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The End of the Circus: A Tale of the Yizibajohei
Shipgirl Short Stories: Hearts of Oak II: The Battle of Marazion
By Fred Herriot
Based on characters and situations from Bible Black, created by ActiveSoft; Mahō Sensei Negima, created by Akamatsu Ken; Kantai Collection, created by Kadokawa Games; Sister Princess, created by Kimino Sakurako and Tenhiro Naoto; Worm, created by John C. McCrae; Sherlock, created by Steven Moffat and Mark Gatiss (based on Sherlock Holmes, created by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle); Harry Potter, created by Joanna K. Rowling; Urusei Yatsura, created by Takahashi Rumiko; and normalman, created by Jim Valentino.
Including mention of characters from X-Men, created by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby.
Also including characters and situations from Urusei Yatsura — The Senior Year, created by Mike Smith and Fred Herriot.
Near the Avebury henge earthworks (ten kilometres south-southwest of Swindon in County Wiltshire), the last Wednesday of October in 2012, two hours after lunch (Tōkyō time: An hour before midnight)...
"You have all sensed this?"
The considerable crowd of hooded and masked people now prostrating themselves before the man born Thomas Marvolo Riddle all put their covered faces to the linoleum floor of the main dining room of the primary residence of the Noble and Most Ancient House of Malfoy AKA the magical Marquessate of Avebury at their dreaded lord's question. "Yes, my Lord!"
"You have all felt such beings' power?"
"Yes, my Lord!"
"Bring this Warspite to me! And any other of these 'shipgirls' who dares rise to defy me!"
"YES, MY LORD!"
And with that, a dozen Death Eaters immediately portkeyed away from the current base of Lord Voldemort...
Marazion east-northeast of Penzance in Cornwall, that moment...
«I say! Warspite?! Is that you down by Land's End?!»
Perking on hearing that voice echo in her mind, the Lucky Woodpecker of Battle blinked before she looked around, causing the considerable crowd inside the Tutor Chappy fish and chips/ice cream store to silence themselves. "Royal Oak...?"
As people's breaths all caught in their throat on hearing THAT particular tragic battleship's name, Charlene Boleyn then closed her eyes, she sensing a considerable stream of visual data pour into her mind from her younger half-sister who had been struck down by a torpedo strike IN SCAPA FLOW OF ALL PLACES in the mid-autumn of 1939 by an unbelievably daring crew of submariners aboard KMS U-47 commanded by a bold captain named Günther Prien. «Yeah, it's me, 'Spite! I felt it when you got salvaged and merged with one of the Healer's creations right now! Old Vanguard's with me as well...!»
«'Lo, 'Spite!» a new voice cut in, this one with a Cumbria accent marking her place of construction at the Vickers-Armstrong yard in Barrow-in-Furness; the first one she had sensed through her telepathic "secure communications" had the same accent Charlene herself possessed as the third of the Revenge-class battleships had also been built at Her Majesty's Naval Base at Devonport near Portsmouth in Hampshire. «Even got seven of our friends from across the North Sea here, too...!»
«Guten Nachmittag, Freiin Warspite!» another voice cut in, this one with the clipped Prussian tones indicating a native of that old kingdom...though such was also mixed with some other type of German accent that Charlene did not recognize. «Much that I'm personally glad that our nations are allies now — can't believe the Kaiser was so stupid to invade Belgium to start the blasted row between our empires in the first place! — but do you have ANY idea what's going on here?!»
«KÖNIG! How in God's name can you question the Kaiser of all people?!» another voice shrieked in outrage.
«Um...nearly two million dead, Markgraf?» the reborn Royal Oak then sympathetically advised.
Silence.
More silence.
Still more silence.
Then...
«Lieber Gott im Himmel...!» the reborn SMS Markgraf — her accents were quite the melodious mixture as well — moaned.
«You girls must be hungry,» Charlene then sympathetically cut in. «Feeling as if all your fuel tanks are empty now? I'm in Marazion near Penzance on the shores of Prussia Cove right now. Lovely fish and chips shop with even lovelier tea and ICE CREAM as well! Come down here to get rations; the folks who helped me return to the Queen's service suspected more of us would come back this way today. Oh, Oak, Vanguard, one thing; pass it on to any of our other fleet mates who come back as you come down here to join me: Her Majesty's DIRECT orders are to make NO public mention of Yiziba!»
That made the reborn warships perk as they floated over the middle of Scapa Flow. «Why?» the reborn SMS König demanded.
«Something about the whole of Earth's safety being potentially in danger; that was Her Majesty's warning about same...»
«I can explain that to my countrywomen, Kapitän Boleyn.»
That made the adopted native of Devonport gasp. "Bismarck...?!"
The whole crowd inside the Tutor Chippy exclaim in disbelief...
Thirty minutes later, on Marazion Beach...
"Damn! Didn't expect THIS sort of crowd!" WOCDT John Blake tried not to moan.
His fellow senior cadets from Canada, Australia and New Zealand nodded as they took in the sight of a considerable crowd of shipgirls from Britain and Germany — effectively hosted by the reborn HMS Warspite and KMS Bismarck, the latter looking somewhat wary given how the government in Berlin was QUITE skittish over the idea of having the living personifications of the warships who served during both the fourth and fifth reiterations of the Great European Free-for-All "come back to duty" as shipgirls — chatting excitedly away with each other. Also present were two shipgirls bearing the badge of the Royal Danish Navy on their belt buckles, one of whom was a native of that nation while the other was an adopted German of all things!
Hehilde Zenne had been the planned second SMS Wiesbaden of the Cöln-class light cruisers — two of their number had been scuttled at Scapa Flow in the summer of 1919 to never be salvaged, SM Schiffe Cöln (now Loralei Kaulhausen) and Dresden (now Didrika Franck) — but since the second Wiesbaden had not been completed by the time of the Armistice of Compiègne on 11 November 1918, she had been scrapped...which freed up her living soul to be ADOPTED by the Land of Lego as KDM Limfjorden, named in tribute to the shallow sea dividing the northernmost part of Jutland from the remainder of continental Europe. Right now, the adopted native of Aalborg (largest port of the Limfjorden), Wiesbaden (her namesake city had she served in the Kaiserliche Marine) and Szczecin in northwest Poland (where she was built) was busy showing a wide-eyed Loralei and Didrika about the many things that were common in her adopted homeland via a holographic image emanating from the ubiquitous paperback novel-sized devices that came with the shipgirls' new "sea uniforms"; Blake and his fellow senior cadets knew where THOSE devices ultimately came from and how they helped the reborn warship spirits adopt to the modern age.
"So even if the bastards in the Benderblock are publicly saying nothing about German shipgirls and where they go, they're busy preparing themselves for when the rest of the public back home accepts them back, huh?" CDT CPO1 Marilyn Jones mused.
