"THAT MONSTER KILLED MY SISTER!" Hornet screamed, her voice bordering on feral and unrestrained.
"Hold up a moment." Odin tried, only for her words to be shot down by the appearance of a massive reinforcement of Explorers.
"Tch. Damn it. Stupid fucking Sirens." Odin spat under her breath.
A hand came to her shoulder.
"I shall lend aid by keeping the Explorers away from you and Hornet. Try to get through to her." Bismarck spoke as she and Wilhelm stood on either side of Odin with their weapons drawn.
"Dispose of every Explorer here! Do not let a single one reach the Vice Commander!" Wilhelm yelled as he leveled his rifle at the opposing Sirens.
"Thank you, Bismarck. Please be careful. She has a strange ability I have yet to decipher. Keep an eye on the sky." Odin warned as Bismarck nodded and fired a salvo from her rigging, marking the beginning of the firefight.
Odin walked forward slowly, keeping her shields and rigging active as Explorers tried to attack her, only to be shot down by the overwhelming number of bullets being fired by Wilhelm's men and the freedom fighters, led by Stefan.
Odin managed to close to within five meters of Hornet before she managed to shake off the remaining effects of being struck by Odin's lightning attack. Wasting no time, she leapt at Odin, delivering a fist to Odin's shields, placing a massive crack down the center.
"I didn't realize she was this strong." Odin whispered to herself.
"Vice Commander. What is wrong with my sister?" Enterprise's voice came over the radio.
"That's what I'm trying to ascertain, Enterprise. Please send my backup. Hornet is a lot stronger than I gave her credit for. Her fist was enough to crack my shield." Odin said as she jumped back to keep the force of Hornet's attack from cracking through her shield further.
Odin stepped back further as Hornet charged at her with her rigging deployed.
"You fight for that monster. You kill the people you claim to save. You are the true enemy of humanity!" Hornet yelled as she launched another wave of miniature dive bombers to assault Odin and distract her.
"What gave you that absurd notion? We have not harmed a single innocent person, if anything, you're the oppressor here!" Odin shot back, firing another bolt of lighting at Hornet, who handily used the flight deck of her rigging to keep the bolt from hitting her body.
"I was tasked to defend this country! In the name of the Eagle Union, I will not allow you to subjugate this nation!" Hornet yelled as her flight deck dispersed the shock of the lightning bolt.
"Subjugate?! Like what you have helped the sirens to do?! Have you lost your mind, Hornet?!" Odin roared angrily as a blast of wind from behind her indicated her backup's arrival.
"Vize Kommandant. I have been ordered by Mein Kommandant to aid you in… capturing this Kansen. Please step back." Roon spoke as Shrimpy lumbered ahead of Odin, keeping her protected from the pack of suicidal planes flowing from Hornet's flight deck.
"Roon. Please. Do not harm her. We want her alive." Odin reiterated.
"I understand. But if I do not attack with the intent to kill, she will not be able to be brought down." Roon spoke as a pair of metal gauntlets adorned her pale hands.
Odin sighed as another hand met her soldier.
"Damn the Commander's orders to stay put. She's my sister. I will not lose another." Enterprise spoke as she activated her rigging.
Enterprise's rigging had changed from what it had used to be. Her signature flight deck on her left hip had changed to show the updated design, while a smaller secondary flight deck adorned her back in the form of a quiver. The Bow, made from a scale model of her new island, had compacted slightly from the longbow she had used before to a much more sophisticated compound bow, allowing Enterprise to have a much easier time aiming and using her bow effectively with the new rigging setup.
Odin sighed.
"Maybe you'll be able to get through to her, Enterprise… She believes with every fiber of her being that we killed you." Odin said with a shrug.
Enterprise sighed a bit.
"Knowing the Sirens… they probably did to her what they tried to do to me." Enterprise said.
"Care to explain?" Odin asked as a sharp metallic clang was heard. Odin and Enterprise looked over to see Roon and Hornet locked in combat, Roon's fist generating sparks against the hard steel of Hornet's flight deck.
"Yes. Empress tried to show me the video that she received from Norfolk. Except they had managed to edit it into a convincing montage of torture involving my sister's. They edited two separate video's… one showing Yorktown, the other showing Hornet." Enterprise said.
"So you believe that Tester has shown Hornet a video of that incident except edited to show you?" Odin asked.
"Yes. But I know Hornet… she wouldn't buy it completely. Not like this. I talked with Prinz Eugen before she left to scout these islands. She spoke of a black cube being implanted into her neck to make her believe things that were simply impossible. So if they showed her that video, and then implanted a black cube, it would be nearly impossible to get her back." Enterprise said.
"You said nearly… but somehow I know I'm not going to like giving this option to the Kommandant." Odin spoke.
"That combination, on top of the bruises I see covering my sister's body… She has more than likely been brutally conditioned to no longer see me as her sister. The Enterprise in the video is the only Enterprise she may see." Enterprise said with a tone lost somewhere between seething anger and unfathomable sadness.
"So not even you would be able to get her back…" Odin said.
