24th May 1941.
King George V, who is leading her little merry band, suddenly gets a terrible feeling. "I fear we may be too late…" she says over the radio.
Victorius asks, "Why is that, George?"
KGV responds, "Just… a gut feeling… keep going."
Victorious encourages her, "Don't worry. George! With me here with you, we're sure to achieve victory!" The Carrier's confidence in winning yet reluctance to accept missions all the time baffles the Battleship.
Repulse chimes in, "Yeah, you worry too much, George! Your newest sister is with Lady Hood!"
KGV mutters, "That's what I'm afraid of…" she speaks more clearly, "Suffolk is telling us Bismarck is now further south. She must've either avoided or escaped Wales and Hood. Adjust your headings."
Norfolk and Suffolk ready their weapons as a large contact emerges from the fog. To their surprise, it's a friendly. Suffolk contacts her, "Lady Prince of Wales!? What happened!? Where's Lady Hood!?"
They hear only Captain Leach's voice, "Norfolk, Suffolk, Wales is severely injured… I'm afraid Holland and Hood are… dead…" he and Suffolk hear Norfolk start to cry.
While Lütjens thinks, Bismarck decides to test the waters and take a gamble. She jumps over the railing on her ship, much to the shock of Lindemann who was stood with her to inspect the damage to her bow. Ignoring Lindemann's yells, Bismarck lands on the water and looks down at her feet. She's standing on the water as if it was frozen. She carefully skates over to Hood's floating cubes like being on an ice rink. She picks them up and they hum a soothing noise. Bismarck looks at them and thinks, "Now we can help your friend, Zero…" having no pockets and knowing Lindemann is watching her, she pretends to mourn Hood by taking off her hat. With it hidden in front of her, she puts the Cubes in it and puts it back on her head. The hat has enough slave inside to conceal them. She skates back to her ship, jumps high and lands on her deck, making sure her hat doesn't fall off. Lindemann asks what she was doing and she lies, "…I just thought her Cubes would be there… so we could properly send her off for them…"
He's surprised by her apparent care and respect for an enemy and says, "I see. I take it they went down with her ship?"
She just solemnly nods. They head back to the bridge where Lütjens is giving an order to Eugen, "You need to split off of we encounter any more Royals, Prinz Eugen."
Eugen argues, "Allow me to help you fight with you on the way there, Herr Admiral! They can send Scharnhorst and Gneisenau in our place!"
Lütjens shouts back, "Do not argue with me, Eugen! We cannot lose a Battleship and a Heavy Cruiser in the same operation!"
"But Herr Admiral!" Eugen tries, until Bismarck's voice interrupts them.
"Eugen." Her leader says, "Obey orders. Stick with us as we head to Brest. If we come under fire again, you must leave us and save yourself. Don't worry about us. We've just seen what my firepower is capable of and I'd rather you not risk your life protecting a doomed Battleship in the middle of the North Atlantic. Plus, we need you do move ahead of me to provide forward radar coverage."
Eugen stays silent for a solid 10 seconds. Usually she'd be tempted to make a teasing joke about leaving Bismarck alone with two men in the middle of nowhere, but she doesn't like the idea of leaving one of her comrades to the wolves. She feels the comforting hand of Brinkmann on her shoulder and finally relents, "…Jawohl, Lord Bismarck…" and moves ahead of her.
"Danke, Eugen. Make us proud." She puts down the radio and Lütjens gives her a nod of appreciation. Bismarck suggests, "Sir. I recommend you and Käpitan Lindemann transfer to the Prinz Eugen and allow me to return on my own so that you are both safe from the Royal Navy. They're no doubt about to start hunting me down for this."
Lütjens states, "I'm afraid we were given strict orders to stay with you, Bismarck. You're too important to be left on your own and now that you have to return, Rheinübung has effectively failed. This was probably our last chance, so now the U-Boat flotilla will likely be used for commerce-raiding instead. We are to stay with you to deliver the bad news to Raeder, and honestly, I'd rather not be without a Battleship on my side when Ciliax and Scharnhorst find out."
Discouraged that it's her inability to avoid the Royal Navy and that she'll be unable to focus all of her attention on the enemy if she's ambushed due to them being on board, Bismarck has no choice but to comply, "Understood, Herr Admiral, but why not go back through the Strait and back to Bergen?"
He explains, "Like you said, there's no doubt that the Royal Navy will be after us even more now. The fleet at Scapa Flow will most likely be scanning the North Atlantic, so we must keep heading south and head for the Vichya Dominion where the other Battleships are. Without them and Tirpitz with us, this whole damn operation was doomed from the start…"
Bismarck gets little sleep that night. In fact, nobody gets much rest. Zero visits again, having seen Hood sink in spectacular fashion. Bismarck grabs the Cubes out of her hat on her nightstand and says, "Here they are... What now?"
Zero takes them and smiles, "Thank you. You're now one step closer to having the rigging I promised you. Once Alpha is free, we'll be able to work together on summoning it."
"Ja… if it's as useful as you say, surely we can win this war. To crush the rest of those monsters and rescue the humans they've enslaved."