"Being smart if you ask me," WOCDT Patrick Lowell noted, crossing his arms. "You saw what old Bisko did to that wanker terminator Nimrod when he moved to attack the Queen Mary 2 the day she 'recommissioned', right?" As the native of Woolwich near Kitchener nodded — indeed, who HADN'T seen what the most famous warship of all had done to the mutant-hunting Sentinel also known as "Bastion" when he tried to strike at clones of the X-Men who had gone to the current flagship of the Cunard Line on the seventy-second anniversary of KMS Bismarck's commissioning? — the Auckland native added, "The Germans got a right to be wary of the Nazis trying to come back — especially with those Gesellschaft bastards who are backing up the Empire Eighty-Eight over in America and their friends elsewhere — but Bisko's as anti-Nazi as they come!"
"Do not worry about those mörderischer Abschaum, Herr Oberdeckoffizier," a voice called out, making Blake, Jones, Lowell and their Australian friend CDT CPO Lee Shannon jolt before they smartly turned to salute the reborn SMS König.
"Admiral, congratulations on your appointment!" Blake called out. "Hello to you as well, Admiral Iuel."
Hearing that, the woman now called Marie Charlotte von Württemberg chuckled as she returned that courtesy, as did the current "flagship" of Denmark's corps of flådejomfruer, the reborn post-Great War armoured ship/training cruiser KDM Niels Iuel now known among her peers in the defence forces of Denmark as Kommandør (acting Flotilleadmiral) Christel Iuel. "Danke, Herr Oberdeckoffizier," the adopted native of Stuttgart in Baden-Württemberg (birthplace of her effective namesake, King Wilhelm II of the Kingdom of Württemberg) and Wilhelmshaven in the former grand duchy of Oldenburg (where she was built as the first of her class of super-dreadnoughts) stated as she lowered her arm. "Tell me; I fear I might have misaddressed you...!"
"None of us would technically be seen as 'Oberfähnrich zur See', Your Highness," Jones noted with a polite bow of her head.
"Though we definitely might consider joining our respective armed forces if this whole thing about starship versions of all of you being built now is true, ma'am," Shannon added, his own eyes twinkling in amusement; yes, the senior cadets present today had been briefed on THAT as well. "Captain Farncomb just can't stop going on and on about what her starship-self can do."
The older shipgirls laughed. "Did you get a chance to deal with these interdimensionale Eindringlinge back in August, Christel?" Charlotte asked, she trying NOT to blush madly at being called "your highness" of all things. Yes, as a living namesake of the Royal House of Württemberg, she was entitled to the 'Fürstin' honorific applied to her adopted family name...!
The adopted native of Oslo in Norway (birthplace of her namesake) and Copenhagen (where she was built as Denmark's last coastal defence ship), shook her head. "Sadly, nothing came our way, Charlotte. Our Swedish, Polish and Finnish cousins got involved — without their starships, sadly — but Denmark, the Faeroe Islands and Greenland weren't invaded."
"Wonder what Captain von Bismarck did when she took that wanker Nimrod back to his universe," Lowell mused...
...then the shipgirls all tensed. "Incoming from the area west of Guernsey!" Elizabeth Kitchener, the reborn armoured cruiser HMS Hampshire who had been sunk via mine strike west of the Orkney Islands in 1916, barked out.
Heads turned south. "Two of them!" Elizabeth's sister Margaret Campbell, the reborn HMS Argyll sunk by grounding a year earlier near Dundee in Scotland, said as she shielded her eyes from the early afternoon sun. "Two battleships!"
Christel and Charlotte peered intently at the two small dots in the southern sky slowly growing as they moved to make landfall. "One's Baden!" the latter then announced. "The other one seems to be an Orion-class..."
"Monarch," Charlene Boleyn declared before she concentrated. «Hello, Monarch! Can you hear me?!»
«Huh?! That you, Warspite?!» a strange voice with a mix of Geordie English marking HMS Monarch's place of construction at Elswick in Newcastle-upon-Tyne — and some version of French of all things — called back, sensed by all the shipgirls present.
«I'm at Marazion now near Penzance off Prussia Cove, along with a whole FLEET of others like us!» the adopted native of Devonport warned. «Come see us now so we can get our kit in order before reporting to the Admiralty.»
«Baden, a whole slew of girls from Germany are here, too!» Charlotte added. «No mention of Yiziba, ladies; direct orders from the Benderblock. You'll be explained why once you get some food into you.»
«Jawohl, meine Flagschiffe!» came from the last of Imperial Germany's completed capital ships, SMS Baden.
"WAIT! BROOM RIDERS, DUE NORTH!"
Heads snapped over...
"Mein Gott!" Luisa von Bismarck snarled on seeing at least a dozen people in cloaks on riding brooms now hovering over the nearby A394 roadway. "Don't those Idiotische Magie know not to stick their noses out of their enclaves like that?!"
"Why the devil are they wearing masks?!" Jocelyn Dick, the reborn ninth warship named Vanguard — who would KEEP her name should her immediate successor to said name be reborn as Patricia Agnew — then demanded; Luisa had been quite kind as to help the newly-reborn shipgirls key into their personal administrative assistant devices to get updates on a LOT of things.
That made Luisa, Christel and Hehilde perk before their eyes went wide. "Todesser!" the adopted native of Schönhausen snarled.
Charlene blinked. "'Death Eaters', Luisa?"
The taller reborn battleship glared at the spiritually older woman. "Magical rebels against the British Crown, Charlene."
Charlene's own blue eyes went wide. "Like that lot who followed that Grindelwald fool from Hungary?"
"Worse! They're magical equivalents of the Nazis of all things!"
Everyone's eyes went wide. "Oh, how CHARMING!" Kimberly Maclachlan, the reborn HMS Royal Oak, mockingly noted. "Shall we teach these — oh, what's that word?! — ah, I recall now! Those STALEBLOODS about loyalty to the Crown?!"
Savage grins crossed the faces of the other shipgirls present. "Warrant Jones! Get all the civilians under cover now!" Charlene then barked. "Charlotte, Christel, would you and yours care to join us in this little exercise?"
"Why, you're far too courteous, Charlene!" Charlotte affirmed with a courtly bow as Christel nodded savagely...
North of Marazion, moments later...
"The muggles are dispersing, Corban!"
"I see it, Thorfinn!" Corban Yaxley declared as he reached into his robes to draw out his wand. The current head of Wizengamot administrative services at the Ministry of Magic — who had taken a "day off" to attend to the Dark Lord at Avebury, thus was made the co-leader of this mission — tried not to scowl. "Did those shipgirl things spot us?!"
"Impossible!" Antonin Doholov sneered behind his own mask to Yaxley's right rear. "There's no magic in those things...URK!"
