Failure to plan is planning for failure. Keeping that in mind, I decided to observe the abyssal base for a day or two before attacking. Roughly 200 ft underwater, the base was a series of trenches dug into the seafloor, and alongside the walls of the trenches were what appeared to be doors and windows. Essentially their base was a network of rooms built just under the surface of the seafloor. I'm not sure if other bases would have different designs though, because most of the ocean is way too deep to build seafloor bases. Oh well, one thing at a time. The weirdest thing was that I almost missed the base at first. It looked like normal seafloor, but I felt something off. When I focused, I was able to see and hear the base, but if I relaxed as normal it disappeared. Weird.
It had taken a few hours, but my crew and I finally managed to classify every track we heard. In total, there were 37 vessels we could count. Of them, all but one were small submarines. Well, smaller than me at least. They looked exactly like the ones that had tried to grab Spence.
Nothing of interest had happened besides the changing of the guard and occasional patrols leaving or returning. I was starting to get antsy, itching to just destroy these weaklings. I'll show them true pow- stop that. Stop it. No edgy ranting right now.
That being said, torpedoing the subs from a distance seemed to be the best bet. The Seawolf-class has a full load of 50 torpedoes, and I only used 1 earlier so I still had more than enough torpedoes. Not 49 though, for some reason my loadout when I realized I should probably take inventory had a few missiles and decoys. According to my crew though, I could always change inventory by eating the weapon and reusing that material to load a different weapon. Like an inefficient form of recycling that uses magic to beat the laws of physics into submission. Now I just need to reduce and reuse. Does reducing Abyssals into scrap metal count? I mean framed in a certain way I'm creating a lot of artificial reefs. It's definitely not something I'm telling myself to reduce the guilt that I might accidentally be killing and eating endangered fish whenever I'm hungry.
As my onboard fire control systems finalized firing solutions for the first salvo of torpedoes, the sonar picked up a sound. If being underwater near a base of eldritch spirits of darkness wasn't creepy enough, there was now screaming. Joy.
I deployed the ROV. Why investigate the mysterious unidentified screaming in person when I could send a replaceable underwater robot to do it for me? Although I hoped the ROV would make it back. I'd grown attached to the little thing. Maybe I should name it. Well that could come later.
Sending it towards the source, I noticed something. The screaming sounded vaguely familiar. And then the ROV camera picked up the first images of the inside of the room where the screaming was coming from.
[JS Harukaze]
She winced as the abyssal whipped her sister.
"Aagh!"
With a pained gasp, Matsukaze collapsed onto the floor. A sadistic smirk on her face, the abyssal sub slowly swam towards Harukaze. Putting her ice cold fingers under Harukaze's chin, she whispered inches from her ear, "Don't worry, you'll get your turn tomorrow."
The abyssal then reshackled Matsukaze to the wall, before leaving the prison room. Months ago, Harukaze would've cried. But time had numbed her. By this point, she had begun to lose hope of any rescue. Even if they could find the abyssal base, which was notoriously difficult, there were just too many abyssal subs. She had counted 10 different ones alone that have been inside their cell, and those were just the ones on guard duty for the cell. Still, she had to put on a strong face for her sisters, Asakaze and Matsukaze. Thankfully, Natori, their squad leader when they had been ambushed by the abyssal, was still encouraging the destroyers and keeping their morale up. She would tell them stories, and tell them not to give up hope. With Natori doing her best to keep morale up, all Harukaze had to do was keep a strong face. She didn't think her sisters would believe her if she talked about rescue, when she didn't believe it herself.
Still, even if she didn't believe it would happen, sometimes she still hoped. Hoped that someone would come save her. Almost like a knight from a fairy tale. With thoughts of a brave hero risking it all to save her in her mind, she drifted off to sleep.
The next morning, she was woken up by a slap.
"Rise and shine, sleepyhead!" said the Abyssal, pulling out her whip.
This is going to hurt, thought Harukaze. She closed her eyes and braced for the hit.
A crack rang out in the room. It wasn't the crack of the whip that Harukaze expected though. Puzzled, she hesitantly opened her eyes. And saw the abyssal sub slump onto the floor with her neck broken, revealing an even larger abyssal submarine behind her. It was the largest submarine she had ever seen, even larger than the I-400 class. All of sudden, 4 black imps exited the sub, and started swimming towards the shipgirls.
Harukaze nervously stared as one swam right up to her face.
"Hey hey hey!"
"Huh?"
