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Hogwarts, suppertime (time in Japan: Two hours after midnight on Tuesday)...

"So how are things over in Eta-jima right now, Aotearoa?"

An amused chuckle escaped the tattooed battlecruiser/fast battleship that was the co-leader of the modern shipgirl version of the Australian and New Zealand Army Corps. "Party's winding down and people are heading to their racks...or to the refurbishment docks in the case of the new arrivals," New Zealand reported over the magically-hardened computer that was now at the head table of the Great Hall, loudspeakers allowing the gathered members of the Order of the Phoenix to listen in. "Harry's alright. Appears that Imperio and Tirpitz are taking an interest in the lad, just like Kirishima threw herself over Ataru after he killed that one submarine with the soulsword when he and his sisters came here. All the newbies are preparing for their first trip on the bay later on this morning with their rigging so they can get their sea legs back. So far, it's been quiet here; we only got hit once on the run from Táiwān just north of the Pinnacle Islands, but that was brushed off pretty easily."

"Were there any cargo ship losses, Madame Aotearoa?" Albus Dumbledore asked.

"No, Professor...though the Yanks got jealous that we could deluge the lot with Harpoons and ASROCs and they couldn't," the battlecruiser answered. In the background, there was a peal of laughter from a small gathering of people at one of the open-air lounges close to the seashore. Albus was quick to recognize one as the aircraft carrier Jun'yō, a woman who was something of a notorious drunk due to a tragic incident early in the Abyssal War that haunted her right to this very day. "Those three little scrappers in Taffy 3 wanted to get in there and blast away with their guns and torpedoes, but we sank them all at range before they got any closer for a knife fight. At least Johnston and her sisters were able to sink a submarine when we sailed past Kagoshima."

"Well, hopefully, the people in Cornwallis will be able to perfect the new equipment upgrading mists soon, then get it shipped to Japan so we can get all the girls there refitted with missiles and modern technology," the cruiser noted. "It's no fair that we're able to fight with modern digital equipment and everyone who came out of Eta-jima is still stuck using analog machines."

The battlecruiser nodded in agreement. "Everyone's spirits here are up. Once General Dover got here earlier yesterday, she used her firebird powers to yank out something really evil from that destroyer Quadra salvaged from near Wake a few months ago, no to mention that carrier that nearly got sunk at the replay of the fun in the Coral Sea. Atop that, Bisko, the Littorio sisters, Eugen and Yamato got their last sisters to come through the system. Even better, when Imperio came through, so did Fiume, Gorizia and all of Libeccio's sisters."

Surrey nodded. "That makes sense. The bonds between sisterships are often quite strong. That sort of thing should be looked at before folks at Great Lakes start doing summonings for the rest of the Fletchers, the Butlers and the Casablancas. If all the girls that come through there get upgrades..."

New Zealand sighed. "True..."

The cruiser took a deep breath. "Anyhow, I have to sign off now since there's a meeting of a special group that's going to help see that Riddle wanker put down once and for all. I'll call you tomorrow morning my time, alright."

"Right. Po pai."

"Poi...!" a voice echoed from the background.

Surrey laughed on hearing Yūdachi call out from Eta-jima. The link was cut, then the raven-haired tomboyish shipgirl with the dark blue eyes took another deep breath. "Well, at least he'll be happy..." she mused.

"He should be here, Albus!"

Albus sighed as he gazed on Molly Weasley. Much that he was more than happy to see the matriarch of the Weasley Clan of Ottery Saint Catchpole volunteer to do anything to see Harry Potter safe, it could be seen by some as the first step towards an act of line-theft; atop being Sirius Black's immediate heir, he was also heir to his own family fortune (which he couldn't properly access until he was of age) and a top-tier seat in the Wizengamot. With all the players who were totally beyond the influence of wizarding Britain taking profound interest in the lad's future — as currently personified by the shipgirl now seated beside the headmaster — that was a recipe for disaster, especially once the Queen finally weighed in her judgment on the viability of maintaining the Separation Act of 1692 in the face of the Abyssals and the shipgirls.

"Molly, given the Ministry's current official stance concerning Voldemort's return two weeks ago..." — he ignored the shakes and jolts from the others in the room save Surrey on hearing that particular battle name — "...here is the very worst place for Harry to be. Atop that, I have had suspicions concerning what was buried within his scar. Hearing that the War Hawks have returned to duty to help deal with the Abyssals, I knew that the problems with the scar could easily be neutralized by Jessica Dover; there was nothing I could conceive of to remove that thing from Harry without risking him dying!" He ignored the shakes and jolts from the others save the heavy cruiser on mentioning the birth name of the Soul-Eater of the Dnipró even if some of the younger people present all winced on hearing how badly Voldemort had scarred the Boy Who Lived. "It was done with no harm to Harry. Even better, doing that disembodied Voldemort and hurt dozens of his followers early this morning when Jessica used her powers to wreck whatever magical links had been formed between Harry and Voldemort at the end of the tournament." As some of the people nodded, he added, "That will do a lot to dishearten our opponents, which will give us time to help those in the Ministry who would side with us gain the upper hand against those such as Cornelius and Dolores, not to mention those factions in the Wizengamot who have always sympathized with Voldemort's cause."

"What was in Harry's scar, Professor?" Daedalus Diggle asked. "Why couldn't it have been taken out after You Know Who was put down the first time?"

"I won't answer that due to the specific nature of what it was, Daedalus; it is something that the traditionally dark families would NEVER consider doing to themselves." As people nodded, the headmaster added, "To answer your second question, I didn't realize what it was back then. Given the sheer uncertainty of the time, I believed it was better to get Harry immediately to his relatives and safety, away from the furor that followed Voldemort's destruction at Lily's hands. That was clearly a mistake on my part...but it appears that the power of the prophecy we've been protecting in the Department of Mysteries came into play even if Harry's home life was clearly not what he deserved." Albus shook his head, turning his eyes down. "I have apologized for that. That he forgives me even after all the years of abuse and neglect he received from Lily's sister and her husband speaks well of his good nature, which can and will help him in the times to come." As the others in the room nodded, Albus added, "Atop that, given the many attempts those of Voldemort's allies who were still active made over the years between that night and when Harry finally came to Hogwarts to track him down — to say anything of how the losses we were taking thanks to the Abyssals were diverting everyone's attention from trying to seek Harry out because of what Lily did — I couldn't realistically do much more to see to his safety; anything that I did would have alerted people like Lucius Malfoy immediately." He shook his head again, then gazed on Surrey. "I'm more than grateful to you for your intervention towards that end."

"Well, as soon as Harry was away from those freaks, he did rebound quite nicely when he was staying with his godfather before coming here and being forced into that silly tournament," the heavy cruiser noted while some of the others in the room exchanged smiles. "And he forgave you in the end, which shows what a good lad he. Once Riddle's forever dealt with and his friends are all forced into Gonebren finally, it should be all roses for Harry in the future."

She ignored the shakes from wizards and witches on the mentioning of the prison which often was called "You Know Where" because of the magical-hating monsters born from the souls of normal people who had been killed or hurt by wizards over the last millennia and more that lurked within its walls. Even now, three centuries after Gonebren's "decommissioning" — in truth, the prison had always been seen as active in the eyes of the Crown — and the establishment of Azkaban on an island off the Shetlands as the new prison for the Ministry of Magic, many magicals still feared the possibility of the Hollows surging forth from their current place of residence to drag wizards and witches into its dark walls to see their magic and their souls torn from them. Atop that, given that the keys to Gonebren had always been in the position of the reigning Sovereign since that time, the few attempts at trying to use those keys to trace down the unplottable location of the "Maze Among the Rocks" had wound up with wizards and witches forced into a mind-wrecking fatal stay within Gonebren's walls.

Very few knew the Keys of Gonebren were currently in the hands of the three operational flagships of the Royal Navy's shipgirl corps: Battleship King George V, aircraft carrier Illustrious and battlecruiser/fast battleship Hood.

Albus intended to keep it that way.

"So is Harry safe from Riddle now?" Hermione Granger asked.

The headmaster looked at the young witch from West Sussex. She had willingly foregone a vacation in France with her parents to attend this meeting; given that she was Harry's best friend, Albus gladly invited her to stay a while at Hogwarts before rejoining her parents in France. While Molly had objected to her presence here, the fact that Hermione accompanied Surrey to the castle shut her up very quickly; after all, one didn't get into arguments with living personifications of missile-augmented heavy cruisers with a tactical defensive range of a hundred miles and the willpower to use same against people she often saw as more hindrance than help in the war against the Abyssals. Sadly, all of Harry's other friends such as Ron Weasley hadn't been invited here, though the headmaster would definitely get that changed soon; it was their future that the Order was fighting to guarantee. "He is, Miss Granger. I'm sure you've read a lot about Heather Thompkins even before the announcement came from the United Nations in Niagara Falls that she was made Miss Surrey's operational commander-in-chief." As the other magicals in the room nodded in approval, he added, "I can assure you she is far too skilled and experienced to not allow something Voldemort may have left within Harry to escape her attention. If something DID escape her notice, there are also Jessica Dover and Moroboshi Negako present to detect it. Given Negako's ki sensing abilities, I doubt nothing Voldemort could think of could escape her and her soulsword powers for long."

"Who is this Negako woman?" Sturgis Podmore then asked.

"The Earth Angel," Hermione answered. "Master Hosan's spiritual daughter outside General Raeburn. Our planet's first true artificial intelligence."

Jaws dropped. "Oh, my! We're going to WIN this one!" Elphias Doge exclaimed. "Did you have something to do with this, Albus?! It sounds like you!"

Albus chuckled as some of the others in the room whooped in delight. "Sadly, I can't claim any influence, old friend!" he confessed. "It turns out Negako's last host — and now adopted brother — is Moroboshi Ataru, that brave young lad from Japan who had to deal with that alien girl who claimed him as her husband last year, around the time Harry met Miss Surrey. It was he who found some way to allow Negako to finally acquire a body of her own, seeing the Promise of Bunka-gonen finally fulfilled...with him surviving it at the end! He's now in Eta-jima assisting Negako with the kanmusu to prepare them for the necessary weapons and sensory upgrades to press the fight against the Abyssals home. It turns out that one of Miss Kongō's sisters has taken a fancy to him."