"Good day, sir."
Heads snapped around...
"Impossible!" Yaxley exclaimed in disbelief.
...to see the descendant of Russian magicals who had fled the just-formed Soviet Union after the October Revolution for safety in Britain now being held at the back of his head by a woman FLOATING in mid-air, her free hand snaring Dolohov's broom before it dropped towards the highway almost a half-kilometre below. As he tried to twist around to unleash his signature blood-boiling curse at his current captor, the other Death Eaters who had come to find the reborn HMS Warspite drew out their own wands to send curses her way, aiming in a way to give the veteran of Voldemort's rebellion against the Ministry of Magic in the late 1980s and early 1990s a chance to escape. Several bolts slammed into the pretty brunette's head and arm, leaving no mark on either her quite soft skin or the medium blue traditional sleeved uniform dotted in gold French fleur-de-lys with the white-bordered black number 55 on her upper thighs. As Doholov finally managed to get a good firing arc, he hissed out something in Russian...
...before the side of his very SKULL was allowed to smash into Nicola Poincaré's forehead!
Blood exploded from a caved-in head as Doholov's hand dropped his wand, such snatched up by a fast-moving blur which melted into a younger woman — the reborn HMS Monarch appeared to be in her mid-twenties age-wise; the newcomer bearing the badge of HMS Hampshire on her silver-trimmed blue uniform with red-and-white checkered trimming appeared to be as if she just graduated from Hogwarts herself — who arced around to float upside-down in front of the mortally-wounded wizard.
"Need some help with the trash here, Nicola?" Elizabeth Kitchener then teasingly asked, she then scowling as her nose scrunched. "Bloody hell, does this thing SMELL! Doesn't even LOOK bloody British to me...!"
"ALIEN BITCH! AVADA KEDAVRA!"
A bolt of green light slammed into the reborn first of the Devonshire-class armoured cruisers (by launch date), the burning effects of the Killing Curse unleashed by Thorfinn Rowle dancing over her uniform for a second before it dispersed into nothingness...
...leaving a very ALIVE reborn adopted native of Winchester (seat of her namesake county) and Elswick (where she was built).
"What the devil was THAT?!" the namesake of Field Marshal Herbert Kitchener, the war hero who died on her decks when she was sunk in 1916 days after Jutland — due to succession issues with said earldom after the death of the field marshal's grandson the previous year, all Elizabeth got was the right to be addressed by the prefix The Honorable in lieu of being made either the Viscountess of Broome or the Baroness of Denton — as she stared at the mere SPECK of a man who just tried to kill her.
As other shipgirls — be they British, German or Danish — swung into an encircling formation around the attacking force that portkeyed in from Avebury moments before, Rowle nearly dropped his wand in horror. "Impossible...!"
"Oh, I wouldn't say that, sir..."
He yelped as a hand snared his wand, he then looking up to see his team's target now floating nearby, a wry smile on her face. "Let me try something," Charlene Boleyn then trilled as the wand she snared began to glow brightly.
"CRUCIO!"
A bolt of nearly-blinding red light lashed out to rip into Rowle, that causing ALL the Death Eaters to howl in agony...!
Across the United Kingdom...
In their various homes and places of work, those followers of Voldemort who hadn't been called out to Malfoy Manor this afternoon in response to the salvage of Britain's most successful warship ever screamed out as their Dark Marks lit up with burning energy, searing through ALL their nerves as if they had been dipped in a boiling pot of sulphuric acid.
Not even the Dark Lord himself could escape such horrifying torture; at his current base of operations, the man born Tom Riddle was practically on FIRE as his newly-rebuilt body — formed in part by supposed stolen blood from Neville Longbottom, the so-called "other prophecy child" who had been effectively orphaned by the Lestrange family in the late fall of 1996 shortly after Voldemort himself had disappeared thanks to the late Lily Potter at Godric's Hollow — convulsed from the burning outrage of THOUSANDS of muggles being funnelled through the newly-forged soul of one Charlene Boleyn into Thorfinn Rowle. Among those who helped design, build and crew HMS Warspite over the three decades and more were dozens of nimmibs — known commonly in Britain as "squibs" — who survived the traditional culling of such "dead blood" by their relatives to erase the "shame" of their existences, then had been forced to throw in their lot with their muggle countrymen and serve the Crown.
And given that the Crown had — near the start of the rebellion against the Ministry of Magic back in 1985 — issued a Magical Royal Proclamation demanding the DEATHS of Voldemort and his followers to ensure that such narrow-minded "stalebloods" couldn't spread their fascist-like poison over Her Majesty's loyal subjects both normal and metahuman...
...in a strange way, the reborn second of the Queen Elizabeth-class fast super-dreadnoughts was seeing said proclamation being carried out in a way that Voldemort could never had predicted when he branded his followers with the Dark Mark!
And as a panicking Dolores Umbridge — who, while not branded as a Death Eater (no doubt because the Dark Lord knew of her being not as "pure" due to her muggle mother and squib brother), was quite sympathetic to their goals — was trying to call from Hogwarts to get officials over to Scotland away to help administer to a wildly-screaming Severus Snape, he being tortured in his own potions laboratory in the dungeons of the old castle in front of a chorus of wide-eyed freshmen students...
...the "leader of the Light" was calmly watching things through Hirosaki Chikage's own crystal ball...
Hogwarts, that moment...
"That may be a problem, Chikage."
Hearing her headmaster's warning words, the Dark Heart of Pure Chaos could only chuckle as she sat back in her chair before Albus Dumbledore's desk. "Given that any ship that was sunk or was damaged — and thus, suffered fatalities among the crew — potentially inherits the memories and skill sets of those who died on their decks, that Charlene can pull off something like THAT shouldn't really be surprising at the end." She pointed to the image of the reborn HMS Warspite continuing to funnel her huge pool of raw power through Thorfinn Rowle's wand into the man who had dared tried to use a Killing Curse of all things on Elizabeth Kitchener just now. "See how Thorfinn's wand is disintegrating from the power input, Albus?" As the headmaster of Hogwarts and veteran of the European side of the Wars of Liberation known locally as "Grindelwald's War" nodded in cold understanding, the native of the magical side of Tōkyō added, "I can alert Luisa to tell Charlene — who will be seen as the 'commodore' of local British shipgirls since she's the first of their number returned to duty this day that we know of — to have all the bodies dumped off Land's End to feed the colony of kraken there. No evidence for Amelia Bones' people to look at to find out what happened and why. Cornelius can scream and yell to his heart's content, but it'll get nowhere."
