Blazepanzer here...and...wow...I've been out of action for far too long! Sorry about that, I'm back to writing now though. Also...gonna have to order a new copy of the GUP anime, as my season DVD copy is getting...worn. No, seriously, I've watched this series about 100 times sense I first got the copy! Gonna wait until Das Fanalie is fully completed before actually buying it, though I don't mine spoilers.
Anyways...Mostly I'm just aiming to have a bit of fun with this chapter as well as dive into Hanoashi and Miho's backstory just a little bit.
And a thank you to Pham Hng for another review, I know it's been a while since I last updated. Maho's still a girl, same as in the anime, except with a brother now instead of a sister. Or...does she actually have a sister in this cannon? She actually does as I kinda spoil at the end of this chapter. As for the Harem...I'm thinking not so much a Harem but more of a fanboy situation were some people think that Hanoashi should lead and some people think that Miho should lead, with a bit of love drama in the mix.
Anyways with that out of the way, enjoy! Note: Blazepanzer does now own girls und Panzer!
He was...quite frankly...not expecting this.
Sure, he'd seen some odd things in the past. Hell, his own passing interest in a show staring a teddy bear who always get into fights and loses was weird. Passing being a very key word with that one as it was more of a Girl's show after all, or so he assumed.
But to see his wife in a short-sleeved maid dress standing over him was something else.
"Good morning master!" Hanoashi chirped.
Miho shot up in surprise. "Hanoashi...what the hell are you doing? And are those...what are those on your wrist!?" He gasped.
"Leather cuffs of course!" Hanoashi smirked, turning around and presenting her back to him, her hands behind her. "Latch me master!"
He stared at her, confused as hell, before noticing a metallic chain in her left hand. "Rikona has corrupted you," he muttered as he took the chain, tempted to toss it out the window. But it was something that she had purchased, so he didn't.
"It's not real bondage if you can get out of it!" Hanoashi smirked. "Besides, I'm a bit frisky today."
Miho sighed, giving in and latching her wrist together. "No, seriously, when did you become okay with this bondage stuff?"
Hanoashi just shrugged. "A few weeks before the plague, I gave in to Rikona's demands to try bondage...or at least a bit. Handcuffs can die in a hole and let's just say she got a good glare when she asked me to try the ropes, but this leather stuff...it's a bit comfortable, not gonna lie."
"And when did you get the maid dress?" Miho asked, walking around.
"When we went shopping," Hanoashi stated flatly like it was the most normal thing in the world.
"So, what are you really after?" Miho asked, growing a bit too concerned again.
"Well, first, you need to lean me against the wall," Hanoashi smiled indulgently.
"Er...what?" Miho gasped as Hanoashi walked to the wall and practically leaned herself against the wall. "Come, let's have some fun!"
Miho shuddered as he very reluctantly complied. Just what the hell are you trying to get at, Blaze? He wondered.
"So master...would...you like to...to...give me a kiss?" Hanoashi whispered, trying to act quite shamefaced, but failing quite badly at it.
"You suck at faking embarrassment," Miho muttered, leaning in to give her a small peck.
"Mou! I want something more!" Hanoashi moaned, acting like a total brat about it.
Miho sighed and mentally prepared himself, before giving her a more proper kiss.
"Sorry if I came off a tad forward there, Master, " Hanoashi apologized as she placed a small stack of pancakes and a glass of milk in front of Miho."
"No, I kinda enjoyed it," Miho smiled gingerly. "You...play the part of maid quite well I might add."
"Well, I always wanted to try it out," Hanoashi smiled. "That...and housemaid was my ninth pick in career choice," she added.
"What was your first choices then?" Miho asked as Hanoashi placed her own pancakes down on the table, though she opted for water as apposed to milk.
"Hm...in order...Stay at home housewife, High school English teacher, Daycare worker, School nurse, Prison consular, Store clerk, Janitor, Truck driver, House Maid, and professional Sensado tank driver."
"Prison consular?" Miho gaped.
"Rikona...kinda inspired me considering she wanted to go into prison nursing." Hanoashi shrugged.
"That Rikona was weird..." Miho muttered.
"You can say that again!" Hanoashi laughed. "No seriously, as much as I loved her as my cousin, who the hell enjoys being tied up in ropes!"
