The 1st Fleet was at the canteen, Shigure chatting with a few of the naval base's ship girls, a little overwhelmed from the attention that she was receiving for no reason whatsoever as she ate her breakfast which consisted of a boiled egg to be eaten with her rice, some sushi and green beans to go along with their miso soup.
Naka and Jintsuu introduced themselves to Shigure, being the two sister ships to Sendai who was currently out on a sortie with the Infiltration Fleet, the last time anyone checked.
Naka was wearing the same orange, white and black dress that was standard of the Sendai-Class light cruisers, along with the two black shoulder gloves also worn by the three sisters.
She had two ahoge sticking out of her crown, and with two buns at the rear sides of her head with hair strands hanging down her head. She was cheery and seemed never to lose her smile, and the air seemed to brighten up around her as she introduced herself as the Base's idol,
"Naka-chan Dayo!"
Shigure was told that she was the Base Idol, and that meant a big concert was held every two months for the whole base to attend free of charge, and was an integral member of keeping the Fleet morale up through her upbeat and inspirational, yet meaningful songs.
She was also in line for a Kai Ni upgrade, having had an excellent service record in the past along with Mutsuki, who was also Kai and was preparing for a Kai Ni.
Although she introduced herself in an upbeat voice while softly shaking Shigure's hand, the destroyer concluded from their momentary exchange that while Naka held herself with confidence, it never went so overboard as to seem prideful, or even arrogant.
From the way she cheered the members of the 1st Fleet on and seemed genuinely interested in Shigure's experience so far in the base, she didn't seem to keep up any facade of sorts or hiding any deep-seated psychological issues.
She was just extremely enthusiastic about helping others out in any way possible, not just because she was an idol, but because she was genuinely a compassionate ship girl, who truly cared for her comrades.
Jintsuu was the opposite of her sisters, although no less compassionate and kind despite being quiet, concerned and supportive towards her sisters as she completed the Sendai-Class light cruiser trio.
The difference between her and her two sisters was that although she was also established to be a serious contender for Kai Ni, she was humble enough to admit that she was quite under-leveled and wasn't quite ready to receive it compared to her sister and thus supported her idol sister in her endeavor to attain Kai Ni.
Along with her orange-black dress and with her black long gloves, she had brown hair like her sisters that reached down to her waist, and the hair on her forehead was swooped down on both sides of her temple and twirled up at the ends, along with a green bow that held her hair up from the back of her head.
Ayanami was quick to let Shigure know that despite Jintsuu's polite demeanor, she was a closet drill sergeant, being more effective than Tone despite also being tougher as an instructor.
Her 'drill sergeant from hell' persona was so feared that she was approached by few ship girls for training, despite the effectiveness of her training.
One of the ship girls who was previously under her tutelage, Maya, was instantly silenced upon being asked about Jintsuu, and only had a thousand-yard stare in response to her question, along with breaking out in a cold sweat and quiet mumbling like she had a PTSD-flashback.
It would have almost been funny, if Jintsuu wasn't standing right behind them, smiling innocently.
Some of the other ship girls under her guidance had gone on to achieve greatness, like Hatsuharu, Kawakaze, and Kiso, who had all gone on to achieve Kai Ni at the expense of refusing to talk about their time with the kindhearted light cruiser's training methods, which weren't abusive, simply grueling.
Shigure also kept a mental note about another one of her sisters being on the base, wanting to meet her sooner or later if possible.
However, Shigure noticed Furutaka moping at the side, entertaining whomever tried to make conversation with her, but when she left the table to retrieve a tray to put together another plate of freshly cooked food, no one stopped her or interrupted her small routine, seemingly used to it by now.
She was sitting with a ship girl who possessed grey-pink hair that was tied up in a side ponytail, and she had green eyes looking downwards at her breakfast.
Kinugasa donned a white uniform with a blue dress and sailor collar while a yellow necktie was reaching down her chest, a belt to hold up said dress while two thin black stripes ran down her unblemished white uniform top, finishing the uniform with brown thigh-highs and a pair of slippers in lieu of shoes.
Along with Furutaka, they both gathered to talk about something as they queued for food while everyone gave them a wide berth to respect their privacy.
When Shigure asked Ayanami about what was up with Furutaka and Kinugasa, Ayanami's face drooped in response to the question, Shigure already mentally preparing herself for the response that was to come with a depressed expression.
"She's taking the dinner tray to Aoba, who's holed up in her copper-shielded room."
Shigure's eyebrow was raised at that last remark, as Ayanami explained.
"Aoba's got a…condition, where she can detect a lot of radio waves in the area around her.
And in order for the information overload to not drive her insane, she needs to stay in her copper shielded room to block out the radio waves.
It's rather sad, really, when you consider what she was like before."
Shigure couldn't help but wince at that.
She didn't know how Aoba, the heavy cruiser that had survived several close encounters with the Grim Reaper in World War 2, had to be grounded and was even living like a recluse.
Ayanami noted Shigure's discomfort, and consoled her with her standard 'name ship elder sister' voice.
"W-Well, if you wish to find out, you should ask Furutaka, or Kinugasa and even Aoba herself to find out what really happened.