Several of the Order of the Phoenix — who were privy to the secret of Chikage's Gifting as Dragonheart in the summer of 2008 before the start of her second year at Hogwarts — all grimly nodded at that dry observation. "The Queen's already nixed any attempts by Malfoy and the rest of that lot to declare shipgirls as 'magical creatures', Albus," Alastor Moody declared, he grimly smiling at the sight of Rowle now literally being BURNED ALIVE by Charlene Boleyn. "And whoever's been playing around with the Law Scrolls at the Ministry over the last year to remove the anti-muggleborn legislation has too many of Fudge's fools at the complex running around as if they were baby dragons with their heads cut off. Once Mycroft smacks the fool down..."
"You might have to arrange an accident to prevent Umbridge from stirring the pot up more, Professor," Nymphadora Tonks, who had come to the old castle with her senior instructor, wryly added. Like the veteran auror, the cadet magical law enforcement officer had quickly conformed with the more hard-line attitude the nominally-pacifist Dumbledore now expressed when it came to the Death Eaters who were responsible for the deaths of over SIX THOUSAND people from 1980 to 1996.
"I can deal with that, Dora," Chikage stated.
"What if she tries to go after your family, lass?" the native of the magical side of Edinburgh — who was tutored by Chikage's own grandfather Hirosaki Ryūji when he attended Hogwarts during the run up to the Wars of Liberation — wondered.
The arch-mage sorceress/dark lady of the Sith gave Moody an amused look. "WHAT are the laws concerning the defence of one's home again, Alastor?" she coolly asked before she pulled out her PAA from her jacket pocket.
Moody cackled as Tonks and her peers snickered while Dumbledore grimly nodded...
In the skies over Marazion, a moment later...
As the now clearly dead Thorfinn Rowle slumped on his faltering umbrella — his body now nothing more than a burnt-out husk of flesh, his clothes smouldering from the sheer raw power of Charlene Boleyn's surprising replication of a Cruciatus Curse of all things — Luisa von Bismarck, who had placed herself off to one side of this ad hoc formation of shipgirls from three nations, perked as her PAA buzzed in her belt pocket. Taking the device out of its pouch, she tapped the control crystal, blinking as her new "hull's" telepathic-like "secure communications suite" picked up the message from the one member of a remarkable family of Metamenschen currently in the United Kingdom continuing her local magical studies. Seeing the message from Hirosaki Chikage there, she then aimed the multiversal use device at Rowle's body just as Margaret Campbell moved to scoop up said corpse to ensure it didn't fall down and cause a mess in someone's car or farm field below; this confrontation had happened near the intersection of route A394 and Gwallon Lane. Before the reborn fifth of the Devonshire-class cruisers could snare said corpse, it vanished, being teleported several dozen kilometres off to the west to fall into the waters of the Celtic Sea.
The blonde, golden brown-eyed adopted native of Inveraray (seat of her namesake county) and Greenock near Glasgow (where she was built) blinked at such an action before she gazed in curiosity at the adopted native of Schönhausen. "Why?"
"A suggestion by one of the Admirale who are the siblings to the man who gave us all our human names, Kapitän Campbell," the tall Aryan-like blonde calmly answered as she slipped her PAA back into her belt pouch. "The Todesser are all condemned to die by order of your Queen via a magische Königsproklamation issued in 1985; if you had nimmibs — 'squibs' to quote these tote Blutschweinhunde here — among your crew, you'd know that such a thing is the supreme law of the land for magicals here."
Hearing that, eyes locked on Charlene; much to the reborn fast super-dreadnought's delight, the members of her ad hoc "fleet" of shipgirls had snared the other Death Eaters and their brooms before they fell to the ground, thus preventing the Obliviators — who, while their mission was distasteful in the eyes of the adopted native of Devonport, were simply doing their jobs to protect their fellow magicals from uncontrolled discovery by normal people — from dealing with no end of issues. "Well, if that's the Queen's desire, we've no choice but to obey! Where did you send that particular fellow anyway, Captain von Bismarck?"
Luisa pointed to the west. "Wonderful colony of Krake out past Land's End there, Frau Kapitän!" she declared, winking.
That made the other shipgirls present gape. "Wait! What?! KRAKEN?!" Cheyenne Bridgeman, reborn name-ship of the Drake-class armoured cruisers who had been sunk off the coast of County Antrim in 1917 by SM U-79, then squealed.
"Oh, God! I want to see these things!" Jacqueline Drummond, the reborn HMS Aboukir who had been sunk by SM U-9 in the first major anti-surface ship action by a submarine in the Great War in 1914 off the coast of the Netherlands, squealed.
Hearing the other shipgirls chatter excitedly, Charlene exchanged looks with Nicola Poincaré, Kimberly Maclachlan and Jocelyn Dick — who, as the reborn Monarch, Royal Oak and Vanguard respectively, were "deputy commodores" of their "formation" — before she shrugged, then gazed westward. "Well, let's get these wastes of flesh out of people's hair, everyone!"
Fifteen minutes later, back at Hogwarts...
"Oh, bollocks...!"
Hearing that hissed statement from Gregory Goyle, his friends from Slytherin looked his way. "What is it, Greg?" Pansy Parkinson asked as people in the divination classroom all fell silent...then she gaped. "Oh, shit...!"
Eyes locked on the beefy — yet not as dumb as some people made him to be — native of Wolverhampton northwest of Birmingham before their eyes locked on his left hand. On the ring finger there, the sigil marking him as heir apparent to the Most Noble House of Goyle/Viscountcy of Wolverhampton had changed to a much more intricate design, that making all those who understood when things like this happen gape with a mixture of horrified understanding and surprise. Coming over herself to see what the hullabaloo was about, Professor Sybil Trelawney blinked on seeing what had happened, then she bowed her head formally. "My Lord, may I express my deepest condolences at the demise of your father. I pray it wasn't painful."
Hearing that earnest statement from his fellow alumnus of the house of the cunning, Gregory bowed his head in turn. "My deepest thanks, Mistress Sybil," he ritually returned, his eyes misting. Despite what his father had been involved with since he himself graduated from this school over two decades before — and which had come back with the force of a cyclone, threatening the future of his and so many other families across the British Isles — he still had feelings for the older man; blood purist or not, Lance Goyle had been a very good father for his only child. "If you'll excuse me, I'll need to speak to the Headmaster..."
"Of course, My Lord. If you may escort him there, Lady Parkinson...?"
The Shadow Hunter perked before nodding. "Certainly, Professor. C'mon, Greg..."
Rising, the Wulfrunian teen allowed his arm to be taken by his beloved peer from Lancashire, then both walked out of the divination tower to the nearest stairwell to get them into the main castle itself before heading to the entrance to the administration tower at the centre of the complex. As they went, Greg drew his wand to put up a privacy spell; again, despite how people in other houses — especially Gryffindor — viewed the man, he wasn't as stupid as he often acted. "Who was it, Pansy?"
