Soon enough, the day of the exercise arrived, and I found myself almost giddy with excitement. It'd been a while since I'd seen the kansen in action, and longer still since I'd seen them in non-lethal combat. And, if I'm being perfectly honest, I was really excited to see Scharnhorst in action. Gneisenau, too, of course, but mostly Scharnhorst.
So imagine my surprise when I get to the exercise area and find Taihou waiting for me in full rigging. "What...are you doing here, Taihou?" I slowly began, eyeing her up and down. "Didn't you say you were running the office today while I was gone?"
"Oh, I got Shangri-La to cover for me," she hummed happily as she leaned up against me, her face growing uncomfortably close to mine. "But I heard there was an exercise for the new arrivals and I had to be here to show you just how strong and amazing I am!"
"Uh-huh…" I dryly responded as I leaned my head away from hers. "And all that talk about combat not being your thing when you took over as secretary?"
"Oh, I eschew combat, but if you're watching, then I simply can't let myself be locked away and deny you the beauty and majesty of my power!" she breathed into my ear, her voice barely above a whisper. "After all, we can't let those two from the Iron Blood have all the fun, can we?"
"I see you're getting very well acquainted with your new secretary, Commander…" Scharnhorst's annoyed, yet amused voice interrupted Taihou's...love offensive, much to my relief. The carrier, however, looked exceptionally annoyed for a moment, shooting Scharnhorst a scathing glare that rivaled the battlecruiser's own before it was replaced by a sickly sweet smile.
"Oh, he is," she answered, wrapping her arms around me tightly, even going so far as to hook a leg around my waist. "Why, our relationship is almost...intimate."
"Almost...but it isn't," I cooly rebuffed her as I disentangled myself from Taihou, much to her anger and dismay. Doing my best to ignore the betrayed look she was giving me, I strode over to Scharnhorst, who was similarly decked out in her rigging. "You're looking good," I said with a smile as I examined her equipment. "Vestal did great work in getting you back up and running. Hell of a lot better than the first time I saw you."
She looked away, her cheeks flushed as she crossed her arms over her chest. "Yeah, yeah, don't go reminding me. At least now you'll be able to see how strong Gneisenau and I really are, though!"
"Can't wait," I replied as I smiled at her enthusiasm. "I've been looking forward to this if I'm being honest."
That caught her attention, and she glanced back at me, eyebrow raised. "...yeah?"
"Of course!" I nodded eagerly. "I've only ever read about your exploits in dry reports and secondhand accounts. I've been waiting to see you tearing things up in person."
Her jaw worked up and down as she tried to find the words. Unfortunately, we'll never know what they would have been as Taihou rudely interrupted us. "And see her you shall, Shikikan-sama," she said, her words dripping with honeyed venom. "But I think it's time for us to prepare, don't you agree, dear Scharnhorst?"
Before Scharnhorst could answer, Taihou hooked an arm around hers and began none-too-subtly(or gently) dragging the Iron Blood battlecruiser away. "Y-yeah. See you out there, Commander!"
I chuckled and waved to her as she tried to pry her arm free of Taihou's apparent iron grip. "Good hunting!" I called out, watching them for a few moments more before turning and heading up to the observation station.
As its name implied, the observation station was an overlook that allowed spectators to get an excellent view of any exercises that were going on down in the lagoon below. In addition to the commanding view, it also had several screens that could show up-close shots of the particular combatants, as well as a holomap to display any relevant tactical data. While it could comfortably fit a dozen or more, today I found it to be empty.
Unsurprising, given the routine nature of the exercise. Most leaders tended to be hands-on, and they could go through the recorded combat data just as well once the operation was completed. The only time this space saw any real use was during a friendly duel when two kansen decided to test themselves in one on one combat or to settle an argument. The last time was...Shangri-La versus Hornet. While it was ruled a draw, I think they both came away winners, considering they'd learned something from the fight.
At least there had been quite a few people in here with me last time. Now, it was just me, and the silence was deafening. I was so rarely alone at any point in my life, especially nowadays. Only in my apartment did I find myself truly alone, and I spent so little time there while actually awake, it was practically negligible.
