Chapter 122: Fight the Ship
Battleship Arizona had always wanted to visit the Philippines, and now that she was finally there… She had to admit, the islands were even more breathtaking than she'd imagined.
The air was warm with just the right amount of salty crispness to keep from being muggy. It was like taking a bite out of a nice fresh apple, equal parts refreshing and enjoyable.
The beaches gleamed like polished ivory in the midnight sun and seemed to beg the old standard to grace them with her presence in a relaxing afternoon of swimming and sunbathing. It was an idea Arizona wasn't quite opposed too—provided she could procure sensible swimwear for herself and her friends. She shuddered to think what Jersey or Prinz Eugen might consider appropriate for bathing, and from what she gathered, Shinano's bathing suit would require special attention to keep the fragile carrier from melting down.
But that was a question for another time. Arizona knew she'd soon be steaming into battle, and she wanted to soak up as much pleasure as she could. And… she was quite certain this was the place to purse that intention. The ocean below her keel felt like snuggling armfuls of plushies fresh out of the dryer underneath a fluffy comforter that was also fresh out of the dryer. It was warm, and so crystal-clear she could see her sister's screws lazily spinning with the current.
And, more to the point, it was utterly devoid of the Abyssals' demonic taint. The whole archipelago was.
The Philippine navy was small. Even their biggest ship displaced a scant three thousand tons, and the bulk were smaller still. Frigates, Corvettes, even patrol boats made these islands their home. They fought for the archipelago, and in turn the archipelago fought for them. Its countless islands, channels, and inlets gave perfect hiding spots for patrol craft, funneled Abyssal heavies into choke points, and let skilled Philippine helmsmen simply vanish into the maze the minute they wished to disappear.
Every time the Abyss had mounted an offensive, they'd been met by minefields so thick one could almost walk across them. They'd found every shoal, every rock, every twist in the coastline hid a torpedo. They couldn't go one boat length without tearing their hulls open, getting their superstructure showered with napalm, or any number of a million horrible fates devised by a people as desperate as they were inventive.
In the end, the Abyssals had simply given up in disgust. They'd contained the island and forced its valiant defenders back the the inland seas. But the island still stood as a bastion against the pacific, a wall the Abyssals were forced to detour around rather than smashing through.
Arizona only hoped her conduct in the coming battle would live up to their standard. She was an old ship, with many years of faithful service under her boot stripe. Many years of peacetime service. In her twinned life as a battleship, she'd fired her guns in anger only twice.
The first was a battle that, save for the sudden intervention of a half-starved submarine, could have gone a very different way.
The second was the battle with the demon wearing Tosa's face. A battle that nearly cost Arizona one of the precious few friends she had. Hiei had been all but crippled in her second engagement, and she was a proper capital ship.
Now, Arizona was steaming into battle with a destroyer by her side. A real destroyer, a ship of steel crewed by three-hundred-eighty brave souls and protected by little more than her captain's wit and the favor of fate.
Intellectually, Arizona knew she would win. She was a hundred miles outside jet range, and the distant buzz of Shinano's orbiting fighters was a gentle reminder of the timid carrier's quiet protection. She knew two standards were more than a match for three great-war battlecruisers, and she knew Jersey and Kongou would be standing by to assist the moment things got dicey.
She knew she would win the day. But every time she caught the camouflaged bulk of McCampbell steaming proudly by her side, a tiny voice in the back of her head whispered "at what cost."
"Miss Arizona," The tight, crisp accent of heavy cruiser San Francisco cut through Arizona's pondering like a honed blade. It was distinctly Frisco's voice, Arizona had gotten to know the heavy cruiser back when they were both stationed in pearl—although Frisco still wore her whole shirt back then—but the playful, laid-back lilt was gone.
Frisco was fully-engaged, and there wasn't a shred of her sinewy body left for mirth.
"Arizona copies." The standard reflexively brought her fingers to her scared ear.
"We're closing the distance," said Frisco. "Should be forty minutes out."
"Understood." Arizona rolled her thick neck until her bulkheads snapped into place. Her turbines roared to flank and her screws bit into the water. Her wake churned to foam as the old standard roused herself for battle again. Her guns materialized at her hips as she let her hands close around their polished wood grips.
She drew the big irons from her hips and thumbed the hammers back without a second thought. Her gaze was locked on the horizon, and her temples rang with the howl of her general quarters siren.
Beside her, Johnston pulled alongside with an utterly homicidal smirk on her little face, a smile that seemed to consist only of gleaming canines. Her feathers whipped with the wind as the little destroyer practically glued herself to the big standard's hip. "Nobody's touching you, ma'am."
Arizona smiled. She'd never had the honor of fighting with a Fletcher, but she knew their reputation.
If a Fletcher said a ship was safe, she was. There was no room for debate with the little firecrackers.
"Yo," The rough-cut contralto of New Jersey rumbled through the radio. "At 'em Arizona!"
