Tick, tack, tick, tack*

"So, what do we know as of today?" Conte Di Cavour asked herself as she stood above the flat world map mounted into the table as a strategic center. Naturally, said map being painted all over with markson points of interest and zones of above average Siren activity range. All of it within a room that just had to be painted black by design, since a large lamp hanging in the middle didn't illuminate the place outside of the table map itself all that much.

"Many things." New voice cut in, approaching from the left up to her right side. "So many of them true."

"Good to see you in good spirits, Marco Polo." Di Cavour looked at her, the back on the map. "Words from Commander Council or Senate?"

"Mateo bought himself a body pillow of Strasbourg."

"... That's it?" Di Cavour shaked her head in disbelief. "I genuinely expected more."

"It's been years now since something actually changed above us." Marco Polo waved her off with a lightweight tone before placing a hand on her shoulder. "Besides, you do know how easy it is to do our missions in our way."

"It may be easier for you, but…" Di Cavour moved her arm away from herself, making both turn to face eachother directly. "They aren't responsible just for orders. Ammunition, food, relations with other fleets. We aren't supposed to worry about it!"

"Exactly." Marco Polo nodded decisively. "Now, you know the roles on our actual top command. Bolzano is a secretary, I am the second in command along with Littorio and Vittorio Veneto is on the top as a face to our fleet." She paused, taking out her massive, sceptre-like staff sporting a white mask on the top along with a design choice that would fit in a poker-themed game character. "What if we changed who gives orders? Or something else?"

"You can't seriously plot to replace Vittorio." Di Cavour made a dubious face, almost as if she wanted to do something bad.

"Relax, I want to give her a chance." Marco Polo rolled her eyes, slightly backing away with a smile. "After all, recently she did gain the benefit of a doubt in my eyes as she didn't bother to stop Gorizia going to our ammunition supplier over resupply delay. If she lets smaller ones fight for glory of Sardegna Empire, why stop her?"

"... You are so messy." Di Cavour sighed deeply. "Any more orders, Vice-Commander?"

"Not now, take your time while you have it." Marco Polo backed away further into the darkness of the lightened room. "You never know when it's cut short…"


"So Commander Council has no intent to hunt Wicher?" Gorizia asked, as she and Roma walked down the corridor, with numbered rooms to the left and glass in between them and sunshine to the right.

"Gorizia, you sweet summer child~." Roma shaked her head in positive disbelief. "You know maritime law. Wicher is an independent party that doesn't interfere with our operations. And what he did on land yesterday? Not a navy problem. Though Sirens getting into rivers streams is an issue to acknowledge… But not by us, so don't feel guilty."

"It's not about guilt. More like, eee…" Gorizia tried to respond, but got lost for words.

"... Ah!" Roma gasped with unhidable happiness. "A class story."

"What do you mean?" Gorizia looked at her with a confused stare.

"Nothing." Roma looked away, by occasion taking a letter from a passing girl with large sunglasses and a camera in hand. "Thank you, Alfredo."

"For you?" Gorizia asked, curious.

"That would be lovely, but…" Roma looked at the letter, before quickly passing it to her. "It's for you."

"Hmm…" Gorizia took the letter from her hand, as the two took a stop in the middle of a corridor. "Let let's see what this is about." She opened it with ease and got to reading the text.

Gorizia. At exactly 12:59 there is a large shipment of raw material departing from a forced stop at Malta towards Genoa. Maestrale had to be called off given an abrupt emergency off the coast of Cyrenaica.

Your arrival to take up escort duty for the ships is necessary as soon as possible.

Bolzano

"Guess I have to go now." Gorizia put the letter down into a pocket before proceeding forward in a fast stride. "Have a nice day, Roma."

"You too, Bolzano. Safe sailing." Lady in red responded, taking a while of looking on the back of slowly shortening in the distance figure, before turning around to face Marco Polo. "Nicely done."

"No such thing. Talking is my passion hidden under the lantern." Marco Polo took a deep breath with a satisfied face. "I'm sure it will go as we see fit."

"Task switching is a plot twist worthy of a drama from old times." Roma commented with hidden congratulation. "One would normally think the signature was faked."

"No one takes the upper hand on me by just a single glance." Marco Polo shaked her head. "Now, if my assumption is correct, which it must be, then that Wicher thing will show up to help her once Sirens do their thing. Thus, pull him deeper into us by that strongly-blinked relation. And few things make a bond strong like a life-threatening experience."


"Hmm… What are Vichya doin'?" Wicher asked in his mind, staring into a distance from the water surface.

Now granted, he couldn't see anything but a horizon with some white cloud obscuring something ahead of him. But in reality, that is what advanced optics are for. And so he stared ahead, into the very busy fleet port close to Marseille. After all, given the Sirens and other threats, military and civilian ports had to be separate. And military port being unusually busy could mean only one thing.

