Chapter 2: More Brass, All the Brass

Jersey stretched her legs as best she could in the cramped ten-ton's bed. Her toes squished into the front of her navy-blue running shoes as the bumped up against the opposite wall. She'd been under tow before, back when she was a ship proper, but this… this was something very different.

"Leg falling asleep?" asked Crowing, obligingly scooting down the bench seat to give the battleship more room to stretch.

"Hmm?" Jersey tilted her head to the side, peering at him though the tops of her shades. "Oh, no…" she trailed off, trying to think of how she knew what 'leg falling asleep meant.' "I don't think. Just a new experience for me."

Crowning nodded, then slowly let out a soft chuckle. "I keep forgetting you're less than a day old."

"Hey now," Jersey sat up, resting her arms on her bare thighs. "I was laid down in '39."

"And yet, this is your first car ride."

Jersey scowled. "Fine, you got me. I'm grouchy." She crossed her arms over her chest, puckering her down vest so the yellow-gold liner showed. "I'm not meant to spend this long cooped up in a box."

"We've been driving for an hour and a half."

"Don't tell me," Jersey glanced at one of the watches around her wrist, making sure it agreed with her ship's chronometer. A minute or so fast, but that didn't make her sore... stern? maybe? feel any better. "'least we're almost there."

Crowning glanced over his shoulder. The windows were little more than narrow slits, impossible to get a good set of bearings without your nose pressed up against them. "With this traffic, who knows?"

Jersey smirked.

There was a sharp bang against the front of the cab. "Yo," Sherman's voice was hoarse from screaming at traffic and the truck's overstressed engine. "we're here!"

Jersey's smirk graduated to a full-blown Cheshire-cat grin.

"How could you possibly know?"

"Simple," said Jersey, her body sloshing forwards against the cabin bulkhead as the truck ground to a stop. "We made two stops in quick succession. That was our driver stopping to exchange ID, then wait for the inner gate to open."

Crowning sat back in his bench, shaking his head with a disbelieving grin.

"Oh, and I launched a kingfisher before we met. Had it trailing us for the past four hours." Jersey closed her eyes, letting the faries in her scout plane see for her.

"That… that's cheating."

Jersey shrugged, waving a hand at the back door, "And in three… two… one…"

The latches swung open with a crunch of metal-on-metal, and the door swung open to reveal a half-dozen men in splotchy gray tiger-stripe fatigues. The nearest offered a pearly smile as he stepped back to make room. "Welcome to JB-MDL, ma'am?"

Jersey ducked as she made her way out the rear of the truck, letting out a pleasured sigh as her shoes hit the comfortingly still tarmac. "Jay-Bee-what-what?" She pulled her cap on, squinting into the amber evening sun. "We name bases with a can of alphabet soup in the future?"

"Uh, no, ma'am," said the main in the tiger-stripe fatigues. "It stands for Joint-Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst."

Jersey was only half-paying attention as she whistled for her kingfisher. The fairy'd been happy to finally get in the air again. But four hours was a long time to stay in the air, and the poor thing was getting grouchy. "Bit of a mouthfu- wait, what?"

"Ma'am?"

Jersey glanced over at the man, her eyes picking out the details of his uniform. "Hey, Sherman!" she barked, her floatplane all but forgotten.

"Ma'am!" Sherman trotted over as fast as the limp he was dependently trying to hide would allow.

"We let zoomies on our bases in the future?"

"Well… ma'am, it's technically our base now." said the Airman. "JB-MDL is under Airlift Mobility Command."

Jersey let out a grunt, flashing a smirk at the airman. "Well," she said, splitting her attention between the airman infront of her and the kingfisher angling in on said airman's cover, "Thank you for letting an old salt onto your fancy little base."

"You're very welcome ma'am," said the airman with almost painful earnest.

"One question."

"Ma'am?," he said, blissfully ignorant of the tinny whrrrrr of a teeny-tiny Pratt & Whitney.

"Is the pattern full?"

"MaaAAA The FUCK!" His voice jumped almost a solid octave as the kingfisher sent his cover flying with the nose of its float.

Sherman bit his lip to keep from laughing along as the tiny airplane flew a victory roll around Jersey's head before vectoring off to land.

"You, uh, might want to advise the tower."

"Will do, ma'am," said the airman, waving at one of his subordinates to do the deed.