Arizona's smile widened, and she ran her tongue against her teeth. All canines. All sharp enough to cut steel. Perhaps that was simply what American warships did when steaming into battle.
"USS Arizona," the big standard felt the need to say something as saw the first glimmer of bloody red peek over the horizon. "Engaging."
—|—|—
The Island princess was beyond rage now, she'd left that behind her and passed thoroughly into a heart-shattering despair. Her demons, her own flesh, that which she birthed from her womb and suckled at her breast were going to die, and there wasn't a thing she could do to stop it. Caught between an irresistible force and an immovable object, they would be mauled to pieces by the traitors, and all she could do was watch.
Her stormbirds didn't have the range to assist, and even her lightings could only barely make the journey, and only if they didn't save a single drop of fuel for their flight home.
The princess roared in anguish, her vast gauntlet carving a deep gouge in the concrete of her throne room. It didn't matter anyway. Even if she could somehow mount a strike, even if her jets somehow had the fuel to fly flat-out the whole way, their engines would eat themselves from the strain, and even then it wouldn't be fast enough.
Concrete shattered as she fell to her knees. If she had eyes, they'd be pouring tears down her stony face. She raked her talons along her twisted metal crown, tearing at the metal fused with her skin as a howl of anguish slipped through her teeth.
Her demons would die.
There was nothing she could do about it.
The traitors would steal them from her, the only things she'd ever loved.
And after that, they'd take her island. They'd take her.
And they could have it. If they drowned in in their blood.
The traitors would learn the fury of a mother with nothing left to loose.
She would avenge her demons.
AND THEY WOULD ALL DIE SCREAMING!
—|—|—
Arizona brought her guns to her eyes with cool precision. The gears in her mind ticked away with the oiled mechanical grace of a fine Swiss timepiece as she plotted her firing solution. She knew, intellectually, that she wasn't alone. She knew Jersey and Kongou were standing by a scant few miles west, ready to step in the moment something got out of hand. She knew Shinano's Shidens and Jills were orbiting overhead, ready to swoop in with a strike from the heavens if need be.
She knew, but she didn't care.
It was irrelevant to her right now.
Her universe consisted of herself, her rifles, and her targets.
"Range," Arizona whispered to herself as she thumbed the hammers back on her Colt Navy revolvers, "Twenty-eight-thousand four-hundred yards."
She didn't—yet—possess the magical radar-linked computers of her sister or Jersey, but the old standard had been practicing optical gunnery with Mutsu and Hiei daily ever since she'd returned. And today, with a brilliant midday sun hanging in the middle of a cloudless sky as clear as sapphire, was a perfect day for optical gunnery.
"Target speed," she squinted over the gleaming waves, her cover pulled low over her eyes like the western gunslingers of yore, and her bright red neckerchief flapping in the breeze. "Twenty-eight knots."
Arizona's fingers closed around the polished steel triggers of her revolvers. "FIRE!"
BA-BA-BA-BOOM! Her rifles spoke with perfectly-tuned harmony, the interrupter circuits turning a thunderous explosion of noise into a roaring symphony of steel and cordite. Arizona felt her guns flip in her hands as her rifles dropped to their loading angles. faeries scrambled inside her turrets, working deep inside her barrettes to haul fresh shells and powder up to the waiting breeches.
Her first volley was a miss. Towering splashes carved a vast checkerboard on the ocean, telling Arizona not only that she missed, but precisely how much she missed by.
One of the abyssal battlecruisers twitched over, diving for one of her splashes in a frantic attempt to spoil her solution. The other two barreled straight on, desperately trying to close the range until their own twelve-inch guns could drop shells against Arizona.
The standard wasn't worried. She knew she was far from the fastest ship afloat. The doctrine that conceived her had fallen to the scrapheaps of history, replaced by ideals prioritizing speed over sheer armor. Arizona was slow. But not even Jersey had a thicker belt.
She smiled as she felt her second volley slam home into her rifles. The breech blocks cranked closed and her twelve-gun battery answered her commands again, following her steely gaze as she stared down the lead battlecruiser.
"FIRE!" Her rifles spoke once more, hurling twelve fifteen-hundred pound shells in a tighter grid towards her target. Her first estimates had been close, she need only tighten her guesses until she found the range.
The battlecruiser didn't try to dodge. It's inky black hull burned like cold fire as it roared towards her. Its stacks belched smoke as thick and black as coal, and its wake roiled with a freezing taint.
With a crash, Arizona's second volley slammed into the ocean. This time, her bracket was tight, constructing her target like a corset of steel and fire. She'd found the range, she need only prosecute her just vengeance.
"Fun, isn't it, Ari?" For the first time since she'd come back, Pennsy wore an honest smile. Her eyes burned not with the general hatred she so often smoldered with, but a pointed, focused anger. Righteous fury directed squarely at the demons under her guns.
