[A/N]: Finally got a computer for proper editing! Now hopefully I'll be able to get more chapters out. Sorry for the cliffhanger, but it seemed like a good place the end it :P

As always, check out Touhoufanatic's side of this story. He's a great writer!

With that said, enjoy!

Come the morning after the battle I'm hating myself more than I was last night.

Eager to drown the memories of the massacre I gladly joined in the festivities aboard Intrepid's ship. I didn't dance, or play pool, or even talk with people. No, I was there only to drink, and drink I did, an entire bottle of vodka and a quarter of a bottle of scotch from my own stash.

When I wake up my head pounds like a church bell on Sunday, but thankfully I find myself aboard my own ship, though I can't find one of my crutches. I reluctantly haul myself to my feet and limp my way to Hope's ship for my morning checkup.

When I get down to the medical bay I find both Intrepid and Enterprise laying in beds beside each other. Only the latter is awake, but she looks like she doesn't want to be.

"Mornin' E. What're you in here for?" I ask.

"I overworked myself yesterday. I made too many planes, and when the last one landed I passed out. Same thing with Intrepid I guess."

"You tell me not to overdo it, but you overwork yourself? Christ E, I've never seen you be so hypocritical before." I tease, limping my way over to the chair by her bed.

"Shut up, desperate times called for desperate measures!" She snaps, and I wince a bit at her volume. "Oh, sorry. Fun night?"

"If by 'fun' you mean trying to drown the images that I was seeing every time I closed my eyes, then yes." I grumble, easing myself into the chair.

"Oh. Yeah I know how that is. Any luck?"

"Some. Any word on that woman we fished out?" I change the subject.

"Other than the fact that she's alive I got nothin'. Ask Hope when she comes in."

"I plan on it."

"You plan on what exactly now?" Hope asks as she comes into the doorway behind me, a strangely solemn expression covering her face.

"Asking you how that woman is." I respond, slightly concerned about Hope.

"She'll live. When she wakes up try to make things seem as normal as possible. Use your human names and just tell her she's in the hospital in Olympia."

"Alrighty then, we can do that." Enterprise says with a nod.

"Excellent. Alaska, I assume you're here for your morning physical?" Hope asks, checking on Intrepid.

"Yes ma'am."

"Good. I've been asked by the flagship to do psych evaluations on your fleet too, so if you'll permit me I could do that while I'm checking on you."

I look to Enterprise for her approval and she scoffs. "What are you looking at me for? You're technically flagship right now."

I roll my shoulders and look back to Hope. "Sure, let's do it."

Hope smiles and points to the empty bed next to Enterprise while retrieving a small bag. "Excellent, please lay down on that and we'll begin immediately."

Finally after an hour of talking to Hope I'm finally permitted to ditch the crutches. Albeit she said it's "not recommended", but close enough. I talk to Enterprise for a while and then excuse myself, walking over to Intrepid's ship.

I cross over Scylla's ship and climb up to the flight deck of the carrier, limping my way across the deck and into the conning tower. On the stairs I almost step on a passed-out La Vallette, but after repositioning her I continue down, into the lobby.

"Christ, it's a fuckin' mess in here."

Chairs are scattered around the room, some occupied by passed-out hybrids while others are tipped over. Plenty of people lay unconscious on the floor, and I make my way through the mess to the bar at the opposite end by the pool table, where surprisingly the bottle of scotch I left behind last night is untouched, sparing what I drank of course.

Sitting down on the barstool I rest my face in my hands for a minute, then reach for the bottle, pouring myself a glass with no ice, which I proceed to nurse for a while until a voice speaks up quietly behind me.

"Isn't it a bit early to be drinking?"

I look over my shoulder to find a wide-awake Mobile, who moves to sit down beside me.

"I suppose it is, but it's better than seeing things every time I close my eyes." I respond before knocking back the last of the glass.

"Alcohol isn't the answer to a problem like that."

"... How do you deal with it?"

Mobile shrugs. "You just try to find the silver lining in everything. Like that destroyer you blew up yesterday, look on the bright side, they didn't suffer and now they're free to do whatever they want."

I stare blankly at the empty glass for a few moments before huffing in amusement and cracking a small smile. "That's fucked up."

"I know, but after a while it almost feels like a service when you end a ship like that. There's hardly any suffering if any at all, and it's just…" She tapers off, trying to find the words, and after a few seconds she snaps her fingers. "Done."

"Is that why Scylla and Topeka customize their missile payloads?"

