Chapter 23

Traf was done with checking the Tiger I, when he heard a rumble of an engine, he thought that he wouldn't hear at least in a while. It had been almost two weeks since the battle with Pravda and no one had heard about the school sending a tank in the near future. And yet, here it was: a T-34/76 with almost faded mud green camouflage and the symbol of Oarai in the same condition.

"I wonder how it got in here and this fast…" George muttered as he too noticed the tank. "I don't know, but with the upgrade kit, we'll have a fast heavy-hitter MT at our disposal. It would be able to outrun the Panzer III and avoid us getting into the Maus's ambush," Traf responded and sighed in relief.

Suddenly, the driver's window and the commander's hatch opened and three boys exited the tank. They quickly got in line and saluted. The leftmost one had red hair and blue eyes, the one in the middle had blonde hair and almost grey eyes and the last one had brown hair and eyes. They all were wearing ushankas and Soviet tanker uniforms.

"Товарищ, allow me to introduce us! My name is Boris, and these two are Ivan and Grigori," the blonde one said with a clear Russian accent in his voice and pointed respectively at his comrades, which nodded, when their names were spoken.

Ivan - the redhead - was the loader of their crew, while Grigori was driver and radioman, which left Boris as the commander and gunner. "And I am Trafalgar Jameson, Kommandant of this beauty behind me," he pointed at his tank, "and these two are George and Takashi, my radioman and driver and also backup gunners, when something happens to me."

"Can you show us how you can operate with your tank?" Miho's voice asked from behind and caused Traf to jump in surprise. "Damn… stop that, Kommandant," he said with a bit of irritation in his voice, which was rewarded by both Takashi and George laughing their asses off.

The trio of newcomers nodded and got quickly inside their tank. It sputtered to life and sped off towards the end of the line of garages.

Boris and his two friends had a great time. They could show off their driver's skill well enough and still enjoy the smooth ride, while preparing for a shooting exercise. After all, they wanted to do their best to impress the first ever boy crew in Sensha-Do that was also a living legend in their eyes.

"Do you copy?" asked suddenly the voice of Trafalgar asked through the comms. "Да," Grigori answered. "Great. About 200 meters north-west is the shooting range. We'll look at your reloading speed and shooting there. Over," and with that, Trafalgar terminated the connection.

"Are you sure? Katyusha-sama would get angry, if we do it," Ivan stated with worry in his voice. "She'll understand. And Nonna-san would calm her down and lower the punishment… probably," Boris said and chuckled.

"Ya always wanted to beat her, да?" Grigori asked right as their tank stopped at the shooting range. Boris only nodded in response and Ivan loaded an APCR shell into the F-34 cannon's breech. "Loading complete!" the redhead announced and Boris took aim at the closest prepared dummy tank: a Panzer 38 (t).

Three days after the semifinals, somewhere in Aomori prefecture

"You three!" the voice of Katyusha boomed in Boris's room as she entered it. Ivan and Grigori shared a worried look with him before snapping into attention. It was Katyusha after all and squatting in a room like gopniks was frowned upon by her.

"Да, сестра?" Boris asked and reached out to try and pat her. Of course, she backed away and jumped on his bed to make herself bigger. "I chose you to deliver one T-34/76 to Oarai," she started her announcement, "it would be ready in two days. And no gopnik acts!"

Boris nodded and waited until she left. "Wanna be my crewmates?" he asked his friends. This was their chance at joining forces with the first ever boy crew in Sensha-Do that even managed to almost outgun Nonna herself.

"Да, товарищ!" Ivan and Grigori said in unison. Sorry, sis. We won't part with the tank! Boris thought and sneaked into Katyusha's room for a manual to help them with operating the tank.

Miho sighed, when she saw that it took almost two times longer than normal for the T-34/76 to take aim, compared to the slowest of Pravda's loaders. "Same issue as with the first T-34 tank crews… Slow loading and aiming…" Trafalgar muttered next to her with clear disappointment in his voice.

BANG! the cannon of the most produced WW2 tank announced as the shell flew towards the dummy Panzer 38 (t). Bad aiming and loading speed, but better accuracy than expected. With a bit more training and the upgrade kit for their tank, it would change to good at best, OK at worst, her inner self noted as the shell surprisingly hit the commander's hatch of the light tank.

Suddenly, she saw Saori and Yukari run to her. "Miporin! They found another tank!" Saori shouted and caught her attention. "Which one?" she asked. "A Type 3 Chi-Nu!" Yukari responded instead. To say that Miho was surprised would be the understatement of the year. That tank never saw combat, yet it was said to be comparable to both M4 Sherman and Panzer IV.

"Is that a T-34/76 model '43?!" Miho simply nodded at her loader's question. "And it seems that it's crew's commander is related to Katyusha," George's voice added. Miho turned to him with a raised eyebrow. "He has the same vibe as her, but less pronounced with cockiness," the radioman of the Tiger I explained. He has a point… Miho thought and turned back to watch the T-34 as it shot at the sister /85 variant of it.

