Miho and her friends were in the lounge that was provided to them by Ami to house them between matches and let the teams catch up with each other. Miho was confused about who decided to visit them earlier and were talking about it to themselves.
"Who was that boy who came and visited us?" Saori asked as she was curious about it. "I bet he was cute enough to marry."
"I bet he was handsome, you should try dating someone." Hana added. Miho was trying to think about what happened.
"I don't think so, he didn't say who he was but he was looking for this one girl, all I got was the newspaper clipping of her and that was it. No introductions, no name or anything." Miho gave her answers that she didn't know who this person was.
"Who did you give the clipping to?" Mako asked. Yukari came in with the mess kits and the food.
"Trout, she was looking for the same girl as this boy, what they both want from her is beyond my understanding, we need to figure out more about this." Miho gave her answer. Yukari began serving them the food as she began describing what it was.
"I decided to put fish, cream, cheese, shrimp and potatoes together and placed scallions on top. Try it out for yourself." Yukari told them what she had made, she was licking her thumb to get some of the potato off of it. She began serving them what she had just served. Miho took a forkful and began eating it.
"It's strange but this is actually good. I think you've struck a gold mine when you made this." Miho smiled at Yukari, Hana was the last to serve herself as she went for the biggest piece of the meal.
"Hana is always the one to wait last so she could take all the leftovers." Yukari teased Miho as they were all sitting down and eating their food.
"What do you want to do afterward?" Saori asked, and she felt somewhat bored that they weren't going to be doing much as the weather was still their biggest killer. Now it was dark outside.
"Momo said we're not allowed to leave the hotel cabins until morning so we're stuck here. I think it's either we watch television or just call it a day, we have another match ahead so we need to get ready." Miho was being conscious about this, the team needed to rest up for tomorrow.
"Well I'm heading to bed after this, it was nice chatting with you." Yukari said with a smile. She finished her food and got up. She was going to head off to bed.
"Take care." Miho told her friend. Yukari walked into the sleeping area and climbed into bed. She placed her head on the fluffy pillow and immediately fell asleep. She was just that tired, the blanket was warm and fluffy, a perfect contrast to the cold coarse snow that laid outside of the room. She thought about the blanket and thought about Miho for just a moment, she turned her head and tried to clear Miho from her mind. She needed the rest.
The girls were sleeping in their beds when they woke up the next morning. Saori was up first and she was getting the group ready.
"Psst, guys, it's morning." Saori nudged them. The others got up to see the field was covered in another blanket of white. Miho stretched as this meant day two of the matches. Her phone began to buzz. Miho picked it up to see who it was.
"Hey someone, is trying to contact us." Miho told the group. The others were curious as Miho was reading who just texted them.
"Is it Shiho that is texting us?" Yukari asked as she got her snow clothes on.
"It's not, it's Viggen's commander, she wants to sit down and have a few words with us during breakfast." Miho answered Yukari's question. Miho continued to get her uniform on as she slipped on the wool socks and thermals.
"Well this should be interesting as I have yet to see Viggen." Yukari saluted Miho as this was a school they weren't familiar with they were facing against.
"I sure hope they are friendly." Miho sighed. She walked off with Yukari to get breakfast with the group.
Miho and the others had got what they wanted as the chefs were preparing food for them. Miho was astounded with what they were served as these chefs cared for them as if they were their guests. Trout walked over as Miho was speaking to her friends.
"They only serve breakfast so we're going to have to get stuff to make food again." Miho sighed as there was nothing that they were going to do.
"The store isn't too far off but we need to go in a big group as we can't be expected to carry all of those bags at once nor make multiple trips." Hana told Miho to look on the bright side of this, they didn't have to drive very far.
"Well I guess you're right about that." Miho sighed.
"Good morning Miho, how did you sleep last night?" Trout asked her. She was trying her best to keep her chin up with what was going on.
"Fine, but don't know what today would bring." Miho told her friend that she had an okay night's rest but she didn't know what today was going to bring her.
"We're against Kuromorimine which I am nervous about. They're masters at Sensha-Do but I don't know how well they're going to hold up here?" Trout asked Miho about her insecurities.
"Depends, if Kuromorimine is willing to give you mercy." Miho answered her question. Trout laughed a bit before Miho began speaking again. "I'm actually serious. If Maho's in a good mood, she'll try to play fair but if not, she's going to decimate you."
"Okay I'll go talk to her." Trout turned away as Miho went over to the commander of Viggen's team. She was busy having breakfast with her vice commander. Miho pulled a chair out and sat down in it.
