A/N Thank you for all the reviews. Brief definitions: ahead standard-about ½ speed,all submarines are U-boats to the Kriegsmarine, fighting a ship-to have command of a ship during battle. While Lindemann and Lütjens are the Historical commanders of Bismarck all other crew are of my own creation. Read and review, I don't own RWBY

Two hours. It had been two hours since Bismarck had passed into and out of the strange squall. As Lindemann strode back onto the bridge he could not help but wonder what was going on. He had just finished making the rounds around Bismarck, a duty that was not technically necessary but one he often performed. It did the crew good to see their captain walking the ship with calm confidence, even if that confidence was a lie. The only place that he had not been able to maintain the charade was in the radio room, when he had spoken with the operators and they continued to report that they had intercepted no contacts at all. Even the normal background noise of the bizarre, ghostly contacts of ships and planes talking to their comrades had completely disappeared; all that could be heard was the empty static. This could mean one of two things, one was that something had merely gone wrong with the somewhat temperamental equipment, and while the techs could not find anything wrong it was still the far more likely possibility. Another possibility was that the reason for the silence was that there was nothing to pick up on the radio. The other reason that Lindemann was concerned was because that even though they had reduced speed to ahead standard, they should have been able to see the coastline of France by now.

As Lindemann closed the bridge access hatch behind him his eyes searched out Lütjens in the darkened compartment. He knew that Lütjens was not going to like what he had to say, but as far as Lindemann could see they did not have any other options at this point. "I want to send the Arado up," Linemann stated in the most calm and matter-of-fact way he could. The Arado 196 was a two seater catapult launched scout plane, of which Bismarck had four of. They were excellent scout aircraft with over a 1,000 kilometer (670 mile) range and a top speed of 311 kilometers per hour (about 193 MPH).

Lütjens frowned, uncertain. "If we do send it up and there are any British Fleet elements nearby, we might as well fly a giant flag that says 'here we are, come kill us'." Lindemann was stunned, not by the analysis for he had worked out the same thing himself, but by the fact the Lütjens had just made a joke. Lindemann had never heard Lütjens make a joke before.

It took Lindemann a moment to recover from his surprise, but when he did it was right back to business. "Yes, sir, I am aware of that; however we need to find out what our current situation is. We have not had any contact from the enemy fleet since the squall, and in my calculation it is worth the risk."

Lütjens sighed, "Very well, you may proceed, and if truth be told I agree with you; I just hope this will get us some answers."

…...

Friedrich Hantzsch, pilot of the Arado, could only look out to sea and wish that he was in the air. For the last six hours he had been standing by, his plane waiting for the order to take off. Friedrich was somewhat disappointed in the Arado. Even though the Arado was a fine plane, it could not hold a candle to his beloved Bf 109 fighter that he had once flown. Friedrich had been in the Condor Legion during the Spanish Civil War in 1937, and had been well on his way to making a name for himself as a fighter pilot with four kills, only one away from being an ace. Unfortunately that was when fate had struck him hard. One day when returning from a patrol, a particularly dim Spanish Nationalist pilot had somehow mistaken his Bf 109 for a republican aircraft and opened fire. The Nationalist had realized his mistake almost immediately, but by that time it was too late. Two rounds from the 7.7 MM guns on the Nationalist's plane came right through Friedrich's canopy and one had lodged in his arm. That had been more or less the end of his fighter pilot days. He had spent the next few years being bounced around to different training camps, due to his injury. However last year the navy had been very interested in acquiring skilled pilots, even ones with damaged arms. So, even though it was just an old slow float plane, he was once again allowed to fly.

Despite that, he was feeling quite angry at the moment due to the fact that he had been sitting at his battle station next to his plane for six hours straight with nothing to do. So far he and his observer had both run a maintenance check and found everything in working order, but besides that there was nothing to do but twiddle his thumbs while the ship ran for its life. Unfortunately this idleness had given him plenty of time to contemplate what had happened in the squall. What he had concluded about the squall was that it was the weirdest and scariest thing he had ever contemplated, and it was still bothering him hours after it had happened.

Friedrich was brought out of these thoughts when the commander of flight ops strode out towards him. "We need you to take your plane up, get high and check the surroundings of the ship. Do not leave visual range of the ship and check the four directions only, check ahead first and be fast, radio silence unless it's an emergency, now move it."