The reality/shadow warper — who was known by her peers as owing a Life Debt of all things to the Trickster of the Show, Tuyuki ("Coyote"); such seeing herself Gifted as Silhouette in the spring of her second year in 2009 during the whole Chamber of Secrets business — took a deep breath. "We've got our own shipgirls now, Greg," the native of Morecambe overlooking the bay of the same name north of downtown Lancaster warned. "A whole slew of them came back around noon down by Penzance in Cornwall. Lead of them was HMS Warspite, a battleship who was in both World Wars; don't ask me what human name Ataru gave her, though I'm sure Chikage would know." As he nodded, she added, "No doubt, given what happened on Monday with Greyback and his lot, the Dark Fool decided to get himself some metahuman help to deal with potential opponents since the idiots he and his rescued from Azkaban earlier this morning won't be in any decent fighting shape for a while."
He grimaced. "And if what you learned from Mistress Josephine is true...!"
"Someone passed on word about the MRP from '85 that condemns Riddle's idiots to death if they're caught in the open."
"Chikage?"
"Probably. She's with the headmaster and several of the Order of the Phoenix now in his office."
Greg nodded at that. Given the current political climate and the loud denials from Cornelius Fudge about the return of Lord Voldemort of all people at the end of the Triwizard Tournament earlier that spring, Albus Dumbledore had to be very circumspect when it came to prosecuting any sort of campaign against the Death Eaters, which Lance Goyle had happily rejoined when the muggle nobleman's son had been given his new body with the involuntary help of Neville Longbottom while Cedric Diggory was busy winning the Tournament against Viktor Krum and Fleur Delacour. "Not any sort of death cheating, I hope?"
Pansy smirked. She hadn't revealed that the young Marquess of Holdenhurst based in eastern Dorset near Bournemouth was himself gifted as the Master of Plants, Ukor'be Dumdyatosi ("Vinclozolin"), around the same time that she had become the Shadow Hunter; like Pansy, Neville owed Tariko Katabarbe a Life Debt due to her rescuing him from being nearly KILLED by his paternal granduncle Algeron Rosier to "scare the magic out of him". "Good guess," she said, making her housemate blush. "No, Nev's not an idiot when it comes to that. He had pouches of his father's blood with him when Pettigrew kidnapped him so Riddle could get the blood of the 'enemy forcibly taken' to see that death cheater given something of a physical body."
Greg snorted...before he perked. "Wait! Nev got blood from his FATHER?! How'd he...?"
Pansy winked. "Spoilers," she warned as they arrived at the administration tower before blinking. "Chikage!"
Turning to see the Dark Heart of Pure Chaos standing there with an understanding look on her face, Greg twirled his wand to disperse the privacy spell around he and Pansy, then sadly smiled. "Tell whoever did it to pass on my thanks, Chikage."
Hirosaki Chikage chuckled as she came over to grasp his hands in her own; a flick of her eye indicated her own privacy spell going up to ensure their conversation couldn't be eavesdropped on by the portraits lining the stairs heading to Albus Dumbedore's office. "He's finally at peace right now, Greg. While I suspect that his death scene was not what he'd want in the end, if we move smartly enough, neither you nor your mother will have to suffer because of Tom's depravity anymore."
He grunted. "Family comes first," he breathed out...
London, no. 10 Downing Street in the City of Westminster, the first Thursday of November, after breakfast...
"They're coming now, Mister Prime Minister."
Hearing that comment from the portrait of Minister for Magic — and later Supreme Mugwump — Faris Spavin hanging from the wall of the Messengers Room at the residence of the United Kingdom's head of government, David Cameron could only sigh. "Rather fast, don't you think, Minister?" the native of London who currently held the seat for Witney in Oxfordshire while also serving as the chief minister of Her Majesty's Government then mused as he exchanged looks with Mycroft Holmes.
"Pureblood LORDS have died, David," the mugalophile long-term head of Britain's magical government who had been shuttled off to lead the International Confederation of Wizards in 1903 just to get him away from driving the conservative purebloods up the wall noted with a wink. "Given how much of a greedy fool Fudge is, any loss of potential 'contributors'..."
"Who's in the party, Professor?" the "heart" of the normal British government then wondered.
"Himself, the toad, dear Amelia and Rufus Scrimgeour, plus two escorting aurors, Sergeant Shacklebolt being one," the spirit echo of one of the country's more eccentric Ministers for Magic — one who loudly acknowledged the Crown's traditional oversight when it came to Britain's magical population as witness what he did when Queen Victoria died two years prior to his move to Switzerland — declared with an amused snort. Given how much of a mugalophile he had been — as witness his flat-out support of the Canadian Ministry of Magical Affairs when they launched the first two generations of magical battleships to deal with the so-called "sea leviathans", dementor-like creatures the size of a small skyscraper who came out during the Great War (and later the Second World War) to consume the souls of sailors lost in battle — the idea that the "stalebloods" had taken such control over people these days would make him physically ill were he still a living person. "No marked fools, fortunately."
"Oh, joy," the Master of the Specialized Warfare Fencibles chuckled. "I'll warn the girls, David."
"Thank you, Mycroft," Cameron breathed out.
A minute later, a fireplace at one corner of the room flared the familiar green flames indicating someone was travelling through the magical corridor connecting No. 10 Downing Street to the Ministry of Magic complex under Northumberland Avenue four hundred metres northeast. Soon enough, a man in a green bowler hat emerged. "Ah! Prime Minister!" Cornelius Fudge called out as he moved to stand aside, allowing his current bodyguards Kingsley Shacklebolt and John Dawlish to come through.
They were soon followed by Dolores Umbridge, Amelia Bones and Rufus Scrimgeour. Seeing the loathsome "pureblood wanna-be" who was causing no end of headaches in Hogwarts given her drive to make the students there conform to her boss' wishes to deny the return of Tom Riddle to cause more issues in the land, Cameron tried not to scowl at her as he came over with his hand out to shake that of his effective opposite number. "Do come in, Minister, ladies, gentlemen. I trust your day isn't as harsh as the message Minister Spavin relayed to me earlier today's hinted at. Everyone's in the Cabinet Room."
The native of Cotswold near Gloucester in the West Country shook his head. "Horrible business, Mister Prime Minister! Just horrible business!" he declared with a shake of his head as they walked out of the Messengers Room into a corridor leading to the ante room beside the place where Cameron's cabinet gathered. "While I can understand your desire to have these shipgirls here to protect the muggles, they've been accused by trusted people in the murder of a dozen prominent citizens on our side..."
"Oh?" the prime minister blinked with well-disguised surprise in the eyes of Bones and Scrimgeour, not to mention Shacklebolt. "From what we've learned from the ladies who've rejoined us, the people who were caught near Penzance were marked followers of this Riddle chap the late Marchioness Potter was so kind to deal with back in '96 during Mister Blair's ministry..."
