With Georgia:

I had stayed with Hakone until her breathing had evened out, then gently tried to disentangle myself from her grip. I was able to do so after gently tickling her nose, making her swipe at her face, still asleep, and I took the opportunity to get up.

Then I tripped, Hakone's hand having latched on to my ankle, and flopped next to Anne, who, seeming to sense something within cuddling-range, wrapped her arms around me as well. Now trapped within the grasp of two different ships that I didn't want to wake up, I basically gave in, and settled down to wait.

...

It was morning, and oh my god I had SUCH a kink in my back! I'd been caught in that awkward position forhours.

Hakone had been confused when I'd finally decided to wake her, staring at my foot for a good twenty seconds before letting go. And Anne?

Well, apparently she was a heavy sleeper.

"Georgia...Are you alright?" Chitose said, eyeing my position with an eyebrow raised.

"Help. Me." I deadpanned, squeezed as I was against Anne's chest.

Chitose stretched languidly, giving a small yawn as she rocked herself out of the bed she had shared with Lao, the little Frigate beginning to blearily stir herself as Chitose came over. "Were you like that all night?" She asked.

"Yes, now, once again. Help... Me." I said.

Chitose tapped her chin, "hmmmmm..." She hummed coyly.

"You know I'll get you back for it if you don't."

"Oh alright," I sighed in relief, "After I do my hair."

I sighed in frustration.

...

It took ten minutes to wake up Anne, who, rather confused by my presence smooshed between her breasts, promptly let me go. I jumped up.

"Freedom!-ACK!" I doubled over, the kink in my back reminding me of its presence.

I looked over at the abashed ship, "That's it! Next store we go to? I'm getting you lot teddy bears to save my freaking back!"

"They sell bears in stores?" Hakone asked.

".̸.̴.̴W̸h̶a̶t̵'̸s̸ ̵a̴ ̷b̵e̵a̸r̵?" Said Anne.

"...So anyway!" I turned to Lao, who was busily rolling her pantihose back on, "Where to now bosserino?"

The Frigate replied to me as she attached one of her thigh-mounted armor plates with a satisfying 'Click', "The docks, the escort ships the Cambodians have are meeting us there, they'll stay with us for as long as we're on the Mekong, and turn back once we go into the tributaries."

Chitose fiddled with her blouse, tying that complicated knot-thing that kept everything in place. "So are we going alone?"

Lao nodded, "the military that came with us are going to have their hands full as it is taking care of the civilian refugees, that, and the more people we bring, the slower we'll go. Better to just bring the six of us."

I nodded, going over to a patiently waiting scooter as I readjusted my eyepatch, "Well, let's get a move on then!"

With Hakone:

We made it to the docks just as the sun was finally breaking free of the horizon, there were a bunch of men in uniforms waiting, some in the tan and brown camo of the Cambodian navy, while most wore the greens of the Vietnamese forces that had followed us upriver. Lao was speaking with a group of them, oh! There was Giang and Duc's dad!

I waved, he seemed to notice, but rather than coming over himself, he gestured towards me as he looked over-

"Hey! Hakone!" Giang said, scurrying out from behind a few men, where I hadn't been able to see him.

"Hey, Giang! What are you doing here?" I said, Lao said the humans would be staying behind, right? "You're not coming with us are you?"

The boy rapidly shook his head, "No way in hell! Barely lived through last time!" He got closer, "Dad is stay with the lieutenant, we are stay with him until we moved."

I nodded, "Probably for the best, humans are soft and squishy and break too easily, and I wouldn't want you to sink trying to come with us."

Giang gave me an odd look as he came to a stop in front of me, "...Yeah, sure," He shook himself, "Right! Yeah, Chitose interrupted when we were making, but me an Duc finished, dad helped too." He held out the package to me, wrapped in brown paper.

I took the package as I looked at him blankly for a moment, before I remembered with a start, "Right! Back when Chitose said you tried to have the sex with me!"

"What."

I nodded, "I didn't believe her either, but Chitose told me that boys that want to make a ship with you are wanting the sex. I don't get it either, you don't even have a crew to give me!"

Giang just looked at me, "What." He repeated.

I just shrugged as I looked over the package, "You don't have any sailors to give to me, so you cant crew any ship I make."

Someone in the background started laughing as I unwrapped the package, It was...

It was me!

"Wow!" I looked over at Giang, who was starting to look a little red, "This is great! It looks just like me!"

Giang squinted through his blush, looking at the model and then back at me, "...it does?"

"Yeah!" I put the model up next to my face, "Can't you see the resemblance?! We even have the same placed stacks!"

"You have stacks?" Giang said, "Stacks of what?" His eyes flickered down for some reason.

"Smokestacks dummy! I..." I stopped, before smacking myself in the forehead, model firmly secured with my other arm, "Ooooh, right. I think I remember you can only see the girl part of me, right?"

