Chapter 8: Holding Nothing Back

The greatest challenge was still ahead of us. We had to defeat Black Forest, the school that had won nine consecutive times in the past, until the last tournament. But while Miho's decision to save the flag tank had played a role in their loss, I saw it as proof that they were not invincible, that a single well-placed shell on their flag tank was all we needed to win, and that winning was possible no matter the odds, as long as we had a shell, an opportunity to take a shot and a tank that could make the shot. I also saw it as proof that she cared for those who served under her, and was willing to make sacrifices and difficult decisions for what truly mattered.

Everyone redoubled their efforts to prepare for the final battle. We continued practicing, working out our weaknesses and trying to close the gap between ourselves and our mostly more experienced rivals. We fielded two new tanks and upgraded our Panzer IV and Pz38. Saori was no exception, as she asked for my help so that she could study for a Level 2 Radio Operator license, and I agreed to help her.

"So what exactly brought on your interest in studying for the exam?" I asked Saori. "You didn't try anything like this before."

"Well, the enemy's tougher this time, and considering what's at stake, I figured I had to do what I could to help out," she said. "I may not be the commander like Miporin is, but my role is one I hope to do as well as I can for all our sakes."

Saori had changed a great deal regarding her understanding of tanks. She had reportedly, when assigned with divvying up the roles, wondered why the tank needed so many people to operate, and didn't know how the shells were to be loaded. Now, she was able to understand and appreciate some of the finer points of one's individual role in the tank, commanding a tank and leading a team of multiple tanks. Tankery was no longer something she did in the hopes of meeting a boy, but something that she took seriously, and her resulting increase in competence was proof of her efforts bearing fruit.

The same went for everyone else, who, except for Miho and possibly Yukari, had started out as amateurs, and plunged headlong into something unfamiliar to them. In retrospect, it seems odd to remember that none of them, except the Student Council, knew about the school's existence being on the line, considering how hard they had worked and how much they had improved. And, for the most part, I was no exception.

"Anyway, Mako, I'm having a bit of trouble understanding this part..." Saori said, pointing to a passage in one of the books she had borrowed.

"Really?" I said, then proceeded to summarize it. Over the years, I had gotten used to helping Saori study, but explaining things in terms she could understand was still something of a challenge for me.

"Oh, I get it now!" Saori said. "Thanks, Mako, how did you understand it so easily?"

"I just started looking it over around the time you told me you wanted to study," I said. "I have to do my part here, too."

For Saori, this was about being able to help her friends or her school. For me, as her friend, and as someone who shared her goals, I decided to do what I could to help her, no matter how seemingly small the assistance would seem, or how difficult it would be for me.

Saori took and passed her radio license exam. We managed to field two more tanks for the final battle, and find students to crew both of them. While their crews had never seen actual competition before, they started at the same point most of us did, and would have to rise to the occasion regardless of their inexperience. While many of our preparations seemed hasty and last-minute, so was the entire idea of winning a tournament in our first year. And yet, except for St. Gloriana, we had been able to defeat the tournament opponents we had faced until now, when few had expected us to do so, and had only gotten stronger since then.

I knew that despite our preparations, our chances of victory were slim, but winning this battle was crucial to me for several reasons. If I lost, we would lose our chance to prove to the arrogant Black Forest vice captain that our school, seemingly unworthy to enter the tournament, could triumph against the reigning champion of Japan. If I lost, I would do so in front of my grandmother, the person I hoped would acknowledge my efforts. If I lost, I would likely not qualify for the tardiness passes and extra credits, which would likely result in my repeating my second year. If I lost, I would be separated from the others. And if I lost, I would fail to protect the school. The stakes were higher than ever, so this was no time to hold back or be a burden to others.

Getting fired up about this was a new sensation for me; if not for what was at stake, it would have seemed enjoyable. But I realized that Saori was right, and that life is more bearable and more fun if you don't see it as a series of obstacles to be overcome through as little effort as possible.

During the finals, Miho's plan- formulated to best utilize the strength of our own tanks while exploiting the weaknesses of Black Forest's- seemed to go well, or at least as well as we could reasonably expect- until Rabbit Team stalled in the water. Would Miho choose to press on, without Rabbit Team's help and while leaving them in danger? Or would she risk the victory we all sought in order to save them?

