8190. Any attempts to summon shipgirls who were never laid-down are to be first authorised by the resident admiral.
Vanguard looked at the machinery before her, it was a rather impressive set-up by all accounts, it had taken months to recreate the machinery that had almost landed South Dakota in a brig, but had given Shimakaze three sisters in the process, It was an impressive accomplishment by all accounts, but like any good mad scientist Vanguard could see room for improvement, namely if you could make new shipgirls from an existing one, why couldn't you make a new shipgirl using a combination of shipgirls; now anyone rational would have shot down the idea then and there, but Vanguard had perciviered and had come up with a possible candidate to make an attempt at.
"Ok then lets start, all resources accounted for?" she said aloud, glancing at the piles of specially treated bauxite, ammunition of the correct calibre and barrels of fuel, which she had quietly acquired over the months she'd been recreating the machinery, she'd learned that lesson from South Dakota, "Check, consultants familiar with the planned equipment?", she queried, looking at the assembled group of fairies on the monitor next to her, which she had persuaded to assist her in this endeavour.
"Desu" chorused the fairies in response, they had refused to attend in person, partly due to not wanting to be missed, but mostly due to the last experiment ending in a colossal explosion.
"Finally, the necessary ingredients for the experiment" she declared, looking at the three samples in front of her, all three having been chemically engineered to be compatible with one another, and in one case augmented to make up for a deficiency in the original, "Firstly the base, the ever-reliable King George V class" she noted, pouring the sample into the solution before picking up the next sample, "Next the armament, a sample of the Nelson class, modified to be superior to the original" she continued, again pouring the mixture into the now bubling solution, "Finally, to bring the whole thing together, and make it just that little bit better, a bit of me" she mused as she poured the final sample into the frothing concotion of King George and modified Nelson Battleship DNA, which settled once Vanguards DNA was added, causing Vanguard to smile, her theory was correct, "Good, now lets begin" she beamed as she hit the lever to distribute the solution in to the six holding tanks, with that done Vanguard fliped up the saftey cover on the button, which if she was right, create a force which could rival any Iowa or Yamato in a fight, "Well, I'd like to say something profound or inspiring, but fuck that and lets do something awesome" she declared, pressing the large red button, and watched with gleeful interest as the process began".
Admiral Collingwood stormed out of the command building, Vanguard had gone too far this time, he'd put up with the constant explosions, and the neverending headaches from said explosions but repeating South Dakota's infamous cloning experiment was the straw which had broken the camel's back, now he was going to deal with her himself.
"Ok, when we get Vanguard, she is mine!" he barked at the assembled force of shipgirls, most of Scapa's heavy units were away but there was still enough firepower here to take on the renegade battleship, "George, York and Belfast are with me, the rest of you I want on the perimeter, don't let her get away!" he ordered storming off towards the pillar of purple lightning shooting out of the top of Vanguards distant workshop, his shipgirls falling in behind him, he'd picked George and York because they could hold Vanguard off, whilst he and Belfast gave Vanguard the beating she deserved, Collingwood had taken some lessons from Goto and Holloway in dealing with Abyssals and unruly shipgirls and was eager to try them out, and Belfast was probably the only one above battleship tonnage who could deal with a battleship with any degree of confidence.
"Hey Admiral, I'd offer you some dutch courage but you seem like you don't need it" Belast mentioned, holding up her flask of rum, the same flask which had put Conway in traction, seeing this Collingwood snatched the flask, emptied a good amount into his mouth, before handing it back to the amused cruiser, "I'll drink to that" she added, taking a gulp of her own.
"VANGUARD!" Collingwood bellowed as he kicked open the door to Vanguard's lab, Vanguard paled as she saw the force which had been sent to oppose her, King George V and Duke of York were bad, Belfast was worse, but the look of murderous fury on Collingwood's face and the stories of Goto and Holloway was terrifying, quickly she glanced at the monitor showing the progress of the procedure, 96% and climbing quickly, it was a good think she'd made some improvements to the process, namely the ammount of time taken.
