemy or use confusing tactics."
"Christ, is she trying to kill me or something?"
Bismarck shook her head no. "No, no. Probably just Akagi being herself. I've talked to her before on meetings and she doesn't even intentionally do it. She's just naturally.. What's the word for it..."
"...manipulative?"
"Yeah, manipulative."
"Doesn't she have a sister?" Karl remembered Akagi mentioning a sister ship.
"I believe so. The Kaga, if I recall correctly. A lot of the Japanese Navy is some sort of family, like the Yamato sisters for example. Being Yamato, Musashi, and the Shinano."
"Ah, I met Yamato when I went down to Japan. Very tired looking, kind of a clutz, reminded me of you."
"'Clutz' - ? Karl, I am not a clutz."
"You forgot my chair."
Bismarck took fake offense to this, dramatically placing a hand on her heart and gasping. "Hmph! Yea - I did... So what?"
Karl and Bismarck kinda stared at one another, before they both began to honestly chuckle, chuckling that turning into laughter. Bismarck laughed at Karl's surprised looking face, not realizing at first she was being dramatic. And Karl laughed when he realized she was just kidding around, his worries exiting his body with the sounds of amusement. Eventually, it died down.
"Hah, heh... haa..." Karl took a deep breath while Bismarck went to her coffee. "Huff... wait... don't you have paperwork to do, Bismarck?"
Bismarck's eyes went a bit wide as she drank from her coffee cup. Despite internally panicking, She patiently set the glass down and looked at Karl with a straight face. "I do. And you offered to help before, so -" She pointed at him. " - You're helping with it. Payment for my teaching services."
"Uh - sounds good to me." Karl shrugged as Bismarck reached into a filing cabinet and took out some papers. A solid stack of at least eighty different papers, if not more. Large ones too, with plenty of text. She straightened them out on the desk and split it in half.
"Should I sign these as myself?" Karl asked as he took them and grabbed a pen. Bismarck nodded.
"Both of our signatures will work."
In front of Karl was forty pages of disciplinary records, fund relocation requisitions, various things like complaints to recommendations to just mail from the girls, among other things. Karl sighed and realized he'd have to do this on top of his own - but probably was nothing to Bismarck. So, he bit his tongue from complaining and got to work.
And of course, Bismarck and Karl engaged in plenty of small talk whilst they did so. Mainly Bismarck gossipping to Karl about the stupid things the girls got up to. Things like Hipper's crossdressing to U-47's hatred for board games.
"...And, there's that." Karl said, sliding the last paper over to his side. The clicking of a typewriter next to him suddenly stopped and the 'clachink' of the paper being removed soon followed. Bismarck had finished up a little report she had to write and added it to her stack of papers, hitting said papers against the table to straighten them.
"So, you're done?" Bismarck reached over to take his stack and Karl nodded, sliding them over so she didn't have to reach far. Her fingers slid under the stack and she picked it up to add to hers. She did her same straightening routine and sighed in relief.
"Thanks, Karl. What time is it?"
Karl looked up to a clock above the doorway. "Christ alive. 10 PM. How long have we been at this?"
The two hadn't done just the eighty papers that were originally there. Something more like one hundred fifty to two hundred they had done. A good bit of them was Karl's hospital records and the report from the attack that had taken some time to compile and get ready. The pilot Rudolf's personal medical ailments from the attack were also in there, plus the crash report on the He-111, plus the report from the Japanese navy, plus the - you get the point. There was always a fine print for them to read, or some other section for them to find, or some other corner of the page they had to sign. It was tedious work, and Bismarck had to do this every day for potentially hours.
"So, five hours we've been at this." Bismarck chuckled. "Would have been all night without you. At least I can get some sleep. Seriously, thank you."
Karl turned over to her as Bismarck stood to go put the papers away. "Hey, don't mention it. As the commander, this is also my thing. I don't plan on placing all the small, annoying work on you."
Bismarck put the papers atop a filing cabinet for Z-23 to later collect. She then turned over to Karl. "Well, I can't say I don't appreciate the help. Seeing as I actually have some time to kill until I head off to sleep, I'm gonna clean up."
"Ah, gotcha." Karl's mind went places for just a second as he got up and moved towards the door as Bismarck opened into her bedroom. She looked back to Karl before he left.
"Hey, if you ever want to help out again, just stop by. Be sure to knock, of course."
Karl shrugged. "Hey, I probably will. I enjoyed this, so."
Bismarck's cheeks reddened just ever so slightly and she smiled. "Glad to know. I'll see you later, Karl."
"You as well." Karl nodded and exited, closing the door behind him. He stepped into the hallway and turned towards the left, heading down towards his room, which was just down the hall and to the right.
It was dark in the hallway, as 'lights out' normally came around 9 PM. This was done to reduce light signature to avoid Siren attacks, but also to generally keep some order, and a curfew is a good way to do that. There was enough ambient light however to see well enough in the hallway, mainly due to the amount of windows. Of course, when he looked out the window, he could see the main dormitories of the girls and light coming from a considerable amount of rooms., but didn't think much of it.
He came to a turn and went right of course, heading to the closest door which went into his room. Karl walked over and took out a set of keys. He always locked his door, a habit he had grown during his time on the Bismarck. He put his key in and turned the lock, then turned the knob.
Click. Nothing. The door was still locked. Confused, he looked down, noticing the fact that he had just locked the door instead. Meaning he put the key into an unlocked door. Of course, this was odd, as Karl was pretty damn sure he locked his door. He turned the key back and unlocked the door, turning the knob again and this time unlocking the door, opening it. Karl reached over to the side of the door and flicked a light switch on.
Again, nothing. Karl sighed as his worries temporarily washed away and he closed the door behind him. He probably did just forget to lock the door. He walked up to his office desk and took off his blue officer's jacket and threw it onto it, uncaring of wrinkling it or anything of the sort. Karl went over to his bedroom door which was in his office and opened it. This door was normally unlocked, so it wasn't an issue that it opened up and let him inside without any protest.
Inside was a pretty simple bedroom. There was a sizable bed, about queen's sized, which was neatly made and tidy. There was a dresser across from it with a radio on top, and to the left of the bed was a nightstand and lamp as well as the book he was currently reading. To the right into the wall was his closet, which was closed behind a white sliding door.
Not caring enough to take his pants off or to really change, he laid onto the bed without even moving the covers. He wasn't exhausted or anything, but just wanted to rest his eyes for a second. Karl was always quite the sleeper, and never a fan of staying up past 10 or so. Of course, that was a regular for pretty much his whole adult life, but he never got over it.
He rested his wrist on his forehead and let out a sigh, head moving back into the pillow he let it down on. And thus, he silently dozed off.