Miho, as always, chose the hard way to do things- saving Rabbit Team while continuing to try to win the tournament. I acknowledged the difficulty, but I realized that if I were to always take the easy path through life, I would never have gotten here. I ultimately had to respect Miho's decisions. She was not taking the easy way out by avoiding the Nishizumi Style, but choosing to do things her own way, even if they were difficult and less conventional than the alternative. It was for this cause that I was willing to put everything I had into winning.

But we were not out of the woods yet, as we soon came face to face with a Maus, one of the largest tanks in history. Its armor repelled all our initial frontal attacks, and its cannon took out Mallard and Hippo Team in rapid succession. Sodoko called me over the radio, promising to wipe my slate clean if I was able to win. Making such an offer seemed completely unlike her, since I had imagined she had been against offering tardiness passes, but it was also the only thing she could do for us at the moment, now that her tank had been taken out. She didn't need to, as I was no longer fighting solely for my own sake, but I understood and appreciated the gesture.

For this cause, when Miho asked me to perform a drift with our tank in order to get behind her sister's tank for a kill shot, I gave her fair warning that the track would snap, leaving us vulnerable to a counterattack should we miss, but then focused all my efforts on simply carrying it out. As I slid the tank behind her sister's tank, and Hana aimed and fired, a loud boom erupted from the cannon, then several moments passed in silence, before we noticed the white flag on the enemy flag tank.

The strategy had worked. Oarai had defeated Black Forest, the school that had dominated the national tankery tournament for almost a decade, and had saved itself from being shut down.

After the match, Sodoko, in front of my eyes, produced her hand-held computer and called up my attendance records. I had heard we were promised up to 200 absence credits, but she went even farther, taking off not only my 251 tardiness demerits, but also my 12 unexcused absences.

Everything I was thinking about faded to the background as I realized that, as I was going now, nothing would stop me from graduating on time. And even that faded from my mind as I impulsively rushed forward and hugged her.

"Thank you, Sodoko!" I yelled.

"Hey..." Sodoko said, taken aback.

I then heard a soft giggle behind me, which sounded slightly familiar.

"What's so funny, Gomoyo?" Sodoko said, glancing over my shoulder.

"Nothing, Sodoko," Gomoyo said. "It's just nice seeing Reizei-san so happy with you; she must be really grateful."

"Yep!" I said.

"Yes, but there are… rules… about PDAs and…" Sodoko trailed off from her listing the rules- the desperate habits she clings to when she could think of nothing else- as I began to notice that her face was turning a color that matched the sunset. "You're welcome, Reizei-san," she said with a small smile.

Miho spoke with her sister after the match, and, to my surprise, I heard that Miho's sister apparently approved of her way of tankery even though it was different from what she and the rest of her family practiced, simply smiling when she heard Miho declare that she had chosen her own path. Even the arrogant and condescending vice-captain seemed to take the loss in stride; perhaps suffering defeat, as unpleasant to her as getting up on time was for me, was a necessary step for her to build character.

"I was wrong about your sister," I said to Miho on the way back. "She seems like a kind person,"

"She is," Miho said with a smile. "She's always been watching over me, living up to being Nishizumi heiress so that I don't have to. Sometimes she acts distant to me because of the pressures of being heiress, but she's always thinking of and caring for me, even when she can't express it."

"Have you ever properly thanked her for it?" I asked Miho.

"I did, once," Miho said. "But she said that simply seeing me happy and living life my own way was enough for her, 'its own reward,' as she put it."

"It can't hurt that she also knows you appreciate it," I said.

I think Miho knew the implications I was making about my own family, in particular the less than overt way Grandma showed affection and the way I had failed to show gratitude to my mother in the past, but chose not to bring it up, much like how Saori skillfully distracted people from uncomfortable subjects. There would be time to dwell on these matters later, but now was the time to enjoy our collective and personal victories.

The Oarai spectators turned out in droves, both for the celebration after the game and the victory parade through town the next day. Even those who did not know that our victory had allowed their school to remain in operation, and who did not have friends or family participating were thrilled to see their school triumph over Black Forest, and win the tankery tournament in its first time after two decades of not doing tankery.

Grandma was no exception, as I saw her look on with a smile and wave to me.

