Narrator pow:

"... Damner." Eclair cursed lightly, blandly starring down the pot, in which insides she was mixing for a good while now.

"Eclair, what are you doing?" Beatrice asked her, walking into the kitchen with moody face and tired eyes.

"I'm making a chocolate pudding." She responded with low effort, taking the pot and throwing the brown-black mess out of it and into a baking form.

"It's four o'clock in the morning. Why in the right mind are you making a chocolate pudding?" Beatrice asked her again, already fed up with her behavior.

"Pudding is life now." Eclair siad with clear voice, putting the pot to the side and opening the oven. "Besides, someone needs to be ready for a council meeting today. Andou is tired and Rosehip worked enough so far, first turn to put the effort here is mine."

"Oh right, you three are picked as the student council by Maken in case he did something stupid." Beatrice nodded, beginning to understand her reason. "But you need some sleep to, you know."

"No, my job for this place wasn't a failure only because both girls I had to recruit for us were barely teasing on their parents behalf and were supposed to be just a temporar students to begin with."

"But you haven't derail the operation."

"Neither did I move it on the right track. Mine point still stands."

"May I at least-"

"No."

"That's just... Odd." Maken commented, talking on the phone while also looking at the screens in CCTV room, as he saw a rather sleepy Eclair walking towards the conference room where Andou and Rosehip were to discuss his latest ideas. "They are lucky I kept for myself the political stuff."

"Can't disagree. Even zhat bossy frauen Kadotani didn't got to say zhe word in front of Tsuji." Dr. Ludwig responded from the other side.

"And yet, me managing to make him unable to do absolutely anything towards mine school didn't free me from the nerves and doubts instead of allowing me to actual sleep. Fuck."

"Ooohhh, no need to be so stressed. After all, they'll definitely sense whem you begin to have problems in that area and go out of their way to free you from this nightmare."

"No, they will join me in a fight against it. Replacing the victim doesn't end the harm."

"Fair, my eaisly manipulated freund. Just be-!"

"What do you mean, eaisly manipulative?"

"And what Pekore did to you? Assam? Gaster?"

"Point for you. But now I need to go."

"Of course! Until we meet again!"

"Till' we meet again, Doc."

"Eclair, you good girl?" Rosehip asked, shaking her friend a time or two.

"Yes... No... Yes! Yes I am!" She exclaimed, jumping from her seat and landing on the floor, bouncing from it twice thanks to her momentum.

"No, you're not." Andou added, looking from the other side of the table. "I swear I can see the dark under your eyes from a mile.

"Mon ami. I have?" Eclair asked, then looking into the mirror Rosehip gave her. "Wow, I have it."

"Beatrice told me everything." Andou said, rolling her eyes. "Seriously, haven't Maken teach you anything?"

"About what?"

"About owerworking."

"Well..." Rosehip added, helping Eclair stand up. "She has a point, you know?"

"Aaand?"

"And you can't deny yourself sleep. Even he doesn't do that." Andou cut in.

"How do you know?" Eclair asked her. "He told you?"

"Of course that he did. Took some pushing, but I know he isn't lying."

"... Oh."

"It doesn't mean, however, that you can go in that direction."

"... Excuse my manners..."

"It's not about manners. It's about sanity."

"Oh yeah? Then what is so insane about me?"

"Making a chocolate pudding at four A.M." Rosehip responded, joining back into the conversation. "Dark lining undeneath your eyes that is definitely not a makeup, you-can't-tell-me-what-to-do and I-know-myself-better attitude. This is not sane, nor safe."

"... Huh." Eclair sighed, as akward silence took it's place between them. "That's all?"

"You still aren't taking us seriously?" Andou asked her, this time with growingly impatient tone.

"I do, I do. Really."

"Then why are you just dismissing what we say to you right now?"

"... Fine, you win."

It's not about winning, Eclair. It's about being a human being."

"A what?" Rosehip asked, still being sidelined by the main topic.

"I'll tell you two a story." Andou closed her eyes for a moment, sending Eclair a very suggestive glare. "Once upon a time there was me, worse than you..."

"Alright Jajka, how are you feeling about the next match?" Maken asked, as he and his fellow student walked alongside the side of a schoolship, looking at the bright blue sea and clear sky with Sun hanging high above them.

"The agreement is for the use of twenty tanks each, propably for Jungle Tunnel to use additional crews as digging squads." Jajka responded, counting something on her hands. "But clans that gathered with me are as follows: Brazilian, Uruguayan, Chilean, Paraguayan, Bolivian, Ecuadorian, Guianan, SViG, Saint Lucian, AiG, SKiN and Anguillian. All with their own tanks."

"Five FT-17's, six M-3 Stuarts, two Chaffee's, two Vickers E Type B, A1E1 Independent, Archer, AMR 35, Matilda I and Matilda II? That can work." Maken concluded, listing the total number of tanks the mentioned clan would field together.

"Exacly, I have a well-rounded mix of speed, armor and pemetration on the team." Jajka smiled, looking back at him. "But what will they send in?"