"I still can't believe how tall she was," Miho noted. "She dwarfed even me!"
"Ironically she was quite proud of her height," Hanoashi chuckled. "And her long, luscious brown hair...ah she was the best."
"You uh...kinda sound like you like her," Miho gawked.
"Maybe I did a bit too much," Hanoashi shrugged. "Whatever guy ended up with her would have been in for a real treat though."
A few hours later the doorbell rang. Miho, rushing up to get it, found himself face to face with Hana and Saori. "Come on in!" he smiled inviting the two in.
"Sorry for the intrusion," Hana smiled as she entered.
"Why does it smell like Pinesol in here?" Saori asked.
"Sorry bout that, I had just finished cleaning," Hanoashi poked her head out of a door before still stepping out, still in her maid outfit.
"Blaze, I thought you were changing out of it!" Miho gasped.
"Well I was until I heard the doorbell chime," Hanoashi shrugged, walking over and bowing to Hana and Saori. "Welcome Masters, may I serve you some tea?"
"Er..." Hana gazed at Saori, never clearly never having been called a Master before.
"This is super embarrassing Blaze, please stop it," Miho gritted his teeth.
Hanoahsi let out a tired sigh. "Fine, I need to change into the Ooarai uniform anyways given that Sensado practice starts in an hour."
As she walked back to their room, she found Hana and Saori gazing at him funnily. "Look, she woke me up while wearing that maid outfit on, don't look at me!"
"Yeah, but you did pick out her clothes for her, right?" Hana gazed at him evenly.
"Not all of the clothes," Miho shrugged. "To be honest I was so tired that day that I didn't even noticed that she had slipped it in until she told me this morning."
"So what exactly happened anyways?" Saori asked.
"Not much, she woke me up, called me master a few times, fixed me breakfast, and then started cleaning," Miho admitted. "Other than the whole master part, it was kinda nice though." No need to tell them that she had me latch her hands behind her back and kiss her for a good three minutes, he added silently, shuddering at the thought of them knowing about that. Hana would judge him for sure, he suspected. Saori...well she could be a bit of a dense airhead and might get a wrong idea from a multitude of angles, and Miho knew he only could think of a tenth of them.
"I bet she's a good cook," Saori noted.
"Er...I just prefer the simple stuff. She's...not really that good with complex meals, but what she does cook is really good," Miho noted.
Saori gave him a funny look, but Hana nodded. "Out of curiosity, what is it about Blaze do you like best?" she asked.
"Honestly, her comforting presence," Miho smiled. "With her by my side, I feel like I can get through anything, plus she's good with a conversation."
"Alright, I'm ready," Hanoashi smiled as she exited, still in her maid uniform.
"Hanoashi Amelia Katoni, get back into your Ooarai uniform right now!" Miho fringed anger in exasperation.
Hanoashi's eyes widened, and she bowed, looking sorry. "Yes master," she whimpered, though if one looked real closely they could see a slight smirk in her expression.
"That was mean," Hana chided harshly.
Miho shrugged. "Roleplaying," he muttered. "She's not really sorry and I'm not really mad."
"But she looked so upset..." Saori noted.
Hanoashi then came out in her actual Ooarai uniform, and sat down next to Miho, petting his head. "That was a good rebuke," she smiled. "Even they were convinced."
Miho noticed that Saori and Hana sharing a gaze mixed with amusement and disbelief. "Yeah yeah," Miho sighed, letting out a tired smile. "You ready to go?"
Hanoashi smiled. "Yep! Ready for the lottery! Let's gamble our savings away!"
"The Sensado lottery, not the money lottery!" Miho sighed in exasperation at his wife's teasing.
"Lottery?" Hana asked?
"Ami's choosing our tanks via lottery," Hanoashi shrugged. "We've got a good mix, some good heavies and mediums as well as a couple of light tanks. Including s specific light medium tank so to speak."
"Sounds rather irresponsible," Saori noted, clearly unimpressed.
"Hey, it's her idea! And I don't have any practical experience with tanks with more than sixty millimeters of armor or a fifty millimeter cannon, so I'm fine with having my tank chosen via lottery. Although, I'm kinda hoping to get that Panzer IV H, as it's my favorite tank."
