Kure naval base, Honshu, Japan
The base was in utter chaos; scream and explosion sound filled in the quiet night of the base.
The alien creatures shot many buildings easily with their mounted bio-weapon-cannon in the mouth; they faced almost no resistance as the entire base personal just got great terrorized recently (Yuudachi's false!).
Mutsuki leaded her blind sister by the hand, she hoped they won't encounter those terrifying inhuman being along the way to one of the base exit.
Along the way, they walked past many fresh bloody dead bodies which gave off blood-iron smell into the area.
Suddenly, Mutsuki bumped into someone as she turned at the corner.
At first sign, she thought the person she bumped into was Harusame.
Well, she looked a lot like Harusame if you didn't count in the details about very pale skin, black cloth, and blue eyes.
But she wasn't sure anymore when the supposed Harusame, who opened her mouth showing sharp canine teeth, tried to bite her.
By reflex, Mutsuki pushed her away before she could sink her teeth into the mute flesh.
'What in the World is happening HERE!?' Mutsuki frustrated.
She lifted Kisaragi up into a princess carry pose and started running, even she didn't know where she should run, escape from that...Haru….zombie Harusame was the most important.
The girl was running…
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Bang!
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"At last, you're down. Such a tough son of a bitch." A thirties-year lady voice muttered from nearby.
'That sound….could it be!' Mutsuki got her hope up once she heard a survival voice, that person should be a heavier class ship than her if she remembered correctly. The same went for Kisaragi as well, but she didn't want to distract Mutsuki so she kept quiet.
At the scene, a sign of familiar lady reflected on the mute destroyer's eyes.
Third of Myoko-class-Heavy Cruiser, Ashigara, had just pinned down one of the invader creature with a mounted Bayonet, extended from under barrel of Arisaka type 99 rifle. The xenomorphic victim was stabbed and shot through its' massive mouth, sending the outlander to misery. Ashigara sat on the ground, huffing, after confirm that it was dead. Her purple cloth got torn and some blood spot on it.
Then, she noticed that someone was staring at her.
She turned her head around; she spotted a pair of Mutsuki-class-Destroyer.
"Mutsuki-san, Kisaragi-san! I'm happy to know that you're alive" Ashigara waved her hand with weak smile.
"This voice! Ashigara-san?" If her eyes weren't blind, Kisaragi would be crying with joy to see another survival.
"Yes, I am! I'm sorry for your eyes. I'm full with works that I don't have any free time to see you." Ashigara sincered.
"You don't have to feel sorry, Ashigara-san. We understand your responsibility. Oh! Aside from my blind, Mutsuki-chan was mute due to the injury, so don't be surprise that she don't say anything." Kirasaki replied.
"By the way, what happened here? Since Mutsuki-chan can't communicate long story with me; and I smell blood and smoke all the way here, could you fill me in with the update?" Kisaragi trusted Mutsuki's judgement, she didn't resist her sister's dragging at all since the incident broke out.
"I don't know. I got ambush with some kind of alien creature group after I walked out of Houshou Bar." Ahigara recalled, she was a bit alcoholic so she almost ended up there every day after work.
"I fought the whole gang, and the last one just went down just a second ago"
"But what about the gun shot we heard? Ship girl can't be armed with her rigging on land, can she? It will cause us to be immobilized."
"If you're talking about the gun, it's not my ship gun." Ashigara patted the world-war-two era rifle. "This is the one of the remnant from World War II, the Arisaka type 99 rifle, I got it from somewhere around the navy memorial section…shit!...these shitty alien pushed me that far!? I can't believe it!" Ashigara began with narrative, but she got upset at the end so her tone got aggressvie when she realized how far she got dragged.
The destroyers got scared from Ashigara angry ending; when the speaker realized, she gave an apologic smile.
"Never mind that, I'm sorry for my rudeness. As senior, I should be a good role model for you."
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Suddenly, another entity jointed the conversation.
"You look delicious…let me eat you~"
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Ship girls snapped their head to the direction the voice came from.
The owner was a very pale girl, blue eyes, with black clothe. The notable thing was the Naka-chan long hair lookalike figure.
Ashigara sensed danger from this evil Naga (?), she ejected out the old case and chambered the next round (luckily that bolt-action was simple to use, otherwise it wasn't better than an iron pipe right now).