"Given my inteligence reports, it will be as follows: FCM 36, two R35, two FT-17, three Type 95 Ha-Go's, Four T-34's, M3 Lee, two SU-122, two SU-100 and three SU-76. Their-24 Chaffee isn't operable after their battle with Waffle due to lack of spare parts in their magazines."

"At least they won't run in circles around us. That's an upside."

"Sure it is, but be wary of over-relying on speed alone. This is not a Tankathlon match."

"Right... Feels weird to be schooled by you."

"I know, right? Almost like in the Star Wars. When I left you I was but a learner: Now I am the master."

"I know, makes me think if I was in the wrong..."

"There is no rights and wrongs in real life, Jajka. Only points of view and the butterfly effect." Maken concluded, deciding to switch the conversation topic. "But how did it go with you leaving Bonple? Rosehip didn't gave me too much solid information about it."

"Maiko and Uszka turned against me as soon as some first-years put me as the sole reason for Bonple's failures." Jajka responded, lowering her head as a small pair of tears appear in her eyes. "You know, holding the title of 'Queen of Tankathlon' as restrain on our Sensha-do part, to which I can't respond in legitimate way. Then they give me a revolutionary trial and kicked me out. After that, they pulled out a lot of money and assembled a makeshift army of tanks matchable only by yours."

"What?" Maken asked, grabbing her by the shoulders and turning her to face him. "What did they do?"

"They did all you proposed, 10TP, 14TP, 25TP... They even build two 40TP's on their own!"

"How?"

"No idea, most of it happen after I left... But they did kept 9, 7 and 4TP's, plus Archer, Hetzer and TKS."

"What about FT-17's? R35's?"

"Relegated to training duties. Especially since they have plans to move Archer and Hetzer to their main team as functional units."

"I feel so proud, yet so disgusted." Maken said with spite, hugging Jajka tightly. "They do what I would to, but couldn't move past the vendetta shtick..."

"Yeah, there is no reason for me to feel bad." Jajka responded sounding as if she felt better. "Whatever happens, I will beat Jungle Tunnel."

"If that's your will then you have my full support." Maken nodded, looking straight into her eyes. "We both learned about the meaning of humility, now it's their turn..."

"My majesty! I have good news and the bad news!" A small girl under the light-browl cloak shouted, running into the Bonple's student council room before falling down on her knees in a sigh of submissison.

"It's slim majesty for the next time, Pierogi." A rather wide girl with bright blue eyes and short ginger hair responded, putting aside her pudding. "Hmm... Start with the bad one, then."

"It doesn't work."

"Hah! Fantastic!" The girl behind the desk smiled, correcting her shirt sleeves and looking over the pink nails in search for the rest of her meal. "And the good one?"

"We delievered a P. 1000 Ratte into our school, as you ordered."

"Ahh, victory...?" Wide girl smiled before her eyes widened and then shrinked in barely a moment's notice. "What do you mean it doesn't work!? WHAT DO YOU MEAN IT DOESN'T WORK!?"

"... And that is how I got to this school." Andou concluded, looking outside of the window at the early sunset. "Are you two feeling good?"

"Well, I do." Rosehip responded first, looking at Eclair, who only nodded in silence. "Thank you for telling us."

"No worries, it has to happen at some time." Tan-slinned girl smiled, walking up to the two and taking them on her back. "Now let's get moving, our work shift is over."

"What did we concluded about overworking?" Eclair asked her, now slightly annoyed.

"Oh come on, just this once."

"I couldn't do it once, so neither do you."

"But-!"

"No but-s, only cheecks!" Rosehip interrupted her, putting her legs in a way that they all fell down on the floor before bursting out with laughter."

"Well, they are at least fine." Maken smiled, observing his three successors from the distance of his oversized balcony, and more precisely a car-sized observation machine freshly mounted on it's middle. "I got to thank our astrology and DIY clubs for this beauty of a machine."

"You could just pay them twenty dollars." Doctor Ludwig responded, rolling his eyes while resting his back at the balcony windows behind him.

"But where is the fun in that?" Caudillo asked him, turning around to face him.

"Fair, I also began to miss the funny hole-in-hand man telling me weird things."

"Don't worry, Assam is getting better by the day. Soon enough he'll be back to suggesting you some obscure interdimensional transpantology. Trust me."

"Wait, you don't like it, commander?" Uszka asked, as she and Mako walked alongside Bonple's Sensha-do storage rooms, filled with a noticable variety of tanks.

"As Maken was always saying, the ability to deploy a Maus, Karl Gustav, Ratte or anything of similar scale is insignificant next to the power of actually thinking during the battle." Maiko responded, looking far away at the window's of student council room. "I don't know what Krakus is thinking right now, but for me it is not worth it unless we get to the final of this tournament. And even then it isn't guaranteed to work."

"But, didn't he wanted to deploy a Tog II at some point?"

"He did once, but then changed his mind and now keeps it as a back-up tool because of it's inferior mobility."

"And how do you know that?"

"I actually bothered to listen to him at the first ocassion instead of staying with Jajka and following her orders word by word."

"Tak, I know that was stupid..."

"Just as me to not back him up when it mattered... But then again, he propably would want us to go against the odds."

"Mhm, just as he did."

"Exacly."