Beneath the evening sky, as the sun slowly descended towards the horizon a young girl was seated on top of disabled coastal gun. The dual thirteen-inch barrel pointed towards the entrance to the bay, still aimed at foes long gone. Its gun house sported a gaping hole on its roof, warped steel making way to a burnt out interior as evidence to the reason for its ruined condition.
It was on top of the gun house that the young girl sat, legs kicking back and forth as she watched the clouds. She'd been waiting for the return of Iowa, Manjuu Foreman, and the explorer duo for hours now. She wanted to be the first to welcome them back out of those dark and scary looking tunnels in the ruined fort, and be the first to know what spooky and awesome stuff they may have found.
A while later and still no Iowa, making young Highwind harrumph in annoyance. "Come ooon, what's taking them so long?"
She decided then, that a change of scenery will be best. So she pictured herself standing on top of her crow's nest, and in a blink there she appeared, startling Alex who was doing maintenance on her antenna. She giggled internally, though outwardly she only allowed a beaming smile to express her amusement.
"Gosh, you scared me girl!" The woman held her chest as she calmed her breathing, though she too was smiling at the smaller girl.
"Sorry!" Highwind apologized brightly then gave Alex a hug. "And thanks for fixing my antenna! My radar range was shrinking."
She got a pat on the head as her sailor responded. "Anytime Highwind."
The shipgirl spent a while up there with her sailor, chatting on any topic that crossed their minds. Highwind learned more on the culture of Alex's family in the Dragon's Tail archipelago, and Alex on the tense relationship between shipgirls and airshipgirls.
"...and so auntie Valorous picked stupid Serene up and threw her into the water!" Highwind mimed hauling something up effortlessly and tossing it over the side.
"That was very deserved, but how did the other airshipgirls react? They wouldn't let something like that go, right?" At this point Alex was packing her tools, finished with fixing the issue in the antenna. It was a couple of circuit boards that got a bit wet due to a fault in the seals of the outer shell so some water dripped inside.
"They weren't happy, but they respected my auntie like everyone else. So they just fished out Serene and left, and after that they never came down to the port to boss around seaships again." She crossed her arms, smiling at the memory.
They would have spent more time talking about many more things, but there were other tasks the engineer has to attend to. And so after exchanging farewells, Alex went down the crow's nest leaving Highwind alone. There she spent some more time just watching the hustle and bustle of the harbor, near empty it may be. Manjuu fishing boats were packing up their nets to head back in, the few of her passengers who wanted to explore the fort's surroundings were making their way back into their accommodations in the base's residential accommodations and most of her crew were preparing for a lighter schedule for the coming night. And still there was no explorer group walking out into the evening sun.
But then finally, as the sun began to dip below the cliffs enclosing the harbor there they were walking out the entrance of the fort. With them was a large group of manjuus, carrying boxes and crates and all of them looked upbeat. The young girl, previously in a downcast mood, brightened immediately, finding herself jumping up and down in excitement.
"They're here!" She cheered. She then imagined herself in front of the battleship lady and the next thing she saw she was standing before a surprised Iowa. "Auntie you're back!"
And then the battleship was promptly glombed by a very eager transport girl.
Being glomped was a surprise to be sure. But it was a very welcome one all the same as after all the trekking through dusty depressing hallways, being ambushed by an Abyssal and then going all the way back to the top wasn't a fun trip. Getting a hug from my favorite little shipgirl, adding up with the project left behind by this base's previous owners, made me a very content battleship.
I let out a sigh as I melted into the smaller girl's arms. "Ahhh Highwind, your auntie misses you very much as well."
"You took so long down there." The young girl looked up and met her eyes, smiling. "You found a lot of treasure didn't you?"
I didn't reply with words, instead showing a knowing smile and gesturing to the box-carrying manjuus beside me. Said manjuus got the hint, a couple undoing the locks on one and lifting the lid to reveal three Wisdom Cubes set into a plump cushion, their soft glow making a mesmerizing sight for Highwind to marvel at. She gasped in wonder and let go of me, walking over to get a much closer look. Her letting go also did a small good to my chest as my damaged frontmost boiler let me know its status with a slight burning sensation. Thankfully Highwind was too distracted to notice the hitch in my breathing.
A gloved hand grasped my shoulder from behind as Nandor walked up to my right, a worried frown on his face directed at me. "You better get yourself to a drydock soon. That hole in your chest'll need more than a temporary plate welded on it."
He was there when manjuu Foreman got a look at the slap-dash repair my ghostly damage control did on my chest, and watched the bird weld a spare sheet of steel on it. With a slight smile I nodded at him, which apparently reassured him as he smirked back and let go to help his mentor carry all the archaeology stuff they brought down into the basement. They stumbled upon a library miraculously left intact by the Sirens. I then turned back to Highwind, who was in the middle of reading a couple of signboards raised by the manjuus covered in information on the Cubes.
"Highwind." I called out, and she turned about with remarkable sharpness towards me. "I'll be dropping my hull down into the water, want to come with?"
"Sure, lead the way!" Despite that she grasped my hand and pulled me along towards the water. "I also want to know everything that you guys did in the basement, please?"
"Of course!" I replied. "Where to start... We got down into the underground lab. It was uneventful at first then... ah yes, when I first stepped on a tile and the floor before us fell into depths of the earth..."
Highwind went from a positive mood listening to my story so far, to a worried one when she got a good look at the state of my hull.
"Oh my gods, Iowa your superstructure!" In fact, she cried out in fright as she pointed a shaking hand at my ship-body from her spot standing on her deck. "It's full of holes!"
