The Legends Still Live On
Bogen Siebundzwanzig-komma-ein: Extras Neun und Zehn
Kapitel Zehn: Es ist unabhängige Schulung
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Up in a very specific bedroom of the Akiyama Barber Shop, there was a lot of stuff scattered across the floor. The scattering was not random, but deliberate. Boxes were propped in specific locations and arrangements, creating a semblance to a very specific type of field.
Also on the floor were various tank models, all representing various tanks in the possession of Ooarai. There was the distinctive Bräunlichrot Panzer IV H of the Anglerfish Team, the Dunkelgelb Jagdpanzer 38(t) of Turtle Team, the tan I-Go otsu of Duck Team, the Panzergrau StuG III F, the naturally dark brown M3 Lee, the yellowish Char B1bis, the faded green Chi-Nu, and the Panzergrau VK 45.01 (P).
"So if events occurred like this…" Yukari muttered to herself as she manipulated the Panzer IV and VK 45.01 (P) into position. They were depicted such that the Panzer IV was retreating around a corner, represented by a small box, and the VK 45.01 (P) waiting a little ways behind the corner ready to blow whatever was tailing the smaller German Panzer to smithereens. "… Then the enemy should react like this…"
Yukari then moved a dark gray Churchill Mk VII, representing the same full-scale infantry tank commanded by St Gloriana's Darjeeling, to appear to be trying to peek around the corner. "The enemy should easily be taken out, as at this range the Porsche Tiger has a powerful enough gun to take out a Churchill Mk VII from the front, while the Churchill would be unable to respond due to the Tiger's thick armor being too much for its own gun to punch through…" Yukari noted as she grabbed the Churchill, taking it out of the simulation after determining it wouldn't survive.
She put it with the other model tanks she had off to the side, all of which represented the tanks that Ooarai's rivals used. There was of course the Churchill Mk VII representing Darjeeling's tank. Also present was a tan Matilda II as a generic St Gloriana tank, a flat green M4 sans suffix representing any of Saunders' numerous Shermans, a slightly darker green Sherman VC to represent Naomi, a dark green P26/40 to represent Anchovy, a snow white T-34-85 as a general Pravda tank, a snow white KV-2 to represent Pravda's Gigant, a snow white IS-2 mod. 1944 to portray the sharpshooter Nonna, and an assortment of German tanks representing Schwarzwaldspitze. The assortment contained a Dunkelgelb Panther G, a Dunkelgelb Vomag-produced Jagdpanzer IV/70, a Dunkelgelb Jagdpanther, a Dunkelgelb Elefant, a three-color camouflaged Maus, a Dunkelgelb Tiger II (H) to represent Erika Itsumi, and a Dunkelgelb Tiger H1 to portray Maho Nishizumi.
"Now…" the tank guru muttered as she began rearranging the 'battlefield' again, moving boxes into strategic positions. "… To work out how just one team could possibly take on Schwarzwaldspitze's best…" She began to set the battlefield's players, choosing three of Schwarzwaldspitze's tanks to bring out against the sole Panzer IV H. "The Jagdpanther, Miss Erika's Tiger II, and Lady Nishizumi's older sister in the Tiger I… This doesn't look too good for us, but I think we can do this…"
Yukari had each side start on opposite ends of the battlefield, which had boxes scattered across sporadically to serve as cover. She had the three Schwarzwaldspitze Panzers split up and go in different directions, with the Tiger II going straight up the middle.
The Panzer IV went to the right side of the battlefield as soon as the fight commenced. However, it was soon intercepted by the Jagdpanther, which Yukari knew possessed quite impressive mobility for its weight, being based on the similarly agile Panther.
"No, no, the Panzer IV needs to book it here…" Yukari predicted the most likely action Miho would undertake, which was to immediately accelerate to the side upon seeing the Jagdpanther lining up the Panzer IV for a shot, to throw off the tank destroyer's aim and get it to miss. Taking advantage of the time the Jagdpanther needed to reload, the smaller Panzer closed with the tank destroyer, heading for its side.
"And Hana fires…" the tank guru visualized the scene, getting very much into the simulating. She imagined the 7,5 cm KwK 40 L/48 planting a shot straight into the side of the Jagdpanther's crew compartment, a fatal shot for all intents and purposes. "… And the enemy is history."
After simulating that brief skirmish, Yukari manipulated the Panzer IV to head for the middle. The other two German heavy tanks both started heading for the direction of the lighter Panzer, with the Tiger I being more runabout in its route and the Tiger II being more straight forward due to its lesser mobility and closer proximity.