"Congratulations, Mako!" she called out, unable to think of any of her usual jabs, and entirely unwilling to say anything else, or anything more. Surely she had realized that I had committed myself to something no ordinary high school student could accomplish, and had put in tremendous amounts of effort to achieve that goal.

I was in perhaps the best mood I had been in a long time. We had won a national tankery tournament. My record had been cleared, leaving smooth sailing toward graduation at my current rate of attendance and punctuality. Both Miho and Hana had resolved their family issues. And for the moment, I had impressed my grandmother, showing that even if I wasn't quite ready to care for her yet; I could accomplish great things for the sake of myself and others. Perhaps in my doing so, I would ensure that she could be satisfied with the effort she had put into raising me after my parents died.

But in the weeks that passed since the finals, as I pondered what Miho had said, I thought of one other person who had, in her own way, been there for me, someone whom I had not thought of as doing so until now. And as the window of opportunity to speak with her would soon close, I had to soon decide how to express what I wanted to say to her, and say it in a way that would best convey my gratitude. I resolved that this time, I would not fail to say what I wished or allow myself to say anything I did not mean, but would express all of my feelings to the fullest extent.

Omake

As the rest of the disciplinary committee and I- members of Mallard Team- lay in our disabled Char B1Bis, we were left wondering how things had come to this. Nishizumi-san's plan had seemed like a good one at the time, to escape from the overwhelming might of Black Forest and attack them from a more suitable area. But we were going from the frying pan to the fire, as we stood face to face with the Maus, the largest superheavy tank ever made in the World War II era.

The Maus stood tall and lumbered forward without a care as to what was in its path. It only stopped turning its turret because of the building in its way, almost as if it expected that the building would give way and enable it to turn its gun. It moved with such arrogance, reminding me of Reizei-san's pride in her own intelligence and seemingly thinking herself above the rules, but without the compassion and selflessness she often showed to her grandmother, her friends, and even those who got on her nerves. Vexed beyond my breaking point, I ordered us to fire on it and put it in its place.

The shell bounced off the frontal armor of the Maus like a tennis ball against a brick wall. In the next moment, with contemptuous ease, the Maus fired its cannon, flipping our tank over and taking off its tracks. Even if the flag had not come up, our tank was no longer able to fight or move. Perhaps the Maus crew's confidence in their superiority was justified to an extent.

The remaining tanks retreated while futilely attempting to shoot down the Maus. Hippo Team, whom I had previously berated over their costumes only to receive a snarky blow-off worthy of Reizei-san, also tried to fire on the Maus, and were defeated just as easily. The school's fate lay in the hands of its five remaining tanks, most of all, our flag tank, Anglerfish's Panzer IV Ausf. D. This was the end of my efforts to keep the school open, and now I would have to entrust this task to my comrades, seeing as how I was not skilled enough to do anything more to affect the outcome.

But if Reizei-san was arrogant, might the same apply to me? Might I have prided myself on being a "good" student and citizen, and thought that mattered above all else? Now, my tankery skills- the only thing that mattered at this moment- had failed me, and I could only depend on Reizei-san and the others.

Swallowing my pride, I called out to Reizei-san over the radio, offering her a clean tardiness record. She had made compromises and sacrifices, and invested a great deal of time and effort into our quest to win the tournament. Considering what it meant for her to do that, my making a compromise here, with this much at stake, was the least I could do for her and this school.

Author's Notes
Interestingly enough, Mako having 245 tardies at her debut and 251 tardies at the end could suggest that she's put some effort into improving her attendance.

Maho's characterization as caring about Miho and wanting her to find her own way of tankery comes from Little Army. In "Off The Path" I wrote an entire chapter detailing Maho's perspective on Miho's decision in the last tournament, that goes into more detail about it. It's also possible that Mako and the rest of Team Anglerfish made note of this part of Maho's personality, after hearing her talk with Miho in Episode 12.

Sodoko's offering Mako a clean tardiness record can be seen as motivated by 1)the fact that she realizes Mako is one of those who has the school's fate in her hands, while she can no longer do anything herself, 2)being forced to swallow her pride in the face of her defeat by the Maus, another reason she and Mako are not as different as they initially thought.

There will be one more chapter, as an epilogue of sorts after the events of the series, providing a conclusion and wrapping up Mako's development throughout the fic.