I can at least say that no one fully understands the situation more clearly than those three.
You can ask them, and I believe they'll try their best to fill you in with unbiased information to the best of their ability."
Shigure thought about it for a second, before noticing the Furutaka and Aoba-Class heavy cruiser duo approaching her, waving meekly to her in advance so as not to scare her off. Furutaka opened up the conversation, asking if Shigure would mind following them to Aoba's room.
When Shigure inquired as to why Aoba would want to meet her, the heavy cruiser duo looked away shiftily, unable to come up with a reason as to why their sister would want to meet the Shiratsuyu-Class destroyer. Kinugasa finally took her chance to introduce herself, and to explain their predicament.
"Um, I'm Kinugasa, and I'm Aoba's sister ship.
The thing is that, our sister's changed a lot ever since something happened to her, so we can't really understand anything she does anymore.
But she wants to meet you, and we'd like you to fulfill that wish of hers and be someone whom she can talk to."
Furutaka looked down at the dinner tray, and her face couldn't get any more depressed as she had Aoba's best interest in mind, and clearly Aoba wasn't in the best of conditions if she could inadvertently make her sisters this depressed just by worrying about her.
Shigure sighed, resigning to her fate and picking up her tray to put it in the sink as she exited the canteen with the heavy cruiser duo, her curiosity now piqued and interested in what the Aoba-Class heavy cruiser was like.
Shigure looked up to the label on the door, titled '青葉' as Kinugasa was knocking on the door, Furutaka behind her with the dinner tray, dinner still piping hot.
All three of the ship girls were waiting in trepidation, two of them waiting for any indication of rejection that Aoba might shoot them down with.
Shigure had gotten some backstory on the name ship of the Aoba-Class heavy cruiser, and what she had done to get herself in this situation.
It was a long time ago, it was a few weeks after Yuubari had sunk when Aoba was tasked with going through and sorting out her unfinished plans and files, and was sifting through her drawn blueprints to see if anything was of worth, or could be put to good use.
From what Furutaka and Kinugasa could coax out of Aoba, apparently, she found the plans, and even rudimentary blueprints for some sort of machine that could install a mental module in their minds allow a ship girl to detect radio waves around them.
This could potentially make for a division of ship girls with powerful mental capabilities that could lay the foundations for a far more efficient and powerful communication system.
She'd stolen the blueprints, and being a competent engineer due to having spent some time interviewing engineers and intently studying up on the topic to better understand the subject, modified the design to fulfill her own goals, which Aoba had never revealed to them.
Whatever her intentions were, it landed her in the Ship Girl Institute of Mental Health, in a padded cell wearing a straitjacket.
When Shigure blanched at the mention of a straitjacket, Kinugasa tried to explain that ship girls were treated with the utmost of respect and care when it came to rehabilitation, with their well-being in mind.
But anything stronger than a light cruiser was strong enough to cause significant harm to ship girls or orderlies.
So, in order to pacify ship girls suffering from mania due to overwhelming stress, traumatic events or were being affected by something that would impair their judgement, isolated and put under intense medical observation.
And to prevent them from harming anyone or themselves, they sadly had to resort to medical rubber straps for destroyers and light cruisers to strap them to medical gurneys and beds.
Straitjackets were used to restrain ship girls who were heavy cruisers and above to stop them from hurting anyone, including themselves, before medical staff could step in to find out what was wrong with the ship girl in question and establish whether it was safe to remove the restraints to start treatment.
The restraints were created to be as comfortable as possible without compromising their ability to effectively immobilize the ship girl, Shigure having heard everything from Akashi, but was almost unable to believe that anyone could be so damaged to require such extreme measures to restrain in such a day and age.
It wasn't the best of solutions, but it was the most practical one, although Kinugasa was also quick to point out that Admirals could be reported for overuse, or misuse of the restraints as a means of punishment.
Kinugasa had an example in mind, asking how they were going to stop Hiei if she ever lost control and went berserk, and was a freaking battleship.
Shigure shuddered at the mere thought of even trying to stop her powerful teammate without being reduced to a smear on the wall, and solemnly conceded the point.
Aoba had spent an entire week screaming herself hoarse and crying herself dry, begging everyone to 'get the fucking voices to stop'.
She attempted to bash her head against the wall of the padded cell, only to be stopped by the medical staff on the 24/7 watch, and failed to get any sleep, which further exacerbated her situation with paranoia, fatigue and hallucinations.
After several mental evaluations and neural scans, they discovered that she was receiving the radio waves from not just from the television channels that were being sent to the televisions in the hospital, but also from every computer, phone, radio and WiFi in the city that filled the sky with radio waves and entered her mind, and she couldn't control her ability to filter out the signals.
So they constructed a padded cell with copper walls that served as a shield of sorts to block out electromagnetic waves, after which Aoba finally got a good sleep as the radio waves that plagued her mind were blocked out.
After a few months of rehabilitation, Akashi brought back a twitchy Aoba from the hospital, along with prescribed medication specifically made to help desensitize her radio-receiving capabilities and a copper helmet to shield her mind, effectively making her barely qualified to sortie without them.