"Mutsuki-san, get going! I'll hold her off!" She readied her weapon.
Mutsuki noded, she started running without hesitation, Kisaragi could only gnashed her teeth for her uselessness.
Ashigara glanced back. When she was sure that the destroyers already left, she charged toward the pale enemy with a loud Howl.
"OORAAAA.!.!.!"
Ashigara charged forward and thrusted the mounted bayonet to the enemy mouth, intended to kill a pale lady with the same method as the xenomorph.
She missed her mark as the pale girl twisted her body to avoid the attack; the pale girl returned her with a shove on her abdomen, sending her several meters away.
"….Damn it!... Your strength ….is too much, Dark Naka-san.." Ashigara coughed. She decided to name her opponent, seeing that no introduction was started.
Dark Naga flinched.
"Is that supposed to be my name?"
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"You look familiar with someone I know, Naka, so I call you that. Calling You, You, is confusing." Ashigara paued her action but still on guard nonetheless.
"I don't recall meeting yo- Ahg!" She winced suddenly from a headache; she got a hazy memory about being killed by a bright light (?).
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Seeing the opening, Ashigara should attack her opponent.
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But she chose not to.
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She realized the different in Strength which was drastically terrifying; that shove gave her some 2-3 broken (metal) bones, just breathing was quite painful. She retreated as fast as she could endure the pain from jogging.
"I Wonder, who else is still alive in this MESS?" the heavy cruiser worried.
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'What is it just now?' Dark Naka also wondered. As far as she could recall, she woke up at the bottom of the see with no memory. The instinct told her to hunt for any fresh meat and metal (?), and she met these black alien along the way. Then, some hazy memories just struck her to interrupt her meal time.
'Can it be that I used to know her at some point?'
'Naka, huh? Such a cute name.' Without reason, she felt attached to this name somehow.
One of other survival was a certain experiment cruiser, a mechanic maniac, who looted weapons, purses, and car keys from the random navy dead bodies.
"Come one, COME ON!" She had a hard time finding the car which one of the key was belonged to; despite the logo Toyota on the key, this base had too many Toyota! That wasn't a surprise, considered it was one of Japanese common brand after all.
After struggling for another ten minutes, the heaven gave mercy to her.
Click!
The car she just unlocked was something that ignited her excitement.
It was a white (?) Toyota Celica Gen. 7 from some decades ago, Yuubari believed it used to be white in its' fresh year, but now it got mild yellow-cream colour instead due to covered dust maybe. From quick survey, she was gladdened that it was installed with automatic transmission so she could drive it (She recently had interest in automotive so she know basic things, but she needed more time to specialize about operating them, especially manual gear).
She threw all the looted equipment on the shotgun seat; she started the engine, resulted in the light on of the car dashboard: Full Fuel gauge, Normal Engine Temperature gauge.
She shifted the gear to D, and drove for some meter to test the RPM gauge and Speedometer, they functioned well.
'Alright, forget about the odometer and get out of here'
Yuubari continued driving slowly to not draw attention, ignore the struggling humans and ship girls who tried to survive the massacre from an unknown force along the way. She was cheerful and wasn't a heartless person by nature, but she couldn't help anyone as staying alive used up all the strength she had. If she ever interfered to help them, she absolutely would die along with them instead. No insane person would jump into the pool of those black monsters.
She felt ashamed and guilty, but it was an important scar in order to survive.
Upon reaching the exit, she spotted a running girl who carried another girl on her chest level. Seeing that there was a space left in her (stolen) coupe, she pushed the car horn to greet them.
Honk!
The destroyer pause and waited for the Celica to stop alongside her. Yuubari lowered the window seat.
"Get on!"
Mutsuki nodded.
But she seemed too confused as what to do next?.
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'OH!' Yuubari facepalmed, she just forgot that not all ship girls were that knowledgeable about human staff. She got off the driver seat: opened the door of shotgun seat, and slid the seat.
"Put Kisaragi-chan on the rear seat, hurry up!" She expedited as she noticed some of dark creatures were starting to pay attention to them.
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The Celica kicked off immediately after Mutsuki shut the door up.
"I'm glad that someone made it out alive other than myself." Yuubari glanced at Kisaragi via the rear view mirror, and Mutsuki by half turned her head.
