Apparently from the past to the present to even foreign worlds, some things seemed to stay the same.
That was Shirayuki thought as she roamed throught what seemed to be a lively market in the town she and her two sisters were tasked to infiltrate.
The cries of the seagulls in the sky. The salty scent of the nearby sea. The smell of fresh fish displayed on wooden tables or baskets put on the ground. The loud noise of countless discussions and bargaining of numerous peoples : fishers, merchants, townfolk, travellers.
It somehow vaguely reminded her of her birthplace, Yokohama, but also Kure, Samah or Singapore during the war. True the setting was much more militarised but even conflict couldn't totally stop trade and the daily life of people. At least during the early stages.
She couldn't really compare to her current naval base thought. Even before the strange event that displaced the naval district in this world, the base was set appart from the rest of the port areas. It was strictly militarized, surrounded by wall with guards at the entries.
However, during her patrols along the coast of Japan, she came close to different ports, some of which she had been during her previous life. What struck her the most was how everything has changed. How the military installations has disappeared to the profit of commercial ones which has then suffered from disuse during the time the abyssal fleet imposed a world wide blocus.
However, as much as this place had a distant but familiar atmosphere, she was pretty sure that nowhere, at anypoint in time in her world port cities had women with a lower body of a giant fish living inside of them among normal humans.
That was definitely something to report to the headquarters and was but one among the many discoveries she did until then.
Tchack
The sharp noise of a camera shot being taken made more than one head turn in their direction. As much as they were meant to be discreet, they were tasked to come back with visual datas of the situation inside this city. Shirayuki herself turned to the origin of the sound.
She was divided between approval to the initiative of her younger sister or dismayed at the sight of the oversized camera she carried. Why did she had to bring her personal camera instead of those provided by the military ?
So far they did pretty well to not attract too much attention. Some people had looked oddly at them, probably because of their clothes since sailors uniforms were not common sight and also party because of the camera, a object obviously unknown to these people who seemed to live in a somewhat western medieval time.
Nevertheless, even if they probably looked a little bit out of place, they were rapidly ignored to more important matters and so far the local authorities, in the form of armored guards, didn't bother them.
As she realised that the attracted a little bit of attention, Isonami, the girl with black hairs with a long braided low pony-tail and black eyes, wielding the camera, timidly blushed and seemed to shrank a few centimeters.
"S-sorry", she muttered as she lowered the black device.
"It is fine", rassured Shirayuki before a loud sigh came into her ears.
"Are we finally done ? My legs are tired and I want to go back and sleep", declared the bored voice of the naval base third agent.
At her words Shirayuki frowned on the form of her direct younger sister. It was hard to believe the first time you hear of it but Hatsuyuki, a girl with long black hairs with a princess cut and tired brown eyes, was the third ship of the Fubuki class.
As Fubuki was reknown to be an eager and hard working destroyer always doing her best, and Shirayuki for being a calmer and mature version of her older sister-ship, Hatsuyuki was nearly the complete opposite. She was lazy, spent her time sleeping and reading mangas and when asked to do the minimum effort, she complained and pushed to delay her work for the next day… each time.
"I think it is a good opportunity to have you do something useful for a change", chastised Shirayuki. "Since Fubuki-onee san is not back yet, it is our duty to carry the responsabilities of the Fubuki-class".
"Gna gna gna… There are twenty-four members of the Fubuki class. Why do I have to come when Miyuki, Murakumo and the others are taking it easy at home ?" complained Hatsuyuki, her arms lazily dangling before her as she arched her back.
"There is no point in discussing the admiral orders. I was asked to gather a small group to infiltrate this place. Murakumo, Shirakumo, Shininome, most of the type II and the sixth division were discarded for reasons unknown to me. I don't think Miyuki is a good pick for any stealth mission. Uranami and Ayanami are in patrols. And most of the others are preparing to be send on ground reconnaissance missions. If you have the energy to complain, then you can gather informations for us", the elder sister berated.
"Tch… And then I through being bland would help me getting unoticed…", murmured Hatsuyuki as her sisters when back on track.