Being labelled as a special case and Akashi being quite close to her as a caregiver and a friend, her single room was renovated and every panel of the wall was lined with copper to shield her from radio waves in the environment.
She had slowly requested Kinugasa for a landline, and had slowly moved on from pen and paper to a typewriter, and finally had established a relationship with her sisters, where she'd request them to do something or get her something, although they had never been invited into Aoba's room.
Furutaka and Kinugasa had been relocated to another room, right opposite Aoba's room. This relationship had been going on for six months, and they had been increasingly worried about their sister's mental well-being and her change of character.
But they respected Aoba's privacy, and decided to comply with her sister's wishes and simply provide her with her three meals, which Aoba thankfully ate regularly, took our her trash and did her laundry.
The response behind the door came after a while, a quiet voice that had likely once sounded sweet, fast and energetic but had slowed down considerably, and had transformed into a bitter and lethargic tone due to unfathomable events happening to her, contrasting with her default high-pitched voice that moaned out.
"Whhhaaaattt…"
Furutaka responded with a false, cheery voice that announced that she had brought Aoba's dinner, to which the ship girl on the other side of the door mumbled,
"Leave it at the door. Thanks."
Furutaka looked down, instantly dropping her smile like a dead weight, slouching down and kneeling to put the tray on the floor, turning away to shamble away with Kinugasa behind her before she turned back to address Shigure.
"Ahh, Shigure-san, just wait outside the door.
Aoba will be with you shortly."
Shigure was left standing outside Aoba's door, and was slowly inching away in dread, already afraid of the possible jump scare that would pop out of the door at any moment.
She wasn't exactly sure how a quasi-schizophrenic ship girl would react to her presence, having forcibly altered her perception of the world and wasn't the most mentally sound ship girl on the base.
Not that she was one to talk, remembering the fact that Akashi had highlighted her for counselling.
Eventually, she was greeted by a quiet voice from the opposite end of the door, requesting politely.
"Um…Shigure-chan, are you still there?
If you are, can you please bring in my dinner?
I won't bite, and I'll open the door slowly."
Shigure could only stand there, wondering what was the next best course of action.
On the one hand, she could just walk away and wash her hands of this matter.
But, despite the sour and pessimistic tone plaguing the voice that came from the other side of the door, she could clearly detect loneliness and maybe even a hint of desperation in her voice.
She finally sighed, kneeling down to pick up the dinner tray that had a miso soup bowl, with small pieces of seaweed and tofu sprinkled in it.
There was a bowl of rice along with 6 pieces of sushi on a plate with various ingredients wrapped in them, and Shigure could see several of them with tuna, cucumber, and eggs amongst other ingredients.
A small piece of steamed salmon was served on a plate with a small dish of soy sauce beside it to dip the salmon in. A pair of chopsticks and a spoon was also provided by Furutaka.
Shigure announced in a resigned voice,
"I'm here.
Please open the door, Aoba-san."
As small clicks and scratches sounded down the door, Shigure tilting her head in surprise at the number of locks the heavy cruiser had in place as redundancies to protect herself against the world.
The door noiselessly swung open, swinging into the room and barely revealing anything amidst the darkness plaguing the interior of the room.
The hinges were clearly oiled, thought Shigure, but why would anyone to do that for a ship girl that could barely socialize, and likely couldn't go outside for extended periods of time due to her condition.
A ship girl who was around the age of a young adult peeked out, her grayish-pink hair tied up in a ponytail, although that did nothing to hide the fact that her hair strands were split and her hair was as messy as a mop.
Her blue eyes were dulled and tired like Akashi, and her crumpled blue and white sailor school uniform seemed to be hurriedly straightened out to at least make herself presentable to meet Shigure.
Her thigh-highs were torn, but despite them being riddled with holes, they were still worn and rode up her legs while exposing patches of skin.
The rims of her eyes also had the signs of insomnia and stress, bloodshot eyes with red rims along with slight eye bags plaguing her lower eyelids.
She was looking down the corridor with a shifty look, as if looking out for anyone who was spying on her, and after looking relieved at the lack of people in the corridor, she quickly pulled Shigure into her room by the forearm, and it was by some miracle that Shigure didn't accidentally spill or drop the dinner tray she held in her hand as she was pulled in.
Aoba slammed the door closed and locked the door in a quick routine, pushing in the sliding lock, twisting the door lock closed, and slid in the chain locks to ensure that the door was secure.
As Shigure stood in the center of the room in a daze, her eyes adjusted to take in more light in the dim environment, and while she wasn't exactly scared of the heavy cruiser, she was now getting more and more worried about the heavy cruiser's mental health.
The room was filled with a yellowish tint due to the incandescent LED light on the ceiling. The room wasn't very large, being about the size of a standard prison cell or a small hotel room, about 2 meters by 3 meters in terms of area (or about 6.5 by 10 feet).
She was standing in a corridor with a closed door to the right that led to a bathroom. The end of the short corridor led to the room itself, and the fold-down bed that lay at the right of the room was unmade as the blanket, pillow and bolster were all lying in a heap on the bed next to the wall.
On the table to the left of the room and right in front of Shigure, there was a typewriter, relatively ancient in terms of technology but supposedly the best equipment for a girl like Aoba to write effectively, a slower method being the pen and paper.
