The Legends Still Live On
Bogen Neunzehn-komma-drei: Tag des Jüngsten Gerichts!
Kapitel Ein: So Beurteilend!
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Up in the skies over some random place in the continental United States, a fresh sheet-metal silver late production P-47D, with the bubble canopy and extended ventral tail fairing, was brutally shot down by an enemy Tempest Mk V that proudly wore the Allied invasion stripes. The four Hispano Mk II 20 mm cannons on the Tempest, each one filled with highly destructive HEFI rounds, were more than enough to snap the left wing off the Jug and send it careening down to earth. As was customary in the Jägermeistern air battles, a red smoke trail deployed from the Thunderbolt's tail, though it was clear it was out of the fight even before it slammed into the earth. The pilot for the Jug had jumped out before experiencing the slam to earth for himself and parachuted to safety.
From an observation post on the field, three judges were present. All three hailed from different countries, but they shared the same uniform minus two shoulder patches on each arm with their countries' flags. There was one from Germany, who had brown hair and blue eyes. Then there was one from America, who had unruly blonde hair and also had blue eyes. With them was another judge from Russia, with black hair as dark as midnight skies and brown eyes. Each of their uniforms were the standard all-black judge uniforms, marked by how their shirts had 'JUDGE' boldly written out on the upper backside.
"That's it," the German judge summarily declared as he manipulated a tablet of his, no doubt making a confirmation of the air battle's results. All three knew that the British fighters were the victors after they absolutely annihilated their American adversaries, and, as judges were expected to do, none of them showed any bias or favoritism to any one side, instead relying on the facts. "The fight's over. We're done here."
"Aaaaah, finally..." the Russian judge exhaled out as he stretched out, no longer being forced to stay in one position. He then looked over to his fellow judges with an inquiring look. "So, what's the plan for after this? Are we heading somewhere or what?"
"I guess so," the German judge replied as he continued messing around with his tablet. "I mean, I don't have any plans for later, so I'm game."
"Hey, y'all wanna head to a fighter emporium, then?" the American judge butted in with. "I've been eyeing some of the things in there."
"Ugh, again with that?" the German judge bemoaned with displeasure. "I don't know about you, but I'm sick of looking at anything else related to aviation for today. Besides, I'm starving now."
"Aw, c'mon man," the American judge tried to barter with the others, albeit unsuccessfully.
"Oi! Refs!" all three heard a new, noticeably younger voice call from behind them. All of the refs turned their heads in questioning.
Walking up to them were two high-school boys that were in no way connected to the two teams that just duked it out. Their black uniforms, at a glance similar to that of Luftwaffe ground crew, identified them as members of Ooarai's Jägermeistern Staffel.
"Hey, just wanted to say thanks for putting up with everyone's shit!" Anton Silva so eloquently put forth, which earned him a smack to the back of his head by Herz Benz. "Ow, fuck! Well it's the truth, you know!" While the blonde American nursed the area of hurt on his head while simultaneously shooting a look of contempt at the noble Prussian, it was noticeable that he had a plastic bag filled with something.
"I believe what he meant to say was, 'thank you for all the hard work that you do,'" Herz rephrased with a winning smile. "We wish to express that sentiment via a gift." The black-haired noble looked over to his blonde comrade. "Anton?"
Anton took the cue and brought up the bag he held for all to see. "So we all decided to give you all some of the best pretzels baked up by Ooarai's resident pair of Swabians." He then slightly rolled his eyes in amusement upon recalling one particular detail: while he supported the idea, Erich simply left Miho to bake the treats for herself, because God forbid he does any work for once. "Or, at least, one of them." Anton then presented the bag forth as if gesturing to take it. "Anyway, it'd be awesome if you all enjoyed them."
The German judge's eye twitched as if wanting to do something but clearly restraining himself.
"Aw yeah, I could inhale those right now!" the Russian judge remarked with an eagerness to his demeanor.
"Mmm-mmm! I could go for some pretzels!" the American judge similarly spoke up with delight. "I gotta admit-"
"NEIN! NEIN! NEIN! NEIN!" the German judge interrupted as he practically exploded into a frenzy of energy. He had also started forcefully dragging his fellow judges away by the scruffs of their shirts, and none too gently, either.
Anton and Herz both blinked a few times, stunned at what just transpired. They both looked to each other in confusion, and the American soon shrugged slightly. "Maybe he doesn't like pretzels?" he guessed, not at all sure of what had caused the German judge's ire.