"Miss Kongō's sister?" Minerva McGonagall mused, sipping her tea. "Which one?"

"Miss Kirishima, Professor. Miss New Zealand just told Miss Surrey that," Hermione stated as she smiled on remembering when the four Japanese fast battleships had appeared at the Yule ball held in honour of the Triwizard Tournament. Having just escorted a convoy of container ships from China and Russia's Pacific ports through the Northern Sea Route over the top of the Federation itself to England while helping the Krasnoznamënnyj Sévernyj Flot clear out a pack of stubborn Abyssals who had taken up residence on Sévernaja Zemljá, Kongō and her sisters had been happy to sub in for Surrey as Harry's shared dates; the heavy cruiser was then on a mission to the Faeroe Islands north of Britain in support of the Home Fleet's move to deal with a seaport princess embedded there. "Ataru saved her life from an Abyssal submarine with the use of a soulsword just after he moved to Eta-jima with his sisters."

"Ah, I understand," Minerva breathed out with a nod, remembering the bright and intelligent battleship and the long conversation they had concerning how transfiguration could be factored into shipgirl magic to better allow the Japanese and their allies to upgrade themselves with modern weaponry. Should have better listened to that conversation Miss Surrey had over that strange muggle machine of hers, the transfiguration mistress admonished herself. "Good for both of them. What of Miss Kongō? Is she still chasing her admiral?"

"I'm sure Admiral Thompkins will put a stop to that soon enough if Lady Negako hasn't already, Professor," Surrey stated. She got a recording of that night's events from Kirishima and had showed it to all the shipgirls and shipboys in Europe, Canada and Asia over the Internet within a fortnight. Seeing Kongō give a lecture about how to express "burning love" to wide-eyed wizards and witches from three schools while Hiei and Haruna danced away with Harry made shipgirls and shipboys from Scapa Flow to Toulon to Taranto to Kiel to Severomórsk and all the way to Eta-jima, Québec City and Vancouver scream with laughter. It came as no wonder that the Daily Prophet (thanks to Rita Skeeter) immediately went on an anti-shipgirl tear in the wake of the Yule Ball, railing that the "dark muggle golems" were launching an evil campaign to "corrupt" the innocent wizards and witches of Hogwarts, Beauxbâtons and Durmstrang with their "evil, muggle-influenced" ways. Of course, such a call to rise up and find a way to drive the shipgirls out of the lives of wizards and witches across the Continent fell totally flat thanks to a not-so-subtle verbal threat from the Sixth Sea Lord of the Royal Navy, Vice Admiral Katharine Jones, to the Minister for Magic concerning Royal intervention in the affairs of wizarding Britain, something Cornelius Fudge wanted to avoid like a bad case of spattergroit!

"Albus!"

Albus looked...then he smiled as Poppy Pomfrey came into the Great Hall, a copy of the evening edition of the Daily Prophet in hand. "Ah, I was expecting this! Thank you, Poppy!" the headmaster stated as he held out his hand while the school's mediwitch came up to hand it over. "Now, let's hope that Barnabas didn't give in to Cornelius' pressure...AH!" he then exclaimed. "Wonderful!"

"What is it, Professor?" Arthur Weasley asked.

"Dean managed to get Heather's announcement concerning her taking Harry on as an apprentice into tonight's edition, Arthur," Albus reported as he scanned the large article on the front page, then he handed it to Minerva to have the paper passed around. "With that, I doubt that Cornelius will be able to have more slander published against Harry without people questioning its validity. After all, if Heather questions the whole matter concerning Cedric's death, people would be inclined right away to agree with what she said. A statement from me concerning this matter wouldn't aid the issue. But one from Heather..."

The others in the room nodded. Even if it had been decades since the War Hawks had actively defended Britain and helped liberate Western Europe in the latter years of World War Two/Grindelwald's War, memories were quite long and many of the elder generation of British wand magicals could recall with clarity about how many lives the four Canadian warriors had saved. Heather Thompkins had taken advantage of that when she had sought to become Supreme Mugwump in the 1950s after retiring from active service in the Women's Royal Canadian Naval Service; all of Europe's representatives on both sides of the Iron Curtain had voted her in unanimously. Given how much Heather had helped support worldwide efforts at reconstruction in the wake of the awful damage Grindelwald's War and Tsukuyomi's War of Liberation unleashed on Europe even with the total loss of foreign magical colonies on other continents, many British magicals even now often expressed a desire to see her once more reestablished in her old post in Geneva. Once the news of Heather being made the United Nations' Flag Officer Commander-in-Chief of Shipgirls/Shipboys got out in the magical realms, the uncertainties many felt these days given how badly the Abyssals had hurt people would start to fade...and help make the acceptance of open knowledge of magic worldwide among normal people more digestible for the average magical.

Albus knew THAT would soon come...!

"Well, Harry's safe! That's the main point," Rubeus Hagrid stated. "Soon as Severus gets here with his report about what Jess Dover did to Riddle..."

The main doors to the Great Hall then opened, revealing a pale yet slowly recovering potions master. "Professor!" Hermione called out.

Instantly, Poppy was at Severus Snape's side as he moved to sit close to the head table; Minerva got up to help. "My apologies for being late, Albus," Severus grunted as the mediwitch began diagnostic scans and Surrey got up to have a cup of tea made from the service the castle's house elves had left for the Order. "I was busy with Lucius making sure that all those who were hurt when Riddle so nicely detonated himself thanks to the Soul-Eater ripping out that abomination from Mister Potter's forehead wouldn't try to cause more trouble, much less seek to have him obtain a new body." As the people in the room whooped in delight on hearing that Voldemort was once more effectively neutered and many of his fighters were hurt, Severus smirked at Sirius Black. "Not to mention making sure Peter Pettigrew finally was turned over to Amelia Bones without interference from the minister or Dolores Umbridge."

Hearing that made Harry's godfather gape. "Snape...?"

"I didn't do it for you, Black!" Severus snapped back before nodding his thanks as Surrey handed him a cup of tea. "Thank you, Miss Surrey." He then gazed once more on Sirius. "Fudge's refusal to see reality could have had us all in a major bind if your godson was allowed to stay in Britain! As long as your legal status was up in the air, Fudge would be free to do anything to force Mister Potter to heel. Even his being in Japan could be seen by some fools as kidnapping; there's no way idiots in the Wizengamot will accept the testimony of a shipgirl despite threats from the Throne to force them to comply with the Queen's wishes. I doubt the announcement Admiral Thompkins made in tonight's Prophet will sway some of those dunderheads. However, once you're declared innocent of what happened to Lily and her husband, not to mention those muggles when you tried to capture Pettigrew, you could endorse the admiral's move to apprentice your godson. There's no way in Hell ANYONE can object to that!"

Hearing that made Sirius blink before he slowly nodded. "I could accept that." He then smirked. "If Lucius thinks I'll make his son my heir, he's got another think coming, Severus!" he then warned. "Unless he agrees to admit the truth of what he did in the last war and not hide behind the 'Imperius Defence' like he did last time, I can disbar his whole family from getting a thing."

Severus nodded before sitting back and sipping the soothing tea Surrey made; that was expected from the once-disinherited heir of the Blacks of Grimmauld. Hermione sighed. "I wonder what's happening in the Ministry now..."


Level Two of the offices of Her Majesty's Ministry of Magic (near Whitehall in London), an hour later...

"THAT CAN'T BE HIM!"

Deep in her heart, Amelia Bones moaned as she tried not to give into a sudden urge to reach over and slap her current administrative boss upside the head for his stupidity. Even if he was something of a decent peacetime minister, Cornelius Fudge was fast becoming quite an embarrassment with the pressures of the Abyssal War and the fracturing relations with the normal side of Her Majesty's Government when it came to dealing with the dark sea spirits. "It appears to be Peter Pettigrew," she said. "Lord Malfoy, how exactly did you get the drop on someone like him?" Here, she waved to the stunned animagus, who was now in bindings in one of the holding cells of the Department of Magical Law Enforcement. "If he's evaded us for so long..."

Lucius Malfoy took a deep breath, a humble look crossing his face. Deep down, Amelia knew it was false, but since she didn't have the evidence to see him sentenced to hard time in Her Majesty's Prison Gonebren, she'd leave it be. "I heard about Harry Potter's accusation a year ago that Peter Pettigrew somehow framed Sirius Black for the murder of those muggles when Sirius was captured, not to mention the betrayal of Harry's parents to the Dark Lord that night. Much that I found it quite hard to believe, it nagged on my mind. Just last night, my son took notice of a rat that he remembered once belonged to Arthur's son Ronald. When I noted the missing fore claw, I remembered that Peter's finger was all that was left of him when the scene was examined when he 'died'. I stunned him, performed the animagus reversal spell, then noted who he was. With help from Severus Snape, I was able to get him here around noon hour today. It surprises me that you weren't informed of this right away, Amelia."

Amelia looked embarrassed. "I was busy meeting with Lady Raeburn in Bushy Park in Teddington," she confessed, making the other magicals gape at her. "She's been promoted to general from her old rank of major and was asked to be the commander-in-chief of shipgirl forces within NATO in the Atlantic basin. Right now, she's busy forming her headquarters at the site where President Eisenhower established his command base before the invasion of the Continent in 1944..."

"'NATO'?" Lucius asked in genuine curiosity.

"'North Atlantic Treaty Organization', Lord Malfoy," Percy Weasley said. "It's a military alliance between the Western European powers, the Canadians and the Americans, originally meant to guard against the Soviets. Once the Soviet Union was no more, NATO remained in place and began to expand. It's concerned now with fighting the Abyssals and they're allying with the Russians under Marshal Múromeca to present a united front to keep our side of Eurasia clear."