"Nonsense, Minister!" Umbridge derisively declared as they reached the ante room, moving to head straight into the place where the normal Cabinet gathered when they came to No. 10 to consult with their leader. "Such fallacies...!"
"LA REYNE LE VEULT!"
Instantly, a vise-like feeling seized all the vising magicals, making them snap to attention as they all gazed upon the smirking Master of the Specialized Warfare Fencibles, who had been waiting alongside a shorter woman with her long blonde hair partially done up in a beautiful French braid that was tied off at the top of her head. Her green-and-gold woodpecker-bedecked battlesuit immediately made the magicals gape before their eyes fixed on the gold box under the naval coronet of her ship's crest.
As they DID understand the proper relationship between the Crown and the Ministry, Bones, Scrimgeour and Shacklebolt politely bowed to the reborn second of the Queen Elizabeth-class battleships. "Lady Warspite, welcome back, ma'am," the regent of the Noble House of Bones/Barony of Bute declared with a delighted smile. "Mycroft, good to see you again."
"And you as well, Amelia. Rufus. Kingsley," the brother to the world's first true consulting detective affirmed before he focused on Umbridge with a stare that reminded the magicals of someone gazing upon dragon dung. "Fudge, you were specifically warned NOT to bring this selfish woman to this meeting. Captain Kitchener, if you would be so kind, please...?"
"Certainly, Master Mycroft!"
KK-KRACK!
Fudge awked after a fist smashed into the top of Umbridge's head, making the woman literally kiss the floor, she passing out from the harsh blow delivered by the reborn HMS Hampshire. As Shacklebolt's eyes went wide on seeing her ship's crest over her heart, Elizabeth Kitchener smirked as she grabbed Umbridge by the back of that sickeningly-sweet pink sweater of hers. "Sorry to make a mess, Mister Prime Minister," the adopted native of Winchester stated, her chestnut brown eyes twinkling.
"Hampshire...?!" the Grenadian-descent auror sergeant from Portchester near Portsmouth breathed out in delight.
Elizabeth gazed his way. "Yes?"
Shacklebolt smiled. "Named after the late Field Marshal Kitchener by Mister Moroboshi, I assume?"
"That's right. Why...?" Here, the reborn first of the Devonshire-class cruisers then gaped. "A relative in my crew?"
"A squib...! Pardon me, a nimmib. He 'died' when you were sunk."
As Charlene Boleyn and several other local shipgirls came over to see this quasi-reunion of sorts — the reborn German shipgirls had been taken to the Benderblock in Berlin to be briefed on many interesting things before they would "disappear" from public view, actually heading to the Main Dockyard at the third Sol-Mars libration point to help with starship designs; the two Cöln-class light cruisers scuttled at Scapa Flow in 1919 had been adopted by Denmark and were now in Copenhagen meeting with Queen Margrethe II and her prime minister Helle Thorning-Schmidt before Loralei Kaulhausen and Didrika Franck would be commissioned into the Søværnet — Elizabeth then chuckled. "I assume your relative is living in Canada now?"
That made Shacklebolt gape. "The field marshal knew, ma'am?"
"Tosh! Of course he did, lad! He was Secretary of State for War at the time those ships were commissioned." Here, the reborn armoured cruiser hummed. "It was Sundown that was there for my 'dead', right? The one who didn't get her 'A' Turret stove in during Jutland — I know you people call that battle differently — when the sea leviathans tried to eat everyone's crews?"
The auror sergeant laughed as Bones and Scrimgeour grinned, Dawlish looked confused and Fudge seemed to be on the edge of panic. "Indeed so, Lady Hampshire. In fact, Lady Sundown has herself been Gifted along with Lady Sunbeam; it happened around the time Lady Bismarck also returned to duty. I'll send a message to her to inform her of your asking about her."
That made Elizabeth breathe in. "Oh, bloody hell! What the hell do you give as a present to one of the Dragon Slayers?!"
"Um...Elizabeth, don't you have something to do first?" Mycroft then helpfully cut in.
That made the reborn cruiser awk before she flustered. "Ah, bollocks! Sorry about that, Prime Minister!" As she picked up the still-unconscious Umbridge, she winked at Shacklebolt. "We'll get together at the Leaky Cauldron sometime!"
"I look forward to that, Captain," he affirmed.
As she carried the unconscious senior undersecretary off, Fudge slowly turned to face the true heart of the British government, who now had a HUGE proverbial club by which he could use to keep the magicals down. "Mycroft...!"
"You LISTEN, Cornelius," Mycroft declared as the shipgirls all crossed their arms and focused directly on the bumbling fool who was effectively help setting up the whole of the United Kingdom, normal and metahuman alike, for a disaster. "Those so-called 'distinguished citizens' are marked as TRAITORS to both the CROWN and MAGIC itself by Her Majesty's Magical Royal Proclamation of 1985 when she let loose our friends from Meridiana like Josephine Crowley on Riddle and his fools...!"
As the Master of the Fencibles moved to smartly dress down the Minister of Magic, the shipgirls exchanged amused looks...
The End...For Now...!
WRITER'S NOTES
This short takes place right after the previous short and extends to the first day of November in 2012, that about sixteen days prior to the start of Boy Meets Girl Meets Metahuman.
Ye old shipgirl list; it's a biggie this time. First, from the United Kingdom...
Captain Jocelyn Daphne Dick RN (His/Her Majesty's Ship Vanguard [pennant 39])
Capt Henriette Nicola Poincaré RN (His/Her Majesty's Ship Monarch [pennant 55])
Capt Kimberly Rachel Maclachlan RN (His/Her Majesty's Ship Royal Oak [pennant 67, formerly pennant 08])
Capt The Honourable Frances Elizabeth Kitchener RN (His/Her Majesty's Ship Hampshire [pennant C150, formerly pennant 50])
Capt Marjorie Margaret Campbell RN (His/Her Majesty's Ship Argyll [pennant C180, formerly pennant 80])
Capt Finella Cheyenne Bridgeman RN (His/Her Majesty's Ship Drake [pennant C129, formerly pennant P09])
Capt Jacqueline Esmé Drummond RN (His/Her Majesty's Ship Aboukir [pennant C177, formerly pennant N00])
Jocelyn Dick (HMS Vanguard) and Nicole Poincaré (HMS Monarch) are based on fan art done of them by the wonderful artist Siirakannu. Jocelyn's art can be seen at Pixiv, ID #46140069 (page 4) while Nicole's can be seen at ID #45287159 (also page 4). Kimberly Maclachlan (HMS Royal Oak) is based on her Warship Girls interpretation, such available at Danbooru, ID #2631273. As noted in the previous part, ship pennant numbers were reorganized into a singular list per type, hence the changes of pennant numbers for several of the Great War-era battleships and cruisers listed above. See below to get a better explanation for Elizabeth Kitchener (HMS Hampshire) and her special prefix honorific.
