Rule by Grathryn
6643. HMS Fern is to stop sneaking up on the Type XIV and Type XIVD subs. Even though you're a cargo sub, you have more combat capability than they have and they're getting paranoid about underwater piracy or you leading HMS Epona to their supply bases
6643a. "I'm not; they're just slow and so hard of hearing I literally have to tap them on the shoulder to get them to notice me when we're convoying." - Fern
6643b. "Fern, you're built at least three centuries after them, you've stealth and engines that are much better than their sonar." – Zephyr
6643c. The same goes for the other Tree-class, and the Umbral-class, with pretty much any ex-Axis shipgirl
Keira sighed, watching idly as the bubbles from her breath floated up towards the ocean's surface. She was probably one of the larger submarines around, over one and a half times the size of the Ohio and Typhoon-class subs and nearly as long as the Enterprise CVN-65, most of her mass was devoted to cargo.
Pushing herself to the surface, she pulled out a map and a waterproofed phone. "Okay, GPS says…" she frowned, looking around. "That doesn't look like Greenland, and of course whatever tech they're using, my systems are crapping out on. I wish Alex or Sally's friends would get that patch done. I hate feeling like I'm trying to run a Windows 20 app to pull data from a Windows 2 one." She frowned to herself. "Well, something like anyway," she muttered.
Looking around, she frowned as her sonar picked up a couple of blips a few miles away. Ducking into the water again, she started towards them.
Getting closer, she surfaced again in what should have been their sight range, their IFF returns identifying them as U-460 and U-488, German submarine tenders.
"So then," U-488 said in German, "I asked which one she preferred, and she said that she preferred strawberry."
"Excuse me," Kiera called out, causing both German subs to jump out of the water.
"Mien gott!" U-460 yelped as she landed again. "Where did you come from?"
Kiera arched an eyebrow at the pair. "Norfolk Naval Yard most recently, though I'm not sure how you'd miss me when I was right out in the open. Anyway, I was wondering if you could check something for me."
The two sub tenders shared a look. "Uh… sure?"
Another day, another run, this time though, Keira was convoyed with several of the Type XIV tenders out to one of the islands so that their submarines could take on supplies before doing another operation. At least that was what the 'milk cows' were doing, she was going to another nearby island because it had been taken by her sister, Kayleigh, or HMS Epona, after a near miss with abyssals had caused her to Awaken.
The issue was that the Type XIVs were a lot slower than she was. For her and Anna, the trip had taken a good deal less time than it was this time. She was almost tempted to see if she could find a radio station that her systems could pick up so she had something to listen to besides the steady pulse of her sonar echoes. That or drop a hundred metres or so and see if there were any interesting fish to look at.
Kicking her feet absently, she retreated into her mental representation of her old hull. Nodding to her captain, she made her way over to her mental communications array, checking it and playing with a few of the buttons and knobs before the sounds of Malukah's voice started drifting over the bridge, loud enough to be heard, but not loud enough to distract anyone from their tasks, something that was easier said than done.
Checking in with her navigator, and now actually being able to get GPS and having her instruments synced properly, she nodded on seeing they were close to where they were breaking off.
Returning to the outer world, she kicked her speed up, feeling chill salt water rushing through her systems as she pushed towards the party lead. Tapping U-464 on the shoulder, she blinked as the girl shrieked out a number of bubbles before swimming off as quickly as she could.
"Oi!" snapped Kiera, her words coming out as bubbles before she remembered her radio. "Fuck's sake, 464, I was just coming up to tell you I'm breaking off now. I'll probably be waiting for you when we head back."
Grumbling to herself, she turned, diving deeper and kicking up her speed now she wasn't limited to the convoy's depth and speed.
A few hours later with her holds filled with vehicles, fuel and metals, Keira floated in plain sight at the rendezvous point, chewing on a rather cooked fish. It was interesting just how well one could convert energy from one type to another. Fun fact, pulsing sound at a high enough power worked well enough for a microwave under water. Of course that same sound could shake things apart, so it wasn't the easiest way to cook.
Checking her sonar again, she grinned. The Type XIVs were back, meaning they could get going. A moment later she scowled, spotting what looked like a wolf pack of abyssal subs closing in.
Shifting, she mentally ordered her torpedoes and sonic cannons readied, feeling the slight shiver through her hull as the latter unlocked from their travel position.
Eyes narrowed, she checked the sonar returns again, and then a third time just to be sure of targets, before bringing her weapons to bear. Kicking her hydrojets on, she started towards the girls.
A minute later four torpedoes rocketed out of her tubes, rushing towards the furthest back abyssal.
Both shipgirls and abyssals froze as they registered the torpedoes on the move, just long enough for them to cross the distance and tear one of the abyssals apart in a quartet of explosions and a cloud of gore.
Water rippled and churned as the second abyssal took the sound equivalent of getting hit with a fourteen inch battleship gun causing the abyssal to simply disintegrate into a cloud of blood.
