We bedded down for the night a few hours later, the jungle was pitch black, illuminated only briefly by our spotlights, and then by the small fire I'd had Hakone and Diane start while I was busy cleaning up after fixing my Rigging.

It was still somewhat early in Indochina's dry season, according to Lao, and there had been an abundance of dry, desiccated wood left lying around, it served as kindling to help catch the living-wood cut down and splintered from our little firefight. The fire cast an orange glow to our surroundings, and the crackling snap-hiss of the fresh wood occasionally thrown in added to the medley of sounds coming from the forest.

I sat facing the fire, reclining against some kind of evergreen tree as I watched the flames dance merrily. Hakone had dumped one more pile of logs nearby, before settling down next to me, yawning before laying down next to Anne, who had already mostly drifted off, curling against the larger girl's stomach, facing the fire.

"Night 'Kone, I'll see you tomorrow," I said.

"Hmmmn... G'night, Georgia." Hakone mumbled, as a half-asleep Anne wrapped her arms around the smaller Cruiser, nuzzling the top of her head with her chin, Hakone yawned before snuggling back into Anne's chest.

Lao, standing nearby, yawned sympathetically, and I tried (and failed) to suppress one of my own, "Dammit!" I said, in a faux-yell, trying to keep my voice down, "I don't even need sleep, why do I even yawn?"

"Probably involuntary, same as blinking," Lao said distractedly, still keeping an eye on our captured Battleship, who herself was curled against a rotted log, hugging her knees to her chest as she rested her chin on them.

"How's the pain?" I asked from across the fire.

The Ta-class startled a little, before looking over at me, "I-I'm fine, Risen, functional, I..." she seemed to pause for a moment, before bowing her head at my uninterrupted, questioning gaze, "I still cannot quite feel my toes, but I should be able to walk normally by morning." She finished, somewhat sheepishly.

I nodded, leaning back against my tree again (careful not to snap it in half with my displacement) "Good, good," I looked at the Ta's belly, where a now barely visible weld-line bisected the woman's midsection, "I was worried, you know," I said, "I'm honestly not sure what passes for our nervous system, so I wasn't sure how much pain you'd be in from a complete bottom-transplant."

"It must be weird having toes at all, to be honest," Chitose said, sitting splayed out on the ground off to the side, struggling slightly to deal with Diane as the Battleship leaned against the smaller woman, snoring softly, "I know I was stumblingall over the place when I was first summoned, what about you, Pham?" She asked, looking at Lao.

The Frigate grimaced again in another half-yawn, before looking over, "Oh, yeah, I was stumbling all over the place for a full week, took a while to get used to taking up actual space."

"What you mean?" I asked, idly breaking up a stray branch in my hands, "you were a ship before, right?"

"Well, yeah, but I wasn'thuman-sized like I am now," Lao splayed out a hand and waved at herself, "I'd walk around on my deck, sure, but I could only really feel through my steel hull, same?" She asked Chitose, looking over at the Japanese woman.

Chitose nodded, "Hmm, I could always move around on my...self? But I never felt so heavy as I did when I was summoned," Chitose made an odd hand-gesture as she tried to explain, "It's like, I was able to walk around like a human, and see things like a human, but my real body was... well, me, the ship. The me that walked my own corridors always seemed like... an out-of-body experience, like I was a ghost wandering my own hull."

Lao nodded agreeably, pointing at Chitose, "That! Totally that, I always felt basically weightless when I was... well, before, so when I was summoned, it felt really weird to be able to walk, but have so much weight on my limbs, dragging me down."

I leaned back, "Huh," I thought back to a couple of days ago, and suddenly had a thought, "Hey, when you were... well, before," I made a swirly motion with my hand, "humans couldn't see you, right?"

The Kanmusu both nodded, before Lao stopped, and spoke up, "Well, I don't think so, I never sank until the initial Abyssal attacks, mind you, so I had a lot of time to people watch from my deck."

"Oh, that's right, you said you were basically just a hulk by then, right?" Chitose said.

Lao nodded, "Yup, was at the breaking yards actually," she took a moment to shudder, "there was a decommissioned freighter ahead of me in the line, I..." She gulped, "well, I wasn't looking forwards to being next, let me put it that way," she said, before shaking her head, clearing her thoughts before getting back on track, "Anyway, yeah, I had a lot of time before that to cool my heels and people watch, and while I'm sure no-one actually saw me, I'm almost certain a few over the years could at least slightly sense me, they'd stop and stare at where I was sitting on my hull sometimes, as if trying to make something out."