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Later in the evening, the three judges were hanging out at a bar set up under a tent. It was a relatively small bar, no larger than a food truck. All three judges had put on a sweater with a zipper over their shirts. The sweater itself was black like the rest of the outfit, but there was a small emblem on the upper left chest area as well as a larger version of the same emblem very prominently visible on the backside. It was a circular emblem with a thin black circle around the rim, and within the circle was a black silhouette of a low-wing monoplane with a slender fuselage, shown from the front. The wingtips contacted either side of the circle, and the aircraft itself was level along its roll axis.
The American judge chose to be unique and leave his sweater unzipped. He finished off a cookie he had ordered before he picked up his glass of scotch. He did not drink from it, but instead chose to break the silence among the trio. "You know, Johan," he directed at the German judge, Johan. "They were just pretzels. What kind of harm can pretzels cause? Unless, you know, you're allergic to them?"
"No, Steve," Johan answered upon bringing down his glass of beer. Unlike his two fellow judges, he held himself proper. "But to answer your other question, if word got out that we accepted a gift from students that are participating in the Arts of Warfare, then we would be in a load of Scheiße!"
The Russian judge chuckled in amusement at Steve and Johan's bantering. "You're never one to disappoint, Johan," he remarked aloud his amusement as he swirled his shot of vodka.
"Remember this at least, Steve, Ivan," Johan looked to the American and Russian judges respectively to emphasize his point. "The Arts of Warfare may become as dirty as real war, but for its regulators to go the same route would cause this wonderful group of sports to be outlawed!" The German then took another swig of his beer before speaking up again. "Besides, you should know that I too was heartbroken when I had to decline their gift. You know that I love pretzels, but, like I said, if word got out that we accepted a gift from participants, then we'd be accused of taking bribes." Johan took yet another swig of beer and spoke up again after swallowing. "We've got to be careful about those kinds of things, especially with Ooarai considering just how many of their folks are beginners."
"Ah!" Ivan raised his finger in epiphany. "Speaking of Ooarai, the other day I was over there to collect some paperwork from them." He then knotted his eyebrows into frustration. "Gospodi, I hate that little minx of a girl they have as their school president." Ivan then lost his edge and continued with his previous train of thought. "But anyway, I guess judges aren't commonly seen there or something, because I found a few of their first years just staring at me in curiosity." The Russian then knocked back his shot of vodka before continuing. "So I decided to put on a little show for them! I think they liked my acting. I chose to act as one of those baseball umpires and even do the whole hand signal spiel for directing planes around an airfield! I gotta admit, they were quite cute little ones."
"Gott, Ivan, tell me you're not always doing stuff like that," Johan bemoaned before releasing a rough, exasperated sigh. "Why can't you take your work seriously for once…"
"Well, I had gone over one time to play around with the kids from Pravda," Steve remarked as he swirled his glass of scotch.
"Yeban, I wanted to be the one to play with them!" Ivan objected with a curse as he slammed his shot glass down.
"Steve, what do you even mean by 'play?'" Johan asked with an eyeroll of annoyance, letting Ivan's outburst pass by without retaliation.
"Well it was during some random fight, I don't even remember which one anymore," Steve looked up in thought as he reflected. "But I remember these two tall black-haired folks, one girl and one guy, a couple, I had assumed, and Russian by the looks of it. Anyway, accompanying them everywhere were these two shorter blondes, one boy and one girl, also Russian. And let me tell you, man was that girl tiny! I thought she was only about seven or eight just by looking at her!" The American judge paused to knock back his glass of scotch before beginning anew. "But moving on, I made a remark to the two tall ones about how tough life was with kids, and how they were quite strong to push through it together. They simply smiled and gave their thanks, but the two smaller ones started protesting to my remark rather passionately, saying that they weren't kids or something, I dunno."
"Huh, I never heard of that happening before," Johan noted with a slightly stunned look on his face.
"I'm surprised you haven't, considering it's kind of become a famous story," Steve remarked. He then turned to the bartender with his glass raised. "Oi, get me another, Tony!"
"Get me another vodka, as well!" Ivan requested as he set his shot glass forth.
"Noch ein Bier, bitte," Johan asked for another beer as well, though not with the vigor shown by Steve and Ivan.
"One scotch, one vodka, and one beer coming up," the bartender cheerily replied as he busied himself behind the counter with acquiring the drinks requested.
"But back to what's important, Steve, Ivan," Johan spoke up while waiting for the drinks. "The kinds of things I just heard you two partake in should not be happening! Take your work seriously, for God's sake!"