"Yuubari-san, where are we and where will we go to? Sorry if I ask silly question, but we've a hard time communicating as I'm blind and she's mute." Kisaragi asked, hoping that her question might be the thing her sister wanted to know.
"We're in a car. Well, I haven't decided on where to go yet." 'Just getting far away from them first, anything else comes later'
"What is this pile of metal I'm touching?"
Yuubari just remembered, she left those dangerous items at the back earlier (pistols, assault rifle, spare magazines and ammunition).
"Leave them be, Kisaragi-chan. They're the weapon I'm able to gather in limited time."
The car was completely on the main road, and the road was clear from other cars.
Yuubari smirked.
She fully stomped on the accelerator pad. With its' 190 horse power of 2ZZ-GE engine (Yuubari didn't aware of this, so she acted recklessly), the driver and passengers were pushed against their seat by the G-force, the needles on the RPM gauge and Speedometer increased instantly.
"Eek!.!.!" 'Eek!' They shocked at the pressure they received.
"Haha! I LOVE IT!" The crazy mechanic cruiser's heart was already charmed by the skittish engine under the front hood. The steering wheel was steered left and right in excitement along the road.
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If she glanced at the wings/rear-view mirror, she would see a red CBR 600 followed her. The rider had a noticeable Imperial Japan bolt-action rifle slung on her back.
"You speed freak MELON! Will drive slowly make you die?" The amateur rider shouted aggressively.
Even she was considered new and amateur to motorcycle; to be able to handle the Big Bike for the first time in her life wasn't a small feast. However she encountered a problem which Yuubari didn't.
"How the hell could I ride faster than this?"
The Honda CBR 600 under her body was built with manual transmission, sucked to be dumb about manual gear. She was riding with limited maximum speed as far as the first gear allowed. The engine round's indicator was dancing like crazy in the red-zone for sometimes now.
As she saw Yuubari's sport coupe went further and further away, she cursed.
"At this rate, I will lose them. Damn! I once saw a human rode you very speedy, how come I can't do that!"
Once the creamy car was out of sight, She snapped.
"FUCK! Do not mock me!.!.!"
She struggled to her full stubbornness, she swore she would use this set of metal to the fullest of its' performance at all cost.
Iwo Jima, Japan
Gunzou gulped at the scene in front of him; imaginary sparkled between his Stepmother VS his Girlfriend, it was too intense that it could turn into a battlefield at any moment. Shouzou wasn't in any better state than his son.
Musashi's eyes were seriously stern; her mouth formed no curve, devoured from any emotion other than rage. Yamato changed from a big smirk to a small smile, but intimidating feeling could be perceived from her gaze.
The tension was broken apart by the urgent contact from Nagato.
"Yamato, you might want to hear this. Atago fleet was just destroyed; last information before her sinking is that her executioner is a group of monster and strange very pale ship girls!" Her worry wasn't well hidden under her calm voice, Atago was her direct subordinate after all.
Musashi and Yamato shocked at the news, Shouzou and Gunzou remained silence.
"Did her core survive?" Yamato enquired.
"Yes, but barely. Akashi already retrieved her core." Nagato reported.
Yamato sighned, at least her subordinate was still in the game.
"Nagato, I'm curious about monster and strange ship girl, can you tell me more about it" Musashi was curious.
"It's wasting time to explain, you should see the footage yourself."
Nagato sent the footage for witnessing, everyone in the rooms was disgusted with what they watched. The fog vessels were devoured hungrily like a struggling animal in the pool of Piranhas, they bit off any ship part in the way. Atago jumped off her vessel to flee while a few black monster and pale girl were after her.
When the footage ended, Yamato commanded Nagato.
"Inform every single flagship to be aware of this event! Don't think about fighting them, retreat as fast as you can when encounter them. That's all"
"As You Wish, Nagato ends the call"
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"We'll continue our issue later, is that alright, Musashi?"
Musashi nodded.
The Supreme Flagship turned her attention back her guests.
"Shouzou-san, do you have any idea of what happened? Is this some kind of new type of ship girl?" Yamato's voice was normal, but her glare was starting to threaten the Captain. Musashi, while she didn't like the idea of her sister threaten her husband, trusted her sister's judgment as she also wanted to know whether her husband was still hiding something or not.