"Ma'am-" Sherman stepped a bit closer to the battleship, "General Carter and Admiral Williams want to talk with you."

Jersey huffed, crossing her arms with a cocky smirk. "No more bothering zoomies?"

"I'm afraid not, ma'am."

"Fiiiine."

"You want me to land what?" Tech Sergeant Kenny Chung could only stare at his own bewildered expression reflected in the smooth black plastic telephone.

"A, uh… floatplane, Tower." the tinny voice on the other side of the seemed to flip between confusion and a tinge of fear with every word.

"A floatplane." Chung's voice was flatter than the miles of concrete runway he looked after. Any other day, he might have brushed this off as some sort of prank, the poor airman on the other end certainly sounded like he didn't believe what he was saying. Then again, the base—the landlocked base— was currently playing host to a battleship from WWII.

"Uh… yes, sir." there was a pause, and Chung could just make out rapid, if muffled, conversations on the other end of the phone. "A kingfisher, sir. We think."

Chung sighed, cradling the phone against his shoulder as he reached for his coffee. "And do you have a vector for me?"

"Uh, negative. She just told us to tell you."

"She?"

"New Jersey, tower."

"Well, tell her that-" Chung's voice was abruptly lost in the throaty rumble of a Pratt & Whitney Wasp Junior engine ripping past the control tower windows with all the speed a portly little kingfisher scout plane could manage. "FUCK!"

"Yeah," said the airman, clearly struggling to suppress a chuckle as muffled laughter sounded though the phone. "She, uh… likes to do that."

Chung growled something incoherent and slammed the phone back down. "Tapping!"

"Sergeant?" the blonde airman looked over from her station.

"Get me a line to that plane, WWII frequencies!"

"Uh… okay, Sergeant." said Tapping, her normally doe-like blue eyes as wide as dinner plates with confusion.

"Have to vector in a WWII naval float plane," said Chung, hoping if he explained enough it would make sense to him.

"But… we're landlocked."

"Yeah," Chung sighed, hanging his head in resignation. "Just… tell me when you have the freqs."

"Wait one," Tapping ducked under her desk for a few minutes, coming back with her cover askew and a triumphant smile on her face. "Try it now."

Chung held the phone like a lifeline as he brought it up to his face. "MDL tower to…" he paused, trying to guess how to even address the buzz-happy little floatplane, "New Jersey kingfisher. How copy, over?"

The little blue plane dipped one wing, then the other as it blissfully cruised past the tower.

"Sergeant, that plane has a float," said Tapping, setting her binoculars down.

"I know."

"I mean- It doesn't have wheels."

"I know."

Tapping leaned in, pressing her binoculars against the control tower glass. "We're on a landlocked base."

"Yeah, I know." Chung let out a low whistle as he tried to think. "Uh, Kingfisher, due west of the tower is a lake, you'll have about twelve-hundred feet of open water."

"That's not much," muttered Tapping. With her eyes glued on the little floatplane, she utterly missed the razor-sharp glare Chung was sending her way.

The kingfisher, however, seemed to disagree. Flipping one haze-blue wing over the other, it did a little barrel roll over the tower.

"Uh… let's get a fire-control team down there," said Chung, "So we can fish out the, uh, WWII floatplane." he added, hanging his head. This was going to be a strange night.

The General's office stank of long-forgotten coffee and messy piles of paperwork made the room seem half the size it truly was. Jersey nearly knocked over a pile of binders resting precariously on a chair as she ducked under the lintel, her sneaker stopping just in time.

An exhausted-looking woman—her rumpled tiger-stripe fatigues nearly lost in the mess of forms and stained-brown coffee mugs— stood to greet the returned battleship.

"Battleship USS New Jersey reporting!" said Jersey, throwing her shoulders back as she stood at full attention, the brim of her cap just brushing against the overhead light fixture. "Ma'am!" she added, snapping her hand up in a salute.

"At ease…" the General returned the salute with a considerably looser version. For a moment, she looked lost for how to address the towering girl, before finally settling on, "Jersey. Sorry about the mess, managing airlifts' been hell."

"Oh, of course ma'am." Jersey nodded, tipping the brim of her hat at Crowning as the civilian awkwardly shuffled in behind her. "And, ah, this is Professor Crowning. He's the one who summoned me." She paused, biting the corner of her mouth, "I- think."