I hummed, before throwing an errant stick into the fire, "But no one actually SAW-saw you?"

Lao shook her head, and I continued my thought, "You remember back on the River, when we had to get past that blockade on the border?"

Chitose shuddered a little, "Yes! That ghost that we..." she trailed off, and here eyebrows slowly rose to her hairline, she looked at me, "...you don't think?"

I nodded, "Had the same name as the life-buoys, the humans with us couldn't see her, spoke gobbly-gook-"

"Khmer, Georgia." Chitose corrected.

I nodded absently, giving the point to her, "Yeah that, and I don't think she ever left the hulk we were talking on, did she?"

I got a pair of headshakes, "I think that was a spirit, like WE used to be, before becoming," I gestured at all of us in a circling motion, "this."

Well, that they used to be, I was pretty sure I was something else entirely.

Lao sat back, "Damn, now I feel kinda silly for being so scared of a Cruise ship."

Our captive Ta blinked, before speaking up, "I... my group came upon that barrier as well, when we were... chasing you, Hime-Georgia."

"Did you get spooked too?" I asked.

"Yes, when 08-" The Ta gulped, looking at her new knees for a moment, "t-the Ru-Class you destroyed, tried to bull through, she said she suddenly felt weak, as if something was sapping at her strength, and we could ALL feel something watching us. It was quite... unnerving." She finished.

Chitose took her turn to add fuel to the fire, careful to not let the leaning Diane slip off of her as she kicked a log into the flames from where she sat, "How did you get through, then?" She asked, curious.

The Ta shrugged, "We simply went around it."

I facepalmed, as Lao snorted rudely, "Damn irrigation canals, they snake through everywhere in these countries."

There was a general sense of agreement, before I spoke again, looking at Chitose, "So, if a Cruise ship can have a spirit... can they be summoned? Like, as a Kanmusu?"

Chitose opened her mouth, then closed it, deep in thought as she scrunched her eyebrows together, "Possibly?" she said, "I can't see why they couldn't be, though whether they would answer the summons... they are civilian ships, why would they answer the call to war?" she asked, "And more importantly, should they? I admit, we need all the ships we can get, but how would a glorified waitress help?"

"Auxiliary ships are a thing, remember," Lao said.

Chitose nodded, "And they are all at least armed, in one way or another, but these ships? They would have nothing to defend themselves with!" She made a waving motion, as if banishing the thought, "I'm just saying, without proper weapons or armor, I just can't see them wanting to throw themselves into the line of fire."

I shrugged, "Well, that can always be fixed with a few salvaged turrets, right? And the freighters would be good for logistics, too! I mean, the Wa-Class can move a lot of crap, apparently, what do you have?"

"We have the Marus, the Taigei sisters, Mogu, actual, dedicated auxiliaries..." Chitose seemed to falter then, "though, really, they could use the help... I just wouldn't want to throw them to the wolves like that, you know?" she finished.

Lao shrugged, "Well, it's really up to them, wouldn't you say?" We looked at the Frigate as she continued, "I mean, if the brass tried summoning them, they could always, you know, just not come. If they really don't think they can do anything, they wouldn't even bother coming, right?"

Chitose didn't seem to have an argument for that, "I suppose..." she allowed.

I just shrugged, "Well, it's really a theoretical argument more than anything anyway, it's not like we have a summoning chamber laying around out here in the woods, right?"

Lao nodded, "Yeah, the nearest one from here is the one they were making in Da-Nang, and I don't think it was ever actually finished." She looked at our questioning glances and continued, "The one in Hanoi was finished first and deemed sufficient, and further away from the front, Vietnam isn't exactly drowning in available Kanmusu, so we didn't really need a secondary facility, especially one within easy air-raid distance of Ho-Chi-Minh City."

"Ah, fair enough."

...

The night dragged on from there, Chitose was the first to go, gently setting Diane down fully, before joining the Battleship in slumber. Meanwhile, Lao's drooping eyelids and yawning started to grate on my nerves.

"Why don't you go to sleep, Lao?" I said, jostling a log on the fire with a stick, "I'll watch our guest over there," I nodded at the Ta, who had drifted off herself, still resting her head on her knee's as her breathing had evened out in slumber.

"Cam sleep, 'marine'll get meh." Lao mumbled, before letting out a jaw-cracking yawn from where she sat.

I just shook my head and quietly sat back. Waiting silently as the determined Frigate slowly lost her battle against the sandman, eventually curling up and drifting off as well, though she kept mumbling in her sleep.

I simply kept the fire going, listening to the wildlife and watching the stars through the canopy as the night wore on.