Zero nods, "Indeed. When you make it back to Brest, I will come and get you and we will devise a plan to attack Scapa Flow and rescue Alpha. With our support, the Crimson Axis of Iron Blood, Sardegna and the Sakura will be the most powerful Navy the world has ever seen, with you, The Iron Chancellor, as one of the 3 great leaders, along with The Eternal Flagship and the Great Shrine Maiden." Bismarck nods and Zero vanishes through her portal again. Before she knew it, the sun had come up again. Having had no sleep, Bismarck sighs and gets dressed.
"…Der Eiserne Kanzlerin…"
The Kansen enters her bridge to see Lütjens looking troubled. "Herr Admiral?"
He looks at her, and then back out at sea, handing her his binoculars and pointing, "Do you see them?"
Bismarck looks through them and sees three ships on the horizon, one of them trailing smoke. "Ja."
He solemnly says, "They're the Battleship and two Heavy Cruisers we encountered in the Strait. They're broadcasting our exact location. To them." He points over to the right.
She looks over and her eyes widen. There, much further away, she sees another Battleship identical to the other one, accompanied by another Battlecruiser and an Aircraft Carrier. "Scheisse…" she whispers.
Lütjens says, "We're going to have to tell Eugen to escape while we cover her. We may very well die in this damned ocean..."
Bismarck thinks about the promise of a great, all-powerful Crimson Axis if she makes it. She looks at him and proclaims, "Herr Admiral, I must insist that we retreat into U-Boat territory and towards Brest."
"We shall, Bismarck, but we must make sure Eugen makes it to safety first." He responds.
King George V sees Bismarck Prinz Eugen to the front left and her damaged sister to her front right on the horizon. She radios, "Wales!? Is that your ship smoking!? What happened? Where's…" her question is answered by her sister's soulless voice, her pronunciations hindered by her split cheek.
"She's dead, sister. Hood was sunk by a single shot fro' that 'onster… I failed her, I failed you and I failed Her 'ajesty… I should just let that 'attleshi' sink 'e for 'y uselessness..." she charges forward at Bismarck, having knocked out Leach who tried to stop her.
"What!? WALES, NO!" KGV yells as she sees her sister get closer to Bismarck.
Lütjens sees a rain squall developing overhead as the enemy Battleship gets closer with her Cruisers. He radios, "Eugen. Break off. We'll cover you."
Eugen says, "To Brest, Herr Admiral?"
"Take some convoys out first. Return when you're out of ammunition or energy." Bismarck adds.
Eugen replies, "Of course, Lord Bismarck. Good luck."
"Danke, Prinz Eugen. Goodbye." Bismarck answers.
Bismarck's finals words to her sends cold shivers down her spine. Hesitantly, Eugen speeds off while Bismarck uses the rain squall to turn around and present her broadside at the British Battleship again.
The German Battleship lets off a salvo that puts the two Heavy Crusiers on edge, but they remain undeterred. Wales almost regrets them not hitting her. "I can't even 'e a good enough target… and now the escort has esca'ed…" she accidentally says over the radio.
Norfolk says to her, "Miss Prince of Wales… it's not your fault…"
Suffolk begs, "Please, Miss Prince of Wales! Return to port for repairs! You can't even speak properly now!"
"Wales! Call off your pursuit now! Let us handle her!" George demands. Wales just ignores them and switches off her radio.
After trying and failing to scare off her pursuers, Bismarck gets back on course for Brest. She stares down both the three that had followed them and the other three that are now hunting her. She looks over at Eugen's ship disappearing over the horizon and says to herself, "Eugen, my friend… please… be safe…"
Suddenly she notices that the Aircraft Carrier had broken off from the formation…
KGV commands, "Victorious, immobilise her!"
Victorious reluctantly obeys. "Fine, but just this once! I won't help you with your missions a second time! O beautiful world, sing to me a song!" She yells as she launches her torpedo bombers. They glow red as if to announce that their attack will be more powerful than usual.
KGV watches them fly, but Victorious gets confused as the sea fog rolls in again so her planes target Norfolk instead. KGV yells, "Victorious, check your fire!"
Victorious corrects it before her planes attack. "Oops, sorry, Norfolk!"
Norfolk radios back, "You scared me, Miss Victorious…"
KGV breathes a sigh of relief, "Will you concentrate for God's sake, Vic?" Repulse holds back her laughter, both her and Victorious unaware of Hood's demise. KGV had not yet told them.
Bismarck sees the mishap and it has allowed her to take aim with her AA guns. "Ich lasse mich nicht von einem verdammten Flugzeugträger versenken!" she yells out. The planes circle around and then fly close to the water. She fires her AA guns, she misses them, but only one torpedo hits her. It explodes against her thick armour belt.
"Damage report!" Lütjens calls out.
Bismarck grunts, "Ugh… just… just a dent, sir. No significant damage." A bruise forms on her side to reflect it.
Victorious radios her comrades, "I hit her. If only our enemies would just surrender…"
KGV sees where Bismarck is retreating to and says, "All ships, adopt zig-zag manoeuvres! We've entered U-Boat territory!" They all comply, but groan in frustration as they were struggling to catch Bismarck to begin with thanks to her impressive speed for her size. They all enter into another huge cloud of sea fog. Suffolk keeps losing her until she disappears completely from her radar.
Bismarck takes advantage of the sea fog and the slowed fleet to circle around behind them, allowing her to slip past and head East again towards Brest, while the Royal Navy ships all continue West to search for her…