"Yeah. To get the most efficient way of killing something. Or at least that's why Topeka does it, I don't know about Scylla."

"Did you see what she did yesterday?" I ask.

"Yup. I don't know what to think of it."

"Me neither."

"A couple of us asked her about it, but she didn't say anything." Mobile sighs in disappointment.

"Judging from how she looked when it happened, I'd say even she doesn't know what happened." I grumble tiredly, laying my head on my arms.

"Hey 'lass, orders from Brisky." A person yawns from behind us. I swivel in my chair to find Roberts standing there in a pair of blue jeans and a grey hoodie.

"Thanks. How's the hangover?" I ask, taking a white envelope from her.

"Don't have one. I stayed up last night on picket duty." She yawns back, rubbing her eyes.

"Oh. Well, go get some sleep. I'll let you know if you're needed." I order, earning a nod and a tired salute before she makes her way across the lobby and disappears into the stairwell. Once she's out of sight I spin around on my barstool and open the envelope. "Why did she bother with an envelope when she could just send the file to me?"

"Beats me, are those our patrol compositions?"

I pull the several folded sheets of paper out and look them over briefly. "... Yeah. I've got a patrol route near the shore with your sister and Astoria." I have a look at the fine print under our assignment and scowl. "Well then. I guess we're going to pay a visit to Victoria and destroy any targets of opportunity."

"You're with Topeka…?" Mobile pales. "Oh God this isn't going to end well…"

"Well, I guess we're swapping sisters for our patrols, because you're with Samoa and Oakland. The orders say 'effective immediately', so let's wake everyone up and go get this over with."

"Let me go find Topeka and get her up. She's not a morning person." Mobile says as she gets up and starts scouring the room.

"That makes two of us." I grumble, changing my shirt into a hoodie before stuffing the bottle of scotch into the large pocket.

I get up and move over to the closest person, which happens to be Guam, and start shaking her to get her up. "Hey, wakey-wakey. Patrol compositions are here."

Grumbling she rolls over and starts to go back to sleep.

"Get up Guam, or I'm throwing you in the drink again."

"I'm up… fuckin' A. If you don't throw me in then I'm gonna jump in. At least that'll help with the fucking hangover."

"You do that. Then get your ass down here and help me wake everyone up."

"Yes ma'am."

Knowing she's awake I move on to the next person, Molotov.

"Wakey-wakey Ruskie. Time for patrols to organize."

"Did you seriously just call me Ruskie?" She grumbles, opening her eyes.

"Yeah, being how you're a Russian ship I figured it'd be appropriate."

"I am Russian, thank you very much. Calling me that is not okay."

"Duly noted, now get your ass up. I've got patrol assignments right here."

"Are you always this much of an asshole?"

"Only when things need done."

"Ugh, get laid already."

"Hey I mean, if you're offering I won't say no, but I've already got my sights set on someone else." I tease, trying to make her uncomfortable to shut her up.

Molotov smiles and shakes her head. "Heh, so you go for girls eh? Not surprising really when there's no guys in the fog, or hybrids for that matter. But no thanks. Who is it?"

"That's for me to know and you to figure out. Start waking people up and I might give you a hint when we're done."

I spend the next ten minutes trying to get everyone up, and eventually give up, instead focusing on waking up Astoria, who's passed out on the pool table.

"Hey, get up." I shake her shoulder and she rolls onto her side, facing away from me.

"Astoria get the fuck up. We've got a patrol and I'm not going on it without you." I continue to pester her.

"...Mmmnnn. No. Hangover." She mumbles.

"Fine. We can do it this way."

I grab her behind the knees and by the shoulders before picking her up, feeling a slightly painful twinge in my leg as I do so, but not enough to keep me from carrying her up the stairs, across the flight deck, and down a holopanel staircase to the water.

"Time to wake up, Astoria."

With that I drop her into the water, and seconds later she comes up sputtering. "Not fucking cool! Not cool at all!"

"Au contraire. It's very cool, as you just found out."

"Fucking smartass! That's not what I meant!"

I giggle and haul her up onto the holopanel I'm on. "Go get to your ship and stand by."

"Yes ma'am."

Having managed to collect Topeka and get underway the three of us patrol along Vancouver island, staying just over the horizon so nobody on shore can report our position. Nonetheless, I keep scanning short-range radio frequencies, listening for any sort of activity that isn't construction related. All the while Topeka is surprisingly quiet.

Until she isn't.

{Come onnnnn! When are we going to find someone to kill?!}

"Once we get there. Quiet down so I can listen to the radio."