"So you're the one who texted me?" Miho asked her. The commander looked up to Miho and began speaking.
"Yes I did, I wanted to meet with you before the match started, I'm Tatiana by the way." Tatiana introduced herself. Miho shook her hand. Tatiana had beautiful long brown hair and light blue eyes. She had an average build though she remained the more laid back of the students.
"Nice to meet you Tatiana, does your school practice Sensha-Do, that's what we do back in my school." Miho asked her about the sport that they participated in when it was warmer out.
"We do have tanks but that really isn't my style, I prefer this and skiing." Tatiana replied. Miho nodded.
"So more of a winter type of person huh you have tanks but you don't participate?" Miho asked her.
"Yeah, I guess that is how you can put it." Tatiana replied. "I'm willing to play fair though I won't go easy on you as your school managed to pull off that victory again." Tatiana was talking about the fact that they were competing for the last spot, one of them was going to be taken down for the other one to move on ahead.
"What victory are you talking about?" Miho asked, she was skeptical about what Tatiana was saying.
"The victory over Kuromorimine last year. You got me interested but not willing to participate as of yet, we're just going to see how the wind blows and which way the pine branch snaps." Tatiana responded. "I'll tell you what, I'll finish breakfast and we'll meet on the field."
"Sounds good to me." Miho nodded with the response. She decided to keep eating as the match against Tatiana and her team was inevitable.
•1&3 Maple High school vs Kuromorimine
•5&7 Ooarai Girls Academy Vs Viggen High School
Miho and her group were walking along and talking about what she spoke to the Viggen commander about.
"What did she say?" Azusa asked, she was carrying her helmet with her as she just had a hat on her head.
"I don't know if she's willing to go easy on us as we managed to beat Kuromorimine that one time but let's see how it goes." Miho was still skeptical about the whole match and what Tatiana had in mind. This match could go either way.
"Me and Aya were chatting with a couple of students and when Aya mentioned meatballs, their mouths just watered, I wonder if that would be the same if we said Pasta?" Azusa asked. Momo then came along.
"Could be, I can call Chiyomi to see if this could be the trick." Momo added in. She got out her phone and decided to dial in her number. Momo then placed the phone to her ear and waited for her to answer.
"Hello?" Anchovy asked.
"Hey Chiyomi, I wanted to ask you something." Momo began.
"Yeah, what is it?" Anchovy asked.
"Would the girls of Viggen have their mouths water when we say Pasta? We know from Aya that they do this with meatballs." Momo asked if this was going to be true.
"Did you say Pasta? Meatballs with them too?" Anchovy asked, she was now really excited to see that word had been muttered.
"Chiyomi calm down, we're not sending you food over to your school but we need this information so we can win." Momo tried her best to keep Anchovy calm so she didn't go insane for Pasta.
"I've seen them and they're much like us, so you can give it a try." Anchovy was skeptical but her guess was based on a hunch that could possibly be successful.
"Okay that's all I wanted to ask." Momo replied.
"Okay see you." Anchovy then hung up as Momo had a plan. They continued to walk as Miho spotted Naomi talking to the boy that she saw the day before. Naomi had flagged him down.
"It's like she wandered off into the fort and started singing. The ghosts of the past filled the air and started dancing with her but I think she must've passed out afterward. We're still trying to figure out her family." Naomi told him about what she must've seen yesterday. He nodded.
"Well I have to go, it was nice chatting with you and I'll hopefully use that information to find her but I definitely wanted to give this to her when we first saw each other when she was fourteen. I danced with her that one night and wanted to give her my music box but I couldn't find her. Anyways, see ya." He turned and walked away.
"Wait, I didn't get your name sir!" Naomi called out. He ignored her and kept walking. There went an opportunity to piece more of the puzzle together.
Miho and her group had gotten themselves together as they were at their starting position.
"Okay should we try the same strategy that won us the last round of splitting up and trapping the enemy?" Miho asked her friends if that would be the best plan for the match.
"I wouldn't count on that, we should see what the enemy is up to, Saunders was distracted which allowed Noriko and Akebi to catch them off guard so we should rely on Memphis group to deal most of the damage while we skirmish with the rest of the team. Nya." Nekota told the group that they should be observant to what Viggen might do. Ooarai had blue balloons while Viggen had orange balloons, the mortar fired into the air and signaled for the match to start.