Here, I was alone with my thoughts, and I found them inexorably drawn to Scharnhorst. Her question from a few weeks ago was ringing in my ears, as was my answer. Why was I doing this? My original answer to her wasn't a lie, but it wasn't entirely honest, either. I kept going back to the moment in the launch, seeing that tender, vulnerable side to her, feeling her in my arms. I still kept wondering if it was a genuine connection or if I was just going through post-breakup depression and looking desperately for a replacement.
Was I simply looking for a friend? I hardly opened up to anyone on base, considering my status as Commanding Officer, and the last one was Shangri-La. Now that she was, at least for the time being, unavailable, was I just looking for a confidant, someone outside of the regular command structure I could unburden myself to? I sighed heavily and looked out the window again as I doubted I would find the answers I sought any time soon…
My self-reflection was interrupted by movement out on the lagoon as the girls sailed out to their starting positions. I quickly turned on the monitors and holotable and made sure to highlight Scharnhorst in all of them. After taking a step back and realizing just how weird and creepy that looked, I left Scharnhorst on two of the monitors and focused Gneisenau and Taihou on the other two.
The expressions worn on the faces of the three women could not have been any different. Gneisenau had her calm, collected, "business-as-usual" expression as she sailed in formation with her sister. Taihou had a giddy, but somewhat sinister smile, and an almost manic look on her face. Scharnhorst, however, was a wolfish, predatory, but resolute mask. The hunter in her element, at long last. I could see the hunger in her eye, not to impress me or to make a good impression on the other kansen, but the hunger to win. I only wondered if she could temper that hunger, lest she be lured into a trap.
As they took up their starting positions, I surveyed some of the kansen selected for the opposing force. A fairly even mix between Royal Navy and Eagle Union shipgirls, most of whom had never faced down any of the three Crimson Axis women. One name caught my attention, however, and when I saw it, I let out a quiet, "Oh, no…"
HMS Glorious.
As soon as I saw her name, I felt bad for the poor girl. I'm sure that Scharnhorst would be eager to repeat history and score an easy kill. Of course, that could be part of the plan, trying to lure Scharnhorst in and cut her off. In any case, this fight just got a lot more interesting…
Before too long, the kansen had all taken their starting positions, and the starting horn sounded across the training lagoon. All at once, the shipgirls leaped into action, moving out as they tried to outflank or outmanuever their opponents. All except Scharnhorst.
Immediately, she began making a beeline for Glorious, just as I anticipated, and if their movements were any indication, so had the opposing fleet. Already they were maneuvering to intercept her with Cooper and Grenville, with Pensacola in close support and West Virginia bringing up the rear. For what it's worth, it was a fairly good strategy. As long as the two destroyers were afloat, they could force Scharnhorst to keep away from them and simply wear her down with long-range firepower. But Scharnhorst and Gneisenau had learned from their mistakes.
Coming up close behind her sister, Gneisenau opened up with a volley of high explosive shells that beautifully arced through the air before coming down right on top of Grenville. The smoke and flame momentarily obscured the top-heavy destroyer before she burst out of it, her guns blazing furiously. Scharnhorst waited for another half-second before she opened up with a volley of her own, and when that failed to stop the Royal Navy kansen, a second salvo from Gneisenau finished her off.
I had expected Cooper and Pensacola to back off, but instead, they pressed on, charging directly for the pair of battlecruisers. As I watched them bravely charge into the jaws of death, I idly wondered if they'd read up on Scharnhorst and Gneisenau, more specifically, their armaments. Whether they had or not was about to be rendered a moot point but the sudden arrival of an unexpected ally.
As Cooper lined up her torpedo salvo on Scharnhorst, a squadron of B7As came screaming out of the clouds, raining their destructive payloads directly on the poor girl. She tried to dodge, but there were simply too many bombs and she was the second ship to go down. At this point, Pensacola had begun to retreat, but it was too late for her. Scharnhorst and Gneisenau had her under their guns, and they were laying down a punishing barrage. But it wasn't either of them who finished her off.
Once again, diving from the clouds was another flight of B7As, this time armed with torpedoes, and dropped a full spread right into Pensacola's path. Even without the pounding she'd taken from the Not-So-Ugly Sisters, the salvo would have finished her off when it impacted with a thunderous explosion and massive geysers of water.