Many in the area of the holding cells winced on hearing the name of the Bloody Siberian She-bear, the normal-born farmer's daughter who led a brutal decade-long purge throughout the Soviet Union to effectively wipe out the purebloods of old Russia and ensure loyalty to the regime formed in the October Revolution of 1917. She was also the one who led the liberation campaign between 1941 and 1945 to clear out half of Europe from Gellert Grindelwald's control; doing that earned Svetlána Il'ínična Múromeca the sobriquet "Liberator of All Europe" even if Albus Dumbledore was the one who had put his old lover down in the Battle of Nurmengard on the summer solstice after the European side of World War Two officially ended. Naturally, almost every British magical alive loathed the mere MENTION of that woman; had the Bloody Siberian She-bear been active in the country when Voldemort launched his rebellion, every pureblood adult alive would have been killed and their children forcibly "re-educated" to forever renounce any type of blood politics. And while Svetlána had been imprisoned to prevent the start of World War Three after her patron Iósef Vissariónovič Stálin died in the 1950s, she had been let out two years ago, restored to her wartime rank of chief marshal of magical troops of the Russian Federation, then put in charge of shipboy forces of Russia and the other ex-Soviet republics. While it had been a pragmatic decision and one that saved thousands of lives from the Abyssals, it had people in the magical ministries of Europe quaking in their boots, wondering if Svetlána would decide to finish the job left half-done in 1945...even if Russians themselves had long rejected communism!

"Well, with Lady Raeburn here, we shouldn't have to worry about the Moscow Magical Front suddenly reforming," Lucius then quipped. "Eh, Cornelius?"

The minister for magic perked, then he nodded. "Yes, yes, Lucius, that's true! I should call in on Lady Raeburn myself to see what we can do to help her fight those damned things! Much that I'm still baffled about these shipgirls...!"

"They will fall..."

Hearing that from the prison cell opposite Peter's, Amelia looked over. "Says who?" she wondered as the younger Barty Crouch glared in defiance at her, his body quaking. "None of our spells can work on a shipgirl. Even the Killing Curse does nothing save shut down parts of their bodies...which start up right away given the sheer spiritual energy they possess. Their magic is too powerful!" As he sputtered in disbelief, the director of the DMLE added, "Indeed, they're as the Japanese always see them: Living divine spirits born from the united sense of loyalty, duty and hope of their builders and crews, gladly answering the call to arms to defend their homelands from the Abyssals. How could even your precious 'dark lord' stand up to the likes of one of them?"

"LIES! ALL LIES! THE DARK LORD WILL CONQUER...!"

Barty then screamed as something hot ripped up his arm. Gazing on the exposed limb, the observers watched as the Dark Mark seemed to tear itself apart, a vertical cut slicing the skull in half from chin to the top of the crown, the serpent's head cut off at the neck and disintegrating. "NO!" Barty wailed out. "NO! MY LORD! I CAN HELP YOU BE REBORN! PLEASE! COME BACK, MY LORD...!"

"Some after-effect of having that thing branded on his arm," Cornelius quickly concluded as Percy nodded. "Since he took it willingly, it's no wonder he feels so much loss because You Know Who is gone. But how did that happen...?"

"It happened to me, Cornelius," Lucius stated as he moved to bare his arm.

The others looked, then gaped on seeing the faint yet visibly mutilated mark that was burned there. "Merlin! It's almost totally gone!" Percy exclaimed.

"Indeed, Mister Weasley. I felt it happen very early this morning," the patriarch of the Malfoy Clan of Avebury explained with a genuinely relieved smile. "Since I was under the Imperius, the bond I felt with the Dark Lord wasn't as strong as it was with Barty. Thus it didn't affect me save for a headache when the Mark disintegrated. I've confirmed the others possessed in the same way — people like Severus Snape, Malcolm Parkinson, Cyrus Greengrass, Mason Nott, Lance Goyle and Vince Crabbe — experienced the same thing."

"LIAR!" Barty shrieked out. "YOU WERE NEVER POSSESSED...!"

"STUPEFY!"

The stun bolt slammed into the shrieking man, causing him to pass out on the floor. "Apologies," Amelia stated as she holstered her wand. "He's delirious with pain now. Have you had a chance to get a healer to look at your arm...?"

"CORNELIUS!"

Everyone turned as a middle-aged witch raced to join them, a copy of the Daily Prophet in hand. "Dolores!" Cornelius called back as his senior undersecretary came to a stop, panting hard. "Good heavens! What's the matter with you?!"

"LOOK!" Dolores Umbridge snapped as she thrust the paper into his hands.

He looked...then gaped in shock as the message there sank in. "Merlin! Harry Potter's in Japan with Supreme Mugwump Emeritus Thompkins?!"

Jaws dropped. "Why would Harry be there, Minister?!" Percy demanded.

"Just a moment..." the minister bade as he scanned the notice there, then he hissed. "Oh, Merlin, I don't believe this! How could this have not been damned noticed in all the years he's been going to Hogwarts?! That poor boy!"

"What happened, Cornelius?" Lucius wondered.

"The Soul-Eater of the Dnipró just happened to the boy," Cornelius stated, making the others gasp in horror. "Supreme Mugwump Emeritus Thompkins was just made the commander-in-chief of the world's shipgirl and shipboy forces to deal with the Abyssals by Dumbledore's opposite number in the United Nations." None of the people listening to this noted Dolores' look on hearing again about the shipgirls. The senior undersecretary had been the centre of a passionate anti-shipgirl movement within the ranks of the Ministry who had done everything they could to try to regulate such beings as mandated by the Statute of Secrecy. Fortunately, such efforts had failed spectacularly...which had allowed Dolores' resentment towards those "evil muggle golems" to fester to near-paranoid levels. "At least the old fool did something right and got Harry over to see her just yesterday. The Soul-Eater is with her friend right now to help destroy those things...and she noticed the poor boy was POSSESSED by something that was possibly related to You Know Who! Damn! What the hell was Dumbledore doing placing the boy with magic-hating muggles with that damned curse scar not properly looked at?! It's a miracle the lad has his magic still!"

"Is he recovering?" Percy asked out of concern for his brother's feelings.

"Doesn't say here. Anyhow, Harry will be in Japan and be looked after by Supreme Mugwump Emeritus Thompkins and the Soul-Eater, not to mention Lady Moroboshi Negako, the Earth Angel." As Dolores turned a sickly shade of puce on noting the sheer level of spiritual and magical power that was now close to Harry Potter — which would make it totally impossible to reign in the lying brat and make him heel to the Ministry! — Cornelius sighed, shaking his head even if he seemed to stand straighter. "I'll issue an apology and retraction to what's been said about him in tomorrow morning's edition. Amelia?"

Amelia perked. "Yes?"

"Get your people to find Sirius Black. Offer some sort of amnesty to get the man in here so we can learn the truth of what happened when Harry lost his parents. Since we lost the Dementors when the Abyssals wrecked Azkaban, he won't be so afraid to come in." He shook his head. "Damn! Another fool thing I did! I'll put that in my statement to the press tomorrow morning!"

"Cornelius, that's the wrong response to take!" Dolores urged. "Sirius Black is responsible for the deaths of those muggles and Peter Pettigrew...!"

"Um, Dolores..."

Hearing Lucius, she looked at him...then noting where he was pointing, she gazed over before she blanched on seeing what was in a cell. "Pettigrew...?"

"Lucius caught the lying monster at his home yesterday," the minister stated, which made Dolores gape in shocked disbelief. "Harry mentioned this to me back at the end of his third year! I should have listened to the lad back then...!"

That made the senior undersecretary jerk. "Don't believe the...!"

"Amelia!"

Everyone stopped, then turned...

...before they tensed on sensing a concentrated tidal wave of incredible magic wash over them as the clanking of metal high-heel shoes echoed from the flagstone deck of Level Two. Now standing by the entrance to the corridor leading to the holding cells for the DMLE beside Alastor Moody was a certain reborn heavy cruiser in full battle rigging, one of her anchor chains extending from her waist to firmly bind the hands of Sirius Black. Also there were two other people Amelia knew were secretly part of the Order of the Phoenix: Kingsley Shacklebolt and Nymphadora Tonks; they were also accompanied by Remus Lupin. Much to Amelia's amusement, there was a knowing smirk on the rogue Marauder's face; she wondered if someone who was sympathetic to the Order had relayed to Kingsley, Nymphadora or Alastor that Peter Pettigrew was here and about to face some overdue justice. "Miss Surrey!" the director of the DMLE called out in greetings as Dolores looked ill and Lucius smiled in admiration at Sirius' quick move to secure his freedom. "How on Earth did you...?"

"A bit of a confession on our parts, Director," Kingsley stated as the scarred Alastor harrumphed and Tonks looked embarrassed. "We all believed in Sirius' innocence. When we got the chance to hear Harry's side of the story, it made sense that something odd happened when Pettigrew 'died'. Since we had to prioritize ourselves for the Tournament and the Dementors were wiped out — and given that Sirius did nothing towards trying to communicate with other Death Eaters — we waited for the chance to find Pettigrew to prove his innocence."

"Which Lucius just did," Cornelius stated, nodding.

"My thanks, Lucius," Sirius stated before he noted the other man's wrecked Dark Mark. "Looks like that whatever-it-was that half-blood bastard child..."

"LIAR! HE IS NO HALF-BLOOD! THE DARK LORD WILL COME AND KILL YOU ALL!"

Everyone jolted on hearing a wide-eyed Barty scream that out, frothing at the mouth as he glared in defiance at the godfather to the monster who had somehow put Voldemort down years ago. As the minister and the others gaped at how fast he recovered from Amelia's stunning spell, Sirius asked, "What's with him?!"

"Like you were about to say, Black!" Alastor growled. "Whatever Jess Dover did to young Potter that tore out whatever Voldemort did to the lad years ago must have affected all those who got marked by that lying, murderous bastard!"

Barty grinned. "How does it feel to know you were BEATEN, Moody...?!"