"Okay everyone, split up." Miho ordered the rest of the group to begin splitting up as they could cover more ground but also keep tabs on the enemy. Miho and Yukari were the only ones that continued going straight.
Nekota and Momoga headed off to a far part of the path as they expected Viggen to pass by. Momoga took out her binoculars and began to scan the horizon to see if there was any sign of Viggen. Suddenly one of the Viggen snowmobiles came cruising along the area before it stopped.
"What do you think is going on?" Momoga asked as she was observing what was happening.
"You're the one with the binoculars, so you tell me." Nekota responded. Momoga turned her head down as the two students were busy setting up something.
"It looks like they're setting up some kind of radar device." Momoga told Nekota. Nekota nodded as she began thinking of a plan.
"We don't know what kind of radar this might be but we need to knock it out before it starts picking up stuff that we don't like." Nekota told her friend. "Guard Kira." She ordered. Nekota hopped off of her snowmobile and began to sneak up on the two students who were busy setting up the radar station to locate Ooarai. The two students were talking to each other while Nekota clutched her grease gun.
"Yeah we should be able to get this up and running in a couple of minutes Tatiana." One of the students began. She began computing the information while the other student was typing up what needed to be done. Then the wheel began to spin, sending out signals to the girls of what was going to happen, it made an audible ping every few seconds.
"Okay good, I see you got the machine up and running, now we should have an easy time locating Ooarai." Tatiana nodded to her friend. "Keep up the good work."
"Okay got ya." She responded. Nekota kept herself low which was hard to do as she was one of the taller Ooarai students. She went prone into the snow and continued sneaking up on them.
"Okay, permission to fire?" Nekota asked, wondering if it would be a good time to catch them off guard as they were still busy testing their radar.
"Go ahead, they should be distracted." Momoga gave Nekota the go ahead to begin firing. Nekota raised her Grease gun and began firing away at the Viggen students. The two students were caught off guard as one of their balloons popped.
"We're under attack!" One of the students shouted. She raised her husqvarna m/38 and fired it at Nekota thinking she was the one attacking them. Nekota fired again as she popped another one of their balloons. They panicked and began to make their retreat back onto their snowmobile as they then drove away, dumping the radar equipment into the ground. Nekota reloaded her grease gun as Momoga drove up.
"We certainly scared them off." Momoga began. Nekota paused but she began speaking to her friend.
"Hang on." Nekota told her. She walked up and picked up the radar device they had set up. "If this can be correct, they're trying to locate our team but at the same time, locate themselves. I say we take this with us so we can hunt down the remaining Viggen students." Nekota gave her a suggestion. Momoga began to think about it as taking the radar with them will help them keep tabs with the rest of the team.
"Okay, mount it on the back and I'll drive us off." Momoga told Nekota. The former nodded as Nekota quickly secured the device in place. Momoga then drove off to locate the rest of the team.
Shiloh, Memphis and Shelby groups had driven out to meet the main group in the center. Oakley group had recently split off to flank and provide a bit of a distraction for the rest of the group.
"Kira group has located a radar device the other school has abandoned in panic and they're giving the coordinates of Viggen's groups back to us." Miho began talking to the rest of the group.
"What do you think Viggen is doing now?" Azusa asked, she was hoping to do some hit and run and try taking out an enemy group as the shotgun she had could guarantee that at close range.
"Viggen has split up so the battles have to be individual. Don't get caught out." Miho told Memphis group that they could do what they needed but they needed to be careful.
"Okay we're moving out." Azusa responded, and within a moment, Memphis group pulled away as they were now going to find any foes and flank them. Shiloh and Shelby teams decided to move off in a pair to cover each other's backs.
Oakley group had spotted one of Viggen's snowmobiles; they were busy trying to get themselves reorganized as they had just lost their radar device.
"Well we got one." Riko began. Takako prepared her M1 Garand and she began to fire it, popping another balloon. The Viggen snowmobile stopped as the student began firing her Automatgevar M/42 and started a duel with them and popped one of Oakley's balloons in return. Riko drove off as Takako reloaded. They began a retreating fight as Takako fired back on them. The other team was catching up quickly as both sides exchanged fire but the Viggen team didn't need to reload as often but their reloads were swift. Both sides lost a balloon of their own and continued firing away. The viggen group came in at close range as both sides fired at each other's last balloon at the same time, both balloons popped as they had both been eliminated. Nekota looked on as one of their groups and one of her groups had eliminated themselves.