A spoiler alert here...
Captain Patricia Caroline Agnew RN (His/Her Majesty's Ship Advance [pennant 38], formerly His/Her Majesty's Ship Vanguard [pennant 23])
Patricia Agnew (HMS Advance, née HMS Vanguard) takes after her Azur Lane interpretation. She is the tenth vessel named Vanguard to serve in the British maritime warfare service, but to prevent confusion with Jocelyn Dick (who keeps the name due to the loss of almost her whole crew when her magazines went up in 1917 when she was in Scapa Flow), Patricia would be renamed; there has never been an HMS Advance in the Royal Navy.
From Germany now (including those not mentioned in the narrative here but were introduced at the end of the previous part)...
Kapitän zur See/Flottillenadmiral Marie Charlotte, Fürstin von Württemberg DKM (Seiner Majestät Schiff/Deutsches Marineschiff König [pennant 42])
KptzS Catharine Ottilie, Markgräfin von Zähringen DKM (Seiner Majestät Schiff/Deutsches Marineschiff Markgraf [pennant 44])
KptzS Augusta Victoria, Fürstin von Preußen DKM (Seiner Majestät Schiff/Deutsches Marineschiff Kronprinz Wilhelm, formerly Seiner Majestät Schiff Kronprinz [pennant 45])
KptzS Heilwig Judit, Kurfürstin von Zähringen DKM (Seiner Majestät Schiff/Deutsches Marineschiff Baden [pennant 50])
KptzS Joanelle Kamrie Tietgenns DKM (Deutsches Marineschiff Bonn, formerly Seiner Majestät Schiff Karlsruhe [pennant K66])
KptzS Wilhelmina Bathilda Schulz DKM (Seiner Majestät Schiff/Deutsches Marineschiff Brummer [pennant K69])
The acting rank given to Charlotte von Württemberg (SMS König) noted here, Flottillenadmiral (literally "flotilla admiral", short-formed FltlAdm), is the equivalent of a commodore in the navies of the Commonwealth of Nations. The service mark for Imperial Navy warships as seen here is DKM (Deutsche Kaiserliche Marine, literally "German Imperial Navy"). Ship prefixes for warships of the Imperial Navy is Seiner Majestät Schiff (literally "His Majesty's Ship"), short-formed as SMS. The modern German Navy ship prefix in my stories is Deutsches Marineschiff (literally "German Navy Ship"), short-formed as DMS; note that in real life, the German maritime warfare service does not use a ship prefix even if the NATO English FGS ("Federal German Ship") is used to identify them in international publications. As with other European powers, capital ships are not given pennant superior letters; cruisers will be marked with pennant superior K (Kreuzer).
As for the reason Joanelle Tietgenns (SMS Karlsruhe) is renamed as DMS Bonn, here's another spoiler alert...
Kapitän zur See Magdalena Wilhelmine, Markgräfin von Durlach KMDR (Kriegsmarineschiff Karlsruhe [pennant K84])
As she was sunk with casualties in 1940 during the invasion of Norway, Magdalena von Durlach (KMS Karlsruhe) will keep her ship name. This required Joanelle to be renamed; the first DMS Bonn (pennant A1413) wouldn't commission until 2013. Magdalena takes after her Azur Lane interpretation, allowing Joanelle to take after her latter namesake's Warship Girls self.
Now the two Scapa Flow girls now adopted by Denmark...
Kommandør Loralei Constanze Kaulhausen KSN (formerly Kapitän zur See DKM) (Kongelige Danske Marine Waddenzee [pennant K32], formerly Seiner Majestät Schiff Cöln [administrative pennant K71])
Kdr Katrina Didrika Franck KSN (formerly KptzS DKM) (Kongelige Danske Marine Midtjylland [pennant K33], formerly Seiner Majestät Schiff Dresden [administrative pennant K72])
The rank title equivalent of a navy captain in the Danish maritime warfare service is Kommandør (short-formed Kdr), literally translating as "commander". The service mark here is KSN, which literally means Kongelig Søværnet ("The Royal Navy"). The ship prefix for Danish warships is Kongelige Danske Marine ("Royal Danish Navy", using a different translation for "navy" here), short-formed KDM; in English-language publications, such is rendered as HDMS ("His/Her Danish Majesty's Ship"). Pennant numbers for cruisers are given superior K (Krydser); such was never given beforehand. The order of numbers for Danish cruisers begins at K20 and will count native cruisers first before adopted ships from other nations are brought in.
The three submarines mentioned in the narrative here...
Kapitänleutnant Haldis Jauslyn Spieß, Reichsfreiin von Freiburg DKM (Deutsches Marineschiff Halsbrüke, formerly Seiner Majestäts U-9 [pennant U09])
Lieutenant de Vaisseau Véronique Heidi, Freiin von Jeß de Réveille MN (formerly KptLt DKM) (Sous-Marin Victor Réveille [pennant S135], formerly Seiner Majestäts U-79 [administrative pennant U79])
KptLt Margarete Lubeck Prien KMDR (Deutsches Marineschiff Kamelien, formerly Kriegsmarineschiff U-47 [pennant U647])
In the Imperial Navy, submarines got the prefix Seiner Majestäts (literally "His Majesty's"), short-formed SM. Thus, when combined with pennant numbers such as SM U-9, such could literally be said here as "His Majesty's Submarine No. 9" (Seiner Majestäts Unterseeboot Nr. 9). In the universe of my stories, it was decided to allow German submarines to be named, names taken normally from the various non-city/town municipalities (Gemeinde in German), such being the effective equivalent of townships in Canada or the United States. Halsbrüke is a municipality in the state of Saxony (Sachsen) in former East Germany, located not far from Freiberg. The honorary ranks for subgirls in the German Navy is Kapitänleutnant (literally "lieutenant-captain", short-formed KptLt), which is the equal of a navy lieutenant in the Royal Navy.
After the Great War ended, some submarines were surrendered to the Allied nations to allow them to advance their own underwater warfare services. SM U-79 was one, she being taken over by the French and renamed SM Victor Réveille. This is why her human name combines the names of her first captain KptLt Heinrich Jeß (1884-1962) with her latter namesake CapV Victor Réveille (1866-1916); the latter's rank title is short for Capitaine de Vaisseau ("ship-of-the-line captain"), the equal of a captain in the Royal Navy. France doesn't use ship prefixes but type prefixes; the ship prefix here is Sous-Marin ("submarine"), short-formed SM (such influencing the pennant superior letter S, also meaning "Sous-Marin"). Véronique's rank in the Marine Nationale ("National Navy", short-formed MN) is Lieutenant de Vaisseau ("ship-of-the-line lieutenant", short-formed LtV), equal to a lieutenant in the Royal Navy.