"If she's telling the truth, we're in your debt," said the General, letting herself fall back into her chair. "Brigadier General Sarah Carter," she added, fishing her name-plate out from a toppled pile of… some kind of paperwork.

Crowning rocked on his heels, suddenly very interested in anything but the General. "You should save the thanks for when I figure out how it happened."

Carter nodded, letting out a quiet sigh as she let her chin loll down against her collar bone.

"Um, ma'am," Jersey stepped a little closer, making sure to duck under the lights this time. "Isn't there supposed to be an Admiral here?"

Carter coughed, nodding in the direction Jersey and Crowning walked in. A huge flat-screen television dominated the wall, leaving just enough room for the door frame and a few shelves with books and scale-models of transport aircraft Jersey didn't recognize.

On the television was a silver-haried man who managed to somehow look even more exhausted than that general Carter. His duty whites were fraying around the collar, and his face had the tell-tale stubble of at least a few days without a shave. A subtitle identified him as "VADM: Samuel Williams, COMPACFLT"

"Oh," Jersey was suddenly very glad for the mirrored shades hiding her eyes, and blush. "That's cool," she said weakly.

"Miss Jersey, Doctor Crowning," said the Admiral, his voice surprisingly commanding for all the stress he was obviously under. "I can't tell you how good it is you have you with us."

"It's, uh… good to be here, sir," said Jersey, somehow forcing her spine straighter as she stood rapt attention.

"Doctor Crowning, before we continue… I'm afraid I must ask something of you."

"Yes?" Crowning stepped forwards so he wasn't being dwarfed quite so much by the battleship.

"I won't lie to you, either of you. We are in desperate need of ship spirits to continue this war," said the Admiral, his gaze piercing even though the jittery webcam. "And so far you're the only American to summon one, regardless of how accidental."

"Sir, I'm not sure-" Crowning abruptly stopped when Jersey put her hand on his shoulder.

"You did," she said, giving him a brief reassuring pat, "I'm pretty sure."

Williams gave the two a moment before continuing, "Jersey is to be transferred to our research facility in Bremerton. Doctor, you're on contract for another month of research on Jersey, though… obviously the situation has changed."

"No, no- I mean…" Crowning shook his head, sneaking a glance at the stern visage of the returned battleship-girl. "I signed on for this, I'm not leaving her."

"Excellent," said Williams, the corner of his mouth twitching up in a vague approximation of a smile. "Carter will have a modified C-5 prepared-"

"Sir," Jersey leaned forwards, biting her lip as she interrupted.

"Yes, Jersey?"

"The pacific isn't the only coast under attacks," said the battleship, her hands on her hips as she stared down at the little plastic webcam. "Why send me across the country."

"Because so far every attack, including the one that sunk you, has been carried out by submarine," said Williams, humoring the battleship girl for now. But Jersey could see his temper wearing thin before her eyes. "Perhaps in the future your surface warfare skills will be needed. But they are needed in the pacific. Desperately."

Jersey scrunched up her nose, risking one more question before she was satisfied. "But… New Jersey is my home, we're not leaving it defenceless."

"The RCN has twenty ASW girls patrolling the coasts, with more on the way," said Williams, "They'll do the job a hell of a lot better than you could. Understood?"

Jersey nodded, the heels of her sneakers coming together with a squeak of rubber on polished flooring. "Perfectly, sir."

"One final thing. As per US Navy protocol, you're promoted to the brevet rank of Lieutenant Commander, with official recognition to follow after you've proven yourself. Williams out."The transmission abruptly cut to a black screen with a blue "Signal Lost" message dominating the upper quarter.

Crowning was the first to speak. "I- I thought you were the first we summoned," he glanced from Jersey to Carter, "And there's already a protocol?"

"You think the Navy would try and summon a shipgirl," said Carter, "without knowing what to do if they got one?"

Crowning shrugged, but Jersey was too busy wordlessly staring at her reflection in the television to notice.

"C-5'll be prepped in two hours," said Carter, flipping open one of the hundreds of folders littering her desk, "Do what you got to do."

Jersey didn't say a word as she picked at her twelfth plate of chicken-fried steak, her face an emotionless mask behind her aviators as she sliced off a bite-sized morsel.

"Haven't said two words since…" Crowning set his cup down, gingerly clearing a spot between the two towers of plates the battleship had produced. "Well, since that talk with the Admiral."