Topeka continues to rant on and on about how bored she is, though I eventually tune her out, scanning the frequencies for even the most minute peep of military traffic.

Finally I find what I want, though it's not good news that I hear.

{*Archer this is Sentinel. Message, over.*}

{*This is Archer, send it.*}

{*Archer, be advised. We have three times Fog ships coming down the coastline, range is thirty miles. One times Iowa-class, one times Cleveland-class, and one times New Orleans-class. How copy? Over.*}

'They think I'm an Iowa-class? I'm flattered'

{*Sentinel, solid copy on all. Let us know if they turn, over.*}

{*Roger that, Sentinel out.*}

"Load and make ready for combat!"

{Finally!} Topeka cries out, her guns all shifting as they looked for targets.

"Astoria, start jamming their comms."

{On it.}

"Actually, belay that. I'll do it."

{Roger. Radar contact, zero-nine-six for twenty miles, altitude is ten thousand feet. It's only moving eighty knots, so I'll bet it's a spotter plane.}

"I guess it's time for a good old-fashioned dogfight then eh?" I ask, preparing a floatplane on both of my catapults.

{This'll be a turkey shoot, one plane against three? They don't stand a chance!} Astoria laughs.

{Hey, no fair! I don't have launchable aircraft!} Topeka complains.

"That sounds like a personal problem."

I launch the SC Seahawk on my starboard catapult first, letting it circle around before launching the one on my port side. At the same time Astoria launches one of her own, and together the three planes loosely spiral skyward. At the same time I start jamming all radios within a fifty mile radius, scrambling the radio waves so often that they can be transmitted, but not received.

"Alright, they know we're here, so let's turn towards the coastline. We'll stay at this speed."

{Can't we speed up a little?! Come on! We're all capable of going faster than forty knots, so why are we doing twenty?!}

"Negative, this speed is fine, and if we go any faster they'll know we're attacking. Beginning a turn to port. Ready. Steady. Turn."

We get roughly halfway through our turn before the radio comes to life again, though within the fifty miles the three of us are the only ones who can hear it.

{*Archer, this is sentinel. The Fog ships are turning towards the strait, and have launched aircraft. How copy? Over.*}

I smile, knowing that 'Archer' can't hear him.

{*Archer, this is Sentinel. Come in, over.*}

After the third attempt from the plane to get in contact with 'Archer' Astoria asks me if she can try something. Not knowing what it is I give my approval.

{*Sentinel, They can't hear you honey! Now, I'm going to give you a chance. If you can survive a dogfight with my plane for five minutes I'll let you go. Okay?*}

{*Identify yourself immediately!*}

{*If you insist! I am the Fog heavy cruiser Astoria, one of the three ships you've reported to your base on land. Provide us with some good entertainment and I can promise we'll let you live!*} She purposefully leaves out the fact that she's a hybrid, since humanity doesn't know about the project.

{*I uh… what?*}

{*Five minutes starts… now!*}

{No fun giving them a chance to run!} Topeka complained.

{Oh there's plenty of fun in it! Now we have some quality entertainment!} Astoria responds cheerfully as her floatplane attacks the Piper Cub, purposefully messing up the first pass.

Feeling disgusted I privatize the channel with Topeka. "In case you haven't noticed, Astoria has a sadistic streak a mile wide."

{What's wrong with that?} Topeka asks as her AA guns shift and try tracking the plane.

"She literally gets off to doing stuff like this."

{Sounds fun! Hey Astoria! Want to see if my guns can take it down before your plane does?}

{Maybe after the five minutes are up. This guy's pretty good!}

{Grrr, fine. I really need to shoot something}

"You'll get your chance. The strait is lined with defenses, and we'll be running the gauntlet."

{Good, my missile tubes are getting restless and itchy.} Topeka mutters as I noticed her missile hatches all open up.

"I imagine it is, just keep things private." I roll my eyes at my own innuendo and focus on mapping the locations of the defences. All the while Astoria's plane continues to toy with the bush plane like a cat playing with a live mouse.

One of my floatplanes holds a blocking position, preventing the Piper Cub from leaving while my other plane flies high over the strait, allowing my a good view at all the poorly-camouflaged gun and missile emplacements. As I'm starting to wrap up my reconnaissance though an unexpected development ensures the destruction of the plane: four ground-based AIM-120 missiles streak up from the ground, tracking gracefully until they slam into the plane.

{Want me to bust those?} Topeka quickly asks.