"I don't know, I swear!" Shouzou shook head.
"And you?" Her next target was Gunzou.
"Are you idiot! If Dad doesn't even know them, how could I know!?"
"Just to make sure, Gunzou, I'm not an Idiot!" Yamato retorted, and her next counter dealt a critical hit to a male maritime student.
"Always overlook a small possibility, that's the reason why you can't surpass me, Now and Forever! Mr. no. 2."
Yamato glanced at him with slightly pity. Gunzou on the other hand didn't back down his cold-furious-glare to his eternal rival.
Musashi and Shouzou met eyes, then both sighed in amusement.
"They're at it again" Musashi spoke.
"I wonder why they can't have a peaceful love like us" Shouzou continued.
"That's because they aren't honest with each other like the two of us, darling~"
"Oh! Why is that, my lovely Musashi~"
"They love their twisted love form because they are Tsundere." At the end, they giggled lovely.
"SHUT UP DAD/SIS!.!" The bickering DUO paused their conflict and coincidentally had a truce to fight another pair.
The situation was more amusing; the teen pair realized their outburst, blushed heavily and turned to the opposite direction.
Yamato coughed to regain her posture.
"Ahem…Anyway, this matter couldn't be taken lightly, it's the heaviest lost ever happened."
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"Musashi, I'll find out about these black monsters, you take care of the base while I'm gone."
"Where will you go?"
"I think of visiting the central government for a bit, and I'm taking Shouzou-san and Gunzou-chan with me." Yamato walked out of the room while she was changing back to her white dress.
Suddenly, she saw Taigei walking around inside the base.
She might ignored her if the submarine tender just wandering around in amazement of this base structure and technology; but that wasn't the case, she was sure that the secretary ship was surveying the base for some purpose from the look of her calculative eyes: seeking all possible escape route.
"Did you find anything interesting?" Yamato smiley startled Taigei.
Taigei wasn't sure how to response at the moment; Yamato seems to be mysterious, but she answer normally as she sensed no ill intention.
"This base is so much more solid and advance from my naval base, Yamato-san."
They locked eyes.
As the Super-Battleship core examine; Ryuuhou looked like she was more capable of than she look. If her instinct didn't fail her, she might be a great chess piece in her game, to gain one more extra force was an option.
"Could you follow me to the Lab?"
Taigei got a bad feeling about this, Hyuugu just encouraged her to be turned to the Fog. She bet this connected to that issue.
"Might I decline?" She chose her word carefully.
That answer confirmed Yamato's suspicious, Taigei was smart and had sharp intuition, she sensed something bad (?) would happen to her.
Yamato grabbed Taigei's shoulders.
"It will be best if you do what I say, Taigei-san. This is my base, your enemy base, I act civilized with you doesn't mean that you're no prisoner of mine."
She was leaking her bloodlust to pressure her target.
"Captain Shouzou is a good man, I don't want him to have Eternal Sleep at the bottom of the sea just yet. You do what I command you, and your captain will LIVE."
Taigei was released.
"Follow me." Yamato gestured before walked away first.
Taigei got the message well, she cursed Yamato, she cursed the Fog, and finally, she cursed herself of the lack of power.
Later that day, most of the Fog standard and light Assault & Suppresion vessels were present at their HQ.
Yamato gave them a briefing that she needed them for suppress mission, she demanded answer from the human whether the event of lost Atago's fleet and flagship vessel was related to them or not since the information they hacked don't have a clue. She intended to bring Shouzou and Gunzou with her to use the title of Captain and Most valuable Top 2 marine time students to approached the High Rank. For this interrogation job, she saw an important of Assault & Suppression vessel more than other types, it suited the job very well if anything went wrong, she trusted the her subordinates' suppress power to cover her retreat.
At the end of the meeting, one mental model raised her hand.
She was Shoukaku: a seventeen-year-old charming girl, golden eyes, white long hair under ivory-colour beach hat, white sundress which covered down ¾ of her thigh, and brown sandal.
"Do we need to hide our mental model from them, High Flagship? They only know you and Musashi as human (fake), though."
"No, but don't just suddenly reveal yourselves. That topic belongs to me only"
Zuikaku inserted her comment.