In following the same habit the Royal Navy used with pennant numbers, the Kriegsmarine reused pennant numbers for their submarines and other unnamed ships. Thus, to provide one single list of pennant numbers for ALL of Germany's undersea warfare craft, the World War Two-era ships have their actual pennant number increased by 600 (thus giving space for all interwar submarines who could be seen as technically German by design but were built elsewhere). Thus, Margarete Prien (DMS Kamelien, née KMS U-47) — as an aside, she takes after her Azur Lane interpretation — would have pennant U647. Atop that, some World War Two-era submarines would get their new names from their unofficial ship's crest often displayed on the conning tower; the word kamelien is German for a type of camellia flower (Camellia sinensis) whose leaves go into making tea!
Now the two Danish shipgirls who appeared here, including one adopted from Germany...
Kommandør/Flotilleadmiral Christel Nielsdatter Iuel KSN (Kongelige Danske Marine Niels Iuel [pennant P15])
Kdr Hehilde Walburga Zenne KSN (also Kapitän zur See DKM) (Kongelige Danske Marine Limfjorden [pennant K35], would-be Seiner Majestät Schiff Wiesbaden [administrative pennant K73])
The Danish rank title Flotilleadmiral (short-form FA) is the local equivalent of a commodore in the Royal Navy. Note that pennant superior P means Panserskib ("Armoured Ship"), marking the effective capital ships in the Søværnet.
And finally from Canada...
Captain (Navy) Stacey Lynn Keel RCN(M) (His/Her Majesty's Canadian Ship Sunbeam [BB-48, formerly pennant 48])
Capt(N) Darlene Ann Saint Germain RCN(M) (His/Her Majesty's Canadian Ship Sundown [BB-50, formerly pennant 50])
As noted many times before, the magical battleships of the Dominion are my creation; their history is revealed in Magic and Canada. The service mark here is RCN(M), short for the Royal Canadian Naval Magical Service. Their rank title is Captain (Navy), short-formed Capt(N); this is done to differentiate the naval rank from the army/air force rank Captain (Capt), which is three steps down on the rank scale from the navy rank. The Royal Canadian Navy used British-style pennant numbers until 1946, when they switched to the American-style hull classification code system; naturally, BB indicates a battleship.
Translation list (all German save one): Guten Nachmittag — Good afternoon; Freiin — Free lady, equal of a baroness; Lieber Gott im Himmel — Dear God in Heaven; Mörderischer Abschaum — Murderous scum; Oberdeckoffizier — Senior Deck Officer, rank title in the Imperial Navy for a chief petty officer; Flådejomfruer — Fleet maidens (Danish); Oberfähnrich zur See — Senior Ensign at Sea, rank title for an officer candidate equal in rank to a first class petty officer in the Royal Canadian Navy; Interdimensionale Eindringlinge — Interdimensional invaders; Meine Flagschiffe — My flagship; Idiotische Magie — Idiot magicals; Metamenschen — Metahumans; Admirale — Plural of Admiral in German; Magische Königsproklamation — Magical Royal Proclamation; Tote Blutschweinhunde — Dead-blood pig-dogs, combining a local version of "staleblood" (see below) with the German language's most wounding insult; Krake — Kraken (can be both singular and plural).
The term Nimmib is my creation. It's the phonemicization of the initials NMMB, which is short for "non-magical magic-born". This is a "politically correct" way of addressing squibs in the Harry Potter series like Argus Filch. As an aside, staleblood is a deliberately-made insult to counter the term "mudblood"; the origins of same can be seen in Part Four of Magic and Canada.
Now, explaining the German noble honorifics...
A Fürstin (literally "lady first", normally translated "princess") is the wife/other female relative of the leader of a principality which is subordinate to a kingdom within the Holy Roman, German or Austrian empires; if such a principality is directly answerable to the Emperor himself (in other words, has imperial immediacy), the prefix title Reichs ("Imperial") is added.
A Kurfürstin (literally "electoress lady first", normally translated "princess electoress") is the wife/other female relation of the leader of the several principalities who have the right to nominate the next Emperor of the realm.
A Markgräfin (literally "lady count of the march") is the wife/other female relative of the leader of a county/province on the outer borders of an empire; in English, the German term Markgraf is often translated as Margrave. Such is the equivalent of a British marquess; the wife/female ruler of such a person is a Marchioness and their territory is known as a marquessate.
A Reichsfreiin (literally "imperial free lady", normally translated "imperial baroness") is the other female relative of the equal of a baron (in German, Freiherr or "free lord") granted imperial immediacy. Note that the wife of a Freiherr is known as a Freifrau; correspondingly, the wife of a Reichsfreiherr is a Reichsfreifrau.
Now the situation with Elizabeth Kitchener (HMS Hampshire): Her namesake is Field Marshal Herbert Kitchener, the first Earl Kitchener of Khartoum and Broome (1850-1916), so known due to his participation in the Battle of Omdurman near Khartoum in 1898 during the Anglo-Egyptian conquest of the Sudan from 1896-1899; as an aside, Broome Park in Canterbury in the County of Kent was is where the field marshal's country home was located. Due to the succession of the earldom being male-only, the death of the third earl, Henry Kitchener (1919-2011), without any heirs effectively rendered the peerage extinct. However, the younger Kitchener did have a brother who gave birth to a daughter, the Honourable Emma Kitchener (born 1963), now a lady-in-waiting to Princess Michael of Kent (born 1945), who tried to become the first Countess Kitchener. Sadly, the rules for royal succession which allowed the first-born child of any gender to succeed to the Throne were not extended to lower-ranked peerages, so Lady Emma lost out. This is why Elizabeth is given the title The Honourable in lieu of being made the Viscountess of Broome (title given to the wife of the immediate heir to the earldom) or Baroness of Denton (title given to the wife of the second-line heir to the earldom). As an aside, all noble titles in the House of Lords Wizengamot are my creation; they're better explained in the first Wizards and Avalonians side story to Phoenix From the Ashes.
Finally, Josephine "Jody" Crowley (Lady Shadow) is a character from the adult six-part OVA series Bible Black New Testament, released from 2004-2007. She is first noted on in this story in Part 19 of BmGmM. As noted there, Jody is actually a peer of the characters of the first anime OVA series released from 2001-2003. As she is said to be the granddaughter of the real-life Aleister Crowley (1875-1947) — founder of the spiritual religious movement Thelema — Josephine herself was born in the universe of this story in 1940, attending the Meridiana School of Magic (from Mahō Sensei Negima) from 1946-1956.