He then croaked in underwear-soiling horror as four BL 8 inch 50 calibre Mk VIII naval guns in two dual turrets turned his way, ominous waves of magic echoing from a certain cruiser's enhanced sensory set homing in on him like a Dementor would to suck out his happiness. "You mind your Ps and Qs, you filthy murderer!" Surrey snarled out. "Once we get you over to Gonebren to allow the Hollows to have at you, you'll be behaving yourself soon enough!"

As Barty suddenly whimpered on hearing the name of THAT place, Amelia smiled. "As a matter of fact, we can send him to Gonebren right now!"

Dolores gasped. "Now see here, Amelia...!"

"Enough, Dolores!" the director of the DMLE snapped. "He was convicted for his crimes as a Death Eater. Adding escaping from Azkaban, killing his father, kidnapping and imprisoning Alastor for a year — plus conspiracy to kidnap and murder Harry Potter! — he would have got the Kiss for such actions once we got our hands on him!" As Cornelius nodded in grim agreement, she added, "Since we don't have the Dementors anymore, we need the Hollows!" She gazed on Surrey. "I assume the Queen can loan the Keys for the task, Miss Surrey...?"

"Just a moment, Madame Director. Suthrige!"

POP! Everyone gaped on seeing a smiling male house elf standing proudly on the forecastle deck of the heavy cruiser's rigging, dressed smartly in an old-style Royal Navy square rig with sailor cap, the proud title HMS SURREY in gold on the tally. "Suthrige reporting as ordered, Miss Surrey, ma'am!" he reported as he gave her a salute which would have earned him many points with the training petty officers at HMS Raleigh near Portsmouth. "What are your orders?"

"My compliments to Hood. I know she's at Whitehall right now. Have her come here. We've got one and possibly two more for the Gonebren Press Gang."

"Aye-aye, ma'am!" POP!

Dolores shuddered. "Now see here, you filthy golem...!"

"Are you threatening one of my troopers, toady?"

Everyone croaked on hearing that voice as Alastor looked around, his magical eye spinning. He then laughed, nodding in admiration. "Damn, Dean! You even can hide that cigar smoke of yours!" he called out. "Nicely done...!"

"Lucky thing I have my Jewel keep an eye on all my troopers," that voice called back as a shift of air made the crowd by Peter's and Barty's cells turn to see a tall woman standing there, the pulsing Power Jewel at her neck making almost all the magicals pale as they realized who had now joined them. "Now...!" Dean Raeburn snarled as she moved to loom like Pallas Athena did over Troy in The Odyssey over Dolores Umbridge. "What the hell did you just call my trooper?"

The senior undersecretary sputtered. "Go away, you hideous muggle beast! You have no right to deal with anything concerning us! The law forbids it...!"

"Magical Royal Proclamation of 1941 says otherwise," the air cavalry officer calmly stated as she exhaled the cigar smoke into Dolores' face, making the witch sputter as she tried not to choke on those sweet-sour fumes. As some of the others hearing this winced on hearing the Protector of All Life declare that, the native of Queenston added, "You should damn hell know by now than any Proclamation of the Crown has priority over even your cute little Separation Act." Ignoring the sputter of denial from Dolores, Dean said, "I've every damned right in the world to protect those under my command and all those affiliated with them from backwards idiots like you. And that NOW includes every shipgirl of the Royal Navy, Royal Canadian Navy and all of NATO active from the Continental Divide in North America east to well past Moscow! AND their adopted relatives, which Mister Harry Potter now is seen...as Miss Surrey here can confirm." As the heavy cruiser beamed on hearing that, Dean gazed in confusion at the man bound by her anchor chain. "What's with him?"

"He was falsely accused of betrayal and multiple counts of murder when Harry lost his parents due to the magical terrorist Tom Riddle, also known as Lord Voldemort, General Raeburn," Surrey reported, ignoring the shudders from the people there save Alastor and Sirius on hearing that man's battle name. "He never even got a proper trial during Minister Bagnold's regime according to his own testimony to me when I met him after I rescued Harry from the freaks that had been taking care of him last summer." As people gasped in shock on hearing that, the heavy cruiser added, "Since the whole issue with the Triwizard Tournament and the visitation from other parts of the Continent to celebrate same distracted the Ministry too much — to say anything of the continued drain on the DMLE and other departments thanks to the Abyssals — I took it upon myself to have Lord Black watched over until such time as we could present him to the authorities to be dealt with. Since Lord Malfoy was so kind as to apprehend the real traitor to the late Lord and Lady Potter...!"

Dean noted where she was looking, then gazed at the unconscious Peter while Cornelius looked ill. "He never got even a TRIAL...?" the minister eeped.

"Never did, Minister," Sirius admitted. "I do admit to feeling very guilty when it came to what happened to James and Lily that damned night! It was that which probably convinced Bagnold and Crouch to send me to Azkaban right then and there without presenting me to the Wizengamot for their judgment. It was my stupid idea to switch secret-keepers to Peter to throw off Voldemort's people once he decided to target my godson. We never once suspected he'd become a turncoat." A wry chuckle escaped him. "He always was a sneaky bastard...but I never thought he could pull something like THAT off..."

"Don't worry about that," Amelia stated. "He'll be tried and sentenced when we get the chance to present this to the Wizengamot. In the meantime, Miss Surrey, you can let Lord Black go. I don't think he's a flight risk."

"Aye, ma'am," Surrey stated as she drew her anchor chain off Sirius.

"Thanks!" he said with a polite nod.

Amelia nodded. "Sergeant Shacklebolt, Auror Tonks, I think you can keep an eye on Lord Black until we arrange for his 'friend's' trial with the Wizengamot."

"Yes, Director!" Kingsley and Tonks affirmed with nods of their heads.

"They'll be treated well, Amelia," Sirius affirmed. "What the hell's going on with Barty? Bad enough he was allowed to be smuggled out of Azkaban by his old man, but he also trapped Alastor in his own damned trunk while he was supposed to be the DADA teacher at Hogwarts! What the hell's going to happen to him?!"

"He'll be sent to Gonebren..."

"He will NOT!" Dolores snapped...

...before a massive burst of air flowed through the room, accompanied by the loud POP! of a house elf teleporting her mistress' friend in from Whitehall. "You wanted to see me, Surrey?" a woman called out as Suthrige popped himself over to stand on Surrey's forecastle...then a sudden gasp of shock caused everyone to turn as the pride of the Royal Navy saluted. "General Raeburn!"

Dean turned, returning Hood's courtesy with her own British Army-style palm-forward salute. Like Surrey, the battlecruiser/fast battleship was in full combat rigging, making the magicals all tense on seeing those four dual turrets with their BL 15 inch 42 calibre Mk I naval guns in ready positions. As she had been augmented with modern electronics and sensor suites on her rebirth as a shipgirl at Torpoint, Hood also possessed four quad Mark 141 launcher packs for RGM-84 Harpoon anti-ship missiles, four GWS-26 vertical launch systems for Sea Wolf surface-to-air missiles, eight 4.5 inch Mark 8 dual-purpose naval guns in single mounts flanking her superstructure, eight 30 millimetre DS30M Mark 2 automated guns and four Phalanx Mark 15 20 millimetre close-in weapons systems. Of course, the armour that hadn't saved her in 1941 had been heavily augmented with no weight loss thanks to the change of her propulsion systems to a CODLAG format that gave her the edge in speed and cruising range, to say anything of not having to spend so much time in refurbishment docks after a mission. "I trust Kathy's alright with the new command arrangement I've made for you girls?"

"She is, General Raeburn. Please excuse me. What's going on, Surrey?"

"One for Gonebren, Hood," the cruiser said as she nodded towards Barty.

Hearing that, the battlecruiser sighed as she reached into her skirt pocket to draw out a certain gold skeletal key. Given the presence of two shipgirls on Level Two right now, none of the magicals were quick to sense the wild and ancient earth/blood magic infused into the Key of Gonebren...though they all gaped as the key enlarged itself to the size of the average broadsword. Seeing that, Dolores shrieked out as she lunged over to grab the key by the shank...

...only to vanish in a flash of light, a howling scream marking her departure!

Silence.

More silence.

Still more silence.

Then...

"Er...?" Amelia began, her eyebrow twitching ominously.

Hood chuckled, her blue eyes sparkling with false mischievousness. "You should keep in mind, ladies and gentlemen, that this key does have powerful anti-theft charms on it. She's in 'C' Block now," she loudly declared. As Cornelius gasped in horror, the raven-haired battlecruiser/fast battleship stared at him. "Minister, with all due respect, this key was entrusted into my custody at the order of the Queen! Because of that, I am bound to ensure its safe use until I am relieved at the order of Her Majesty! You have no right to complain about your senior undersecretary's appalling and disrespectful behaviour! Besides, this bright young lad here seems ready to stand in her place!" she said as she gazed on Percy, making the ginger-haired Wizengamot scribe blush madly.

"I'll make sure he's up to it, Cornelius," Amelia promised.

The minister looked ill in the mainmast. "Er...th-thank you, Amelia..."

With that, Hood stared intently at Barty, the reading glasses covering her eyes glittering in the torchlight ominously. As he gargled on seeing the blade of that key point at him, she smiled. "They'll take good care of you...and make sure you understand your Ps and Qs," she declared. "What are his crimes?"

"Seven counts of premeditated murder with the Unforgivables, two counts of being an accomplice to torture with the Unforgivables, membership in a terrorist organization moving to overthrow the legal government of the land, kidnapping and holding a wizard against his will to impersonate him with use of polyjuice potion for criminal purposes, plus being an accomplice in the kidnapping and near-murder of Miss Surrey's charge, Lord Black's godson," the director of the DMLE stated. "One count of murder, the kidnap and impersonation charges and conspiring to kidnap and murder Mister Potter haven't been reviewed before the Wizengamot in a legal trial, Miss Hood. However, escaping from Azkaban Prison does carry an automatic sentence of death...but since Her Majesty refuses to employ the death penalty..."