"I said nearly impossible, not impossible…" Enterprise said as she weighed the options of telling Odin.
"Enterprise?" Odin asked as the sounds of combat continued around them.
"I know I said I will not lose another sister… and I refuse to do so… but we may have to… kill her to save her." Enterprise said.
"That is the dumbest thing I have ever heard." Odin said bluntly.
"I know… but just listen. Look at Taihou. The Commander has a book that details Taihou being with the previous commander of Azur Lane. Yet with her revival on Palau, she has no memory of her time with him and believes that she has just woken up from being sunk by Albacore, a Union Submarine." Enterprise said.
"So you believe her death and rebirth somehow reset her memories?" Odin asked.
"It seems like a viable theory. After all, before my retrofit yet well after Taihou's initial sinking, Empress received a report from a wandering drone fleet that they managed to sink a Sakura carrier matching Taihou's description. They managed to sink and kill her then." Enterprise said.
"So you are telling me that your best bet to get your sister back… is to kill her?" Odin asked.
"As much as it pains me… yes." Enterprise said.
Odin sighed and opened a line to Isaac.
"Odin, what's the matter?" Isaac asked as he and MacArthur rode in a bright yellow inflatable boat that was painted like a duck. Warspite, Vengeance, Texas, Richelieu, Yamashiro and Hood surrounded them and guarded them as they made their way through the blockade and towards the beach where fighting was fierce.
"Enterprise has informed me of a possible method that was used to turn Hornet against us… and a possible way to get her back." Odin said.
"That tone doesn't sound good. What happened to Hornet?" Isaac asked.
"The running theory is that she has been conditioned to believe that we have killed Enterprise through the use of beatings, torture and the implantation of a black wisdom cube, like the ones used on Roon and Prinz Eugen. We also believe an edited video of Oceana's torture was used to cement this belief by editing Enterprise in Oceana's place." Odin explained.
"That fucking bitch!" Isaac growled. MacArthur placed a hand on his shoulder.
"Admiral. Please calm yourself. We have a battle to conduct. Any and all information must be taken with a level head." MacArthur said.
"You're right… What has Enterprise suggested to help us help Hornet?" Isaac asked.
Odin hesitated.
"She wishes to attempt to kill her and then revive her cubes after a small period of time, the hope is that this will reset her memories and erase what the Sirens have done. With help from Zero and Vengeance, we may see a greater chance of success." Odin said.
"You want me to authorize that?!" Isaac spoke, shooting up from his seat, only kept from falling overboard by a swift hand from Texas.
"I don't expect you to. But with every avenue being closed by the minute, it may be our only chance to safely apprehend Hornet without losing any of our own. She is on par with Roon, and Roon was seen literally tearing battleships apart with her bare hands. Whatever they did to her, she's used that rage to increase her strength. Taking her alive would cost us more than what we stand to gain by acquiring a traumatized fleet carrier." Odin said.
Isaac hung his head.
"Do what you must. Follow Enterprise's lead to the letter. If we must kill her sister, I want it done in a way that Enterprise can be the least upset with." Isaac said as he dropped back down into his seat.
"Her cubes will remain intact. I will see to it myself." Odin said.
"What's with the sudden change, Admiral?" MacArthur asked as the other girls listened in. Chief scooted over and sat next to Isaac.
"They have tortured and twisted Hornet's mind to the point that we cannot help her as things stand. My choice to use that video to frighten our adversaries has come once more to bite me. Hornet now wholeheartedly believes that I killed Enterprise, and continues to fight despite the fact that Enterprise is standing right in front of her." Isaac said.
"That's bad… but I can see the Sirens doing it. That doesn't explain such a rapid change in emotion from anger to sadness though." MacArthur said.
"Our only option is to hope that killing and reviving her will revert her memories back to a point before the torture." Isaac said, causing the entire group to fall silent.
"Preposterous! That is far beyond uncalled for." Hood cried.
"She may be a yank… but nobody deserves what they did to her." Warspite spoke.
Richelieu remained quiet, but the look of anger and disgust on her face was impossible to miss.
"Poor Hornet. She used to be quite the upstart. Always full of energy." Texas said sadly before the anger set in.
"I'll blow so many holes in Tester's body that there won't be anything to put back together." Texas ground out.
"I was sunk by Enterprise and several others during the war… but… I am not so heartless to not feel anger in the face of such an atrocity." Yamashiro spoke softly.
"You all can get in line. If anyone is going to kill that bitch, it's me." Vengeance said coldly.
Chief pouted as Isaac looked to the shore where his forces were pushing the Wolfpacks off the beach and towards the town's outskirts.
"This incident changes nothing. We leave none who serve the Sirens alive. If they feel like it is proper to twist the minds of innocent Kansen, then we shall respond in kind by murdering their followers without remorse." Isaac ground out.
Vengeance grinned a mile wide.
"I like your reasoning, Isaac. Makes it harder to keep myself from making a move." Vengeance said, lightening the mood if only a little.
Isaac chuckled.
"Full ahead to the beach. We'll back the wolfpacks into the city. If we push hard enough, they'll lead us right to Tester." Isaac said.