The table was surrounded by research papers and a half finished cup of coffee that was still steaming, and had a laptop to the extreme end of the corner of the table, barely covered by a copper-shielded serving tray cover with a ground line connected to one of the jacks.
Her discarded uniforms laid were strewn all around the room with crumpled waste paper littering the floor due to the fact that her wastepaper basket hadn't been thrown out recently.
There were several vents in the roof of the ceiling for ventilation, along with drawn window curtains at the extreme end of the room and an air conditioner that was currently turned on for ventilation.
Shigure wouldn't have minded the room so much if it weren't the wall of crazy plans on one wall, and the scribbling on the other wall next to the desk.
Above Aoba's fold-down bed was a map of the world, along with stapled-on enlarged maps of Japan on the left and America on the right.
Red threads crisscrossed the maps and pictures hung down from the threads. Some of them were ship girls that were crossed out, and Shigure could see her face on one of them.
Others were photos of scenes that were likely taken by a camera, beautiful locations that looked too picturesque to simply be ripped off the internet, remembering the fact that Aoba was once a reporter and had likely been to a few places to capture these breathtaking images.
Newspaper clippings and scribbled down notes hung from the strings, and erasable marker writings were all over the map, arrows pointing to several specific locations with a note jotted down.
Small pieces of paper were tied to the edges of the map, with numbers and coordinates, along with timings written down in rows.
Everything was held together by what was likely color-coded thumbtacks, and formed a complex spider-web that spanned the entire wall in her room and connected the proverbial dots in Aoba's mind.
The amount of inane scribblings above the typewriter wasn't exactly a better indication of Aoba's mental health as they were rambling scribbles, Shigure finally deciphering some of them after staring at them for a while, some of them being.
'ThEy're LisTEniNg IN.'
'HElpme'
'tRUstNo oNe'
'WhYwhYWWHyWhY'
'BReAkFasTTT'
'OhGOdshUT ThE FUCK uP'
'91838skn1wu567u12843n4….'
Needless to say, Shigure was more than a little creeped out by the heavy cruiser's room, but she swallowed despite the uncomfortable lump building up in her throat and set the tray down on the table as she looked to Aoba for permission to sit on the solitary foldable chair, to which Aoba nodded.
Shigure sat down and made herself comfortable on the chair in between the table and the bed.
Aoba took up the tray and plopped down on the bed as she set the tray down on her lap, using the utensils to start eating the food on the tray that Furutaka brought to her.
Shigure looked over the papers on the table, noting several lines regarding the happenings of the fleet, including a comprehensive description of the last few sorties, along with a list of Shigure's fleet members and all sorts of numbers concerning her fleet.
Others were about findings and events of other Bases, like how Harusame from another base had sunk because of several events prior, and had encountered an opponent stronger than they had predicted due to the Abyssals utilizing the element of surprise to take her down before she could even respond.
Shigure had to force herself to look to look away, telling herself that events that occurred outside the confines of her base was beyond her area of influence, and that this was war, where everyone, even her sisters ships, sank all the time.
That didn't mean that didn't want to cry her heart out over it.
The final paper she looked at was a paper with mathematical equations trying to work out some sort of answer to a question that was never written down, Shigure guessing that the numbers came from the readings on the map, or probably from some numbers Aoba had literally pulled out from the sky with her condition.
Aoba piped up, asking,
"You're Shigure, a ship girl from the Shiratsuyu-Class of destroyers, right?
I'm Aoba, name ship of the Aoba-Class heavy cruisers.
How do you do?"
Followed with a slight bow in her seated position.
Shigure shot up from the chair to attempt to bow to her senior, but Aoba raised her chopsticks to motion for her to sit, her wan expression gently smiling up at her.
"No need to be so formal.
I've never talked much to anyone besides my sisters ever since I came back, so I'm not one for formalities in conversations.
You must have some questions about my condition, right?
You're new here, so it'd have taken you a while to hear about me."
Shigure wondered how to proceed with the conversation, still hesitant with outright asking her some questions for fear of accidentally committing a faux pas with an insensitive question.
She didn't want to say this, but after hearing how Aoba behaved during her first few days in the mental institute, she would be lying if she said she would trust Aoba 100% with her life on the line.
Not that she had anything against her, mind you, just self-preservation instincts holding her back from truly opening up to the heavy cruiser, who was now eating her meal heartily.
Aoba seemed to understand her dilemma and pointed to the laptop at the edge of the table and near the walls, and motioned for Shigure to open the laptop.
Upon removing the tray cover, Shigure flipped the laptop open, and the monitor lit up her face,passively asking her for a password. Shigure looked back to the heavy cruiser, who was now dipping a sushi into the soy sauce.
She looked up from her food, and upon seeing Shigure's puzzled expression, Aoba replied.
"A03A right now. Don't worry, I randomize it quite often, so that no one can ever access its contents."
Turning back to the laptop and entering the password, Shigure was greeted by the wallpaper of a mountainside. The shot was excellent, the sun peeking over the mountain and casting a shadow over the whole area.
However, the picture took advantage of that, and being taken from a low point, the orange hue of the mountain outline contrasted with the shadow of the mountain that faced the photographer.