"Well, that sounds like a candidate for 'A' Block," Hood stated. "Off you go!"

Barty screamed in mortal terror as the Key made contact with him, he vanishing in a flash of light while a brutal cold wind flowed through Level Two...


The Mahora Academy (north of Tōkyō), after dawn (London time: An hour before midnight on Monday)...

"Negi-sensei...why are you here at this time of day?"

Hearing that question from one of his would-be girlfriends, the slender and bespectacled sorcerer from the mountains of Wales perked. "Oh, just doing some late night research..." he answered before a yawn stole his voice, then he glanced out a window to see the sun well above the rise of hills that lined the eastern part of the university village enclaved within the city of Saitama. "Pardon me...early morning research," he corrected himself as he stretched.

Seeing that, Miyazaki Nodoka shuddered as the mixed feelings she had for the young native of Wales surged up from deep within her heart to nearly overwhelm her. While some of her peers were flatly convinced that Negi's roommates Kagurazaka Asuna and Konoe Konoka stood better chances at winning his love once the whole issues of their being students of his was finally out of the way in a couple years, the young volunteer librarian knew the odds were in her favour. Negi's sense of personal propriety forbade him from doing anything with his boss' only granddaughter (never mind Konoka's relationship with Sakurazaki Setsuna) and Asuna was a blood relative of Negi's late mother Arika Anarchia Entheofushia-Springfield; natives of Mars' sister planet of Nerio had long ago learned the lesson of what inbreeding could do to future children. Atop that, Nodoka wanted to make damn sure that Negi loved her and she loved him; there was no way in hell that she was going to get herself into a relationship with anyone when there was the potential risk of serious heartbreak in the future.

"What are you researching?" the raven-haired teenager with the dark blue eyes asked as she sat across from him at the table inside one of the cavernous reading rooms on Library Island some distance from the Academy itself.

"Looking for ways to help the shipgirls summoned through Eta-jima to get their equipment upgraded to modern electronics and weapons without forcing them to sacrifice too much in the way of performance," Negi explained as he gazed at the arithmatic diagrams before him, glad he was an expert in interpreting Chinese characters so he could convert the equations to something he could personally understand. "For the larger shipgirls like the battleships, the aircraft carriers and the heavy cruisers, it's not so difficult; they have the spiritual displacement that could take changes of armament from massed anti-aircraft guns to missile launchers. Smaller ships would have some serious issues, especially given the propensity of local kanmusu to loathe the idea of landing guns to make room for other things." He shook his head.

"Why was it the Canadians were able to allow their corvettes and frigates to come back so well-armed?" she wondered. "A frigate is one step down in size from a destroyer and a corvette is two steps down. Yet they came back..."

"Practically the equivalents of modern Halifax-class ships," Negi finished for her. "Hai, that would be quite an issue, Nodoka-san. In many places, we'd be looking at the same scale of rebuild the Italians put their battleships from the Great War through during the 1930s." He sat back in his chair. "Take Tenryū-san." He had chosen that light cruiser because Nodoka always saw that particular shipgirl as the one to admire the most given her stewardship of younger shipgirls such as the members of Destroyer Division Six. "As a ship, she was physically the same size as a Halifax-class frigate. She'd want to keep her cruiser rating, so we'd have to find some way to stuff the equivalent of a Kongō-class destroyer's Aegis sensors and modern weapons into a hull that's a little over eighteen metres shorter and HALF the displacement weight lighter. Now, that's quite possible as the Flower-class corvettes proved when they were summoned in Cornwallis. In their original form, they were a thousand tonnes soaking wet. In their 'modernized' form, they're spiritually nearly four times heavier; fortunately, they got the updated power systems to help them go faster than they did in World War Two. It's obvious that Tenryū-san and everyone like her can do the same...but how would such an upgrade affect her given the overall transformation from warship to human being?" He waved to the books arrayed before him. "How would Tenryū-san adjust to such a change, Nodoka-san? It would be like putting her through a Star Trek transporter and reworking her from base DNA up! She would have to learn everything anew...!"

"Which we can't afford to do," Nodoka finished. "The Abyssals won't leave us alone long enough to allow that sort of thing to happen."

"Thus, we need Negako-sensei's brilliance for martial arts and Thompkins-taishō and her friends to weigh in with their power to help out for the time being," he noted. "Give us the breathing room so we could get shipgirls upgraded; it's only a matter of time before those mad geniuses in Cornwallis perfect that modification mist they're designing, then put it to work." He shook his head, his chestnut eyes misting over. "I thought I was so brilliant...!"

"Negi!"

He jolted on sensing Nodoka glare at him. "Stop that!" the volunteer librarian hissed out as her own eyes teared in sympathy. "You have saved more lives with what you did three years ago than any person — magical, metahuman or normal! — has done since the Abyssals first began slaughtering people on the high seas! Stop blaming yourself for not seeing the potential of the spells you used to summon Kongō-san and the others to drive them out of Tōkyō Bay! You unleashed the modern wonder of the world! Hai, people in Canada and Britain took it and ran with it...and that's done more to keep humanity alive and safe on the high seas than anything anyone's done before! Who cares about that stupid secrecy statute?! You've heard Konoka-san's grandfather talk about that! It's pretty much gone! This is what you've dreamt of deep down for years, hasn't it?! To stop hiding like that all the time, show what you can do, help people with the gifts the Kami gave you and live your life without fear! You've seen all the Internet chat about people discovering magicals around the world! We're not like the barbarians who drove magicals into forcing that statute on everyone three centuries ago! Humanity has evolved, Negi-sensei! It can work this time!" She smirked at him. "Besides, doesn't this show up the idiots in London?!" she teased. "All their knowledge they got stored in that ministry of theirs...and they couldn't make a dent against the Abyssals! You, the son of the Thousand Master, the ultimate magical rule breaker...!" Nodoka then shrugged. "You did it, Negi! And they can NEVER take it away from you!"

Negi blinked before he sighed. "Haruna-san?!"

No answer.

"Damn it! It's really you!" he muttered...even if his eyes twinkled with mirth and delight at Nodoka's passionate support of him; he still remembered that time when Saotome Haruna used her own powers to create a literal copy of Nodoka that acted so passionate, it have given him nightmares for a week. "Sometimes, I regret giving you that lesson about magical politics in the British Isles."

"You have Albus' support in that end, Negi-kun," a new voice then called out.

"Kōchō-sensei," Nodoka called out as Konoe Konoemon came up to them.

"Burning the midnight oil, Negi-kun?" the elderly headmaster of Mahora and the effective leader of all Japanese magicals in Kantō wondered.

"Still trying to figure out how we can augment the Eta-jima kanmusu with new equipment and weapons, sir," Negi admitted as Konoemon sat down beside him.

"Well, you can relax for the time being," the headmaster stated. "Heather Thompkins has asked for me to come down to Eta-jima to brief her on all magical developments since she was last on Earth. She'll want to meet you since you're the genius who came up with the whole 'summon the spirits of warships' idea that saved millions of lives three years ago. Maybe she'll have some ideas as to how we can help our kanmusu and the other kanmusu improve themselves."

Negi gaped at him, then smiled. "I best have breakfast!"


Eta-jima, that moment...

"Oh! Ohayō gozaimasu, Teitoku!"

Hearing that bright voice from the destroyer now moving to tie off her running shoes, Heather Thompkins blinked before returning Fubuki's salute with her own. "Ohayō, Miss Fubuki," the Canadian responded. "Off for a morning run?"

"Hai!" Fubuki stated with an eager nod. "Even if I've already upgraded myself to Kai Ni, I still have to stay in good shape for operations. Akashi-sensei tells me that it helps keep the times in the refurbishment bays down to a minimum, which decreases the work for her and Vestal-sensei and allows them to concentrate on more vital repair tasks." She then frowned. "I just wish that all the others would do it as well. Akashi-sensei and Vestal-sensei work hard enough for all of us! Putting more work on all of them is just wrong!"

The admiral hummed. "Well, we'll definitely change that. Excuse me," she said with a wink, then she looked over to the multinational colour party heading to the gaff-and-yardarm-augmented flag pole located by the headquarters building. "Gentlemen! Do you have all the colours to raise this morning?!"

The group stopped, then the senior rate present quickly marched over to stand before his new operational commander-in-chief, saluting. "Good morning, Admiral," the Australian warrant officer stated. "We have all the colours ready, including your own flag. Permission to raise the colours?"

"What colours do you have?" Heather asked.

"The Kyokujitsu-ki for the gaff, Admiral Thompkins. For the lines on the lower yardarm, from port to starboard: The British White Ensign, the First Navy Jack, the Dienstflagge der Seestreitkräfte, the Bandiera Navale Militare, the Canadian White Ensign, the Australian White Ensign, the Royal Canadian Air Force blue ensign and the New Zealand White Ensign. The order is decided according to the recognized establishment date of the service in question."

"Why is the American naval jack being flown instead of the national flag?"

"President Obama allowed it by Executive Order, ma'am."

She nodded. "Go on."

"Your own flag will be raised to the top of the staff given your presence here. General Dover's flag will fly from the upper yardarm to port, with Admiral Saitō's and Admiral Vance's flags set to starboard of the general's flag."

Heather nodded, then she blinked on noting that the Australian senior rate had finished his report. "You're missing one flag, Warrant," she then warned.

He tensed. "M-m-Ma'am...?"

"Where is the Z Flag?"

Fubuki gasped on hearing that. The Australian blinked. "The Zulu flag...?"

"Oui!" she snapped, slipping into French before returning to Japanese; all those assigned to Eta-jima from other nations had to be fluent. "We're in a war situation and the girls have to know that we are taking that situation seriously. That's even done when a battle is not being fought. Get that flag up on the port side of the upper yardarm; you'll have room there. Do it now!"

The veteran boatswain's mate tensed, then he nodded. "Aye-aye, ma'am!"

With another salute, he raced off to get the changes done. Heather watched him go, then she sighed. Fubuki looked up at her, her eyes wide. "Teitoku...?"

