Eyre approached the medical APC, as Victoria and Gibson exited the vehicle, almost completely recovered from their injuries during the match. Peering inside, she could see Tanami and Simpson lying on medical beds, unconscious, before joining Victoria. Running up to the two, she could see Victoria's head was bandaged, from the impact where she hit her head on the falling tank, while Gibson only had minor bruises on her arms and legs.
"How are you feeling?" Eyre asked the two girls. The duo looked at each other.
"We're pretty good. Thankfully, we weren't too badly injured, unlike Tanami and Simpson in there." Gibson looked away, apparently trying to hide some shame, before Victoria spoke again. "Don't worry, Gibson. There wasn't anything you could do about it when it happened."
Eyre was now confused, as she was about to ask what had happened, before choosing not to. Looking to the right of her, she could see the commander of St. Gloriana approach her, accompanied by her aides, one of them was holding a small polished wooden container, containing fine details in all sorts of colours. Darjeeling looked to Eyre, before she turned her gaze towards Victoria and Gibson.
"I have a gift for you," she spoke as Orange Pekoe stepped forward, opening the polished container, revealing a set of expensive tea cups.
Victoria and Gibson looked to each other in confusion, as Eyre watched them with great interest. "Uh… that's a nice tea set, but what does that have to do with us." Victoria spoke, as Eyre learned to whisper into Victoria's ear. "Oh, I'm flattered that you think of us this way, but we still lost."
Darjeeling sighed, as Orange Pekoe closed the container. "It doesn't matter that you lost. You still performed admirably, and nearly knocked out our tank. Your tank and the other Stuart nearly cost us the match, so I see it fitting that you should receive St. Gloriana's highest award of honour. Take care of it."
Orange Pekoe handed the container over to Victoria, as Darjeeling turned to Eyre. "It has been a long time since we last met. How have you been."
"It's been fine here, but I must say, those Tetrarchs lit themselves on fire, I had nothing to do with it." replied Eyre, defensively.
Darjeeling sighed. "It's okay, we had them all repaired. It's a shame that we parted ways on not the best terms, but I wish you and your team the best in future matches. It is nice to know that even former St. Gloriana students still fight in Sensha-do with elegance."
Turning around, Darjeeling began to head for the main hub, with her two accomplices trailing not far behind. "Elegance my ass," Eyre muttered under her breath. Turning to the two girls carefully examining the tea set, she fixed her eyes onto Victoria. "That's a real nice tea set. You should consider yourself lucky. In my two years in St. Gloriana, she only handed out three of those sets."
"You bet it's nice. I think we could sell this for at least a thousand dollars, if not more." Victoria replied, closing the box. She began to rush towards the barbecue area, where she planned to store it next to her other belongings, before tripping over a rock and falling to the ground. The box containing the tea set became airborne momentarily, before slamming into the ground. A loud cracking noise could be heard when the box struck the ground. Gibson quickly rushed to Victoria's side, as Victoria got up to her feet again, before bending down and opening the box. The soft interiors of the box was not enough to save the chinaware, as every item in the box was in at least seven pieces. Eyre bumped Victoria on the shoulder.
"Good job, Victoria. You managed to nearly knock out the flag tank, and yet you can't hold a tea set,"
"Shut up, Eyre," Victoria replied before she turned to Gibson. "Get me the flamethrower. We need to get rid of this before Tanami wakes up, otherwise she's gonna be livid." Gibson gave a call of confirmation before rushing off to find the nearest flame spewing weapon, while Eyre began to search for appropriate firewood to accompany the burning of the box, leaving Victoria alone, holding a box of broken items. Waiting for a while, she suddenly felt the ground vibrate as a loud rumbling sound drew closer. Turning to face the sound, she could see Gibson's head just poking out the hatch of a Churchill Crocodile.
"Eey, nice tank you got there." Victoria turned around to this new voice, seeing Eyre, as she placed dough onto large sticks to make damper with, as well as much firewood as she could carry. Placing the box down a fair while away from the flamethrowing tank, Eyre surrounded it with the firewood she carried, before handing Victoria one of the sticks to make damper. Climbing from the driver's seat to the gunner's, Gibson carefully aimed the gun of the Churchill, before firing it. The gun spewed out fire at an incredible speed, arching incredibly hot flames, as it struck the firewood. The flames instantly spread, creating a plume of fire two metres tall, as the wooden box began to burn. From the crackling of the fire, the three could hear the explosions of the chinaware inside. Soon, the fire died down, as it ran out of fuel to consume, before Eyre began to use a large stick she had found to flatten the ashes. Now with the fire extinguished, she placed down the damper sticks, letting them cook in the still hot ashes, before heading to the medical APC to check on the two injured teammates. Inside, she could see both Tanami and Simpson sitting up, having recovered from most of their injuries, before Victoria and Gibson arrived, entering the APC and carrying their teammates out. The five of them returned to the makeshift campfire they created, where they saw Murray, Darling and Yarra, crowding around the ashes as they placed their own damper into it to cook. The eight girls, now reunited, sat around the remains of the campfire, waiting for their food to cook, as Yarra began to pass around cans of non-alcoholic beer they had procured from the crate Wallaby opened. By the time Eyre had received her can, both Yarra and Darling sitting next to her had chugged down their cans. Taking a closer look at the can, she realised that it said in small words, 'contains alcohol'. Placing the can down, she looked to her teammates, each at a different stage of their can.
"Uh, girls," she said. "You do realise this is actual alcohol, right?" The girls all put down their cans, before examining it, all coming to the same realisation.
"Should we tell Wallaby, or anyone else?" Darling suggested. The other girls shook their heads in disagreement.
"If Wallaby finds out that we've stuffed up the distribution of the beer, she's gonna kill us." replied Eyre. "Let's just keep quiet and eat our damper, and hope to god that nothing bad happens."
The girls all nodded in agreement, as they grabbed the soda bread that had cooked in the ashes of their ad hoc campfire.