"Well one down, four to go." Nekota responded. She spotted the fleeing group and pulled out her Grease gun. The viggen student whipped out her pistol and fired, popping one of Kira groups balloons. Nekota responded with a burst of her grease gun, popping the last one of theirs.
"Two down, we suspect the rest of them are still out there." Nekota took count to see who was still left. She then turned to see another Viggen snowmobile charging straight at them, their light machine gun blazing away, popping one of their balloons. "Begin firing!" Nekota shouted, Momoga whipped out his secondary as Nekota fired the grease gun away, they managed to pop one of their balloons before the group got close and eliminated Kira groups last balloon. That was another group down.
"Three, three, we still need to tip this ball into our favor, Memphis group is still in play so they could get some eliminations, if they take out just two of the groups before going down, they will be outgunned as we will have free range on the last group." Miho counted on how many groups were still in play and this ball was still in anybody's court. Now they needed to snatch it up and get a win.
"Hey here they come now." Akebi told Miho as she raised the alarm, she raised her rifle and fired, she managed to pop one of Tatianna's balloons as she and Yukari began opening fire. The remaining teams skidded to a stop, and they began firing back. One of Shelby group's balloons popped as Yukari fired back, popping two more balloons in the process. Memphis group had managed to get behind the others and began driving to them. Azusa knew that Viggen had fallen for their special trick.
"Good they're distracted, let's sweep around and finish them off." Azusa gave the order. Aya began driving up as Azusa got her Auto 5 ready. Once they got within a safe range, Azusa began rapid firing the shotgun, popping all of Viggen's remaining balloons. This was an automatic game over for them. Tatiana looked behind her to see the two students managed to outflank them and deal heavy damage to their team.
"I think this is the reason why I was hesitant about using shotguns." Tatiana sighed. She slumped down as even though they knocked out two groups this match, they didn't count for Aya and Azusa dealing the finishing blow.
Once the match was cleaned up, Tatiana began speaking with Miho.
"Well, I was expecting a victory, your vice commander is onto something. Well I wish you luck for the final match." Tatiana gave her luck to Miho that the final spot was for her. "Also the radar devices tracked the wrist bands you girls had so we had no trouble finding you."
"But we found you instead." Nekota came over as she had just removed her helmet.
"True but we wish you luck." Tatiana then turned and walked away from the scene. Momo walked over to Miho and the group as she wanted to see the results.
"Well, did you use the special trick I told you about?" Momo asked Miho.
"Well, we did not, they found us instead of us finding them." Miho replied.
"Okay, did you still win?" Momo asked Miho again.
"We did, ths final round is clear in our path." Miho responded.
"Good." Momo said before she turned and walked away. Trout walked up to Miho with Jessica.
"Hey what's up, did you win?" Miho asked Trout.
"We did not. Kuromorimine relied on movement, so they managed to out sped us all. We were never expecting them to move at that speed. We're pretty quick on our feet but not like this." Trout responded that they lost the second match. "It's you against Kuromorimine in the finals."
"Okay let's see what my sister has to throw at me?" Miho asked herself as they were now against Kuromorimine.
Viggen was interesting but now Ooarai had to face an old enemy if they were going to be champions for the sport. Everything teetered on the match coming up.
Olivia had been watching the matches ahead as she decided to sit down with Maho with some discussion.
"Maho I've noticed something peculiar with Ooarai's strategy so far." Olivia began. Maho looked at her friend and she seemed curious.
"What about it?" Maho asked.
"Well I've noticed that Rabbit team is moving around to the rear and taking them out when the time is right, all the matches so far have ended this way so we need to formulate a plan to prevent this as if we let this happen, Ooarai can win easily." Olivia expressed her concern that Memphis group was doing all of the heavy lifting and causing Ooarai to win.
"So you're saying, when we face Ooarai, they're the biggest threat to our victory?" Maho asked her if this was going to be correct.
"That's correct, we should focus on them first if we're going to survive any long battles of attrition. If the matches of Sensha-Do have taught us is to take out the most devastating weapon of the enemy team first so they don't make any attempts are serious pushes." Olivia told Maho of her plan and what the priority threat to their victory was.
"Okay good, I'm happy you're putting in the effort, try coming up with a plan for tomorrow." Maho patted Olivia on her head before the latter walked away to continue her research.
Ooarai was going to face their old enemy coming up tomorrow and both sides needed to be prepared for it.
[A/N]: We're almost at 200 views and we're slowly creeping our way up. While I wrap up the first part of these matches and find who Trout was talking about. I'll have the second part be much longer with some more interactions between the characters.