A sigh escaped the older woman. "In the last two weeks reviewing this whole mess, I've asked myself many times how you've all been able to keep fighting like you have with such little emotional and spiritual encouragement."

That made the destroyer blush. "We've endured, Teitoku..."

"Buongiorno, Ammiraglio!"

Both turned as a smiling Libeccio came towards them, dressed in a form-fitting track suit that showed off her slender body quite well. "Buongiorno, Miss Libeccio," Heather stated as she returned the Italian destroyer's salute, then she gazed down on the clothing. "A little exercise before breakfast?"

"Trying to tire myself out so I can get some sleep," Libeccio confessed, which made Fubuki giggle. "I was so wound up because my sorelle maggiori are here with me now and we can be together, I couldn't sleep a wink last night!"

"Better get used to it soon, Miss Libeccio," Heather stated. "As soon as a certain someone gets here to help out with your armament, physical education periods will become mandatory!" As Libeccio gaped and Fubuki gasped, the admiral added, "It'll help prepare you both physically and spiritually to get ready for the big upgrade in equipment and weapons coming very soon."

That made both destroyers gasp. "You mean like the Canadians and the others in the Commonwealth, the Russians and the Koreans have?!" Fubuki demanded.

"Yes," Heather affirmed. "I'm going to be meeting with Negi Springfield sometime later today so I can get a full idea of all the charms, runes and everything else that he used to bring Miss Kongō and her sisters out when they were needed three years ago. Once I have that, I can compare it to what the people under Admiral Harlan are doing in Cornwallis, then you can look forward to a very nice upgrade to get you up to where any British destroyer is now!"

That made the two younger-looking shipgirls gape. "But wouldn't that mean we'd have to land guns and torpedoes, Ammiraglio?!" Libeccio asked.

Heather winked at her. "Miss Libeccio, it's magic! When there's a will, there's always a way! Our job right now is to find it and make use of it..."

A bugle fanfare echoed over the grounds, making the three women gaze towards the flag pole in front of the headquarters building. Noting the flag party was about to raise colours, both destroyers and the admiral snapped to attention. A glance around told Heather that all the military personnel were also standing ready to pay honours. The volunteer band standing near the flag pole then began to play the Gunkan March, the official music of both the old Imperial Navy and the modern Maritime Self-Defence Force, which told the people seeing this to salute as the Japanese naval ensign was raised up the line to the tip of the gaff. At the same time, both the "Z" flag and the white-with-two red chrysanthemum rank flag of a rear admiral was raised to their positions on the upper yardarm, causing those Japanese shipgirls nearby to literally puff with pride on seeing that famous signal now flying high over the grounds of Eta-jima.

"'The fate of the Empire rests on the outcome of this battle'," Fubuki whispered the flag's message with reverence. "'Let each man do his utmost'."

Once those banners were in place, the band then swung into Heart of Oak, the march past shared between the navies of the Commonwealth. As that was played, the British, Canadian, Australian and New Zealand ensigns went up to fly from the lower yardarm. Noting that, Heather smiled; no doubt, the band director felt it was just foolish to play that same song four times over for each of the Commonwealth navies represented here. After that was done, next came Anchors Aweigh as the American naval jack went up to fly beside the British flag; at the same time, James Vance's dark blue rank flag with its two white stars went up to join Saitō Ten'ichi's rank flag on the upper yardarm. Then came Gruß an Kiel, the march of the German Navy. Heather was quick to hear the voices of several flottenmädchen sing out the lyrics as the German naval ensign joined the banners of the other services. After that came the Italian Navy's march, La Ritirata, which played out as the naval ensign of that nation joined its counterparts while Libeccio sang the lyrics with gusto. Finally came the Air Force March Past as the blue ensign of Jessica Dover's home service joined the others; with that, a medium-blue rank flag with four pearl grey maple leaves in a diamond formation went up to the upper yardarm to fly next to the "Z" flag.

"Sugoi!" Fubuki hissed out. "Hishō's flag is so beautiful!"

"Nice and simple," Libeccio whispered in agreement...then she blinked. "Eh?!"

"What?!"

"Where is the ammiraglio's flag?!"

The Japanese destroyer croaked. If the flag party didn't raise Heather's pennant up the staff, it would be seen as a scandalous insult...!

The band struck up a beautiful rolling tune as a dark blue flag with four gold maple leaves in a diamond formation was then raised to the top of the pole. Hearing that tune, Heather chuckled in amusement, making the two destroyers look at her. Before either could ask a question, the trumpeter blared out the musical command to carry on, which made the people saluting the colours relax before they proceeded to their duties. As she breathed out, Heather's ears picked up excited whispers from various kanmusu as they talked about the sight of the "Z" flag flying from their base's signal yardarm. Before she could say anything, Fubuki looked up. "Ano, Teitoku...was that the wrong song?"

The admiral smirked. "No. That was The Maple Leaf Forever, Canada's first true patriotic song." She perked as the Australian warrant officer who had been in charge of the colour party came back over to join them, saluting as he walked up. "Interesting choice of music for when you broke my flag, Warrant."

He chuckled in embarrassment. "We had no idea which one to play, Admiral. The General Salute is only for when you're reviewing the troops..."

"Change it tomorrow to Requiem for a Soldier," she ordered.

A curious look crossed his face. "Ma'am?"

"The theme music from the television series Band of Brothers, Warrant. The one based on the story of 'E' Company, Second Battalion of the Americans' 506th Parachute Infantry Regiment from World War Two," the admiral explained, then she nodded out towards the Pacific. "For those of us now on eternal patrol."

Both Fubuki and Libeccio bowed their eyes in respect to the thousands of brave sailors, military and civilian alike, who had died in the last decade. The Australian senior rate blinked as his eyes misted over — he himself could now count dozens of friends who were presently on "eternal patrol" as American submariners called it — then he nodded. "An excellent choice, Admiral."

"Tell the bandmaster also that the band better brush up on the regimental march of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police," the admiral then advised.

That made him gape. "You mean Commissioner Larsden, ma'am?!"

"That's him. Have the Force ensign flown between the Italian and the Canadian ensigns on the lower yardarm. There are no rank flags for senior officers of the Force, but you can fly the 'J' Division flag to mark him. I have a copy."

"What's 'J' Division, Teitoku?" Fubuki asked.

"The Force's formation in New Brunswick. That's Martin's home province."

The Australian senior boatswain's mate nodded. "Very good, Admiral. When will we be expecting the commissioner to arrive on the base?"

"Can't say when. His aide de camp should be here sometime today..."

"Admiral Thompkins!"

She looked over as a female American serviceman bearing the rate/rating badge of an operations specialist second class came towards her, she escorting a tall and strikingly handsome man in the blue service dress of Canada's national and federal police force, the four upwards-pointing chevrons of a staff sergeant on his lower right arm. As both Fubuki and Libeccio turned very interesting shades of pink on seeing the brown-haired, blue-eyed native of Nunavut, Heather smiled as she returned the salutes from the approaching servicemen. "Staff Sergeant Fraser. Petty Officer Halbright. You know each other?"

Sandra Halbright smiled as she gazed fondly on her companion. "I lived on East Racine Avenue before I joined the navy when the staff sergeant was assigned to the Consulate in Chicago after his dad was murdered. He helped me out of a bad spot and tutored me to get my grades up so I could join the service." She then giggled. "Lot of people on East Racine my age could say the same thing. It was a really rough part of town, but Staff Sergeant Fraser made it better."

"Out of your jurisdiction, Benton?" an amused Heather asked.

Benton Fraser seemed not bothered by the attention now being lavished on him. "Indeed I was, Admiral. However, even if I did not have any legal authority as I would have possessed were I in Canada, I did assist Specialist Halbright and dozens of her peers in evading the considerable influence of normal inner city street life, pass their General Educational Development tests and either apply to serve in the armed forces of the United States or seek out post-secondary education. It was only the right and proper thing to do in the end."

Sandra giggled again as Heather was quick to note several shipgirls were now giving Benton very frank stares. Before anyone could comment, a cat's meow caused the staff sergeant to look down and see a black-and-white patched shorthair cat now rubbing up against his left riding boot. Without hesitation, he leaned down to offer his hand for the purring feline's attention. After he sniffed the staff sergeant, his purring increased as he rubbed his head on Benton's fingers. The cat didn't resist him as the Mountie gently scooped him into his arms and lifted him to face level. "I believe this is Oskar..."

"OSKAR?! WO BIST DU GERADE?! OSKAR! WO BIST DU?! OSKAR!"

Benton turned, then barked out, "ER IST MIT MIR, FRAU SCHLACHTSCHIFFMÄDCHEN!"

A relieved cry echoed from near the battleship dorms as Bismarck raced over to where her precious cat was. Saluting Heather on seeing the admiral there, the battleship then turned...before her face flushed as red as a cherry on seeing the handsome man holding Oskar. "Um...d-danke, Herr Polizeimeister..."

"Bitte," Benton returned as he handed Oskar over, then switched to accented Japanese as he added, "I would recommend that your cat is fitted with a collar with your bugwappen so there can be no mistake in case he gets lost again."

"By end of business today, Miss Bismarck," Heather added. "And your uniform."

The battleship jerked, then nodded. "Jawohl, Frau Admiral!"

With another salute, she was off as Heather rolled her eyes...


The mess hall, an hour later...

"So who was that cute guy who was with Sandra-san?"

"He's a member of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police!"

"Eh?! What a freaking Mountie doing here?!"

Moroboshi Ataru blinked while overhearing some of the destroyers and cruisers chat with each other about the events that had surrounded the raising of the colours that morning while he walked hand-in-hand with Kirishima to the mess. They were accompanied by his sister Tariko and her sister Kongō, the other two battleships of their class trailing them. Right behind them was Harry Potter, whose arms were currently being held by Bismarck's sister and the last of the Littorio-class battleships. Both Ataru and Tariko had seen the embarrassed look on the wizard's face when they had emerged from their guest quarters; clearly, for all his fame as the "Boy Who Lived", Harry just had NO experience whatsoever with the fairer gender. Even if they both liked the guy from the start, this was too much to pass up. "You okay there, Harry?" Ataru teased.