"Really? What's it like?" Hana asked.
Hanoashi placed her finger to her chin. "Well...it's got auxiliary armor in the form of side skirts, it's also kinda boxy and it's got a seventy-five millimeter gun, and the long barrel version...You'd actually have to see the tank to fully appreciate it, though that goes for any other tank to be honest."
"What about you Miho?" Saori asked.
"Well...it was the Panzer II F, but as of late I'm kinda been appreciating the roof-modded 5CM version...most of the Panzer II's had machine guns or auto cannons, but they did build a prototype with a five centimeter cannon, though the original had a canvas roof. The co-eds use customized roof mod for it, which looks better."
"Yeah, but it's still a tough tank to operate, the gunner has to load and operate the radio, while the driver just lays there in a cramped position. Fun to drive, or so I've heard, though if you really want a good time as a driver, try to get into one of the T-50 tanks." Hanoashi smirked.
"They are considered prestigious post, especially in the middle school leagues, but also in the high school leagues, Miho noted."
"What exactly is a prestigious post anyways?" Hana asked. "I've heard you use that term a lot, but I take it as an important post?"
Hanoashi nodded. "Well, it differs from the middle school and high school leagues, but basically there's some tanks that are considered very pretentious, Namely the heavies, but the T-50's are also pretentious in a sort of ceremonial way. Any tank with one of the team commander positions are also prestigious.
"A lot of the time receiving the command of a prestigious tank is done in lue of someone becoming a vice or deputy commander if more people are deserving of the post than open slots. That especally holds true for if they are more people deserving of a command position than command positions available. That actually happened to Hanoashi in her first year, as a lot of Nishmari's first year candidates looked promising, but between her having no practical experience and being a first year middle school student, they opted to make her the driver of one of the two T-50 tanks." Miho explained.
"So what position did you get?" Saori asked, turning to Miho.
"Well...I went to Kuromorimine and we had just begun our co-ed middle school program the year before, though mother didn't let me participate, instead she opted to train me herself in private lessons. Anyways, during my second year, we were supposed to have gone on our experimental middle school academy ship, but the reactor had a bad malfunction, and we had to suddenly switch schools and I went to Nishmari."
"Were I assumed that because he was a Nishisumi that he had years of experience more than me, so I went back to being the driver and let him command. Which was fine as I preferred driving at the time and commanding was about all Miho knew how to do very well." Hanoashi shrugged. "Halfway though that year our deputy commander preformed poorly during our first official tournament and I was selected to replace him. Miho went back to Kuromorimine and I took over as overall team commander at the end of that year. Good times though," Hanoashi sighed wistfully.
It did not take everyone long to arrive at the tank sheds, and the selection process had truly begun. "First, Hanoashi Katoni, you'll get to spin the wheel!" Ami smiled.
"Aright," Hanoashi mused, walking up to the wheel and giving it a good spin, it landing on the M4 Sherman. "Alright!" She smiled.
Miho let out a sigh of relief that his wife got a good tank. Granted, most of them would work, but commanding the entire team from a tank destroyer might get a tad tricky and the Type 89 would be weird.
"Miho, your turn," Ami nodded.
Walking up to the wheel, he gave it a hefty spin, smiling as it landed on the Tiger H-1 tank. "Nice," He smiled, taking his position next to his tank as Ami had instructed Hanoashi before.
Asuka, and Diaki where chosen next, both being placed in command of the Stug III and the Panzer IV H respectively.
Miho let out a small chuckle as Hanoashi pouted toward Diaki and muttered that she wanted the Panzer IV. Diaki shrugged, and muttered tough luck, to which Hanoashi huffed and crossed her arms in annoyance. He'd later learn that he had joined in as a loader during his final year at Nishmari, so the two knew each other, at least on a teammate to teammate basis, no further friendship or anything though.
"Noriko, Your turn!" Ami smiled.
Getting a good look at the volleyball player, Miho had a sneaking suspicion that she'd make an excellent commander, giving the right training. She spun the wheel, the spinner stopping on the Panzer III M
"Is...this a good tank?" Noriko asked, clearly not knowing much about the tank line-up, not that Miho could blame her. Having gone over the school records of the team with Hanoashi a few days back, he knew that like most of them, Noriko had no experience in Sensado. In fact, this may very well be the first time she even saw a tank in real life.