Vichya was cooking something. And he really didn't like the smell coming from their kitchen.

"Well shit. Guess I'm stuck watching these girls for a day. Might aswell use the occasion to check functionality of repairs I made after yesterday. Listening on the radio for some actual trouble could also be useful…"


"Nm-hm, Hm. Hm-hmmm…"

"Vittorio?"

"Oh!" The called female gasped, turning around to see Littorio approach her. "What is the occasion for you coming?"

"Commander, we have received a probably falsified and unsubstantiated report from the Royal Navy that a large Siren fleet has just swam by Gibraltar strait and is now headed deeper into the Mediterranean." Littorio stated before making a confident face. "Would you believe that?"

"..." Vittorio walked to her right, straight up to the rectangular window with a half-circle top ending that gave the room a Great view over the beautiful seas away from their port. Flat, shining layer of bright blue both on top and bottom as far as the eye could see. "This sea, as you justly always like to say, supported countless civilizations and cultures across thousands of years. And still does to this day."

"That's correct." Littorio added with a smirk.

"What you miss, however, is that this sea also saw endless events that no one could even dream of at the very same time. Wars, floods, disasters at sea and coast." Vittorio Veneto said, placing her hands on the windowsill. "If the Royal Navy says a large fleet comes from the Atlantic into these waters, what makes you not believe them?"

"I refuse to believe they wouldn't just step in and take the glory of the victory." Littorio waved her hand in a downplaying manner. "But if that is your will, I make sure glory of Sardegna Empire is proven again in face of this occurrence."

"So I hope, my friend." Vittorio said, still looking into the sea as Littorio turned on the heel and went to the double door exit. "So I hope…"

Creek*

"Feeling unsatisfied?" Marco Polo greeted Littorio as soon as she closed the doors behind herself.

"There is no way that she is a flagship of our fleet." Littorio responded quickly.

"Want to talk about it?" Marco Polo tilted her head right in an innocent manner. "I have time."

"Oh, gladly." Littorio nodded as they went ahead into an unforced casual stroll. "You see, I am the greatest battleship of Sardegna. And as such I am the one who should hold this glorious mantle."

"You don't care about commanding whole Sardegna fleet as real Commander?" Marco Polo inquired.

"Being on the foremost front like the spire of a cathedral is more suitable to me than boring worries over papers or big words thrown over maps locked behind closed doors." Littorio explained in semi-poetic fashion. "On top, being confined to the office, there is nothing even close to the glory of victory at sea or glamor of camera flash. My prestige is to be expanded, not dusted over or, God forbid, changed into small pieces."

"Hm, makes me see a connection."

"You do?" Littorio looked at her conversation partner with interest.

"Vittorio Veneto is both Commander and flagship." Marco Polo said in response. "Don't you think she should be limited to something more… suitable for her ability? Without sitting on two chairs at once?"

"Hmm…" Littorio put a finger on the chin, looking slightly up. "... What do you suggest?"


"Lucky me that the ammunition I requested came at night. I wouldn't want to waste myself when there is work to do at sea." Gorizia thought, sliding in straight posture across the sea on the front of twelve container ships in a tight wedge, slowly following her figure. "One day out of commision and I already feel like I returned from a long trip. Then again, it is a correct description of what I went into…"

Doooooot*

"Huh?" She gasped at the sound signal, turning around towards the leading triangle of ships behind her. "Fog horn?" She asked herself in confusion as she saw a ship to her right light up the left side lamps.

Something was coming.

"Alright, we have to change course." Gorizia said, quickly moving back to the convoy while extending her left arm to give new direction for leading ships. After all, in a herd when the front turns then rest follows.

And sure enough, the ships did start to turn, but for all the size and carrying power they had, cargo ships are not agile. So the turning speed was, indeed, low. Getting the whole convoy to turn would take time.

Time they may not exactly have.


"Meh, I guess Vichya just has a little party or something. Bruh." Wicher said with annoyance as he took the liberty of just sitting on top of water with back jet engine support as he took his eyes off the port and looked around himself. "... Wait. Since when I can't see my shadow?" He asked himself out loud, slowly standing up and turning around to see…

Well…

"You…" He said with unesttling pause, as if he saw someone deeply familiar.

"Do you… Know me?"

"I recognize that stone-cold face anywhere." Wicher responded rudely, as if he tried to poison with words, cracking his knuckles. "Formidable."

"That's not how you address a lady, stranger." She responded, standing right before him with an imposing presence.

"I miss all the times where you act like one. My bad." Wicher crossed his arms. "That's all? Or something of substance this time?"

"There is a large Siren fleet approaching southern Sardinia." Formidable said, giving him a neutral glare as if unpleasantries didn't bother her. "We thought you would appreciate the news based on your recent actions."

