Arc II chapter 3

Darjeeling looked at the quiet city before her. There were no signs of enemy tanks, sans the few flagged Crusaders and KV-85 that they left behind. "Be on high alert. The enemy can be anywhere," she said after a while and relaxed, when all her remaining forces responded with an affirmative.

Yet, the fear that she was feeling, didn't fully disappear. It was only weaker, because she still had bigger numbers on her side. What she was seeing was a perfect example of No man's land or a Ghost city.

"Uhh… Commander?" the voice of Henry cut through the silence. "Yes?" she asked him back, trying her best to suppress the fear in her voice. "I-I never thought that I'd see a carnage of our tanks like that…" he finished after a while with a trembling voice and several grunts of agreement followed soon after that.

And then, she saw it. One of the two new Panthers that Oarai got. "Enemy at 2 o'clock," she stated calmly and waited for confirmation about all cannons being loaded. After all, it wasn't any of the Tigers that Oarai owned. Or the StuG III F that caused some real trouble back at the first match against Miho Nishizumi.

"What the actual hell?!" Katyusha's voice suddenly shouted into the silence before Darjeeling had even the chance to order firing at the Panther, which finally saw them and fled. "What happened?" she asked the diminutive commander of Pravda, hiding her disappointment at the enemy escaping.

"Mihosha and the rest of her force entrenched herself!" Katyusha answered and for the second time, Darjeeling's cup of tea fell from her hand and broke on the inner turret plating of her Churchill VII.

A few moments before, Oarai-Chi-Ha-Tan (or what is left of the latter) entrenchment zone

Katyusha peeked out from her parked T-34/85 and looked at the bushes before her tanks. Something felt very wrong about them, yet she couldn't tell what. And suddenly, Klara's T-34/85 was flagged from the side. "What the actual hell?!" she shouted in surprise at seeing that sudden turn of events.

"What happened?" Darjeeling's voice asked her and at the same time, a shell from one of the panicking T-34/76s tore a chunk from one of the bushes, revealing the all too familiar frame of a Panzer IV H. And then it hit her. "Mihosha and the rest of her force entrenched herself!" she announced and quickly started giving orders to retreat. After all, there could be sandbags behind those branches and sticks.

"We'll go to the city. The KV-2 must prevail!" she announced and bursted out laughing, when the rest of the surviving Chi-Ha-Tan tanks charged at them. "Fire at the charging fools!" she commanded and smirked, when six of the charging tanks suddenly stopped with a white flag visible. Yet, two of the enemy tanks somehow managed to destroy tracks of her nearest guards, before being shot down.

"When did Chi-Ha-Tan get better at this?" she wondered as her tank with only eight supporting ones entered the nearest forest to the city of Oarai. Please, KV-2! Survive! she thought and shook her head to try to make a plan, while reaching Darjeeling's forces to regroup.

Nonna looked at yet another disabled Crusader and couldn't help, but shiver. She knew that the commander of the kitty is sane, yet the disabled tanks, alongside her brother's KV-85, showed that he was also very quick, but precise, when shooting. Just like a black panther stalking its prey that dared to enter its lair in the middle of a night..

And she was the hunter tasked with taking down the danger, before he causes more trouble to her allies. There are four more tanks to watch out for, she reminded herself, when she saw something of a smaller frame and gray move into a side street. "I saw a StuG III F move into one of the northeast side streets. You can take care of it," she said to the shared comms channel and refocused on watching her surroundings, completely missing Darjeeling's thanks for the warning.

Suddenly, she felt something akin to a few dozen spiders crawling down her neck. Nonna knew the sensation. Someone was watching her from behind. Not today, she thought and gave orders to immediately turn the IS-2's hull, so it won't be easy to take her down.

When Nonna looked in the direction from which she first felt the stare, she saw one of the two Oarai Panthers, but thanks to the rotation of her tank, its shell only bounced off to a random building. And before it had any chance to escape, Nonna was already locked on it and returned fire, triggering its white flag to pop out.

But, that wasn't the end of it. Something moved behind the Panther and soon revealed itself to be her target. And so, she fired at the Tiger I, forgetting about it doing that annoying angling of its hull, but not about it being able to pen the front armor of her IS-2. And so, she gave the orders to quickly turn the hull to face him.

And it was just in time as Trafalgar Jameson sent the opening shot of their duel, destroying the left track just as her tank finished the turn.

Meanwhile, a random tree in the forest near Oarai

She put the binoculars down and sighed. Her master's plan of paying the right people to give Oarai the charging idiots as allies and Pravda with St. Gloriana as enemies was falling apart quite quickly thanks to Jameson and his Tiger I E. He somehow managed to find out about the minefield that she helped set up and also forced her master to buy the desired T26E4 Super Pershings and Maus from a black market, part by part.

That, and his success with helping that younger Nishizumi brat to conquer the Nishizumi style, instead of it destroying her personality, thus making her easier to turn to her master's cause. And all rules be damned. She had work to do. Even if it was against everything those fools said is Sensha-Do.

And with a final smirk, she pulled out a PTRD 41 AT gun from her oversized bag and aimed at the Tiger I's thin top armor behind the turret. "Sweet dreams, Jameson. You outlived your usefulness," she announced quietly and pulled the trigger, knowing it would strike the engine and kill the crew as effectively as an ammo rack explosion can.

Traf suddenly felt that something bad was coming. He didn't know how or why, yet it was there: a loud voice shouting Danger! in his head, yet when he loaded the next shell, it got quieter. "Uhh, guys?" he started to break the silence. "Yes?" George and Takashi asked back in unison with confused tones in their voices.

"I know that this might sound weird, but can you both climb up here?" he continued and noticed that both his crew members exchanged worried looks, yet obeyed him without uttering a single word. And he was glad for that.

And then it came. Just as he fired the shell and hit the driver's hatch of the IS-2, he felt extreme heat from behind just before feeling light as a feather and banging his head hard against the turret armor of his tank. And after that, he fell into the welcoming embrace of unconsciousness.

Viewing platform 1. judge's seat

Ami watched in disbelief as the Tiger I suddenly exploded and immediately called the field medics and Tsuneo to pick up both the crew and their tank from the battlefield, while she rewatched the slowed down replay of the situation, noticing something she thought was impossible to happen - someone with an AT gun tried to assassinate a competing boy crew.

Yet, there were the unanswerable questions: Who and why did it? I'll ask Tsuneo about it, when he gets back, she thought firmly and sighed in relief, when she saw the three boys in the turret unconscious and with some nasty burns, but alive. Yet, the only thing she knew that would be a pain in the ass was repairing the ruined Tiger I, which somehow was still looking proud as ever.

And as she shook her head, she called the ambulance to pick up the wounded boys.

A/n:

Hey guys! Sorry for the late chapter, but I was on a camp for 14 days and the author's block was a bitch again. Also, nothing to see here, it is just a cliffhanger.

See ya later!