Harry jolted, his cheeks reddening even more as Tirpitz and Imperio gazed fondly at him; the latter of the pair of battleships had immediately gone to meet up with her new friend in his guest bedroom after a night's stay at the refurbishment docks. "Give me a bloody dragon any day of the week, Ataru!"

"You fought a dragon, Harry?" Imperio asked. Like her sisters, she wore a hat that resembled the large rangefinder housings meant to be positioned atop her forward superstructure. She was dressed similarly to what Vittorio Veneto normally wore: A green high-collar parade jacket over a button shirt, the whole over a crimson skirt that went to mid-thigh; dark pantyhose covered her legs and hips. She had flaming red hair which matched the Italian flag, styled in the same bob cut Roma wore. Her eyes were a beautiful green that nearly matched the young wizard's; unlike Roma, Imperio didn't wear glasses.

"What the hell were you doing messing with a dragon, Harry?" Tariko asked as they stepped into the mess hall, then moved to get into the lineup.

"A stupid tournament I got shanghaied into thanks to a Death Eater; he's one of Voldemort's followers," Harry answered. "He actually found a way to disguise himself as our defence teacher in the year that just ended. Surprised the hell out of me he was able to get away with it with Professor Dumbledore there..."

"For all his experience, Albus is human as well, Harry," a woman's voice called out, making everyone turn as Moroboshi Negako came up to join them along with Yonaga and her sisters; of course, Yamato was now accompanied by Enterprise. "Sometimes far too trusting to the better angels of human nature when it comes to others. It amazes me even now that Deannette was able to train him in the autumn of 1944 to allow him to defeat his old paramour at Nurmengard."

"Could these Death Eaters be an issue for us, Frau Negako?" Tirpitz asked.

"There are ways to deal with them, Tirpitz. However, given the grave injury Jessica delivered to Thomas Riddle when she removed the horcrux fragment from Harry yesterday, I doubt they will be considering doing anything beyond the borders of the United Kingdom in the immediate future. Magical traditionalists in that nation are shockingly ignorant about matters beyond their borders."

"How so?" Enterprise asked.

The ninjutsu grandmaster stared in amusement at the famous carrier. "Are you aware of how magicals in your country govern themselves, Enterprise?"

Enterprise nodded as Harry found himself remembering the carrier's British namesake, a Great War vintage Emerald-class light cruiser which had been transformed into an AEGIS-equipped missile cruiser when she had been recalled to duty at HMS Raleigh two years ago; that Enterprise was currently assigned to the Channel Fleet at Portsmouth. "The Department of Magic is administered by the Secretary of Magic, who answers directly to the President in all matters that cross the security divide; these days, Secretary Quahog is currently the second senior advisor to President Obama when it comes to the Abyssals behind Secretary of Defence Carter. The Secretary of Magic is assisted legislatively by the Magical Congress of the United States, which is a single house parallel to the House of Representatives, though members serve for six year terms like normal members of the Senate do. There's a magical version of the Supreme Court; the justices are chosen by the Secretary with the advice and consent of the Magical Congress, just like the President is required to obtain the advice and consent of the Senate when he makes appointments to specific offices such as the secretaries of Cabinet. The Secretary of Magic's directly voted into office by all magical electors every six years; the secretarial elections are always set three years after the congressional elections. There are no state-level departments of magic since overall numbers are too small even these days."

"What about the President of the Magical Congress?" Harry asked.

Enterprise stared in confusion at him. "There is only one president in the United States, Mister Potter. His name is Barack Hussein Obama the Second. He was elected to the office in the autumn of 2008, took the oath of office the following January and he'll be stepping down in January coming up because a president who hasn't been forced up from vice-president can only serve two consecutive four-year terms in the White House. There's no magical president whatsoever. The Magical Constitution spells it out that the Secretary of Magic be administratively subordinate to the President as part of his overall Cabinet even if the Secretary is directly voted into office by American magicals."

"Obama-daitōryō," Yonaga finished. "Harry-san, what have you read about this?"

Harry hummed. "Well, it was my friend Hermione who explained this to me, Yonaga-san. American magicals are administered by the Magical Congress of the United States. It was first formed after the Salem Witch Trials in 1693...!"

"Whoa! Stop all engines!" Enterprise barked out, making him gape in shock at her. "How in the name of God did people come to believe THAT?! The United States wasn't even a NATION until 1776! There's no way in HELL that someone could have thought up the idea of the United States back in the 1690s! Whoever wrote that stupid sea story was clearly running on bad bunker fuel!"

"I believe the point has been made here," Negako added. "No doubt, Harry, the mistake about the 'president' of the Magical Congress in the books your friend read was because the position of Deputy Secretary of Magic — that person is the Secretary's main administrative assistant in the Department of Magic — was also accorded an operational supervisory post within the Magical Congress as the 'president pro tempore' of the body, akin to the Speaker in the British House of Commons. She or he is nominated by the Secretary from the list of active congressmen, then voted into such a position by the Magical Congress."

Harry considered that, then he shook his head. "Hermione is going to freak!"

"Why do you say that, Harry?" Imperio asked.

"Well, she warned me about being careful concerning using magic here. Anyone who goes to Mahōtokoro who breaks the Statute of Secrecy are automatically expelled even for potentially permissible reasons such as self-defence."

That made Negako's eyebrow rise as the Japanese shipgirls listening to this all exchanged curious looks. "Where exactly is Mahōtokoro, Harry?"

"On an island near Iwo-jima..."

"Iō-tō, Harry-san," Yonaga instantly corrected. "The word 'Iwo-jima' is a Western mistranslation." As Harry quickly muttered an apology for making such a mistake, the carrier looked over. "Was there ever such a school, Negako-san?"

"Hai, Yonaga. Mahōtokoro was located on Minami-iōtō in the Kazan-rettō," the ninjutsu grandmaster answered. "It was established by Japanese magical isolationists who loathed the ever-growing influx of Chinese and Korean magical teachings that were being introduced to local practitioners within the Home Islands during the latter years of the Heian period. It was selected because it was many kilometres from Japan and uninhabited, out of the potential reach of anyone who might seek to eliminate such teachings by destroying the school. However, Mahōtokoro fell out of favour when Tomohito Tennō allowed the founding of a Western-theme school at Nagasaki, Dejima, in 1550; it was through there that the Hogwarts-style of wand magic was first brought into the country."

"I've never heard of Dejima," Harry confessed.

"Not surprising," Negako stated. "When Dejima was established, Tomohito Tennō also decreed that district magical schools be maintained to ensure traditional forms of magic would be retained. They eventually evolved over the years into the current system of regional Imperial Magical Commanderies. With that, Mahōtokoro was seen ultimately as unnecessary in the grander scheme. Yomigawa Tsukiko ordered its closure after she was elevated to the position of Mahō-Shōgun in 1930; she was then in a position which is the equal of your Minister for Magic. Whatever your friend read about how magicals are administered in Japan is wrong, Harry. No doubt, given that graduates of Dejima — who 'should' have supported the European colonial powers during the Second World War because they shared the same educational syllabus — all gladly supported Tsukiko in her campaigns across Asia and Africa to free local magicals from European control, those who wrote those texts believed it best to make their readers think Mahōtokoro still existed and such radical enforcement of the Statute of Secrecy is a factor of life with magicals in Japan, thus deter anyone from travelling to Japan and learning the truth. Because of that, those who attend Dejima are forced to say they are students of Mahōtokoro when they travel to Britain because of threats of censorship by the Ministry of Magic." She gave him a knowing look. "If Albus did not tell you that Heather was here to see to your needs and help you recover from Cedric's murder, would you have come?"

He shook his head. "Not really..."

She nodded. "My point is made. You will obtain the chance to see how magicals are properly administered in this country later this day when Negi Springfield comes with Konoe Konoemon to brief Heather on local magical affairs. You will be at that meeting so that you can bear witness to what has happened in your part of magical Britain since you began attending Hogwarts."

With that, she headed off to look in on some of the destroyers. Harry watched her go, then shook his head. "Who is Negi Springfield?" he asked.

Save for the newcomers, all the shipgirls were gaping in disbelief at him. Noting this, Tariko shook her head before she gazed on Ataru. «Talk about being made to be a country bumpkin or what?!» she telepathically thought out.

«Yeah! Poor guy...!» he thought back.

"Ataru-san?"

He perked, then gazed over at Yonaga. "What's wrong?"

"Who is Tomohito Tennō?" the carrier asked.

He blinked several times, then he chuckled. "Oh, sorry about that! Onē-san doesn't care at all about posthumous names. He's the Go-Nara Tennō."

That made Yonaga gape. "Why does Negako-san hate posthumous names?"

"In her eyes, in the face of whatever awaits us in the next life, the whole concept of titles just falls through the cracks," Tariko explained as the line moved up and people in their group moved to pick up trays. "Atop that, Onē-san's sort of a 'just the facts' type of person, Yonaga-san. She wants the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth. She's so freaking blunt about things at times, she'd be insulting people left, right and centre if they all weren't so scared of her 'Imperial Special Agent #49' persona. Things like nicknames just totally flies over Onē-san's head; she doesn't see the use in that sort of stuff. It takes a HELL of a lot to make Onē-san actually let her hair down around people. Heck, if she didn't know that Harry's first name is actually 'Harry' and not 'Henry' or 'Harold', she'd be calling him that instead. Look what she does when it comes to Raeburn-taishō? Everyone who's friends with her calls her 'Dean'. Not Onē-san! It's always 'Deannette'."

"She prefers proper formality, but not grandstanding," Tirpitz mused.

"Yeah! Which is weird since the only people she'd ever address by title is the Heavenly Sovereign and his equals such as the Queen of the Commonwealth or the King of Thailand. She must have got it from Master Hosan, I think."

"That wouldn't be so bad," Ataru noted.