Reaching the last, Kiera pulled a heavy knife from her thigh and tapped her on the shoulder. The abyssal spun around only for Kiera to grab her face and stab her several times in the torso before ripping her blade across the pale throat twice.
Letting the corpse fall free, she turned to the trio of submarine tenders, all of whom were watching her with wide, terrified eyes.
"I did say I was going to be waiting at the rendezvous point, and those were abyssals," Kiera commented, cleaning her knife and replacing it. "Emphasis on were, now, don't we have a run to finish?"
She got a short, scared nod from U-464.
Italian battleship Littorio scowled as she looked around what could only be a slaughter field. More than twenty men had been killed, mostly by something with claws if she didn't miss her guess, though what that something was, she wasn't sure.
"What do you make of it, Luigi?" she asked, turning slightly to look at the light cruiser Luigi Cadorna, one of Italy's ships that made it through the war, mostly because she wasn't built to handle the fighting.
Luigi frowned, pushing her dark hair back from her face as she crouched near one of the bodies, looking but not touching. "Were it not for the fact they're supposed to be a myth, I would have said some sort of giant werewolf, Littorio," she replied. "Look, see how large the wounds are?"
"Not a werewolf," another voice sounded, making both shipgirls jump, Littorio yelping as she landed hard on her arse. Looking up, she swallowed at the sight of HMS Umbra. "Or at least, not a true werewolf, this was done by someone suffering a beast plague," the submarine girl continued. "My grandmother back at the end of the nineteenth century, beginning of the twentieth, saw something similar."
"H-how can you t-tell?" Luigi asked, picking herself up.
Umbra pointed at the corpse in front of her. "The damage to the corpse, a werewolf wouldn't have attacked that way. This was done by something that was more interested in damage than food or venting anger." She scowled at the corpses for a moment before shifting over to another and using a dagger to pry out a tooth. "There's also this, wolf claws and dog claws are similar, as are werewolf claws and those are more like an amarok's, this looks different. The middle claws of scourge beasts were supposed to be almost raptor like, and this is definitely big enough. The wounds echo it, most of the claw marks have a much deeper injury for the second and third claw, too much to be from finger length.
"There's something else as well," she shifted, using her knife to point. "Rotting flesh in the wounds, werewolves aren't decaying alive."
The two Italian shipgirls shared a look and swallowed hard. "S-so how do we stop them?" asked Littorio.
Umbra stood, looking around the battlefield. "Mercury or silver bullets, weapons edged in the same and a lot of skill at hunting and brawling." She gave the pair a look. "At least if you care about collateral. Fire works pretty well, especially since they're usually covered in fur or dying skin." Turning, she walked away, vanishing into the morning shadows.
"That just happened, right?" Littorio asked, getting a nod from Luigi. "Good," she muttered. "I don't know what's scarier, the fact we've got a rabid monster around or that she knows how to kill them… or that the Admirals aren't making her wear a bell."
Kiera frowned slightly at the sight of most of the Type XIV shipgirls sitting around in front of the TV at their base. All of them were looking between the screen and each other, discussing something.
"… Yes, she's like one of those galleons…"
"… Killed three abyssals in as many seconds…"
"… Think she might… Epona?"
The last one caught her attention. Her frown deepening, she focused on the girl that had said that, U-489, a brunette subgirl with a worried expression on her face.
"Who knows," U-464 replied. "She says she's a cargo sub, but she killed those abyssals far too quickly, and we know HMS Epona took over a bunch of islands. That's why she was there in the first place. What's to say that ours won't be next?"
"The fact that both myself and Epona have better things to do and more important ones than steal from our allies," Kiera suggested, causing the thrum of conversation to stop dead as every head turned towards her, many of which were stark white at the sight of her then the screaming began.
"W-we don't want to work with her anymore, A-Admi-ral," a rather shaken U-464 said. Kiera and the submarine tenders were all in Admiral Erich Hartman's office. "Sh-she's a pir-rate or-or a st-stalker."
Kiera closed her eyes, gritting her teeth on an annoyed groan that wanted to escape. "While I'd love to not partner with any of the girls here, Admiral," she said once he had indicated it was her chance to speak. "I don't intentionally sneak up on them, heck, I shouldn't be able to, I'm nearly as long in steel form as the Enterprise-class. Either these girls are completely deaf, pay no attention to their sonar or it's just too far behind what was in use when my hull was designed."
Hartman pinched the bridge of his nose as he sighed. "I can understand their concerns, Fern," he said. "While you're larger than them, you're much faster, seem to have a natural stealth far beyond any other submarines I know apart from U-2511, and for a cargo transport, you're impressively armed by modern standards. I'm recommending to Commodore Glenn that she keeps you and HMS Umbra partnered, at least until the rest of your classes show up." He looked around the office. "And I'd suggest you avoid approaching any other German submarines for a while."
Kiera nodded slightly.