Somewhat miffed about his unceremonious dismissal, Friedrich clambered up the Arado's side and into the cockpit. He was followed a moment later by the observer behind him, who also manned the rear firing gun. With a shaking sensation the aircraft was lifted off of the deck and placed on the catapult by one of Bismarck's cranes. After performing startup of the main engine Friedrich looked back to his observer and asked, "You ready to go?" One thumbs up later Friedrich stuck his arm out the window and also gave the thumbs up to the catapult operators, then closed the canopy and revved his planes engine to full power. With a kick that felt like it came from God's own boot, the catapult launched his aircraft into the sky.

It took only a few moments for the Arado to clamber into the sky and head east, far ahead of Bismarck. All that Friedrich could see for miles was sea, sky, and more sea, with only a few clouds on the horizon. "Alright," Fredrich's observer Eric Krahl said. "That's for enough for this, I can barely see Bismarck so we need to head to the southern point." Friedrich turned his plane in a lazy bank to the right, sending them out so that they would be due south of Bismarck, off of her starboard side. After reaching that point there was also nothing to see.

Friedrich turned his Arado north and prepared to pass over Bismarck to head to the next waypoint in the search. As Friedrich prepared to fly high over Bismarck the internal com between him and Erich buzzed, then his observers voice cut in. "There is something down there, can't quite make it out from here. Take us down a bit so I can see what is going on." The Arado went into a bank with the right wing down so that the observer could maintain eye contact with whatever had caught his attention. Whatever it was, it was only a few kilometers away from Bismarck's steadily growing form. As Friedrich leveled out at about 500 feet, he could at last see what had perturbed his observer. It was a dark stain on the water, about 200 feet long and 50 feet wide. The form was unmoving, sitting lazily in the water, and Fredrich's first thought was that it was a shallow spot, perhaps a reef of some sort. Then the spot began to move.

Erich cried out, "That's a U-boat , it has to be, nothing else could be moving like that."

Friedrich was not so sure. While it was the right length for a U-boat, he had never heard of any nation having one that wide. Regardless he asked, "Ours or the Brits?"

"One of ours would have surfaced; good chance it's the Brits. I am calling this in, and damn the radio silence order."

…..

Bismarck's Bridge

Lindeman was staring out of the bridge viewing ports, thankful that the battleshutters had now been mercifully raised, and wondered what in the hell their scout was doing. Something had clearly caught their attention, but Lindemann could not tell what it was. Finally the radio operator grabbed his headphones, getting a message from the scout. He looked up, worried, "Sir, the scout reports unidentified U-boat approximately one kilometer ahead and to starboard, moving slowly ahead and on and intercept course."

Lindemann nodded and spoke the commanding authority, "All hands to combat stations, ahead flank, hard starboard turn. Get Admiral Lütjens back to the bridge." Lütjens had been back in the chart house speaking to the navigators about the current situation and getting their best guess of Bismarck's current location. It would be a few minutes before he could return to the Bridge. The crew of Bismarck had also been at their combat stations since they had made contact with the British, the alarm was more meant to alert them that something was happening than to summon them back to their post.

One minute and thirty seconds after the report form the scout, one of the lookouts caught sight of the shadow right were the scout said it was. Almost simultaneously with this report Lütjens returned to the bridge, but stepped aside to allow Lindemann to fight his ship. Lütjens was the Admiral, in charge of making command decisions and leading the fleet, it was Lindemann's job to fight his ship. With a suddenness that was completely uncharacteristic of any U-boat that Lindemann had heard of, the dark stain on the water surged ahead, making a direct line for Bismarck as if it intended to ram them. "That's insane," Lindemann thought, "There is no way that a U-boat could survive contact with our torpedo belt armor."

The unidentified U-boat accelerated at speed that Lindemann had not thought possible, finally topping out at about 30 knots. The object clearly intended to ram them, mad as that seemed. It was now a race between Bismarck's turn and the object. Linderman was no longer sure is was a U-boat with that onrushing charge. Bismarck won the race, barely. The mysterious but clearly hostile object darted by, just off the port bow, and continued on. Lindemann ordered Bismarck to steady out and steam directly opposite of the strange attacker's course. Throughout this event the scout plane continued to fly above them, unable to influence the battle one way or the other.

The dark shape slowed and began turning to the right, ceasing all movement when it became parallel to Bismarck. "Bring us around to port, I want all eight of our guns pointing at that thing," Lindemann commanded. In response the eight 15 inch guns began to swing around to port. The smaller secondary battery of 5.9 in guns were already almost focused on the small dark stain on the water out to port.