The Königstiger ran into the Panzer IV first, at an intersection. "Lady Nishizumi! To our right!" Yukari made the call-out, using the excessively formal title specially meant for her Swabian commander.
"Got it, Yukari!" Miho acknowledged from her commander's post. She saw the Tiger II's long 88 begin to train itself on the Panzer IV. "Mako, right!"
The Anglerfish Panzer accelerated off to the right to throw off the Tiger II's aim, which forced the heavy tank's shot to go wide left into a building due to overcompensation.
"Now!" Miho cued. At that cue, the Panzer IV drove around the Tiger II to get sight of its side armor. "Feuer!"
At the order, Hana fired the 7,5 cm cannon straight into the port side of the Königstiger. At that close a range, the shot was guaranteed to penetrate and wreck the interior. And defeat the heavy tank it did, as the Tiger II completely locked up after being hit.
Miho let out a breath after her crew slayed the big-game beast that was Erika's Tiger II. "Nice job, everybody," she congratulated them.
"Whoo…" Yukari whooped with shortness of breath from the intense action as she shared a high-five with Hana for her always-reliable gunnery.
The Panzer IV's German commander opened her hatch and stood up into her usual heads-up commanding position to scan the area around her. She was well aware of how there was still one enemy left, and of how that enemy was going to be by far the most difficult to destroy. "Mako, drive on," Miho calmly ordered.
With that, the Bräunlichrot Panzer gently set off and drove forward down the wide multilane street.
If Miho knew her sister as well as she thought she knew her, then she would guess that Maho was going to come after her from the direction she least expected. The light brunette had planned for this, as the street she was on had buildings on either side. Just ahead, the street was split into a crossroads as a four-way intersection, though it was warned that taking a left from Miho's current direction would lead to a dead-end. She held all the cards, as she could easily predict where her sister would come from and have enough time to react in her current position, which held few pathways directly to her.
Suddenly, she heard the distinct V12 howl of the 23-liter Maybach HL230, the engine powering the Tiger I. She widened her eyes in surprise, momentarily panicking because she could've sworn she accounted for everything to work in her favor. At that moment, the building her Panzer IV was about to pass effectively blew up after something plowed through it from the other side.
And, as she held her arms up to shield herself from the debris, that's when Miho remembered that behind one of the buildings to her right was a small side street that, while a dead-end, still led to the building's other side. The side street was perpendicular to the main street the light brunette was on, and as she realized in that moment, it was very much possible to forcefully bridge those two streets together if enough force was put behind such an attempt.
Maho had rammed her Tiger I through the building at its maximum 28 mph speed just as Miho was about to pass by it, clouding the area with a thick cloud of dust from the concrete that was just crushed without mercy. If she had just a little more speed behind her, the darker-haired Nishizumi could've carried enough momentum to effectively ram the Panzer IV as well.
As the thick dust could began to dissipate, and as Miho regained her bearings from the surprise blow, the light brunette saw the distinct front flange and rear disk type muzzle brake of the 8,8 cm KwK 36 L/56 wielded by the prowling beast pointing near her general direction. At that point, Miho decided that it was time for flight instead of fight. "Mako, get us out of here!" she ordered with a sense of urgency.
Heeding the order, Mako quickly slammed the gear shift into first and launched the Panzer forward under full throttle and away from the Tiger I. The German heavy tank began turning both its hull and its turret slowly toward the Panzer IV, with its hull rotating in place and assisting in getting the gun on target sooner due to the slow turret traverse of the heavy tank.
"Make a left here!" Miho ordered upon reaching the crossroads that were only several dozen meters away. The Tiger was about to take a shot at her, so the light brunette immediately sought to evade.
"Roger," Mako responded as only she could: with absolutely no emotion in her voice. She steered the Panzer IV left to make the turn and head down the side street.
Yukari just remembered something critical, however. "But Lady Nishizumi, this way's-" she began to say to Miho that this street was a dead end, but she was cut off before she could finish.
"It's alright, Yukari, that's-" Miho was about to elaborate to Yukari how this was a part of her plan, but she too was cut off as a familiar voice echoed over the radio.
"Jericho, eingehend," everyone heard the voice of the one and only Erich-Dietrich Hartmann, informing that the requested airstrike, codenamed Jericho, was inbound. In the background was the constant deep and powerful howl of the DB 605 engine within his Bf 109 running at full throttle.
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Yukari snapped back to reality with a shocked start. She did not expect the German ultra-ace to worm his way into her visualization. On instinct, she looked around to try and find the source of disturbance that snapped her out of her stupor. Almost everything was as she left it.