Giang nodded.

I flushed a bit in embarrassment, "Well, this looks a lot like my other half, I guess you'll just have to take my word for it."

He kicked at the ground a little, "I guess."

There was an awkward lull in the conversation, and I could hear Chitose speaking to one of the Cambodians in the background, "Thanks a lot for that, you and Duc and your dad, I mean."

"No, thank you."

I gave him a questioning look.

He seemed to understand as he explained, "I was dodging Abyssal aircraft and eating out of bombed-out stores when we met, you got me and my brother out of there. And I know you didn't mean to, but we found dad cause of you, so, thanks. Thanks a lot."

I leaned over and gave him a hug, he didn't try to claw his way out of it, so that was... progress? "Maybe we'll meet again someday!" I stepped back as I gave him the look Chitose sometimes used on Georgia, "And hopefully I don't get shot repeatedly in the face with an SKS when I show up next time!"

Giang grinned "Hopefully."

With Georgie-Porgie:

Chitose was speaking to the officer in charge of the escort detail, they were... well basically the same ships which had escorted us into the harbor in the first place, two Stenya's, and the single Shershen that the Commodore had met us on.

I was keeping myself busy readying for our departure. And by that I mean essentially doing jack-squat, passing the time tossing pebbles into the river, seeing how many skips I could do without going 'full force'.

Fairly certain I could skip a rock clear across the harbor if I did.

I suddenly heard Hakone shout a greeting, as she met up with Giang, it was nice of him to have come to say goodbye- "Right! Back when Chitose said you tried to have the sex with me!"

I started to giggle as Chitose paused in her conversation to look over to me, "What are you laughing about?"

I tried to hold in my chuckles, "N-Nothing!"

She turned back to the man, who for his part looked mildly concerned at the noises coming from my mouth-

"-don't have any sailors to give to me, so you cant crew any ship I make."

I couldn't hold it in. I started to laugh.

"For- What is it Georgia!?" Chitose wheeled back to face me.

I just kept laughing, though, by the time we'd launched and were underway, I was able to get it down to a soft giggle again. Hakone had shown us what Giang had given her, and while I thought it was a pretty decent model, Anne and Diane thought it was fantastic.

"Amazing!" Diane looked over the craft in Hakone's hands, "It looks just like you!"

Anne squinted, "M̵i̶s̶s̷i̷n̵g̶ ̵t̸h̵e̸ ̸b̶a̶t̷t̷l̸e̷ ̷d̵a̵m̸a̵g̷e̴,̴ ̵a̴n̶d̴ ̵t̶h̶e̵ ̷t̷o̶r̷p̷e̵d̷o̵ ̸t̶u̶b̷e̵s̶ ̷o̴n̵ ̵i̷t̵ ̶a̵r̸e̵ ̷s̶m̴a̵l̷l̸e̷r̵,̵ ̴b̶u̵t̵ ̵y̷e̸a̵h̷,̵ ̷I̷ ̵d̶e̷f̴i̵n̵i̸t̵e̷l̴y̷ ̵s̵e̶e̷ ̶t̴h̸e̸ ̴r̸e̴s̴e̶m̶b̷l̸a̶n̵c̵e̷."

Hakone grinned, "I know right!? This is definitely going on my Captains desk!" She stuffed the model... somewhere. I assumed one of her fairies had gotten-hold of it.

"What you gonna call it?" I asked, cruising along beside her casually. We were only going 18 knots, to 'maintain cohesion', though really it was just so we could talk to each other without using our radio's.

Hakone gave an odd look, "I mean, it's Ashigara... Why would it need a different name?"

I shrugged, "I dunno, just thought you'd give it its own name is all, like-" I put my pinky up to the corner of my mouth, "'Mini'Kone!' Or something."

Chitose shook her head, "Please don't call it that." She looked over at me, "That sounds like an ice-cream dish."

I raised my finger to argue, but paused, "You know... it kinda does, doesn't it?"

Lao gave a small groan, before joining into the conversation, "Uhh! now I want Ice-cream! Thanks for that, Chitose!"

The Japanese Tender looked a little bashful for a second, before seeming to think of something, "You're an American ship, right? didn't you have an ice-cream machine?"

Lao looked mildly offended at the generalization, but answered nonetheless, "I WAS an American ship, way back. But you're thinking of the capital ships. Battleships, Carriers, and the like." She grinned, "It was actually pretty common when small ships like the Barnegat's or Destroyers rescued Carrier aircrew, our crew's would 'ransom' them back for a load of ice cream from the carrier!"

We all shared a chuckle at that before she continued. "Yeah, I think they kept it that way for a while, you likely won't find any American Kanmusu that isn't huge that has a machine, I think they didn't start adding those on smaller vessels until after the Korean war, though they did have them on the nuke-subs at that point..."

Everyone turned to look at me.

I looked around at everyone in the sudden contemplative silence, "What?"