I never fully took stock of the damage I took didn't I? And looking at myself now it certainly looks worse than it is. A phalanx on starboard aft blown off its mount, two harpoon launchers with only a blackened half of their tubes still on its mount, two secondary dual 5-inch turrets on my portside disabled with holes on their front armor plate. My A turret has two of its barrels melted to uselessness, as well as a damaged mount reducing its traverse speed by a not insignificant amount. A lot of my searchlights got wrecked with the sections of my superstructure they were on. My two funnels have a couple of holes going clean through them, thankfully only decreasing their efficiency by a small amount. In my superstructure, workshops, crew compartments, toilets, a galley and several passages fell victim to shell holes and explosions in varying severity.
My wooden decks were littered with splintered and cratered sections from the worst partial penetrations. Thankfully only the laser got through the armor beneath the wood. My hull got away with a lot of dents, the armor too thick for the Siren's lower caliber guns in the ambush site, managing to get a handful of penetrations on my thinner fore and aft armor. All in all though, for those without adequate knowledge on how warships work I look pretty damn beat up. My superstructure can be compared to a wheel cheese with the number of holes put in them. The wonders of the all-or-nothing armor scheme everyone, putting the most important parts of a battleship (command compartments, fire control, propulsions, etc.) behind the thickest practicable plates of armor and let everything else (crew quarters, toilets, galleys, etc.) get the tin-can treatment. So even after being on the receiving end of a massive barrage, at least after that I can still float and either keep fighting or retreat.
And while Highwind was freaking out in worry over me, an alarm on base sounded which had several groups of manjuu scrambling my way from several places. This time instead of welcome banners and food stands they were bringing power tools, pumps, trucks carrying building materials and fuel, and everything else needed in fixing up a ship. They were even wheeling in one of those giant gantry cranes they hid... somewhere.
The racket of scrambling manjuu and machinery also got the attention of Highwind's crew, those who weren't gaping at me already anyway, and had Cpt. Bernie wanted to know what the heck was going on as I got a signal from her.
*"Bernie here, all that noise knocked me out of my sleep!"* Was the first thing I heard when I answered the call, the usually jovial man sounding very irritated. *"Iowa, what by the Brothers is going on out there?"*
While he was talking though, the first manjuu repairmen drove up to the quay on my starboard side, the little birds dismounting and forming up behind one of their number who... had a long and very well groomed beard with the biggest hat among them. Said distinguished manjuu promptly showed me a signboard with the words "damage report" on them.
"Wait a moment sir." I answered back to Bernie, summoning a pen and clipboard in my hand so I can begin writing the report. "Gotta give a damage report to the manjuu repair crews."
*"What- damage? How bad..."* He went silent for a bit. I assumed he'd finally gotten a good view of me. *"It... I don't see any sign of listing or a hole on your waterline so I have to assume nothing critical is damaged?"*
"Besides one of my boilers getting clipped by a laser and A-turret needing new barrels and some repairs? Yeah, mostly alright."
Writing the report didn't take long as I naturally knew every single piece of damage I sustained, and so I handed my clipboard to Distinguished Manjuu when I hopped down onto the quay. The distinguished looking bird took one long look at my clipboard, then turned back to me with a nod, its beady eyes glinting with confidence and turned around to address the gathered manjuus with their chirps.
*"A boiler got clipped by a laser you say?"* Returned the now slightly worried captain. *"I pray the damage won't be too severe, else I fear that you'll be needing to spend a longer time on drydock to get a replacement."*
"It's not so bad, don't worry!" At least, not so bad that I'll be needing most of my superstructure to be lifted off to replace the boiler. "Just gotta replace some damaged pipes and machinery to make myself combat ready again."
A sigh of relief came out from the radio. *"That's good, that's good. You heard her Highwind, your aunty's not going to be sinking anytime soon."*
Oh dear, Highwind. Right after I got a call from a distraught little transport girl, Highwind sniffled some as she spoke. *"A-aunty Iowa are you very sure you're ok?"*
"Yes of course!" I hurried to reassure her, jumping back on top of my B-turret so I could try and meet Highwind's eyes. "No holes below the waterline," There was a small one right at the bottom that's already patched up, but she doesn't need to know that. "Or some magazines about to blow, don't worry!"
As the gantry crane began to move into position to cover my fore main guns and manjuu work crews prepared to get on board I spotted Highwind gripping onto the balustrade outside her bridge, her very worried and slightly teary expression sending a pang of guilt through my chest to join with the burning sensation. And as the goal was to reassure her I plastered on my face the bravest and most unbothered look I can muster, hand on hip and jabbing a thumb on my chest.
"It'll take way more than that to bring me, the greatest battleship in two worlds to bring me down." And when she still remained unconvinced I shifted to a more gentle one. "I won't be leaving you anytime soon, so stop worrying! I have a lot more stories to share with you, Highwind."
A long moment passed, her somber mood finally lifting after some time when her lips twitched upwards a few times before finally morphing into a small smile. She suddenly disappeared from her spot, to reappear with a blink right in front of me with her arms reaching out for me. It's obvious what she wanted then.
"Oh come here you." I pulled her into a hug, rubbing soothing circles on her back as she reciprocated with gusto. She still made sure to not squeeze me too strongly, which was sweet of her. "What do you say I bring you to my former captain's cabin and show you my book collection?"
Her reply was a nonverbal nod against my chest. And that's how, later on I was tucking in a sleeping Highwind under the blankets of my bed, a book on the more famous US ships of WW2 on the nightstand by the bedside laying open on a page of the USS O'Bannon.
A.N. - Not much to say in this one, other than a more comprehensive review of the damage she took. Getting hit constantly by naval guns from all around, even if in smaller calibers will still leave a mark on even a battleship.