"Jeez, Johan," Steve began as he propped his head up with his arm, evidently annoyed with Johan's lecturing. "Do you really have the right to tell us that?"
The German judge blinked twice in confusion before speaking up, "What do you mean?" During that time, the drinks each of them requested were delivered and set right in front of each of them.
"Oh, you know exactly what I mean," Steve insisted, fully focused on the conversation and not noticing his scotch yet. "Anzio's post-battle parties. Everyone knows that you never miss the chance to partake in them."
"That's because those parties are a reward for all the players and organizers!" Johan countered with emphasis on the organizers. "They even said such themselves! Besides, who do you know that can resist that kind of cooking?"
Steve held up his hands in a mock-surrender gesture, evidently convinced for the moment of Johan's point. "Alright, I'm just saying," he relented.
Johan rolled his eyes at that. "Well, I will say one thing about those parties," he began. He then lifted his beer with the smallest of grins on his face. "They lack the refreshments we would prefer."
"Amen to that," Steve and Ivan replied similarly with grins on their faces as they lifted their own drinks. All three judges then clanked their glasses together in a toast.
"Prost!" Johan offered his toast.
"Cheers!" Steve made his own.
"Na zdorov'ye!" Ivan offered his toast as well, and then all three proceeded to get fucking wasted.
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Many, many, many rounds of drinks later, Johan gave a sigh, seemingly one of longing. "No one appreciates us," he sullenly said.
Ivan sat up with absolutely zero grace, looking about ready to collapse on himself, and Steve spat to the side after hearing Johan speak up before turning to face the others.
"Well, that came out of nowhere," the American among them observed with a proudly-drunken smile. "But I'll give you that. No one seems to give a fuck about us."
"Da," Ivan slurred an affirmative response. "Even though there's just as much danger in regulating the sport as there is in participating in it…"
"So, then, what I heard the other day then…" Johan began with another drunken tale, number who-fucking-cares of that night. "That ginger girl from Ooarai kept going on and on about popularity to her friends, how they would be all the rage if they participated in the Arts of Warfare…" The German remained silent for a bit, but then he slammed his glass of beer down and shot up in frustration. "There's nothing that awaits you besides serving scum you're forced to address as 'Herr' if you continue on in the Arts of Warfare! There's nothing good that can possibly come from sticking with it!"
"Oi, just sit down, Johan!" Steve tried to coerce Johan into sitting back down, though he had a smile on his face, as if he knew something like that would happen eventually. "Just drink up! Drink up and forget it all!"
"Tony, keep them coming!" Ivan told the bartender with a care-free grin at the situation he found himself in.
"No, seriously, listen to this!" Johan began before abruptly changing his voice into one laced with confidence and an, admittedly awful, impersonation of a Japanese accent. "'I have a 120% hit rate!'" He then went back into his voice of rage. "What the devil does that mean?! How do you even shoot nonexistent targets?! Are you a Dummkopf?!"
Steve and Ivan started laughing at Johan's acting. "Ah, there it is!" Steve cried through his laughs. "There's Captain Honda!"
"Ah, there's Johan's party trick!" Ivan clapped his hands through his own laughs. "Keep it coming!"
"And then the pretty samurai boy's all like, 'Good job, very nice!' like the puppet he is!" Johan continued on with his direction-less, drunken, and mocking rant. "Scheiß auf mein Leben!" He ended his rant by slamming his head on the counter once, and very hard. The wasted German was seemingly done for the night.
Steve and Ivan were about to ask for another drink, but they each felt a hand on their shoulders, and by their sight of him slouched over the counter, they knew it was not Johan. They both tensed with unspoken fear when they found out it could only be one other possibility, a possibility that had only seconds ago been mocked aloud by Johan.
"Hey, Tony," Captain Muto Honda's voice flowed in the nighttime air. He was dressed in the same outfit that the other judges wore, but markedly differed by having a plain white undershirt instead of the judges' unique black shirts. Well, that and he was still measurably more buff than the others even through such clothes. "We're all gonna need some more drinks here. Because let me tell you…" The Captain from the JASDF switched his grip on Steve and Ivan so he now held them by the scruffs of their sweaters, fully knowing they both intended to make a break for it. Well, the Captain decided that wouldn't be so as he held the American and Russian in place with a winner smile on his face. "We're gonna drink to the bitter end tonight!"
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Part of Projekt Jägermeistern.
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The author doesn't claim to own "Girls und Panzer" or any other references made. "Girls und Panzer" belongs to Actas. Any references made belong to their respective owners.
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