"It's an excellent tank dear," Ami smiled.
The next several tanks went through without incident, with Flint, Nova, and Sora receiving the prestigious T-50 tanks. Sure, call them scout tanks all you want, but when your facing against a fast, agile small tank with a decent gun and sloped armor, well...it's not so fun. Unless you're also in a T-50, and then it feels like you are playing Ace Combat.
When Karina got the IS2, the young girl could not contain her excitement for a few moments, before suddenly straightening up. Erwin, likewise, seemed rather excited on getting the Centurion, arguably the best tank in Nishmari's line up. He was surprised to see Asyse among the group, though, and he felt a tad conflicted about her receiving a command, given that she worked on the student council, which combined with school work was probably hard enough without adding a combat sport into the mix.
At the end of the day, however, all of the tanks were filled to capacity, and he was glad that Hana was on his team. He'd have loved to be on Hanoashi's team, but the student council didn't seem likely to let either of them off with just being a regular teammate.
"Welp! That's all for today folks!" Ami chirped.
"No, we need to record who's on what team, in case anyone forgets. And then I'm going to give the orientation to the sport, unless you want too." Hanoashi insisted.
Ami shot her a reproachful look, but Hanoashi returned it with a Nishisumi Glare, causing Ami to shake after a few moments. Hushed whispers erupted at the obvious drama, some giving Hanoashi a look of fear.
Of course Miho knew the truth, right after they had gotten done with driving the tanks to the sheds, Ami had the ever bright idea to try and falsely accuse Hanoashi of assaulting her. Shiho just glared at the instructor, and warned her expressly not to make any more issues for the ginger haired girl, and that an order from Hanoashi was to be considered an order from Shiho herself.
Naturally, this was not how the natural relationship between an instructor and team commander was supposed to be, yet Hanoashi was somewhat of a rockstar within the Zelpher leagues and the officials were not going to take kindly to someone trying to harm their star student with a false accusation.
Well...that was partially true, the fact that she was married to a Nishisumi who just so happened to be the technical vice inheritor of the Kuromorimione academy certainty gave the Zelpher league more gumption than they would have otherwise.
Miho followed Hanoashi around the tanks, collecting everyone's name. Most of them seemed nice, and there wasn't anything too outstanding about them, though most of them were complete rookies, and even those who had prior experience were mostly radio operators, gunners, or loaders. A few of them tried placing down their nicknames, to which Hanoashi politely explain that they needed their real names for the records, but promised to call them by their preferred names, which prevented any fights over the issue.
"So, Any questions?" Hanoashi asked as she finished her explanation of the sport and it's history.
"Yes...why are you the commander and not Miho," a girl in brown hair asked.
"Good question, Asuza," Hanoashi muttered under her breath.
"Well...to answer that question, Hanoashi has three and a half years of practical Sensado experience, on top of the required half year team training requirement for schools new to the sport, with two of those years were as the Nishmari Team commander. Meanwhile, I've only had about one year and two months of practical Sensado experience, one year at Nishmari as a commander of one of their T-50 tanks, and two months of practice matches at Kuromorimine, aside from the half year training requirement. Hence, she has much more experiences than me." He then gazed downward in guilt. "That...and Hanoashi has a clean record in terms of safety, where as I...kinda...don't."
"And how many times have I told you to move on from that incident?" Hanoashi chided gently. "No one got hurt, and it's in the past."
"Um commander, what accident?" a girl in black hair later learn that her name was Ayumi Yamagou.
"Er..." Miho began, but let out a small sigh, realizing that he had inadvertently revealed that something was wrong. He took a deep breath and closed his eyes. "Back at Kuromroimine last year, we were having a practice match. I was in a Panzer III J and had commanded a Stug to snipe from a cliff, one that they had no business sniping from. As a result, the cliff collapsed from the height of the Stug, causing it to fall off. Thankfully, the crew survived, but Kuromorimine has a strict policy about safety violations, and as a result I was kicked off of the team."