The mountain was surrounded by clouds in the sky, seeming to be lit up by the setting, or rising sun from within and causing an incandescent glow, almost forming a halo over the meditative mountain.
Coupled with the minute details of a few rays of light piercing through the clouds, and the small forest that covered the mountain and the small town that lined the edges of the picture, it made for a brilliant wallpaper.
Aoba looked up from her lunch, her mouth full as she instructed,
"Open up the folder called 'Zenchi', and watch the videos in sequential order."
The folder titled '全知', or 'Zenchi', translated into 'Omniscience', and Shigure wasn't exactly sure what to expect when she opened up the first video.
The video player opened up to play the first video in a well-lit room where stacks of paper filled the background, and Aoba was alone in the room, adjusting the video camera to whisper conspiratorially into the screen.
Her face was brighter, and she hadn't developed the bloodshot eyes and eye bags, and regarded everything with enthusiasm, especially her new discovery.
In other words, right then in the video, she was still the 'Intrepid Reporter Aoba-san'.
"Ok, guys, I was sorting through the blueprints, and I just found this one blueprint right here."
The camera blurred, and after re-positioning herself, the screen focused on a blueprint in Yuubari's room.
"Ok, look.
This blueprint was part of the plans for a machine you wear on your head, like Professor X wearing Cerebro,"
The camera zoomed to the part of a blueprint detailing a design for a helmet of sorts, along with several wires hanging from it. Small typed-out notes and dimensions were on the paper, and the title of the blueprint was simply '全知'.
"And as Yuubari, bless her soul, explained in her notes, this will pave the way for powerful ship girls, and have sick mental powers."
The camera turned back to the reporter, her bright blue eyes staring into the camera, eyes oblivious to the inherent dangers of the idea that she put forth and simply twinkling in anticipation.
"Like, what we have, now, our communication system, is capable of receiving radio signals that bounce off of satellites in space to detect orders from our bases.
But the purpose of this machine is to allow a ship girl to detect every radio signal in the area, and if we coordinate teams of ship girls who possessed these abilities, we can better coordinate our efforts to fight back better."
The camera shifted back to display the bright face of Aoba, who looked into the screen and explained.
"Look, I think that this can be used to receive news channels updates and phone calls without even having to check in all the time, and this ability can be toggled on or off and even fine-tuned to detect certain radio signals.
This way, I can keep up with everything around me, and maybe even listen in on emails and conversations to get a better insight on things."
Aoba seemed to try to justify her intentions to the camera, a slight gleam in her eyes as she continued.
"I want to try building this, which I could, due to some dabbling in engineering, but not just for myself.
Maybe, if we teach ourselves to decipher encrypted signals out on the field, we may even be able to learn of the Abyssals' plans if we try hard enough.
But I don't want to be suspended for testing this out on another ship girl, and I'd never be able to live with myself if someone was hurt because of this.
So, if I'm actually going to make this, I'm very likely going to test it on myself.
I'll likely update this story at a later date, but for now, this is the Intrepid Reporter, Aoba-chan, signing out."
The video ended right there, and Shigure clicked on the second video, and after three seconds of loading, the video played.
Aoba was alone in this very room with the same tint that was the result of the light fixture, except that the said room wasn't anywhere as messy, or as defaced as it was right now.
Instead, the room was had cables and metal pieces were cluttering up the room. A stack of thick books were balanced atop each other, the entire assembly sitting on a medium-sized data server connected to a laptop on the floor.
The whole set, which consisted of books atop a server was pushed over to the corner of the room, the thick book on top of the stack opened up and flipped to a particular page.
A metal dentist chair, situated around where Shigure was sitting right now, had metal cables dangling from it and snaking across the floor. Aoba wore her signature school uniform, albeit with plastic gloves and boots to protect herself against possible electrocution.
If she looked closely enough, she could see blowtorches, a small fire extinguisher hidden behind the chair, and something closely resembling a skeleton of the helmet depicted in the blueprints.
Aoba looked at the camera, away from the book she was looking at and set it at the frame of the fold-down bed. Aoba sat on the bed, and narrated while facing the camera.
"Ok, two and a half weeks ago, I got permission to live in a separate room from my sisters.
I told them I needed the space and privacy to write my stories, and they obliged.
Before that happened, I was gathering the equipment to build this machine. This,"
Aoba reached down to pick up the helmet, showing it off to the camera on the bed.
The metal plate to the side had the Kanji '全知', and wires were exposed from within, a few dozen small sensors surrounding the interior of the helmet, likely to read the brain waves of the wearer.
Aoba seemed to regard it in awe, continuing her narration.
"Ok, as you can see, these sensors are implemented to help upload the module into my brain, and also to read the signals in my mind.
Of course, our physiology and neurology differs quite a bit from humans, and I've been consulting engineering books and Yuubari's papers to create a prototype. So, the first thing to test out is whether the helmet can actually read the signals in my ship girl brain and access what's inside.
The program has to be manually written, but Yuubari had thankfully already started on it before her untimely demise.
So I just have to finish what she started, store it in the machine, and upload it into my mind when I finish building the helmet and hook it up to the server."