The trio resumed their mission, surveying the city as they did previously. What they gathered is that the town was called Port Natalia.
The population was mostly humans and those looked europeans to them.
The rest of the population was those strange being with half a body of a fish and so far it looked that they were all females.
Interestingly it looked that the primary language of these people were english or at least something close to it. Since they participated in a war against english speaking ennemies, most shipgirls tended to have a decent level in this language. Some of them even learned other languages, expecially members of the Fubuki class oddly enough, with Hibiki and Fubuki mastering english and russian and Shirayuki herself knew a little bit of french from her brief time operating near french Indochina during the Pacific War.
So it was not very difficult for the destroyers to read the writings and understand the language speaked in the street. However, even if they quite easily understood what was spoken, they noted that the language had some german sounding words in it. So maybe it was a bastardized version. Shirayuki filled this information, intending to incorporate it in her rapport.
From their observation, the city and probably the world they were in, was comparatively to their, really backwater. Their technological level was that of before the use of electricity, heavy industry and maybe black power.
The political system however was completely unknown. It was nearly certain for a ruling entity to exist since someone has to hire and pay the guards keeping order but none of the houses looked like an official or administrative building.
After another half an hour of walk and observation, the small group stopped again to let Isonami take another picture, more discreetly this time.
The team photographer took the picture of a particulary large mansion near the docks. Like the other houses in the area, this one was big, three stories tall and shared bright colors, a vibrant red in its case.
Isonami also took the opportunity to take a overview picture of the market at the docks. It was brimming with activity. Colored stands of various goods had sellers and merchants howling offers to potential customers. Many women with baskets purchased foods and the like while bulky mens were carrying heavy crates to the stands, the docks or warehouses.
"Since we're at it, we should check what kind of goods are sold and how transactions are done", said Hatsuyuki with a bored voice and in an uncharacteristically useful fashion.
The two others agreed, seeing the benefit of the endeavor but Shirayuki still has a frown on her face after the suggestion.
"We don't have any currency so we won't buy anything", she said suspiciously.
"I know, I'm not stupid", answered Hatsuyuki but at the same time a disappointed sigh escaped her lips.
The three destroyer then approached the heart of the market. The atmosphere was immediatly more stuffy as a lot of people surrounded them. They took care to keep close together and not be separated.
They quickly came close to a stand. It was selling fruits which looked similar to the ones they were familiar with. They recognised apples and oranges.
Hatsuyuki was tempted to stealthily steal one of the fruits on display but quickly discarded the idea. Too much people were around, Shirayuki is keeping an eyes on her so she couldn't slack off and she might be caught if she tried. She might be lazy, unmotivated and somehow selfish, but she had still the heart of a warship, and so she would not endanger the success of her mission for something trivial.
Not long after they came close to the fruit merchant, one person came to buy one of the products. A middle aged woman came and brought several apples.
At this occasion, the trio managed to see that the customer traded several orange coins. It was probably a relatively cheap metal like copper since no state would be able to base its currency on something like gold or silver.
After observing the same occurrences happening several times, the destroyers retreated from the crowd to catch their breath. However, as soon at they were in the open, an unfamiliar voice adressed to them came to their ears.
"Would you like to purchased some of my wares ?", said the voice.
The three girls quickly turned to the person talking to them. As such they found one of these young women with a fish lower body, mermaids as they were unoriginally called, with a short blond hairs and small wooden display in her arms.
"I am sorry but we are not owning any money at the moment. We just came to have a look", answered Shirayuki, slightly dipping her head.
"Oh it is alright. Then how about I let you taste one of my products ? If they are to your liking, maybe you would come back to buy more next time ?" the fish woman smiled as she presented strange looking sea-food on the display.
While Shirayuki and Isonami managed to keep their composure, Hastuyuki clearly stepped back at the sight of the "products". The things presented to them were definitly sea food from its shape but the nauseous smell and black and purple aspect made it look inedible.
"I have some Hiei-san cooking vibes", murmured Hatsuyuki disgusted and somewhat scared.
The two others nodded and agreed that they were not risking tasting the offered products as even shipgirls are susceptible to food poisoning.
