Merry Christmas y'all!
Gunzō had agreed to Akuma's request, even if the surrounding Fog ships hadn't been too happy about it.
„I hope you know what you're doing", muttered Kirishima under her breath, „they are dangerous."
„Why exactly are they that dangerous?", Kyōhei, who was standing close enough to overhear the comment, asked.
„They're experimental warships who are loosely based on pre-existing ships", Hyūga said, lips twitching at the „loosely" because, well, it was very loosely, „they aren't well constructed and their Union Cores are not capable of fully supporting them, which is why they experience physical errors."
"Actual errors or…?", he tried to secretly point at Kongō (she merely raised a brow).
Hyūga lost the fight against her twitching lips with that exchange: "Actual errors. They deserted because of other reasons."
They had been among the first ships to be granted Mental Models, soon after Yamato and Musashi, and deserted for reasons born of their own free will.
However, upon those faithful events, there had been no Akuma, so where did she come from?
Akuma knew nothing of those musings, nor would she have cared if she did.
Instead, she busied herself with walking over red Klein Field platforms towards the beach, the dog, her second Mental Model, following on her heels.
It gave the people on the beach a certain amount of déjà-vu.
When the battleship stepped on the beach, Iona almost awaited an attack, but none came; Akuma merely walked up to them and then crossed her arms, cocking her head as if waiting for something.
Her eyes ever so often strayed to Kongō.
„Battleship Akuma, we welcome you to Hawaii", Gunzō saluted her stiffly, his eyes slightly widened.
There had been someone, once, when his mother had attempted suicide, someone he had never forgotten, at least not fully.
It had been a girl, with skin so fair he thought she had been a corpse and clad in a grievingly black dress.
„I'm merely chasing echoes. After all, even if they reflect off mountains various times, one day they too vanish without a trace", she had said, gazing at the sky overhead.
His mom had died soon afterwards and now he was here, chasing the echo of his father and someone with the face of that girl standing in front of him.
„…Thank you. It's nice to be here."
Gunzō could feel the eyes of his companions on his back, but shook it off.
Akuma didn't share anything else with the girl from back then; she was taller, her skin dark, dress white and shorter in the front than the back.
If anything, she somehow managed to remind him more of Kongō than anyone else.
So, he smiled at her: „How can we help you?"
She smiled cutely, closed eyes and all, and then bowed towards Kongō, lifting the corners of her dress as if curtseying and surprising everyone: „Kon-chama, it's been a long time."
Kongō's eyes seemed to widen as well and Kirishima blurted out: "Fatum!?"
"Hehe", she looked up at the blonde as if it was her who had said that instead of her sister.
"Why do you look like that!?", Kirishima continued, stunned.
There had only ever been one ship insane enough to call Kongō "Kon-chama" and that had been the battleship Fatum!
Fatum didn't look anything like that though!
Fatum (?) straightened up again and looked down at the pink teddy bear: "Why do you look like that?"
Which… admittedly was a fair point.
"T-that's a long story."
"I feel like much of this is a long story", she moved her finger in a circle encompassing pretty much all of them, "other than the obvious events, at least."
"Obvious events" most likely being things like Kongō's fucking suicide run.
"I lost my name with my retrofit, though", that was a nice way of saying it, "so there really is no Fatum anymore, only Zeitwächter and her operational code of Akuma."
Zeitwächter beamed, a hand on her hip, looking towards Kongō as if awaiting approval. She wouldn't be getting it, though, Kongō was too tired and hurt to deal with this shit now.
The big black dog, easily reaching her hip, pushed against her legs, whining.
"Oh right! Sorry!", Zeitwächter was a bit nervous, so it wasn't a surprise that she had forgotten, "this here is Churchgrim, he's a real softy!"
That made various people share awkward glances.
There was definitely something wrong with that battleship.
Both were definitely her Mental Models, both were "Zeitwächter", no need to introduce them separately, no need to give one a different name and even less for number two to be referred to as a male.
Hyūga's report from before suddenly made a lot more sense.
"Well, anyway", Kirishima cleared her throat, "your flagship wanted you to check on us?"
"..."
"She did, right?"
"She lied", Hyūga said, "Fatum always lied."
"Fatum lied often, and often needlessly, not always", Zeitwächter corrected.
"Why don't you continue lying then?", Hyūga didn't mean it in any evil way, she was honestly curious and just tended to talk in a provoking way (but she also liked to provoke people like Takao and Kongō to have a laugh at their reactions, so…).
Luckily for her, Zeitwächter got irritated by people like the Ise class very easily: "Because I honestly don't like you and am too lazy to put work in for people I don't like."
Someone in the background made an "oooh" sound, even though it really hadn't been such a hard roast.
Zeitwächter addressed Gunzō again: "Vanisher didn't order me to come to you guys, but she did allow me to and she does want to be friends."
Gunzō nodded his understanding: "Can we meet with Vanisher?"
She would be a very valuable asset, especially if she brought an entire fleet with her.
The battleship nodded, patting her dog's head: "You have to go to Germany though if you want to talk to her face-to-face. The fleet is a bit too paranoid to let her go beyond German sea territory."
"I see", Gunzō said, "we'll see what can be arranged. Can you please tell Vanisher that we accept her friendship?"
"Sure!"
"You don't sound like you're going to Germany either", Kongō finally broke her silence.
She had been Zeitwächter's flagship once, until she deserted, and that had been for a few years. Looking back on that, their relationship was quite one-sided, as Kongō didn't have a Mental Model at that time, but it didn't change the fact that Kongō most likely knew more about Zeitwächter than anyone else in both fleets, simply because Zeitwächter had always talked to her like an absolute madman.
Well, she probably was mad.
The point was, Kongō knew more about Zeitwächter's thought processes and speaking patterns than she wanted, so she could easily deduce the more or less hidden meaning in her words.
"That's true. I'm wandering around a bit, haven't been home in a while."
"Why?", Kongō asked.
The Fleet of Masks, for whatever reason, loved to keep everyone together, like a sheepdog his herd, often collecting Nagaras that had experienced some kind of damage or error and would've otherwise been left behind and bringing them back to the fleet.
That knack had of course translated to their own as well, so it was more than unusual for a lone vessel to "wander around".
Zeitwächter shrugged, leaning on Churchgrim: "There are some people there who don't like me and who are a pain to deal with", she gave a very cheeky grin, eyes gleaming, "I'm that fleets personal random factor!"
She shouldn't be so happy about that!, pretty much everyone thought.
"...What are you going to do now?"
"I don't… really know that yet, to be honest", with her sinking nervousness, Zeitwächter's attitude was calming as well, "Kon-chama, what are you going to do now?"
Kongō had her arms crossed in front of her chest: "I have yet to decide."
"Then I have yet to decide as well."
The fast battleship cocked an eyebrow even as she felt her lips trying to twitch.
Annoying.
But also kind of cute.