Aoba's eyes gleamed as she continued.
"Now, if this works, I can proceed to gain access the inner workings of my mind and learn how to install various modules without the risk of possible rejection or failure.
Now, not all this is legal, some of this information I hacked and stole, some I asked Akashi and the Admiral for help, since it's been quite well-researched upon while being as non-invasive as possible.
I'll upload some fail safes to ensure that I don't die, and implement what's basically a hack to ultra-enhance my ship girl radio wave-receiving functions while the fail safes kick in."
Aoba put down the helmet, and her eyes dulled a little to regard the viewer with serious eyes, her voice and expression taking on a more somber tone.
"Ok, I know that you're likely shouting at me,
'Aoba, this is a bad idea! Don't you know that these ideas never turn out well, especially then you're messing with your own mind?'
Well, I think, right now, I'm still trying to explain this in a way that would get my point across.
But right now, I still need to work on this helmet's program, and I don't feel like it's the right time to reveal it.
This is Aoba-chan, signing out."
Shigure wondered what Aoba's true intentions were, but saw the current state of the heavy cruiser behind her, who was invested in eating salmon along with her rice, and decided to move on to part 3.
The dentist chair was in the center of the room, facing forwards and away from the curtains while and the data server was situated behind the chair, in between the back rest and the covered window.
Aoba had clearly cleaned up the room, the books cleared away and the tools arranged on the table, along with a dozen cups of coffee and cans of Red Bull each on the crowded table.
The heavy cruiser in question still had on the same uniform, although now there were now discarded uniforms strewn across the bed in a pile, over her pillow and bolster.
The lighting was dimmed considerably, casting a slight darkness over the room that blanketed the heavy cruiser who was in front of the camera.
Aoba set down the camera on the table, moving herself back to sit on the dentist chair that was propped up, looking dejected as though the weight of such an endeavor had weighed down on her over the weeks.
The Aoba in the video was starting to look more like the current Aoba, having (admittedly less prominent) eye bags under her eyes.
As Aoba plopped down onto the dentist chair, Shigure noticed straps installed on the handles of the dentist chair, illuminated by the camera's flash set to 'ON'.
Aoba took a deep a deep breath, and started her monologue.
"Ok, I think, now that I'm close to a breakthrough on this project, I think it's safe to try to leave a will, or at least a final message of sorts."
Her face was drained of energy, her expression blank, and didn't hesitate to state the truth about her mortality when she said,
"I'm not that stupid to think the odds are with me on this one."
She looked down, scratching her now-oily hair, as she continued.
"Especially when I found out I had to tap into the whole base's electricity supply to run the machine effectively, because this machine right now isn't exactly efficient, and is quite the electricity guzzler."
Shigure didn't like the sound of that, wondering how Aoba survived the lethal current that could have easily fried her central processing unit and memory drives, amongst many delicate mental and physical faculties.
"Look, I did this, it wasn't entirely for the story. I just wanted to get stronger, you know?
I mean, as of the moment of this recording, I don't have a Kai Ni, while everyone has one.
And they all can aspire for something greater, and I'm happy for them but…"
She looked back at the camera, seemingly passionate about her revelation.
"I mean, the Myoukou Sisters all have Kai Ni, Furutaka, Kako, even though Kako's not in this base, they both have Kai Ni, as do Maya and Choukai.
Fuck, even my sister has KAI NI!"
Aoba caught herself mid-rant, dejectedly putting her face into her palm, as she rubbed her face.
Sighing, she continued.
"Don't worry, this isn't going to be a rant video.
I just want to say that everyone has something they can strive for, to achieve something greater, while I'm stuck here with Kai.
Not that I'm mad at them. No, I'm happy for them. But it's me, I'm just…"
Aoba clawed with her free arm that wasn't resting on her thigh, as she made a face before exhaling in resignation and quietly completed the sentence.
"…I'm just weak."
Looking back at the camera, Aoba had on a look of a girl who was pushed to the limit by her limits.
But she wasn't going to give up, oh no.
She was the Intrepid Reporter Aoba-chan, after all.
"So, just to sum up, I'm not exactly in this for the story.
Not anymore. I did some soul-searching yesterday, and I found that, maybe I'm doing this to try to catch up with my sister ships.
Maybe I'm just tired of knowing that I have limits, and am going to do whatever it takes to exceed them.
Hey, I mean, we got our second chance, having been reincarnated in human bodies and can push the limits of what's possible.
After all,"
Aoba smirked, finally regaining some of the fire in her eyes and thirst for adventure in the previous videos.
"I'm not the Myoukou Sisters, nor am I Furutaka or even Kinugasa.
I'm the Intrepid Reporter Aoba-chan.
I play with the hand I'm dealt with in life, and rather than just being content with who I am, I'm going to keep improving myself and keep up with my sisters no matter what.
And also, what sort of reporter am I if I don't take a few risks to get the best stories?
This is Aoba, signing out."
The end to this video had Shigure hurriedly clicking on the final video, not realizing that Aoba was drinking her miso soup behind her and observing the destroyer's reactions.
Aoba was looking over her shoulder in the video, approaching her room and unlocking her door to let herself in.