The shipgirls all nodded. "It is sad, though," Kongō mused.

"Why do you say that, Onē-sama?" Hiei asked.

"How can Negako feel burning love if she doesn't open her heart?!"

Her sisters all hummed...

...then everyone perked as some destroyers screamed out in surprise, making heads snap over as a beautiful white owl soared into the mess, causing people to yelp as they ducked away from the large bird. Before someone could do something, the beautiful avian angled herself around a stanchion, then came to a hover. "What the hell's a snowy owl doing here?!" Chilliwack asked from a nearby table as some of the cruisers moved to try to corral the newcomer.

A shrill whistle caused the owl to hoot, then she came down to land right on Harry Potter's outstretched arm. Seeing that, many of the younger shipgirls gaped in awe at the sight. "Ano, Harry-sensei...?" Akatsuki began.

Harry chuckled. "Excuse me for a moment," he apologized to his battleship companions, then after handing his tray to Tirpitz, walked out of the line to allow the destroyers a closer look. "This is my owl, Hedwig."

Mass gasps escaped the growing crowd of shipgirls who had come up to gaze on the pretty bird. "Harry-sensei, you own an OWL, nanodesu?!" Inazuma gasped.

"Hai!" He then gazed on Hedwig. "Did you fly all the way here from Britain?!"

Hedwig hooted at him, looking quite satisfied. "Oh, I get it!" the wizard then noted before he gaped. "You bribed Fawkes to flame you over to Japan?!"

Another hoot from the owl, as if she indignantly said, "What?! Do you honestly think I can fly ten thousand kilometres in just a day?!"

"Well, that was smart! You weren't being tracked, were you?"

A more indignant hoot, as if Hedwig said, "I'm not that sloppy, Potter!"

"He talks to his owl?"

Harry looked over to see a wide-eyed Akagi gazing his way. "Of course I talk to her, Akagi-san! She's probably the only true friend I've ever had!"

Another smug hoot escaped the owl in question. Back in the serving line, Tariko moaned. "British wizards are just plain weird!" she muttered under her breath. "Oi, Kon-chan, is there something odd in the water they drink?!"

"Makes you wonder," the fast battleship mused, shrugging...

To Be Continued...!


WRITER'S NOTES

1) The Pinnacle Islands is the Western name for the small islets near Táiwān known as the Senkaku-shotō in Japanese, the Diàoyúdǎo on mainland China and the Diàoyútái Liè Yǔ on Táiwān. The islets are under dispute due to potential oil reserves being discovered in the area in 1968; when the Ryūkyū Islands were transferred back to Japan from American control (as asserted after World War Two) in 1972, the governments in Běijīng and Táiběi both loudly rejected Tōkyō's claim to the islets. The islets are uninhabited.

2) When the United Nations were looking for a place to establish their world headquarters in the 1940s, the twin cities of Niagara Falls in Ontario and New York state were considered a possibility thanks to Navy Island, which is located upriver from the Falls themselves in the Chippawa Channel, the branch of the Niagara River that flows west of Grand Island and forms part of the international boundary; the channel to the east of Grand Island is the Tonawanda Channel. Plans for the United Nations' headquarters site on Navy Island would have seen bridges built across the river to both the mainland of Ontario and to Grand Island; just Goggle "United Nations Navy Island" to see what I mean. Of course, given that New York City is on the Atlantic coast of the United States, moving the headquarters of the United Nations to a secure location inland and away from the Abyssals would simply just be prudent.

3) Ye old translation list: Po pai — Good night; Krasnoznamënnyj Sévernyj Flot — Literally "Red Banner Northern Fleet", the traditional name of the Russian Navy's formation based around Múrmansk on the Arctic Ocean coast; Suthrige — The Anglo-Saxon name for a kingdom that sat on the land occupied today by the English county of Surrey; Kyokujitsu-ki — The "rising sun flag" that serves as the Japanese naval war ensign; Dienstflagge der Seestreitkräfte — Service Flag of the Naval Forces; Bandiera Navale Militare — Ensign of the (Italian) Navy; Buongiorno — Good morning; Sorelle maggiori — Elder sisters; Gruß an Kiel — Greetings to Kiel; Flottenmädchen — Fleet Maidens; La Ritirata — The Retreat; Wo bist du gerade? — Where are you now?; Er ist mit mir — He is with me; Schlachtschiffmädchen — Literally "battleship maiden", this is the term I came up with to address shipgirls like Bismarck in German; Polizeimeister — Literally "master of police", this is the rough German police rank equivalent of an RCMP staff sergeant; Bitte — You're welcome; Bugwappen — Ship's crest; President pro tempore — President for a time; Minami-iōtō — South Sulphur Island; Heian — Literally "peace", this is the name of the period of Japanese history from 794-1185, considered the high water mark of Chinese and Korean cultural influence on Japan; Mahō-Shōgun — Supreme General of Magic.

4) I came up with the term "Imperius Defence" when I was writing Harry Potter and the Icemaidens to describe the moves by people such as Lucius Malfoy to avoid a stay at Azkaban in the wake of Voldemort's downfall. Other writers have done the same, so I can't say who was the one who first coined the term; I have seen it used in other fanfic stories. In the universe of this story, the term is used in a derisive manner by those who doubted such a story.

5) Svetlána Il'ínična Múromeca made her first appearance in Part 12 of Wizards and Avalonians III: The Black Maidens and the Rail-Splitter. Her rank of chief marshal of magical troops (in Russian, Glávnyj Máršal Mágičeskie Vojsk Rossíjskoj Federácii) would be the equal of a generál ármii ("general of the army"), which is the equal of a four-star general in the West (NATO rank code OF-9). Also, names of relatives of Harry Potter's classmates mentioned here are my invention if they haven't shown up in the books. Atop that, the Dejima School of Wizardry and Witchcraft (in Japanese, Dejima Mahōmajutsu-gakkō) is my creation; it was mentioned in The Icemaidens and the Philosopher's Stone.

6) The term CODLAG is short for "Combined Diesel-Electric and Gas". This is a form of ship propulsion that combines gas turbine engines (for high speeds) and electric motors powered by diesel engines (for lower speeds). The electric motors are directly connected to the propeller shafts. The gas turbine would be connected to the shafts via cross-connecting gearboxes; when the ship needs to go to cruising speed, clutches can be used to disconnect the turbine. The advantage of this system is that servicing costs are reduced, more power can be generated for shipboard use and maintenance costs and time are dropped due to the lesser number of drive units in this system. Given that Hood was built with four propeller shafts, she would have two CODLAG drive systems.

7) Nerio is my name for the Mundus Magicus ("Magical World") as depicted in Negima. In the universe of my stories, Nerio is NOT the planet Mars under magical disguise but a separate planet in a tilted orbit; the two planets were once one but separated by a massive asteroid strike millions of years ago that allowed all life-bearing elements that was on Mars to transfer over to Nerio. As an aside, the incident concerning Saotome Haruna moving to make an ultra-passionate magical replica of Miyazaki Nodoka was depicted in Mahō Sensei Negima manga chapter #175, "A Single Frame of a Youthful Summer".

8) Unlike many nations, the United States always insisted on its national flag, the Star-Spangled Banner, to serve as its naval ensign. The First Navy Jack is a thirteen-stripe flag similar to the national flag in styling without the blue canton, it embossed with a golden snake and the words DON'T TREAD ON ME on the lowermost white stripe. As many Americans know, the snake with the term "Don't Tread On Me" was a popular symbol from Revolutionary War of 1775-83. Until 1980, the jack (the flag flown at the staff at the bow of a warship) was always the canton of the national flag with the proper number of stars on it. In 1980, the Secretary of the Navy decreed the oldest active commissioned warship would fly the First Navy Jack (excluding the sail frigate USS Constitution). After the 9/11 attacks in 2001, all American naval warships began flying the First Navy Jack as a visible symbol of the country being engaged in the War on Terror...and in the universe of this story, the Abyssal War.

9) The "Z" Flag is one of the international maritime lettered signal flags. Under normal circumstances, it symbolizes a ship asking for the assistance of a tug (when flying alone) or warning that the ship is deploying fishing nets (if close to known fishing grounds). When used with number flags, the "Z" flag indicates Zulu Time, the military term for what was once known as Greenwich Mean Time (GMT). In Japan, the "Z" flag was used by the commander of the Combined Fleet, Fleet Admiral Tōgō Heihachirō (1848-1934) to send out a message of encouragement to his forces about to engage in the Battle of Tsu-shima on 27 May 1905 against the Russians; as had been arranged to all his crews ahead of time, the "Z" flag flying alone off the yardarm of battleship Mikasa represented the message "The fate of the Empire rests on the outcome of this battle. Let each man do his utmost." Since that time, the "Z" flag has been used in Japan as a symbol to encourage victory or success in all endeavours.

10) As indicated above, Requiem for a Soldier is the name of the theme music for the 2001 HBO television miniseries Band of Brothers, based on the 1993 historical work concerning Company "E", 2nd Battalion, 506th Parachute Infantry Regiment (COY E, 2/506 PIR) of the United States Army in World War Two as written by Stephen Ambrose (1936-2002). The song was placed to words and first published by Welsh mezzo-soprano singer/songwriter Katherine Jenkins (born 1980); the song was published in the 2007 album Rejoice.

11) For those Due South fans who might wish to know, East Racine Avenue in Chicago doesn't exist. There are both a North Racine Avenue and South Racine Avenue in the Windy City; both of them, however, are quite a distance from where the Consulate General of Canada is located at 180 North Stetson Avenue north of Millennium Park downtown. No doubt, the producers of Due South didn't want to imply too much in the way of real locations when they made the series.

12) Go-Nara Tennō (1495-1557), given the birth name Tomohito, was the 105th Heavenly Sovereign of Japan; he ruled from 1526 to his death. The "go" part of his name indicates he was the second ruler of Japan to use the name "Nara"; in older Western literature, he is often referred to as "Nara II". However, there is NOT a "Nara Tennō" listed among the of rulers in Japan that I can find!