"Ok, I know I'm in trouble but can't we wait until this is finished?" she asked, throwing a thumb back at the machines behind her, as she angled the screen away from her opponents with her other hand, she just had to stall them a little longer.
"What the fuck Vanguard, we've already banned cloning, so your not getting a break like Dak, especially since your trying to give yourself six sisters!" George growled, taking a step forward, Vanguard meanwhile could only raise an eyebrow, clearly, they couldn't imagine the brilliance of what she was doing.
"Really, that's what you think I'm doing, what I am doing can give us an advantage the Abyssals can't deal with, what I am doing can help us and our allies, what I'm doing..." Vanguard declared, only to be cut off by a loud ding, signalling the procedure was done, and then the resulting whine of the power supply about to explode.
"GET DOWN!" Belfast screamed as she tackled Collingwood to the ground, George and York following suit, Vanguard, however, was too slow and so caught the full force of the blast. Collingwood ears ringing, throat burning found himself being pulled to his feet by a smouldering Belfast, a trail of blood running down her forehead, "You ok sir?" she asked, her accent returning back to her native Belfast one.
"Better than Vanguard" he replied dismissing his condition, Vanguard was embedded in the opposite wall, knocked completely unconscious, the sound George and York, hauling themselves off of the floor drew Collingwood's attention back to the present "George, York get Vanguard down, Belfast deal with that wound" he ordered, before turning his attention to the other six rather confused looking shipgirls in the room "and as for you lot I need you to, to, toooooo..." Collingwood trailed off as he realised that A) he'd never seen these ship girls before, B) they looked like a cross between the King George's and Vanguard, and C) they were standing where the machine used to be. The Six girls in question, noticing Collingwood for the first time, quickly stood to salute the confused Admiral.
"HMS Lion sir, lead ship of the Lion class Battleships" Spoke one of them, one with ash coloured blonde locks stepping forward.
"HMS Temeraire, Second ship of the Lion class, ready for orders," said another one, this one with long jet black hair.
HMS Conqueror, Third ship of the Lion class, glad to finally be of use, sir" another one declared, moving a strand of red hair out of her eye.
HMS Thunderer, Fourth ship of the Lion class, looking forward to some action" cheered yet another one as she sprang forward, her bright blonde hair a clear indication of her energetic nature, leaving just two lions left to introduce themselves one with copper coloured hair, the other with hair best described as chestnut, except they were both looking rather awkward.
"We don't have names" the redhead explained.
"We were cancelled before we got ones" the brunette continued, which didn't surprise any of the shipgirl's present, most people only knew about the first four Lions, people tended to forget about the last pair.
"How about Monarch, and Princess Royal?" Belfast offered, pointing to the redheaded one and the brunette in turn, receiving confused glances from her comrades, "What?, they need names", she explained, the two shipgirls in question however, could only grin at Belfast's words.
"HMS Monarch, Fifth ship of the Lion class, and proud of it!" Beamed the redhead.
"HMS Princess Royal, Sixth ship of the Lion class, happy to be of service" grinned the brunette, Admiral Collingwood meanwhile was still trying to process the fact that Vanguard had somehow gotten the entire Lion class, and working out how he was going to deal with the fallout, namely every Admiral demanding him to tell them exactly how the hell Vanguard had done it, no doubt Hartmann would be leading the questioning, the man wouldn't rest until he had the H-class battleships, at least, rightnow though he had two rather more pressing concerns.
"Welcome, I'm Admiral John Collingwood, commander of Scapa Flow, this is my trusted second in command HMS King George V, now if you'll excuse me I have a list to update" He explained before sprinting for the command building, he had to get a drink, fast!.
"A list?" Lion asked as they watched the Admiral running like a man possessed.
"We'll explain later, now a little help?" York explained as she tried in vain to free Vanguard from the wall.