"I do." Wicher said, slowly moving around her and away. "But one good deed doesn't make a redemption."

"..."

"Now follow my example and do some of these deeds too."

"Sadly, I have urgent order to-"

"*Sigh* Kujawiak was so wrong about you. You really suck as a human being."

"No need to be so angry." Formidable said, remaining rather unaffected as she watched him blitz away over the endless water. "After all, I don't even know what you are…"


"... Marco!" A call sounded across the corridor.

"Oh?" Called out person asked, looking behind herself at the incoming coworker. "Vittorio. What's the occasion?"

"Bolzano received a message from Maestrale three hours ago. Apparently there wasn't anything where she was dispatched." Vittorio Veneto explained, taking a stance directly under an eagle-themed chandelier. "And you were the one who gave her the order in hand…"

"Now, now. Don't shoot the messenger." Marco Polo waved her hands in front as if to push her away. "I got the written order from Bolzano and in such a form gave it to Maestrale."

"Alright. That sounds sensible." Vittorio nodded patiently. "I'll speak to Bolzano about it."

"I understand. However…"

"Yes?"

"Please, check if she has any cream over her eye bags." Marco Polo suggested before turning around and walking away. "Ciao!"


"Ugh!" Gorizia groaned, taking a step back as her body took a strain from recoil after firing volley from her guns forward at once. "How many of you are even here?" She asked out loud, taking a quick look around as chimera of black and bright neon colors sweep towards her in a 'C' pattern, the opening of said 'C' being directed for her to be trapped inside. "Whatever! I will put you all down." She reassured herself before quickly taking another salvo.

*Booom*

With a hit.

"Hmph." Gorizia smirked, seeing a head of Siren Tracker flying up with a blue flame coming out of the ripped off neck, leaving a trail of black smoke on the way. "One down… Eighty to go." She followed up, cocking up her guns to send another round.

"... Spread!" One of the Sirens at the front suddenly shouted as the whole fleet went to the sides, leaving a giant 'V' path in between.

"Huh? An open path?" Gorizia thought, loosening her arms down from aiming. "But why?"

*VVVFFFVVV*

"Of course, him again…"

"That's anticlimactic." Wicher commented, moving in a still pose across an open waterway before turning around to a stop beside Gorizia. "Sup."

"Helllooo, Wicher." She responded with annoyance channeled into word extension. "What are you doing here?"

"I wanted to help you with these, but…" Wicher explained, pointing ahead totwi tight groups of Siren on their One and Eleven. "They kinda subverted my expectations."

"Not that I mind." Gorizia shrugged her shoulders. "It makes my job easier-"

"Excuse my rudeness…"

"Eh? Cleaner?" She reacted, as they both looked ahead at incoming, familiar by now figure.

"This fleet is yours?" Wicher asked.

"Sirens are a collective. Command structure is very fluid sideways on the chain." Cleaner said calmly. "But enough about us. And since we aren't fighting yet. I want to make a deal."

"... If you leave this convoy alone. I'm fine." Gorizia said, rising her left arm and pointing the thumb at the rear three sluggishly moving ships.

"Naturally." Cleaner crossed her arms, sitting just above the water level. "I need one of you to go with us to the resting place of an old KAN-SEN in the North Sea."

"I can't-"

"I'm in." Wicher cut in.

"Then we are all in agreement." Cleaner smiled, turning around. "Now follow us. We have no spare time now."

"Welp, figures." Wicher nodded, going after the Siren. "See ya around, Gorizia. Be safe out there."

"Thanks. You too." She responded while backing away.

"... So. What do we go after?"

"Patience. Mechanical KAN-SEN." Cleaner wiggled her index finger beside his head. "I tell you as we come closer to the place."


"... how long have I been made to suffer in silence…" Weak voice echoed across the cold waters of the North Sea like a ghost spreading its arms over the dusted hall of an abandoned mansion.

The source? distorted, human-like entity at the very bottom of the sea, halfway on the path from body to a carcass masked gently by sea mule coverage, like a natural sarcophagus for an old mummy. That is, if the dead body was able to speak rather than having a mental episode of imagining its thoughts being spoken out loud because again, the dead doesn't move. But apparently it can think.

Of course, that assumes body and soul are the same. Which it Isn't.

"Heeeeeeeeeeeey."

"Who there?" Body asked in its mind, able to only hear but not to speak as to its rock-stable frontal glare came sight of a purple goo that obstructed de facto nonexistent sunlight that was getting down there.

"Heeeeeeeeeeeey theeeeeerrrre." Strong, propably evil voice spoke again.

"Hello! Umh... Please help me." Body said again, or rather thought.

"I caaan heeeaarrrr your anguiiished screeeaaams." Purple goo proclaimed, getting closer to the body with fluid moves across deep waters like an octopus. Moving and changing shape without stopping in an unstable manner. "Leeet me innnnn. Leeet meeee innnnn and I will show you the cause."