Something began to bother me, and I changed the focus of one of the cameras to Taihou and waited to see if my suspicions were confirmed. Now only West Virginia stood in the way of the onrushing battlecruisers, and I somehow doubted that she would be able to stop either of them, let alone Scharnhorst. The others were rushing to the middle, desperately trying to help out Glorious and her battleship escort, but they were being punished by Scharnhorst and Gneisenau's allies who were pushing hard on the flanks.
In a fluid, coordinated move that could have only come with years of practice, the sister ships broke left and right, crossing each other's wakes as they quickly flanked the slower battleship. Almost before West Virginia had time to react, both Scharnhorst and Gneisenau dropped a spread of torpedoes. The warheads detonated in a staccato series of thumps and explosions of water and steam, but it wasn't what knocked West Virginia out of the match.
For the third time, Taihou's planes descended from the sky and dropped their lethal payload just in the nick of time to get credit for the "kill". Anger welled up inside me as I realized what she was doing, and it was doubled by the frustrating fact that I couldn't do anything about it. Warning Scharnhorst or reprimanding Taihou would constitute interrupting the match and render the entire exercise null and void without a valid reason. And "someone's kill stealing" wasn't a valid cause to do so. Not to mention it would reek of favoritism on my part, showing a clear bias to Scharnhorst. So I simply sat on my hands, gritted my teeth, and watched this play out.
Glorious was in full retreat now, futilely trying to reach safety, with Scharnhorst hot on her heels. The Iron Blood battlecruiser opened up with everything she had, hurtling an impressive amount of firepower downrange. Columns of water towered over Glorious as the shells began to land around her, then they began to find their mark. Smoke began to pour from her rigging, and her movements became halted and sluggish. She wasn't going to make it, and I wanted to scream for Scharnhorst to finish her quickly before Taihou could intervene and steal the kill once more.
But it was not meant to be. Her dive bombers, now reloaded, descended from above and dropped the coup de grace on Glorious, knocking her out in a thunderous explosion. With over half of the opposing team knocked out, and the remaining survivors cut off from one another, the match was called, and Scharnhorst and her team were announced the winners. As much as I wanted to celebrate the victory, all I could do was stare at Taihou's smug grin on the monitors until she turned to the camera, and gave it an unsettling smile. A cold shudder ran through me before I quickly shut everything down and headed down to meet Scharnhorst.
By the time I got down to the training area, I could hear Scharnhorst's angry voice and I immediately picked up the pace. While I couldn't make out what she was saying at first, I had a pretty good suspicion, and as I got closer, those suspicions were confirmed.
"...stole my kills, you overinflated fire chicken!" she angrily spat. As I rounded the corner, I saw her nearly nose to nose with Taihou, or at least, as close as those two could get given their superstructures. "I just checked the data and you waited until you could deny me my rightful kill!"
Taihou's smug grin was from ear to ear, and I could almost feel the superiority radiating off of her. "Perhaps you should try and do better to secure your kills quicker, battlecruiser. It's not my fault I had to mop up your sloppy work."
"That's it!" Scharnhorst snapped, her hands balling up into fists as she got ready to lay out her tormentor.
"And halt!" I barked, startling the two women and halting the feud, at least for the moment.
Scharnhorst at least had the dignity to look surprised and somewhat chastised by my order, but Taihou had the audacity to act like I hadn't figured out what was going on. "My Commander!" she exclaimed as she ran over to me, draping herself across my chest. "Thank goodness you're here! This...bloodthirsty creature was about to attack me simply because I outperformed her in the exercise!" I don't know who she thought she was fooling with acting so terrible it made a late-night horror film look like Shakespearean theater.
"Outperformed?!" Scharnhorst shouted, and I held up my hand to forestall any further outbursts from her. With my other hand, I carefully pried Taihou away from me and took a step back.
"Something you need to learn about Scharnhorst, Taihou," I said, addressing the Sakura carrier in a cool, calm, voice. "Is that her voice carries. I heard her, clear as day, and I also know, she's right. I saw what you were doing from the observation deck, and I want you to know if you pull a stunt like that ever again, you're going to find yourself permanently on long-distance patrols with Albacore and only Albacore. Do I make myself clear?"