She was looking quite panicked, having seen something at the end of the corridor, which Shigure squinted her eyes and made out the silhouette of a few ship girls looking around the corner at her.
Aoba slammed the door behind her, locking the three locks on her door and rushing over to her laptop and booting it up.
She commentated on the situation at hand, her voice fast due to her panic.
"Ok, I think that several ship girls have been on my tail, especially Akashi, Kinugasa and Nagato.
Shit, even the Admiral's noticed my prolonged absences and the missing items from the naval base inventory.
And for now, I've got them off my tail by explaining that I'm writing a sensitive story, but I don't know how much longer I can keep this a secret. So, right now, I'm going to do it."
The exposition was narrated as she set the camera on the head of the bed, and got to work by pulling switches, pressing buttons, and even connected crocodile clips to the transformer atop a car battery that Shigure was pretty certain wasn't in any of her prior videos.
As her preparations went on, she continued in a fever pitch, partially from the adrenaline and from the excitement and fright before performing a potentially fatal experiment.
"Alright, preparations are go, and all that's left is to strap myself in to prevent myself from chickening out halfway, taking off the helmet halfway and possibly killing myself, unless I don't die from electrocution first."
Aoba stopped dead her preparations and regarded the camera with a look that reeked of a desperate ship girl, who wanted nothing more to become stronger, eventually shaking her head, looking down at the equipment in her hand and commenting.
"Ok, I really couldn't care at this point. Not after all this struggling, all this building, all this fucking secrecy and pressure."
She seemed ready to put on the helmet that was connected via wires to the data bank, but she remembered something as she put down the helmet and strafed over to the camera to pick it up and narrate to the audience.
"Ok, in case I hadn't made it clear, Furutaka, Kinugasa, everyone who's watching this.
I love you all.
And Admiral and Nagato, in case you're screaming yourselves hoarse at my stupidity in these few videos, know that I wanted nothing more than to become stronger like my sister ships."
Aoba's eyes were tearing up, as she smiled up at the camera, narrating what could be her final words into the camera.
"Furutaka, Kinugasa, know that I did all this on my own volition, and that I simply wanted to get stronger through my own means.
If that gets me killed, well, maybe, I wasn't meant to stand on the same stage that you two will no doubt one day find yourselves on.
I love you all."
She leaned in with her lips for a quick peck on the lens, before wiping the lens of any vapor or saliva and setting the camera back down on the head of the bed.
She darted over to the dentist chair to put on her helmet, which exuded an electric blue glow due to the LED lights inside, likely reprogrammed to light up in a blue glow if there were no problems.
Since she announced 'All Systems Go', the helmet was aglow with soft blue lights.
Several wires that connected the exterior of the helmet was also connected to the data server behind the chair, and the data server was also buzzing with activity with soft whirs and beeps.
Aoba sat down on the dentist chair, holding a big red button connected to the data server, and strapped her occupied arm down to the armrests.
She reached down with her face, and biting the straps, she managed to tie up her other arm, her right hand still on the button and ready to activate the contraption.
Aoba looked to the camera one final time, and nervously remarked.
"T-This is the Intrepid Reporter Aoba-chan, signing off."
Before adding, audible to Shigure.
"Hopefully not for the last time."
Aoba squeezed her eyes shut and pressed the button.
The next scene was right out of a 20th century execution via electrocution, making Shigure queasy and uncomfortable just watching the scene.
Aoba was lit up, pure electricity coursing through her steel skeleton and almost lighting her body up from within her body in a neon blue glow.
Spasms affected her whole body, quaking and thrashing about as if to protest and attempt to make a break for freedom, the button that sealed her doom already dropped onto the floor.
Aoba's eyes flew open, and Shigure could almost feel the raw electricity, the raw power coursing through her mind as her bright blue eyes started lighting up in a brilliant sapphire glow, after which a current of electricity started emitting from her pupils as her eyes rolled up, the blue lights of her helmet starting to glow brighter and engulf her skull like the radiant sun, coupled with the dimming and ultimately darkened light in the room.
And no matter how hard she tried, Shigure was simply frozen to her seat in fright as she failed to reached for the mute button whilst hearing Aoba's ghastly scream emanating from the laptop and petrifying the destroyer.
Her body continued flailing in her restraints, sparks starting to fly in the darkness as ship girls started banging on the door outside, and even attempting to break it down.
Aoba looked as if she was suffering from an epileptic seizure, convulsing and shaking from the electric current that ran through and warped her mind. Shigure couldn't make it out in the darkness and Aoba's convulsions made it hard to see, but Shigure could almost make out small wisps of smoke wafting from her skin and skull.
Eventually the door was kicked down, and Shigure could make out Nagato's back in the darkness as she reeled back from the sight of Aoba howling in pain on what seemed to be an electric chair.
Furutaka and Kinugasa were screaming along with their sister, and Kinugasa had to be held back unless she wanted to be potentially electrocuted just through contact with the foreign machine.
The camera fell onto the floor just as a few more girls rushed into the room, and one of the girls may have stepped on the camera with her body weight on her feet as the camera cut to black and left Shigure staring at the screen in shock, trying to process what just happened.
"Gets me every time.
What about you?"
