ARC II chapter 29

Traf sighed in relief, when the new transmission was finally put in place and all that remained was putting the plates back on their place. It was even harder than he thought it would be and wowed that he'll never want to repeat that stunt ever again, even if it has a chance of winning the match.

"Finally," George groaned as the trio finished the repairs and collapsed on the ground, exhausted from the work. It was even more taxing than the time they had to put in a new engine after the old one became toast, courtesy of that unknown person with PTRD 41.

"Let's go grab dinner. It's evening already," Takashi added, just as their stomachs started grumbling for them missing lunch in favor of finishing the repairs faster, making them chuckle at the intensity of the noise.

And of course, just before they were able to leave the garage, Tsuneo decided to give them his patented "goodbye jumpscare," making them almost break into a sprint to reach the steakhouse, where they ordered their usual dinner and paid for it, despite the owner's protests that they got it for free.

Yuzu looked at the reports again, even if it wasn't her responsibility anymore, knowing that there was something off about them. Like there was something they had overlooked before. Something very useful.

So, she took the documents from more than 20 years ago and started sorting through them, quickly putting away those concerning their already owned tanks and the Super Pershing, whose fate was announced by Nishizumi's father not long after the VK 16.02 Leopard was found.

It was a long and tiring work, but she, ever the hard-working girl that she was, managed to get through most of the unread documents in two days, but without finding anything about a new tank, except the tank that was blown up by a certain headmaster of a certain university and those sold ones.

But then came the interesting part. Apparently, the Cromwell had some Tulip rockets, but they were sold… not to mention that the same fate awaited smoke grenade launchers that were compatible with the Tiger (P) and Panzer IV. It was as if someone tried to actively cut the funds, when everything was working perfectly fine.

And it was in the next document, when she finally found the reason: the SC prez, who came into her position after the current head of MEXT graduated from Oarai, somehow ended her studies here far richer than when she enrolled. She was also behind the "only girls allowed" policy and disbanding the team itself not too long after, robbing the school off of a big money injection.

And she quickly noted down the name of the woman, before resuming her previous work.

The next day…

Grigori gaped at the note that was stuck with a tape on the garage door with confusion in his eyes. After all, it wasn't every day to see something like that. Whoever made that note was fairly skilled in drawing some of the supposedly Irish symbols - mostly shamrocks, four leaf clovers and leprechaun hats.

But then, there was the fact that he couldn't read the script used to write the message and he hated it almost as much as Konstantin - but who didn't hate that idiotic bigot anyway? - back at Pravda.

Luckily for him, Trafalgar arrived soon after and read the note, before bursting out laughing at whatever contents were written there.

"Damn… who would… write in an Irish accent… thinking… that it's the only way to write English and with grammatical errors as well?" he managed to say between laughs, before slowly removing the tape and folding the message, storing it in one of his pockets.

"What's written there?" Grigori asked, curious about the message, even if he couldn't read its contents… but Trafalgar held up his hand in a general gesture for 'later' and Grigori understood that he'll wait for the others before reading it.

And yet, neither of them noticed a certain redhead, dressed in the uniform of Shamrock, looking at them from the bushes, who was as clueless about what was on the note as Grigori was.

Miho raised an eyebrow, when she saw Trafalgar pulling out a piece of paper from one of his pockets and it almost flew into her hairline, when he said that he'll read whatever was written there in the same way as it was done.

Deer Oarai,

Ah wuld like tu borrou ur Tiga 1 kru tu definitely not beet Gregor fer defeeting Darjeeling in da tourney. Pls dew it sun.

Nou 1.

"Does anyone know who wrote that?" Boris asked and Miho joined in the collective shaking of heads… except for George, who buried his head in his hands and groaned, clearly knowing who was the author of that message.

"That's most likely made by someone from Shamrock," he said as he tried his best to keep a straight face after listening to the message. But, he wasn't alone in that, because even Miho tried her best to stifle the giggles that threatened to escape past her lips.

And everyone then failed at trying not to laugh, resulting in a several minutes long collective laughing session.

"So, Shamrock is taking matters into its hands," Renta mused as he read the message from Tsuneo and chuckled. Their antics were somewhat amusing for him to watch as they reminded him of some of the pranks he and Tsuneo pulled back in High school.

And now, they think that they would be able to take on those who won against one of the best tacticians in the High school league, he thought and shook his head. Even with the help of Trafalgar Jameson and his crew, the victory wasn't assured. After all, he and the younger daughter of Tsuneo showed that Tiger I is not as invincible as it was portrayed… even if the latter was due to that mechanical failure in the latest match.

This can be interesting, but it'll have to wait until the Winter Track Cup has ended and before the Internationals start, he decided and nodded, before writing down possible dates and locations for the match into his notebook.

Somewhere in the Atlantic ocean

"Kommandant, they've arrived," Karl, the commander of the newly formed scouting platoon, announced just as several transport planes flew overhead and released several crates worth of tanks, ammo and fuel for them and Kurt nodded in response, before giving the order to open the boxes, revealing their contents and both boys smirked.

"With these, the victory is all but assured. Right, Kommandant?" Karl asked, but this time, the response came out as negative.

"Nein. Oarai is far more adaptable than anticipated and the Amerikaner have Hellcats and a T29 of all things. Also, I suspect that the Ivans would pull out the thickest armor under their belt," Kurt responded and Karl shuddered, remembering that one training match, where Север pulled out T-44/100s and IS-3s and totally obliterated their Polish challengers.

"We still have Drei Monaten, before the Internationals start. That's enough time to train our newest additions up to the standard," Erika stated from behind and both boys jumped in surprise, making her giggle a bit at their response.

"Anyway, gather the former crews of Panzer IV Ausf Ds und Panzer II Ausf Cs for retraining, Karl," Kurt finished and Karl ran off towards the mentioned crews to inform them about the development.