Jersey glared at him, her stare piercing even though her shades.

"And… you've barely touched that," he added, nodding to the mostly-intact piece of breaded meat on her plate.

"Not hungry," grunted the battleship, tossing her fork down against the plate with a clatter of steel-on-plastic.

Crowning smirked in spite of himself, nodding to the stack of messy dishes. "I should hope so, after all that." He took a sip from his own cup—coffee, one cream two sugars—before addressing her again. "But something's bothering you."

"You don't know that," said Jersey, weakly toying with her fork, turning it over and over against her plate.

"You saying I'm… wrong?"

Jersey huffed slouching back in her chair until her face all but disappeared into her navy blue scarf. "Fine. I'm not okay. I just… that was a Vice Admiral we talked to."

Crowning settled on his chair, taking a sip as he waited for her to continue. Hopefully, she'd put it in terms a civilian like him could understand.

"CINCPACFLT's a four-star billet," said Jersey, scowling as she flung her fork down, crossing her arms with a huff. "If… if a three-star's holding the post, either everyone above him's dead, or" she bit her lip, looking over her shoulder at nothing in particular."

"Or?"

"Or we've lost so many ships a three-star's all it takes," said the battleship. She bit her lip, pulling her shades off to run her hand over her face, barely letting out a tiny sniffle. "Or both," she said, her rumbling contralto replaced by a quiet wimper, "And, uh…" she stopped, coughing as she fought to get her voice back. "And I'm pretty sure it's more the second one."

Crowning stared into his coffee. The horrific losses the Navy'd been suffering were common knowledge, and that was after whatever propaganda mills the DoD had working for them put their spin on it. It was just a fact of life for him.

"I was born after Midway," said Jersey, rubbing her nose with the back of her hand.

"Hmm?"

"The turning point of the war," Jersey sniffed, pushing her shades back on as she turned to face him again. "I served for fifty-nine years, and I never knew a time when we weren't… when we didn't own the seas."

"Times have changed-"

"Fuck that!" said Jersey, slamming her fist on the table so hard her plate shattered, sending bits of jagged plastic flying into the tables around her. "I'm an Iowa class battleship. You know what that means?"

"That-" Crowning was cut off by a guttural snarl from the battleship girl. Behind her, a pair of airmen glanced between the suddenly-shouting battleship and one another, both frozen in place.

"It means," said Jersey, grinding her hand into the table. "It means that my job is to protect. I was a flak screen for our carriers, I was artillery support for our troops… I was… I was…" She snarled again, wiping her free hand across her face. "I let my country bleed dry when they needed me!"

Crowning was lost for words. He'd gotten used to the battleship's relaxed, if rather trollish, personality. "Jersey, we need you now. You didn't miss your calling, it's still here."

The battleship was silent, and Crowning could somehow tell her eyes were fixed on his though those mirrored shades, her lip quivering ever so slightly.

"Hell, we need you now more than ever," said Crowning, "We're up against the wall, and we need… spirits like you." He stopped, running a hand though his hair as he cobbled together another sentence. "We would have taken a destroyer, hell, a freighter. But we got you, a- no, the battleship."

Jersey sat up a little straighter, her head canting to the side as she listened to him.

"I'm no historian," said Crowning, "but from what I've been told… your class were the ultimate battleships, The floating embodiment of America's industrial might. You're more than a ship, you're a symbol. A Symbol that will lead our fleet into battle. And into victory."

Jersey smirked- no, smiled, her teeth shining in the mess hall lighting a she wiped at her face. "The hell'd you learn to talk like that?"

"Henry the Fifth," said Crowning with a shrug.

"Well, it helped," said Jersey, plucking her fork up again.

"Uh… ma'am?" One of the airmen Crowning'd spotted before gingerly walked up, holding his clipboard before like a shield.

"Hmm?" Jersey spun in her seat, her running shorts swooshing against the smooth plastic.

"There's been an… uh…" the airman glanced over for his comrade, who was still standing in the doorway flashing him a thumbs-up. "incident with your plane."

"Oh shit," Jersey, bounced to her feet, her shoes briefly leaving the ground from the energy of the manuver. "What'd she do- wait." She skidded around, grabbing her mostly- untouched piece of chicken-fried steak, "What'd she do now?"