"Not quite yet, we'll synchronize our beginning salvoes." I respond just as Astoria sighs contentedly.

{Alright Topeka, you can have your fun with him, I'm done.}

{Sweet!} Topeka cheers as her AA quickly sends up a swarm of dark blue shots, one shot going right through the plane's right wing. {Got the bastard! He's going down. With any luck he'll hit one of his friends and I'll get a two for one!}

"Congrats. I'm sending you both the locations of the emplacements. Get ready, because we should be entering their firing range soon." I declare unenthusiastically.

{Awesome. I've got corrosive missiles ready and waiting!} Topeka exclaims enthusiastically as all of her missiles tubes light up as they prime for launch.

"Heavy conventional shells for me, no use wasting the Thanatonium for corrosive shells."

{We've got missiles for a reason though, why not use them?}

"I tend to save them for a pinch. It's just personal preference."

{Whatever. Just clear me for firing and those defenses will cease to exist, along with anyone in or around them!} Topeka declares with a disturbed snicker.

Before I can respond I see one of the disappearing gun mounts move into firing position and fire, sending a shell screaming at me, though it lands short.

"Alright, commence fire."

{Eat Thanatonium!} Topeka cries out as a massive barrage of her missiles fly up into the sky.

Both Astoria and I wordlessly fire our guns. The radio is going wild as the shore installations try to communicate with each other, to no avail, and the further we get into the strait the more frantic the communications become, giving me reason to believe there is an important ship in the area that the Navy doesn't want sunk.

{Boom!} Topeka says happily as many of her missiles begin landing on their targets, though just as many seem to get shot down.

"We're almost to Victoria everyone, just five more minutes. Keep taking out the shore emplacements and-"

The loud howling of shells overhead catch my attention. It's louder than any of the gun emplacements, and eventually it stops. A split second later my klein field erupts in balls of flame, smoke, and shrapnel, increasing the saturation level from 27% to 90%.

"What the hell just hit me?!"

{Uh, that.} Astoria says as she points further down the strait.

"Be more specific! Where the hell is… oh fuck."

Further down the strait on the horizon sits a monstrosity of a ship, showing its full broadside to us while the guns flash again, and I hear that terrifying silence.

"That's an Iowa-class! They're the only thing the Navy has that can beat a Fog cruiser in a fair fight!" I yell, bracing for the impact to come.

{Really wishing I had a super gravity cannon right now.} Topeka mutters under her breath.

As expected the salvo completely saturates my klein field, and four shells tear into my lower superstructure, punching clear through my decks, nanomaterial storage, and one of my engine rooms before detonating near the bottom most deck. I'm knocked out of my chair and thrown to the edge of the superstructure as it starts to topple to the starboard side.

"Fuuuuuck!" I yell pointlessly prior to plunging into the cold water.

{Firing smoke missiles and coming to pick you up!} Topeka declares.

When I reach the surface I rig my ship for scuttling using my remaining Thanatonium and start swimming away from it. "Don't bother! Get out of here and get in contact with the fleet!"

{But-!} Astoria starts to argue as another salvo tears into my ship.

"That's an order! Get the hell out of here and let the fleet know there's a battleship here!'"

{Let's not argue with the one committing honorable suicide like some crazy samurai.} Topeka says as her missiles fly over the water, covering it in smoke and hiding their escape.

"I'll keep in touch. It's just not worth you guys getting sunk by that battleship."

{Hope you don't get interrogated and tortured for Intel!} Topeka calls out before she disappears from the comms.

"Thanks for the comforting thought." I grumble to myself, swimming towards the southern side of the strait.

Fifteen minutes after I got dropped into the water I sit on the southern shoreline, catching my breath while I wait for the ship to detonate. Eventually I get tired of waiting and snap my fingers, setting off the Thanatonium scuttling charges inside the stores deep within the hull.

A second passes, and then my crippled ship goes up in a bright flash of light, sending pieces everywhere just like I'd planned. The back of the ship buckles and breaks, blowing the ship in two, then the secondary stores blow, blowing the fore portion in half again.

After finally catching my breath I start through the woods, being mindful of destroyed and active weapons emplacements. The entire trek lasts just short of three hours, and eventually I find a small logging road, choosing to follow it south until I either find a house or a car comes by.

It gets dark before the latter happens, and as the headlights roll down the road I do my best to act lost and scared. The passenger and driver doors both open at the same time, and a voice calls out to me over the sound of the diesel engine.

"On your knees! Put your hands behind your head!"