"I understand that as long as we aren't starting to kill human first, unless for counter-attack, this plan of yours shouldn't be a problem, but what about the others fleet think: like the western fleet?"
"I assure you, they won't mess with our territory affair. I doubt some of them already started their secret project without us or the human knowing."
Shoukaku got her stage light back.
"Then, how should we stand-by? Just standing on our vessel?"
"It's up to you, I don't mind if you walk around town for sigh seeing, but you must be presented if the unexpected happen to support me."
Yamato thought for a moment.
"I don't want to provoke them into a fight, but that doesn't mean we can't prepare for the worst."
"Prepare fot the worst?" Shoukaku and Zuikaku asked in unison, the other vessel looked interest as well.
"Recently, Hyuuga Factory Lab. are filled with various type of human weaponry, you all choose whatever you want and equip them to support me in emergency. It's better than bare hand, even though human can't fight us that easily with our Klein Field power." The White Empress stated the fact.
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Hyuuga suddenly got a chill down her spine, then all the suppression vessels from the meeting came to her lap. Shoukaku acted as group's leader.
"Battleship Hyuuga, allow us to raid your precious lab~" She projected her false smile.
"Pardon?"
Soon, all the girls except the lab owner ran around gathering any weapon they like. The owner was jaw dropped and too stunned to do anything to fight them off.
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Back to the blank meeting room, there was two people left: Yamato and Ryuuhou.
Even the light suppression vessel choice of attire wasn't as grand as a certain Supreme Flagship, it was still very noticeable. She, who looked older than Yamato for 3 years (21-year-old appearance), got a white-red head band over her purple hair which was tied into two tails over her shoulders. Her shirt was a result of fashionable way to combine green kimono with long-sleeve sailor school uniform with a little of coat style. Her lower part looked more seductive; brown boots with black pantyhose under short blue school-uniform-style skirt which cover only half of her thighs.
"I can't believe that you threaten to kill Captain Shouzou just to force me to go through your merging program. What are you thinking?" The older woman questioned.
"I and Hyuuga want to test some experiment on you: Taigei….Ops! I should call you Ryuhou now, shouldn I not? Actually, I don't mean to really do it but you fell for it, so don't push the blame on me." The White Empress winked.
"I must admit. I can't read you at all, Yamato-san. You're the most cunning Creature I've ever met" The former Taigei hissed politely. When she compare the demonic face Yamato used to bluff her and this angelic face before, it was TOO different!
"Are you satisfied with the result, Yamato-san?" Ryuuhou shrugged sarcastically.
Yamato laughed but not answered, and then she left.
'She definitely had done something Special to me more than Shigure-chan, but I shouldn't act aggressive yet, Shouzou-san may be in real deep trouble if I do. As long as She don't take harmful action against him, I must keep my mind in check and stay alert.' Ryuuhou thought.
'You're smart, Ryuuhou-san. You know and evaluate your situation very well. I suppose to be aware of Gunzou intelligence to overcome mine, yet I fear you more than him.'
Yamato knew exactly what Ryuuhou thought while she was walking away, she held her stern expression when she realized that she feared Ryuuhou.
In fact, Yamato & Hyuuga actually did SOMETHING to Taigei in order to become Ryuuhou now. If Ryuuhou knew what happened to her; God knew whether she should be happy or angry, even she was a masterpiece Dual Core (2 vessel core from Fog Taigei & Ryuuhou) which her combined processing core power could rival Yamato herself, Yamato encoded something inside one of her core which cause Yamato to be able to sense Ryuuhou's thought (Of Course! Ryuuhou didn't know).
In conclusion, Yamato knew that this experiment wasn't a complete success. Ryuuhou could defy her command if she resisted like those Ex-Yokosuka Ship girls (But they chose not to). She doubt it was possible to implant royalty to the complete Fog, which led to why she constructed the back door (Her encoded copy core) in Ryuuhou.
Pacific Ocean
Even sea state 9 was dangerous to all ship types, it couldn't be said for Fog vessels. A large group of Fog Assault & Suppression vessels and Light Suppression vessels were led by Super-Battleship Yamato which she already changed back to her school uniform, no worry on their mind as their vessel sailed on the sea like nothing, they enjoyed the wild tides.