Then it surfaced. It came out of the water like any U-boat would, but immediately the differences were apparent to all the well trained Kriegsmarine sailors on board Bismarck. For one there was no conning tower, rather there was a black ridged back that suck out of the water. For another where there should be dive planes, there was a large flipper like object. Linderman's eyes narrowed. "Wait a moment," he thought to himself. "Those are not flipper like objects, they are flippers, what on earth…" Then with a mighty rush of water the sea monster's head lifted out of the ocean. The upper portion was completely covered in thick white bone armor, streaked with red lines. Where the armor was positioned and its angling left no doubt that it was meant to be used as a ram. A single hole was visible in the amour, about halfway between the top of the head and the mouth filled with wickedly pointed teeth. Inside that hole was a single beady eye, staring straight at them. Then the mighty beast threw back its head and roared at them, a deep guttural sound that promised death and destruction.

Just then Bismarck let out a roar of her own as her secondary batteries hurled out their 100 pound projectiles at the monster before them. Unfortunately the appearance and unexpected power of the beast had badly shaken the gunners, and all but one of the shots missed. That single shot slammed into the beast and blew away a gobbet of flesh from its rear. Instead of howling in pain or fleeing however, the beast dove down below the water again and came right at them.

Lindemann knew that he had to act now in order to prevent that sea monster from hitting them. He had no idea if it would or even could penetrate their torpedo belt armor, but he had no desire to find out. Again he ordered a hard turn to starboard and again there was that same race against the clock. This time however Lindemann ordered Bismarck to level out before the beast passed them, betting that it was smart enough not to fall for the same trick twice. Lindemann was right and the sea monster passed harmlessly behind them, ending up on their starboard side.

The gun director was clearly paying attention despite the shock of seeing an honest to god sea monster attacking his ship. Within moments the main battery had reversed directions and was heading out to starboard. Linderman frowned, the beginnings of a plan forming in his mind. "Guns," he commanded. "Keep out to port and only engage the target on that side." There was no acknowledgment but the guns again reversed course, heading back out to port.

Lütjens stepped up next to him, a concerned look on his face. Before he could speak Lindemann cut in hastily. "Sir, I am one of the best gunnery officers the Kriegsmarine has. I was one of the top trainers at the academy and that was why they gave me the pride of the fleet. Let me fight my ship." Lütjens looked at him only for a moment, then nodded and backed away. "Alright people hard to port we need this thing directly out to starboard if this is going to work." Slowly Bismarck turned around, executing a 180 degree turn, being matched by the beast the whole way, in fact it was slowly creeping ahead of them. Lindemann calmly told the helmsmen to steady out the ship, still keeping one eye watching the beast. With a swiftness that any destroyer would envy, the sea monster turned away from the ship starting a long arcing turn that Lindemann was sure was meant to bring it back in for another pass on Bismarck.

Lindemann looked over to the bridge talker. "Let engineering know that they need to be ready for a fast speed change as soon as we signal it. I need it to happen, ok?" The talker nodded and relayed the message while Lindemann again focused on the beast. As he had predicted it was coming around again heading on an intercept course and rapidly gaining speed. Lindemann's pressed eye gaged the range carefully, and when he was certain the moment was right he made his move. "All back emergency." The ship shuddered under the strain that its reversed engines put upon it. She seemed to vibrate with protest and her bulkheads creaked and groaned with the stress of taking the reversal of all three of the ship's screws. However the plan worked the sea monster surged ahead just in front of Bismarck, the wake of her passage splashing up around her bow.

Unfortunately there was no time to celebrate; Linderman quickly signaled the ship the return to ahead flank, putting even more pressure on the hull. Now all he could do was sit and wait, hoping that the beast complied with what he wanted it to do. It did, with a roar of outrage it breached the water just off to port, glaring at Bismarck with its sinister eye. Unbeknownst to its cunning but rather slow-witted mind, it had just placed itself right in the path of all eight of Bismarck's 15 inch guns.