"C-Cause? What cause?" Body asked, moving on with the fact of apparent one-way telepathy.

"The truth of why you were doomed to repeat your tragic death." Purple goo said, focused enough to not drag its accents all over the place. "I know how you sink here for the first time. And I know why you fell into this place for the second time."

"Really?"

"Yeeesss…" Purple goo said, now de facto fully covering the place where the belly of the body would normally be. I steady filling the void from forced removal of everything within space protected by ribs from a genuinely long time ago. "Let me show you…"


"Ahh, the ease coming from the sea breeze is quite something."

"..."

"... Oh."

"Good afternoon. Lady Warspite." Formidable spoke up, slowly walking up the cliff to near her superior.

"Good afternoon, Formidable." Warspite greeted her in royal fashion. "I do sense something unfortunate from you, however."

"I had an encounter with New Wicher, per your request." Formidable report. "And I must say, the deterioration of his approach is drastic."

"But that is not all that is to it." Warspite inquired further as Formidable walked up to her side and they evenly stared into the sea ahead. "Isn't it?"

"... I think that he blamed me for not helping them when it mattered." Formidable followed up with explanation.

"Huh, so tragic." Warspite sighed afterwards. "Still, we mustn't relent in face of adversity. Even if personally charged." She paused, turning sideways and placing a hand on Formidables' left shoulder. "Whatever he may think of you, you are still part of the Royal Navy. And as long as I am still alive, I ensure every member of our fleet is welcomed and needed. That, I promise."

"... Thank you, my Lady." Formidable responded with a weak smile. "I needed that."

"You are a good person under the stern face. People outside just don't see it." Warspite added to her pep-up talk before turning to the way away from the cliff. "But now I must depart. There is a mission in the North Sea for me."

"Understood." Formidable nodded lightly. "Good winds on the voyage."

"Thank you." Warspite smiled, walking away deeper inland. "I'll need them."


"Radio? We have signal flags!"

"For King and country!"

"Fire!"

*BOOOOOOOOM*

"FIRE! FIRE! FIREEEEAAAA!"

"Warspite! You saved me!"

"It's British! SHOOT IT!"

*CRRRCCRRRRRCCGGRCRCGGGRR*

"AAAAAAAAAA!"

"The battle is won!"

"Sun never sets on the British Empire!"

"Sirens repelled!"

"No time to bury the dead, sis."

"Leave it! LEAAAVE IIIITTT!"

...

"Do you see it now?!" Purple goo asked, now surrounding a thin, weak figure of a woman covered in long, ripped sheets of metal plates and cut away pieces of her black hair sticking as some sort of joints. Both present inside some sort of gray cube, maybe a void of a mind where nothing remains?

"... I… I-I was left to be erased into oblivion." Woman figure said, her tears somehow visible in the water and moving up like air bubbles as she looked up at the face (?) of purple goo with green eyes, hollowed into near pure gray by the ages spent open underwater. "They never cared for me. She never cared for me! For all my years I didn't have multiple enemies. Be it Iron Blood or Sirens… I always had one."

"We had one." Purple goo said, ending the suggestive tone and going into stronger, more dense lines. "We had been discarded once not NEEDED enough! WE were lied to with promises of friendship only to be stabbed in the back! WE are left alone… Until now."

"You… Want to help me?" Woman asked, her eyes widening in hope just as the tone became less whisper-ish.

"YEEEESSSS." Purple goo said, getting closer to her from all sides. "I am not so different from Sirens in power. But not without a stable body." It continued, getting closer and closer at a slow, but visible pace. "Aaanddd, we have been wronged by the same liar as you. Liar who rises herself on pedestal with high standards, royal demeanor and authority. Be it sea, be it map, be it lab. But words are all she has to show for the weak."

"And she must pay." Woman said, clenching her fists with a metallic clang. "Whatever, it, takes."

"Then mold with me, Black Prince." Goo said, now slowly getting over her and disintegrating metallic sheets upon coverage. "Mald in the mind, merge in the heart, mutate with our bodyyy."

"Yes…" Black Prince said, the purple goo spreading like a tight web across legs and arms.

"Unite us two into one and grant us our joint desires!"

"Yeeesss…" Black Prince repeated with more conviction, moving up into the air as purple substance already covered most of the body and face.

"Together, we can CRUSH tombs that we were closed in for unjust damnation!

"YEEESSS!"

"One and the same. We will strike back at the blinding light!" Purple body said, growing large and bulkier all over as it crushed from beneath waters and onto the surface amidst dark clouds, 45-degree rain and thundering blitzes all around.

"WE will have VENGEANCE!"

"ON WAAARSPIIIIIIITE!"

"RYAAAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRGGGHHHH!"