Arizona smiled. Far be it from her to declare brutal violence a worthwhile pastime, the old standard had lived her first life in the desperate hope that she'd pass into obscurity without firing a single shot. But… she had to agree with Jersey for a moment. Killing Nazis was good, wholesome fun. "Indeed, Pennsy."
Penny's response was a thundering barrage from her battery, followed an instant later by Arizona's own twelve-piece choir of death.
This time, she had the range. She had the angles. And her shells found their mark.
Fifteen hundred pounds of case-hardened American Iron shoved its way through the battlecruiser's deck and punched through watertight compartments like they were made of tissue paper. A half-dozen of its comrades followed suit, tearing into the battlecruiser's bow and reducing everything forward of A turret into twisted metal even a scrapyard would reject.
"Ha ha!" A raucous laugh firmly at odds with Penny's former dour behavior rumbled from her lopsided smile. "That's my lil' sister!"
Arizona blushed as bright as her neckerchief as she loaded a fresh charge into her navy Colt.
By sundown, all that was left of the battlecruisers was three rapidly-disappearing stains on the pristine ocean.
Jane Richardson examined her handiwork with a beaming smile. Sitting on the middle of the kitchen table, surrounded by construction paper shavings, globs of half-cooled hot-glue, tape scraps, and several empty bottles of white glue was an exact replica of the Sasebo summoning chamber.
Well… not quite exact. Jane hadn't gone into obsessive rivet-counting detail for a simple class diorama, but it was pretty close. She'd copied the Japanese calligraphy from the wall-hanging scrolls as best she could—it took her seven tries, and she was really proud of how they turned out. She'd made little paper figures of her dad and Jintsuu to watch over the summoning pool, and she'd even built the diorama around a Tupperware container. It could even hold water!
A smile passed over the girl's face, as a sudden realization dawned.
Maybe she was just being silly, but…
Jane bolted for the garage with the frantic energy only a small girl who'd consumed her own body weight in sugar products to fuel her artistic efforts could produce. Before long, she was back with a can of Iron filings—which were as messy as they were fun to play with—a battered bottle of three-in-one oil, and a few rounds from her dad's nine-millimeter.
She hadn't touched his gun of course, Jane knew far better than to do that. Although she would like it stated for the record that she was a better shot than him, mostly due to Arizona's teaching. She'd just tore into one of the open cardboard ammo boxes and grabbed a handful of cartridges.
If this didn't work, she'd put them back, but she was sure she'd need them.
"Ahem," Jane said. But before she could continue, she realized she was missing something. She darted over to the wall and turned the lights out, and scrounged up a few matches. They weren't incense sticks like the Shinto priests used, but it was probably close enough.
Jane struck one of the big matches against the box and held it carefully between her fingers. "Ahem. Steel—" she dumped some of the iron filings into the pool. "—fuel—" she dribbled the 3-in-1. It wasn't fuel oil, but it was the closest she could find on short notice. "—Ammo—" she let the bullets slip between her little fingers one at a time.
"This we offer to the deep," Jane bowed her head to her little mini-summoning chamber. "In tribute to…" she tapped her toe against her chair and tried to remember the words. "In tribute service gladly rendered. And humbly, um… request a return to service."
The girl closed her eyes and blew out her match.
When she opened them, she wasn't alone.
Standing quietly on the surface of the little pool was Mutsu.
Only she wasn't Mutsu, she was a four-inch-tall version of the battleship Jane had decided her father was going to marry. This Mutsu—who Jane decided would be called Minimu—had a head nearly as large as the rest of her body, a tiny torso that was almost perfectly triangular, and tiny, stumpy limbs that hung quietly at her sides.
"Eeeeee," Jane giggled and slammed her chin against the table in her haste to be at eye-level with Minimu. Not that she cared, she was too excited to even notice the pain. "Hi!"
"Mu~" said Minimu with a gentle wave.
"You're cute."
"Muuu"
"You hungry?"
Minimu nodded.
"Stay right there!" Jane darted off her chair, only to come back and give the tiny battleship a quiet one-fingered pat on the head.
"Muuuuuu~"
Jane giggled, and darted off to the kitchen. She wasn't sure what the little battleship would like, so she settled on a nice crisp apple. Jane liked candy, but she liked apples too. They were always delicious and made her want to do things.
Also, the one she'd picked out was bigger than Minimu's head, and that was funny.
"Here!" Jane handed the apple to the tiny battleship, who had to strain her tiny arms to hold onto it.
Then, the girl just watched as Minimu enjoyed her meal. It took the little thing a few minutes to even figure out how to bite into the apple, but before long she was happily nomming away with her chubby little legs splayed out on the kitchen table.
"You're so cute!"
"Mu!" Minimu snapped a noise of protest as Jane squished her chubby cheek, but it was soon replaced by a contented "Muuuuu~"
Jane giggled. She couldn't wait to show Mutsu-mama!