However, surprisingly, Hatsuyuki actually took one of the sea-food offered in the form of a charned looking starfish. While her sisters looked dumbfounded, the mermaid looked positively happy and when she realised that the black haired girl would not eat her product on the spot, she thanked her and went back to her business.
Before her sisters could say anything, Hatsuyuki grinned at them while waving her acquisition.
"A souvenir for Hiei-san", she explained.
"I am not sure I can present it as a sample of the local food to the headquarters", sighed heavily Shirayuki.
"I hope it will not inspire Hiei-san to try new cooking recipes", whimpered Isonami.
After this incident, the small group went back at their investigations. They left the harbor and went deeper Inside the city while still sticking to the main alleys.
After a while they finally found what they looked for. Before them was another big, multi-storied building, this time with larges gates at the entrance. It had a white paint and was sticking out by it size among smaller houses. For Shirayuki and her sisters, it was what looked the more like the residence of the people in charge of this city.
For the sake of their information gathering, the three destroyers would have liked to enter inside. However, by doing so, even their bland appearence would not suffice to keep them unoticed. Even thought it was not guarded, they had the impression that only people with business in mind would get inside and as such they would stick out as a sore thumb the moment they went past the doors.
Isonami contented herself to take more photos as Shirayuki took notes. Hatsuyuki was lazily gazing around, midly checking if someone was observing them.
Once they did all the observations they could, the destroyers retreated from the building.
The end objective of the admiral was to make contact with the authorities here. Shirayuki was confident she could handle this mission but the commanders had apparently other plans. And the second ship of the Fubuki class was not sure her sisters were as presentable as her.
The small group spend another couple hours scouting the inside of the city. They found nothing of particular interest except maybe what looked like a pub. The establishement was apparently pretty popular and coincidently had a large portion of mermaids in the staff.
However even if they didn't found anything of importance during this time, Isonami took several pictures of seemingly randoms parts of town. Hatsuyuki was asking to herself why bother while Shirayuki nodded with approval. Isonami may had been meeker than her other siblings, she still had all the diligency of the Fubuki class inside.
As sun was going low in the sky, the small group knew it was finally time to go back to base at the relief of Hatsuyuki. As they exited the city, a random man warned them of the dangers of going outside at night. He mentionned monsters lurking in the countryside, waiting to ambush unlucky travelers.
Shirayuki thanked the man for his concern even as she still proceeded with her sisters to the said wilderness.
They didn't have any problems on their way in the first time and while the return may not be the same, Shirayuki could only wish good luck to anyone of anything trying to go in their way.
After all the members of the Fubuki class always do their best to fullfill their duties.
A/N :
Thank you to Guest and MageTGM for their comments and support, it is really gratifying. I would like to ask those who take the time to review what they like or don't like about this story. It might help me know where and how to develop this fanfiction as to keep it enjoyable for you.
I tried to do a lot of things with this chapter. I made the plot advance a little. I did some characterisation and given some screen time to characters which are not usually used (Who is featuring Isonami in their fics ?). I also did some world building.
With this two last points, you can see that I may take my distance with the canon of the two franchises.
For Kancolle, I don't think I went as far as to going out of character but I may added some personality elements. One of the main reason is that you can't really create a character with only its looks and a few lines of dialogue. As I say in another review, I will try to stick as close to the canon for the shipgirls personnalities but I will still need to flesh out those characters.
Now, for those familiar to MGQ and MGQ Paradox, you may have noticed that I downright changed some elements of the game. For example in canon Port Natalia has no administrative building or the like and the universal currency of MGQ universe is simply gold.
In my mind I have and will change some elements because Monster Girl Quest universe is a parody of a late medieval society. If you just take the example of the currency and you compare with real history, you will notice that gold was never used as the base currency anywhere and at anytime. And in canon we have no information as to who rule Port Natalia. Is it San Ilia ? Does the city has a lord ? Does it has a mayor ?
I want to try to give coherency to the setting of this story and to do that I will need to take some liberty with the original franchises.
Thank you for reading and please share you feelings. See you next time.