Kaga, Akagi, Souryuu, Hiryuu, Shoukaku, Zuikaku, Unryuu, Amagi, Taihou, Houshou, Ryuujou, Hiyou, Junyou, Shouhou, Zuihou, and Ryuuhou were the vessels Yamato selected.
They looked enthusiastic; why they shouldn't? They were out of the boring routine patrol route, they want to experience something new, fun, and exciting! Only Ryuuhou felt worry, she planned before to ask Yamato to be tagging along, but to her surprise, Yamato persuaded her to go along before she asked.
She thought nothing for the other people beside her Captain, but if she could prevent more causality for the Human side, she was willing to do it, her kind heart would still be the same as ship girl Taigei, that was her Moral.
As kind heart as she was, she wasn't going to careless for the unforeseen circumstance, the 12 X Beretta 92FS pistols she carried swayed otherwise. She placed 2 on chest holsters, 6 around waist holsters (2 front, 2 back, 2 left and right), 2 on left and right thighs holsters, and the last 2 on shins' holster. All pistols were insert with maximum bullets per magazine plus one chambered bonus (15+1), the bullets were lead round nose.
She thought like some strange pro-hitman; she equipped the ready-to-use pistols instead of spare magazines because reload took more times than discarded and picked up a new one, not to mention that reload option occupied two hand and had a firing pause between each reload, while the latter option had a shorter pause for synchronized firing or could continue fire if the gunner decided to use one gun at a time. Thanks to strong True Fog Body, she could mounted them on her with no suffering from additional weight.
She assumed they would encounter human with bulletproof vest, so she chose lead round nose bullet out of mercy. She sure that it couldn't penetrate the vest, but broken bone or bruise from the impact was a fair exchange. Well, it was better than dying, wasn't it?
Yamato praised Ryuuhou quietly in her mind from the suitable way the light suppression vessel had armed herself with clear objective. When she checked status of others; some were barely equipped with handguns, some equipped main arms and side arms, and the last group made her facepalmed from the crazy overkill equipped.
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The last group? There were Shoukaku, Kaga, and Taihou.
Shoukaku, Her beautiful innocent teenage appearance were Defied by the scary Mc Bros .95 JDJ she hugged along with 10 spare-round on her cross-shoulder bullet holder. If it wasn't scary enough, Pfeifer-Zeliska .600 Nitro Express was spotted with their spare bullets on her waist holster.
Kaga's appearance was very different from Shoukaku; she wore a black cap but still allowed shoulder- length brown hair to fall, she dressed with black fighter jumpsuit and dark combat boots, she shaded her brown eyes with black sun glasses. Her weapons of choice were the famous Dinosaur Hunter (?): slung A-Square Hannibal .577 Tyrannosaur across her shoulder with 5 spare-ammo inserted on the stock bullet holder. She held the massive frame of 6.5 inch-barrel S&W Model 500, many speed loaders could be spotted from the open-zip waist bag.
"Ne! Shoukaku-neechan, don't you think your guns are too BIG?" Zuikaku herself only selected Saiga-12 Shotgun with three 10-round-magazine in jungle style.
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"Um..Kaga-san, why you choose such large weapons? I think it's not comfortable at all!" At the same time, Akagi asked her close friend. Akahi dressed exactly like a special force agent, only her black eyes could be seen. She used normal UMP 45 and USP 45.
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"Shoukaku/Kaga is an idiot" both assault & suppression vessels synchronized their answer from different angle of the fleet.
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"My fire power is great! No matter what ever protector they wear, these heavy bullets can easily blast them to death with ease. Kaga-san second rate weapon can't compare to me." Shoukaku proudly presented.
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"Power and mobility should come together. Silly Shoukaku will be taught a lesson when she have to reload that one-shot heavy rifle and elephant-killer revolver of hers. Mind is much lighter" Kaga smirked.
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On the Armor Assualt & Suppession Vessel, Taihou, her mental model stood on the bridge. She was a long-blue-hair and blue-eye beauty in her twenty, she was clad in a feminine-white samurai armor set.
Her weapon was the most extreme one, Anzio 20 mm., which was taller than her. 3-round box magazines scattered around her ready to be reloaded.
Yamato didn't bring her sidearm with her; she supposed to be a marine time student for this mission. She hoped it succeeded without the need of her subordinate revelation and support, caused some human might got the most brutal dead from those overpower caliber...