For everyone staying on Bismarck's bridge, and indeed anyone staying on her decks, it seemed like the world exploded with the overpressure of all of the guns firing at once. Bismarck rocked with the force of the recoil as eight 1,800 pound shells flew out of her main battery. The main guns of any battleship were not meant to engage targets at this close of a range, so it was not a surprise that so many failed to connect. Four of the shots went long, sailing over their target to splash down harmlessly into the sea, another two fell short, creating violent geysers of water but doing nothing to harm their target. However the last two, fired from the number four turret (nicknamed Dora by her crew), slammed home. 3,600 pounds of explosive shot moving at 2,690 feet per second rammed straight into the body of the sea monster and exploded. It is safe to say that the beast was at least killed, if not completely obliterated.

On Bismarck's bridge a chorus of cheers went up as the shells connected. Lindemann could see the great bony ram that had adored the creature's head fly nearly 100 feet before splashing back down into the sea. When the smoke cleared Lindemann smiled and turned to Lütjens, who nodded in that curt way of his, signaling the only amount of approval that he ever gave. His eyes however gave away the pride he felt in both Lindemann and his ship.

...

Four hours later dusk was beginning to fall, Lütjens had summoned the heads of all the departments to a meeting. At long last they had brought the crew down to a lesser alert status, allowing one half of the crew to get rest while the rest stayed at their stations. Outside the sky was beginning to darken as dusk fast approached. Lütjens sat at the head of the table, with Lindemann on his right. "All right," Lütjens said. "Let's go over what we know and what we don't know. One, we do not know where we are. Two, we know that there has never been a credible report of a sea monster on earth and three, our radio has made several attempts to contact anyone and has failed every time. Does anyone here have an explanation for this?"

Mathias Schwefel, head of engineering, shook his head. "Sir, with all due respect, if there is no sea on earth where all these events could happen, it would make sense that we are not on earth then."

Niclas Spörl, the quartermaster, shook his head as well and gave a disgusted look to Mathias, "That's insane Mathias, even with the squall and everything else that's happened you can't believe that."

"Well can you explain it then." Mathias shot back.

"Quiet," Lütjens said, his soft voice offering a command that no one here would dare break. "It doesn't matter if we are on earth or not, for now we will have to operate on the assumption that we will be without resupply for a while. We have plenty of supply for now, our mission was a long term one, but I want all of you thinking about how we generate more fuel and food. Our first objective is to find land, so that is what we will be doing for the next few days at least. We will be using the scout and sailing in a search pattern until we find land. After that we will see where we stand. Dismissed."

...

Two hours later both men stood on the bridgewing, looking into the sky. "Well," Lindemann said, "It looks like Mathias was right." Above them, high in the sky a moon shone down on them, but it was not their moon. It appeared to have been broken apart, shattered even, and it cast an unearthly glow down upon their suddenly small feeling ship.

Lütjens nodded, "We have to tell the crew something."

"I will," said Lindemann firmly. "I am the captain, it is my responsibility." Stepping over to the bridge talker, he requested an open circuit to the entire ship. "All hands this is the captain speaking. As you know we have become lost, and have no idea where we are. We do not know if we are even on earth anymore." Lindemann stopped, struggling to find the words to say. How did you tell your crew, the people whose lives you were responsible for, that they would almost certainly never see their home again?

As he struggled with this, the bridge talker begins speaking. No, he began singing.

"Our black white red flag waves proudly on our vessel mast, wave against the enemy, who threaten you, who hate our colors." More voices joined in as the rest of the bridgewatch began to sing the song, which had been written for that older navy under the Kaiser.

"She flutters on the homeland beach with the wind back and forth, and far away from the German Fatherland on the troubled sea." Now across the ship sailors were taking up the song, and the bulkheads rang with their united voices.

"We want to be loyal to her, remain true till death. We want to ordain our life to her, the flag black white red." Now even Lütjens was singing, tears in the old man's eyes.

"Everywhere, where on the sea a high mast stretches, there the German flag is cherished and esteemed, it always provides protection to the empire on the sea, from any treacherous enemy in defiance, threaten Germany's honor." Now Lindemann himself joined in, singing with all his heart.

"We want to be loyal to her, remain true till death. We want to ordain our life to her, the flag black white red."

"And the wild storm drives us aground on a reef, no matter what form of danger threatens our vessel, we do not yield nor falter, we do, how it's a seaman's duty, death will not shrink us from our duty, even to the last breath." The sailors on the unknown sea continued to sing, refusing to give into the hopelessness of the situation. The old proud song gave them the will to carry on, come what may.

"We want to be loyal to her, remain true till death. We want to ordain our life to her, the flag black white red."

A/N Don't worry I have a plan for them to meet team RWBY, soon my friends, soon.