The keyword was 'almost,' as there was one extra presence in her room now: Erich-Dietrich Hartmann, standing before her and looking down at her. He was in nothing but his black swim trunks, clearly unconcerned with propriety. The blond-haired ultra-ace started laughing when he got a look at Yukari's undignified face.
"Oh man, I was wondering how long it would take for you to snap out of it!" the German pilot remarked while his laughter gradually died down.
The tank guru remained in a stunned silence before finally being able to speak up. "What are you doing here?!" she asked, bolting up to her feet as her face flushed red in shame from being caught in such an impassioned state in her role-playing.
"Oh, right, I did come here for a reason, didn't I?" Erich seemed to remember he was meant to do something, quenching his laughter instantly. "Well, I just came by to see if you wanted to come hang out with us all. We were planning to go to the pool for the day."
"The pool?" Yukari asked, forgetting all about how ashamed she was five seconds prior. The blonde nodded affirmative, actually excited about hanging out with her friends. "Oh, yeah, of course! I'll be down in a second!"
Erich watched as the tank guru sprung to life again and ran towards her closet. Seeing his work done, the blonde passed his gaze over all of the tank models on the floor before finally leaving and heading back downstairs.
"So, is she coming?" Miho asked him after he came back outside. She was leaning back against the building with her arms crossed nonchalantly in her own swimsuit, a pink two-piece using a tied top piece and a bottom that resembled an extremely short skirt. A few moderate frills were present on both pieces.
"Yeah, she'll be down in a second," Erich responded. Nobody else was there, as the rest of them had already gone on ahead to the pool, leaving just the two Swabians. The blonde grinned in amusement as he began to retell what kept Yukari in the first place. "When I went up to get her, I heard her talking to herself a bit, going all, 'But Lady Nishizumi!' and then in your voice 'It's alright, Yukari,' and all that while she moved around model tanks on the floor." He tried to raise his voice an octave to mimic Yukari's imitation, but the attempt was rather pathetic. "So I eventually step in and whisper, 'Jericho, eingehend' in her ear, and she just jumps." Erich jumped back a bit to emphasize, and he then began to laugh again at the absurdity of the entire situation.
Miho turned red in embarrassment on Yukari's behalf, because she knew Erich was merciless in his teasing and would never allow the tank guru to live that down. The light brunette was not terribly surprised, however, to find out that Yukari had been role-playing combat scenarios with great passion. But the principle of Erich actually telling her about it without Yukari there did not sit well with her.
"The look on her face: priceless!" the blonde huffed out, about ready to burst into giggles again.
That was when Miho smacked him on the upper arm in reprimand. She smacked him pretty hard, too. After all, this was far from the first time she had to keep the blonde's behavior in line.
"Ah-ha-ha-how-ow…" Erich playfully backed away until his back was to the wall, holding his shoulder with mock-hurt as the light brunette closed the gap with him, close enough so that their bodies could sense the heat of the other without even touching.
"You know that's not a nice thing to say about her…" Miho lectured him with that silky smooth and airy voice she used whenever she wanted to drive a point home while also keeping the overall mood pleasant and uncontested. She had a small smile with lowered eyebrows, a look that Erich swore made her look as ethereal as a goddess. "Would you like it if I told everyone about our secret activities because you were so willing to spill someone else's secret activities for no reason other than for a good laugh?"
The light brunette brought herself even closer to Erich, fully pressing her body against his own and getting him mightily distracted about said 'secret activities.' 'We're still talking about discretion, right?' the blonde thought as his breathing started getting harder and a dark haze curtailed over his vision, bringing all of his other thoughts to the vixen in front of him. Said vixen brought her hands to his shoulders and pressed her forehead to his own, bringing their lips just a hair's breadth away from each other.
"Because you know I will…" Miho whispered, her hot breath ghosting over the blonde's lips and presenting a mighty temptation to him.
And by God, was that temptation effective. Erich wanted to do nothing more than rip that two-piece off of her and conquer her again, and again, and again. If she wanted to start the fire in him, then he would give it to her. He would give it all to her, even when she begged him to stop. He would have her on her knees, begging in such a wanton manner that he wouldn't be able to hold himself back.
"Hey guys, I didn't keep you too long, did I?" Yukari strolled out of the barber shop with her two-piece camo swimsuit in hand.
Miho casually stepped away from Erich with a friendly smile on her face and turned to Yukari. "No, not at all!" she reassured the tank guru. She then waved her hand. "Come on, let's go!"
She and Yukari then set off, but Erich remained where he was, face flushed red from arousal, as he perplexedly watched Miho just walk away like nothing happened.
Finally, he shook his head in defeat as he walked after them. "Ach, du bist so ein Scherzbold…" the blonde muttered how she was such a tease.
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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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