Feeling her hand take hold of his, he let out a small sigh of relief, and opened his eyes. He was glad that his wife was by his side during this rough revelation about his past, and as expected the crowd had mixed reactions. Yukari seemed rather distraught over the situation, some of them begin to look slightly hostile. Asuza was gazing at him in disbelief. Ayumi though shot him a sympathetic glance.
"Any more questions?" Hanoashi asked after a bit.
"What's different between the Belkan league and the Zelpher league?"
"Ah, the Zelpher league consist of co-ed and boy teams, where as the Belkan league consist of all girl teams. The other difference is that the Belkan league utilizes a bracket format where losers are eliminated where as the Zelpher league uses a split grid formats, where each team faces the opposing team, and the team with the most wins faces the winner if the other grid. The winner of that match is the tournament winner. It's...kinda complicated and we'll go into the details later."
"When can we begin practicing?" Yukari raised her hand.
"In about two or three months, sadly the Zelpher league requires several months of paper work and testing before they'll even let you in a tank during a school's founding year, and even then we'll be restricted to gunnery and driving practice until the middle of the year. After that we'll be restricted to the smaller tournaments and practice matches until next year.
"Why's that?"
"The Zelpher league requires one year of training and practice matches before you can enter the main tournaments," Hanoashi explained. "Keeps the competition competent so to speak."
The sun had well set when Miho entered his house, bone tired. "I think things went pretty well for the most part," he sighed.
"I guess it did," Hanoashi yawned. "But they kinda got a bit hostile for a bit when they heard what happened."
"Yeah, I was going to say..." Miho sighed. "Still...thank you...I don't think I could have handled that on my own, much less the Q and A session."
Hanoashi smiled at him. "Comes with the territory of being head commander...unless you want me to delegated it to you next year," she smirked.
"If there even is a next year for me," Miho muttered.
"Relax ma boy, you learned from your mistake, so stop worrying bout it," Hanoashi urged, half serious, half teasing.
Miho smiled a bit. "Yeah, you're right, I think I'll do fine."
Ami was...new to the whole instructor business so to speak. For a brief time she had held the title of head judge of the Belkan league, but after a year she realized that she'd rather be more involved in the day to day lives of the athletes than to simply work at a desk job making sure the judges were fair and balanced in their judgement calls.
Even so, she had barely begun the education process when the Sensado federation had selected her to become Ooarai's Instructor. An insult to the instructor trade agreement to be sure, as the Zelpher league was giving the Belkan league some of it's best where as the Belkan league was giving the Zelpher league...well... very under-qualified instructors. But the ministry of education was beginning to desire the Zelpher league practitioners to join in on the world tournament, and such demanded an exchange of instructors to help gauge the viability.
Obviously, the Belkan league sending under-qualified instructors was an attempt to undermine the Zelpher league's credibility, as they hated the idea of a co-ed league and a male league even more. Ami wasn't too sure how to feel about it herself.
But there was one thing that was bugging her. This Hanoashi Katoni character...what does Shiho see in her that caused her to decide that she's the one Miho should be married to. And her taking over command, Miho being okay with it, and Shiho's insistence on me following her orders after my stupid attempt to get rid of her...I'm clearly missing something here...
So she did the only thing she knew to do, she decided to actually look into her. Something she could have done from day one, but out of stubborn pride, or perhaps simply just not thinking about it, she had avoided the thought. But the way she had glared at her, her insistence on doing more after the raffle, she clearly wasn't a rookie at the team commander role.
What she discovered shook her. First of all, as it turned out, Nishmari had won a total of eighteen matches out of fifty two total matches, of which Hanoashi lead the team in thirty of them. A win record of about thirty four percent is pretty good in terms of total wins...and Hanoashi lead the team in about twelve of them. That gives her about a 40% win rate give or take. Technically enough wins to win three tournaments in the girl's league, provided they were back to back wins.
There were some matches she didn't participate in, which given the amount of stress a team commander would be under in the Co-ed league, that made sense. Sometimes, even entire crews had to take off, one of the reasons why you needed at least twelve tanks to enter the main leagues, the other was that you needed to place at least eight tanks into battle, and the tournament matches were quite rapid fire, with teams having about three matches during a week period. Then a two week pause before another three match period. Then another two week pause before...well...another match period.