The shell, to no one's surprise, bounced but the crew didn't give up and fired again, this time hitting the driver's window and disabling the tank. "We still have two weeks before the finals. Leave their training to me and their loading speed would lower," Trafalgar announced as he pulled out the Panther's remote control and touched several buttons.

"Where did you get that?!" Saori asked. "I just asked for permission to use it today as a part of training for you." That surprised Miho, but the surprise only deepened as the Panther drove out of the forest and went to a halt and fired at the dummy Churchill a second later, disabling it.

Miho watched the remote controlled Panther as it started circling around the T-34/76, earning several cries of "Сука блять!" from the crew as it struggled to rotate it to get a shot at the Panther. "They're more Russian than Katyusha," George smirked and Miho rolled her eyes at that.

And after the Panther finished the fifth circle around the confused T-34, a single shell left the 7,5 cm KwK 42 L/70 and white flagged it. Interesting tactic with a Panther dummy tank against a newbie crew… her inner self said and Miho silently agreed to that.

Tsuneo smiled as the three girls helped him with finishing the final touches on the former Panzer 38 (t), now converted into a Jagdpanzer 38 (t) Hetzer. Buying that conversion kit was a very smart decision coming from the SC, because they now have a stronger gun, capable of harassing other tanks.

"Prepare the T-34/85 conversion kit. We'll leave the repairs of the Type 3 Chi-Nu on the automotive club," he announced as he looked on the T-34/76 that was towed inside the garages by the Tiger I, which left about five minutes ago. It was white flagged and had a hole in its rear armor, most likely made by the dummy Panther toy of Ami Chono.

To his surprise, three boys left the tank after the Tiger I stopped. One had blonde hair and gray eyes, another had blue eyes and red hair and the last one had brown hair and eyes. Suddenly, one of the trio of the new mechanics held her head as if in pain and started falling towards the ground.

Tsuneo quickly grabbed her and put her slowly on the concrete floor of the garages. And as he looked up, all six boys were already gathered next to him. "Do you know why that happened?" one of them asked. "I think that the T-34/76 somehow brought back some of her memories," Trafalgar responded and Tsuneo nodded. It made sense, since he knew about the trio being brainwashed by Raven's Nest.

"Would you two bring her to her apartment?" Tsuneo asked and the two other girls nodded and did as they were told. "And we'll help install the conversion kit, since you wanted to do it anyway," Takashi said and brought a small smile to Tsuneo's lips at that display of eagerness to help.

"Alright! First, you…" Tsuneo pointed at the redhead. "Ivan, Товарищ!" he responded. "... Ivan, bring me a welding torch. We need it to fix that hole. Secondly…"

And after six hours, the T-34/76 was finally converted into T-34/85, but had no compatible ammo and the fuel tank needed to be refilled, due to it being emptied to avoid accidental fire, when working on it.

Amai woke up in an unfamiliar bed with Hina and Nina looking at her with strange and emotionless faces. "Hina-chan? Nina-chan? Where am I?" she asked them. "Who are Hina and Nina?" Hina's voice was almost robotic. "What? Are you two pulling a prank on me? You two are Hina and Nina!" Amai said with a bit of frustration in her voice.

"These ones don't have a name," Nina responded with Hina simultaneously in a very scary way. What the…?! she thought and after that she remembered something that was very out of character for her: mindlessly obeying an order from someone that told her to murder innocents in CV 33s and Semoventes and frame a boy crew for it, only to be stopped by said boys and then agreeing to be a mechanic for Oarai's Sensha-Do team, led by Tsuneo Nishizumi of all people.

Her head throbbed in pain after seeing all those painful memories of the last five years. Suddenly, a cup of water entered her vision and she took it and greedily drank it all. The headache eased a bit after that, but it was bearable now. And so, she slowly stood up and walked over to the sink to refill the cup.

This time, she drank the water more slowly and the headache disappeared completely. This is better, she thought and weakly smiled. Her mind was finally fully free of the Masked man's influence, but still her friends were under it. And she'll find a way to free them at any cost. His plans would fail, if she succeeds, but if she fails, there won't be any hope left for democracy and freedom on Earth.

Meanwhile, School carrier Graf Zeppelin

Fritz looked at the blanket that covered their tank. He was sure that it would be either a Panzer IV H, Tiger I or Tiger (P), due to its shape. Helmut, Karl, Hans and Franz grabbed it and waited for his signal to lift the blanket. They trained on a Panther to hone their skills as a crew and today was the day, when their training with it was finished.

"Do it," Fritz said and the blanket fell on the floor, revealing… a Panzerkampfwagen VI Tiger I ausführung E. This one had its number lower than Kommandant's own has, but it was also legendary. "Nummer 131…" Hans muttered with shock in his voice. "The last functioning Tiger I outside Sensha-Do has the same one," Karl announced at that.

"We'll surely win the Tournament with this beast supporting Kommandant!" Franz cheered and high fived with Helmut. "Alright, we'll train with it, starting tomorrow Nachmittag," Fritz announced and gave his crew the signal to go home for today. They'll need it after all.