Now Taihou looked sufficiently cowed as she nodded eagerly, her ruby eyes cast down towards the ground. "Hai, Shikikan-sama."
"Good. Now go shower and grab lunch, I'll meet you back at the office."
She looked back up, beamed happily at me, and took off in the direction of the locker rooms. I watched her go for a minute, then sighed and shook my head as I turned back to Scharnhorst, who had a decidedly unhappy look on her face. "You knew?" she asked accusatorily.
"There was nothing I could do," I answered, holding up my hands to try and hold off the anger that I knew was coming. "As much as I hated what she was doing, it was, unfortunately, within the rules of the exercise. If I stopped the exercise, it would have been undue favoritism and I can't undermine my command for that." She scowled at me and folded her arms over her chest, but said nothing. "Look," I continued, "while the exercise results may not reflect it, I saw just how powerful and impressive you are out there, you and Gneisenau both. That looked like a remarkably idiotic and bullheaded stunt at first, but you proved me very, very wrong. You did great out there, no matter what Taihou says."
That seemed to calm her down somewhat, and she peered at me with an unsure hope in her eye. "Y-yeah?" she asked uncertainly.
"Yeah," I reassured her. "No soft-soap. You had all of them dead to rights. Well, except maybe Cooper. But the rest should have been yours, and as far as I'm concerned, they are. Might not reflect on the official record, but I know it and you know it."
That restored some of her usual confidence and bravado, and her smug grin slowly returned to her beautiful face. "Damn right I do," she declared, more and more of her old self coming back now. "I just get bent outta shape when someone else tries to steal my glory, you know?"
I eagerly nodded in understanding. "Oh, trust me, I know. I've run into far too many people who are more than happy to coast along on someone else's hard work. Believe me when I said I'd put her on permanent long-range patrol if she pulled a stunt like that again."
"Albacore and all?"
"I'd make them hold hands the entire time."
Scharnhorst snickered and shook her head. "Fair enough. Gonna keep her on as secretary?"
After giving it a moment's thought, I sighed and nodded reluctantly. "Yeah. She's still damn good as a secretary, and unless you're volunteering yourself and Gneisenau to come back-" She snorted derisively. "-then I'm going to keep her on. I'm going to watch her like a hawk, but I'll keep her for now."
"Watch her like a hawk," she chuckled, that familiar predatory grin appearing once more. "With a bustline like that, I bet you are."
"Oh, for the love of…" I muttered and rolled my eyes.
"I just hope I'm invited to the wedding," she continued, undaunted. "I'm sure it'll be a beautiful ceremony for the three of you. Will each one get a bouquet?"
"Keep it up and I'll make you the goddamn flower girl!" I shot back. "Find the frilliest, most 'frou-frou' dress I can find and have you slowly walk down the aisle, tossing little flowers everywhere. And not just any flowers, the frilliest, girliest flowers I can find."
"It'd be worth it to watch true lust, I mean, love, fully realized."
"God, you are insufferable," I sighed, but I was unable to keep the huge smile from my face.
"And yet, here you are," she grinned.
"Maybe I'm just a glutton for punishment. Besides, you're still here."
"Maybe I just like to see you suffer."
"How about we continue your torture sessions over lunch?"
"About damn time, I'm starving!"
Things settled back into a familiar routine, at least for another couple of weeks. Taihou continued to excel at her duties while pushing the boundaries of personal, let alone, professional space, and Scharnhorst and Gneisenau continued to train hard. Unfortunately, Scharnhorst's busy schedule and mine didn't sync up as often, so our sparring appointments had fallen by the wayside. I never realized how much I missed them until now. Still, I thought we could maintain a decent relationship even if we had a dry spell every now and again. What I had failed to realize, however, was the distance growing between Scharnhorst and myself wasn't just bad timing, but the actions of a certain someone acting to keep us apart. And unbeknownst to myself, things were about to take a much more severe turn…
A/N-Carriers, man. Always kill-stealing, right? Well, I'm sure that now that Taihou's been warned, absolutely nothing bad will happen now. No, sir, clear skies and calm seas from here on out. On an unrelated note, got something done that I'm excited to show you guys on December 19th. It's not another story, but it is related to Until the Last Shell! Until next time, fair winds and following seas!