But that wasn't what shook her the most. Her eyes widened when she saw what had happened during her second year. At first, she was commanding one of the two T-50 tanks. Then, she fell back to driving for a half year, before being made the commander of one of the Panzer III tanks. As interesting as that was though, especially giving the surrender of comradeship was listed as voluntary rather than due to discipline, what shocked her the most though was who became the commander of the T-50 after she stepped down.
Miho.
And just like that, Ami connected the dots. Not only had Hanoashi been a veteran tank and team commander, but she had a past with Miho, going as far as to step down from a prestigious tank position for someone who was more worthy.
Selflessness...no more like altruism, Ami mused. And I almost destroyed that... But as she thought deeper, she realized something even more damning.
If she finds out that I've never even passed my instructor's course, she could be the end of me.
And with that unpleasant thought, Ami decided to make a call.
"Let me guess, another false accusation?" Shiho sneered.
"No...though...I understand why you see so much in her now," Ami noted. "Anyways, you know, don't you?"
"We all know, Ami," Shiho sighed. "Unfortunately there's nothing that we can do...yet. They'll out us and the Zelpher league if we fail, assuming the Zelpher league doesn't decide to snuff us out first, though it'd look bad if they did."
"All because the Belkan league hates boys huh," Ami growled.
"You have her, you know," Shiho noted. "Or...you did have her until you decided to try and falsely accused her of assaulting you."
"Any chance she might be able to help me out?" Ami asked, shuddering.
"Let me put it too you this way, the only reason why she hasn't outed you yet is because of her respect for me and what outing you would do for Kuromorimine." Shiho paused briefly. "But if she ever determines that you're a threat to the safety and well being of the team, she will not hesitate to out you. So I strongly suggest that you better shape up, and very quickly. I presume you know that the Zelpher league has somewhat of a respect for her, right?"
Ami gulped. "Yeah, I looked up her stats."
"Good, they won't hesitate to hear a complaint about you from her."
"So...about her and Miho...is it because of her Sensado prowress?" Ami dared to ask.
Shiho chucked. "Well, that certanly stopped any complains from my side of the family about her coming from a poor family, even though things wouldn't have been rather different for her if the Matsumino weren't so stupid for disowning her mother for marrying into a commoner family, one on the brink of extinction."
"So she has Matsumino blood..." Ami mused. "But they don't seem to care about their members marrying into poor families..."
"The guys...they could marry a chick off the street and the Matsumino wouldn't give a care. But the girls, oh Maus no! Sure, they'll let you marry them, but you're now off on your own, young lady!"
Ami let out a small laugh. "It's good to hear you animated like this, you know?"
Shiho sighed. "Sorry, sometimes I get a bit too passionate about certain...injustices. Especially since I actually came close to disowning Miho."
"You almost disowned him?" Ami gasped.
"Yeah, the only reason why I didn't was because I realized that I'd be disowning my own child, my own flesh and blood, over a mistake. Sure, those in the Stug could have been killed, but they weren't, and Miho was beating himself up over it the moment he realized what he almost did. He could never truly inherit Kuromorimine after that, much less attend the school anymore, but disowning him was a bit...much.
"That, and you regret giving up Sachi, right?" Ami dared to point out. She knew that mentioning Shiho's first born daughter was touching a nerve, but she also knew how to bring it up.
Shiho once again sighed, though this time it was a sigh of deep sorrow and regret. "Yeah...it was the right choice, as she could not handle being in a tank with her missing right hand and wrist, much less being a Nishisumi Heiress. Better for her to be adopted by my cousin who thankfully works as a nurse and not in the family business, than be raised by a ruffian like me."
"It wasn't your fault." Ami begin.
"Yeah, but I didn't even tell her half siblings about her." Shiho admitted.
"Well, she's apparently on the Sensado team," Ami shrugged. "Hina signed the paper in person this morning, right in front of me."
"Maybe...but that doesn't mean that she'd make a Nishisumi. Not that I want to disparage her, but...either way, she's free to forge her own path with or without my consent." Sighing, Shiho mentioned that she had to go and abruptly hung up.
Ami slumped back in her chair. But I never got to tell you that your daughter has a husband now...