Shigure pulled back and fell back onto the messy floor, landing on crumpled uniforms and balled-up pieces of paper, horrified at the hushed whisper right beside her left ear as Aoba rose up to her full height, towering over the destroyer on the ground. She looked tired and hung her head as she peeked at Shigure with downcast eyes.
Shigure wasn't sure what to think anymore.
But she was absolutely sure that she was downright terrified of what Aoba had to go through, and could somewhat see things from the heavy cruiser's point of view, where she had tried to transcend her physical and mental limits with the best of intentions and paid dearly for it.
Burnt out and grounded, almost unable to sortie but also inconveniencing her sisters as they needed to take care of her, and isolated by the other ship girls who feared and misunderstood her.
It could be argued that being dead was preferable to living like this.
Aoba slowly leaned forward, offering her hand to Shigure and smiled softly as her eyes tried to regain some of its lost luster.
Shigure took the offered hand, her petite hand shivering slightly from the recent chain of revelations.
She was pulled up gently, Aoba making sure that she didn't hit her head on the table or the upturned chair, regarding her with a level of warmth that Shigure hadn't expected from the heavy cruiser.
"Sorry about that, I've always wanted to do that to someone, you know, sneaking up on someone and whisper in their ear?"
Aoba giggled, as though having accomplished some great prank, but shortly afterwards losing her smile and facade to regard Shigure seriously.
"So you know what happens next.
I'm locked up in the intensive care unit of a mental hospital, they find out this radio wave-receiving module has been installed in my mind and practically fused to it.
And since they couldn't uninstall it, they gave me meds and helped me learn to cope with living with almost no radar and radio communications.
The Admiral made preparations to line my room with copper plates along with making a copper helmet for me to wear when the meds run out.
I came back to this base, and here I am."
She spread her arms outwards as though preparing for a hug, an awkward smile on her face as she presented herself, or what was left of the 'Intrepid Reporter' to Shigure.
Her eyes looked fearful as they slowly drifted away from Shigure's, as though she wanted to properly communicate with Shigure but was already certain that she had scared off the destroyer with her scary backstory, and was trying to hide her desperation and disappointment with her cheery voice.
So Shigure did what she thought was right.
Shigure moved in, wrapping her arms around Aoba's waist and pulling herself close to Aoba's warm body as the heavy cruiser's breath stopped and her body froze at the sudden ship girl contact.
Her breath hitched as she looked down to see Shigure's teary, doey eyes looking up at her, not with sympathy or pity like everyone had ever since she came back, or with eyes of fear that most destroyers had when she got too close to them, Shigure's eyes shone with understanding.
Understanding how hard it was for Aoba, who had to isolate herself from everyone and stay inside this copper cage, which was especially hard since she had been an extroverted and energetic girl before this, always looking forward to the next big story with anticipation and was friendly with everyone on the base.
Now, she was reduced to staying in a small cell with a mental condition that couldn't be reversed by even the developers and engineers of the mental institute, and was forced to live with her debilitating condition.
All while everyone stayed away from her like she had the plague, always fearful that she might break down and hurt someone, something which Shigure guessed Aoba wasn't quite capable of since she had retained her mental faculties and reasoning (most of it), and likely took her medicine to cope with her condition if the half-finished prescription bottles lying prone on the floor were any indication.
As if living in a cell wasn't enough, she was likely afraid of what she had become, never wanting to lose control even for a second and eventually resorted to staying inside her cage to protect everyone from herself.
Add that to the fact that she had little to no one to communicate with without the use of her laptop, her condition probably acting up on several days and the claustrophobic room being too much to deal with sometimes.
Shigure looked as if she was going to cry, as she whispered to the shocked Aoba.
"You don't have to be alone anymore, Aoba-san.
I'm here."
Aoba held up a shaking hand to Shigure's hair, disbelieving of the sight and sensation of the destroyer that was in contact with her, as she hasn't felt the touch of another ship girl in…
She couldn't remember anyone, honestly, her memories before the incident having become a jumble of blurred images in her mind that she tried to sort through day by day.
Everyone was afraid to even talk to her for fear of triggering some sort of mental breakdown, and she eventually got used to the loneliness and isolation that filled her life.
And not wanting her sisters to suffer any more because of her, she chose to cut off her ties with them in the end and lived like a hermit in her room.
Not that she actually liked living alone, she wanted to make her life simpler and kill herself due to the isolation and her condition getting to her on the worst of days.
She was almost certain that the sight in front of her was a hallucination, likely brought on by the exacerbation of her condition and her desperate need for ship girl contact.
But the soft and smooth hair that met her trembling hand, and the tears that rolled down Shigure's cheeks to slightly wet Aoba's uniform slowly convinced her of the very real, and very sad destroyer that was hugging her tightly right now.
Aoba also started tearing up, her hands slowly making her way to Shigure's back to slowly reciprocate the hug, her expression a mix of relief and happiness as she let her tears flow freely.
All this time, when she emotionally broke down in her room on occasion and thrashed everything in frustration, no one was there to hear her cries and pleas.
But now, she had someone here to lend her a shoulder to lean on.
To cry on.
For the first time in a long while, Aoba had made a new friend.