That was weird, the few times she had seen abyssal imps, they had spoken in a strange language she could not understand. And yet this one was asking permission to board her? She looked back towards the big submarine, who had a slight scowl on her face. Deciding that it wasn't worth the risk to anger the sub, she granted the strange imp permission to board her after readying her fairies.
After a few minutes, her crew reported to her that the new arrival wasn't an imp, but a fellow fairy.
"Wait, but that would mean the sub is not an abyssal?"
"Hey hey!"
Hope rose in her heart as the captain explained the instructions the SEAL fairy had given them. Tears of joy streaked down her face. She was going home.
[Trigger SSN-24]
As I used the key from the dead abyssal to free the shipgirls from their shackles, I realized the base was oddly close to Singapore. I'm assuming it was so the subs can choke off the Malacca Straits easily, but I'm not an intelligence analyst. Some of my fairies are though, the little smartasses. Oh well, they're my smartasses.
The proximity to Singapore meant that I was able to go on a quick supply run yesterday after discovering the captured ship girls. Using my cyberintelligence crew, I was able to "acquire" some funds from offshore accounts. I chose accounts used for tax evasion because what are the owners going to do? Report to the authorities that their supposedly nonexistent account had been robbed? It was for a good cause anyways.
I also discovered I can magically change my clothes into a t-shirt and camouflage khakis on land. Weird, but useful. During my shopping trip, I managed to buy food and various equipment including a sharpening stone for my knife among other things. Overall it was a productive day. Especially the part where I broke into the Changi Naval Base to borrow some (I think about 30? Haven't counted yet) instant repair buckets. It had been a while since I ran that fast, so that was nostalgic. Although usually in the past people were yelling at me to encourage me to run faster. Yesterday I think the guard was yelling at me to stop. Wasn't sure, couldn't hear him well after I dove into the water.
Now that the shipgirls were out of their shackles, I passed them each a repair bucket and a bottle of coconut water from the weird storage space in my rigging. Crew doesn't know much about it, they just say try to keep less than 500 lbs in it. A weird storage space that holds 500 lbs. It's almost like the person who put me here has a sick sense of humor and is also a fan of DND. Weird.
The shipgirls hesitantly drank the buckets, and with a glowing they began to change. Dirty skin and ragged clothes became clean again. They went from unhealthily skinny to normal again.
Thank God I thought. Hopefully we won't have to deal with starvation issues.
As the shipgirls started to drink the coconut water, a knock on the door was heard. They all froze.
Ah, fuck. Here I go killing again. As fast as I could, I opened the door and grabbed the Abyssal sub's head. A hard twist and the sub went limp. Then I slowly dragged the body into the room and closed the door.
I should probably enact the escape plan quickly, before more abyssals start wondering what's happening in the prison cell. Using the light on my ROV, I flash in morse code to the shipgirls, "GR". They understood, and the oldest looking one started using hand signals to coordinate the other girls. Meanwhile, my SEALs disembarked and began swimming back to me. After they got on, it was time.
I cracked the door just enough to get a clear line of fire for my starboard torpedo tubes. And then I fired. A MOSS Mk70 swam out. It was like a small torpedo, except instead of explosives it made noise. Usually it would make the same noise as the sub that launched it, to act as a decoy. This one though, had a special recording. After travelling a mile, it started screaming. I managed to record Spence's screaming from a few days ago, along with the noise she made while moving at speed. A few pitch adjustments and it would hopefully be a good bait.
Apparently Spence's screaming is the equivalent of catnip to Abyssal subs. Every single sub besides the ones asleep after night duty chased after the MOSS, like a swarm of piranhas tasting blood in the water.
As they caught up to the MOSS about a mile away from us, the beautiful music started.
One by one, the abyssal subs exploded. Creaking hulls and unholy shrieks filled my ears. I started giggling. The abyssals had run into the minefield I set up earlier.
The Seawolf-class can carry roughly two Mk67 mines in the place of a Mk48 torpedo. Essentially a modified Mk37 Torpedo, the Mk67 mine would basically sit on the seafloor until it detected a target. At that point, it would activate and move towards the target, which it would hopefully reach and sink via explosives. It had taken a lot of cans of spam and other snacks to refill the unending abyss that is my stomach, but I managed to set a minefield consisting of 60 Mk67s set to home in on the sounds of an Abyssal sub.
While the mines were going off, I fired a torpedo. Using wire guidance, I directed it through a window into the room where the night duty subs were sleeping. The shockwave from the explosion managed to take them all out. Four kills from one shot, because we need to reduce, reuse and recycle! I still have no idea how to reuse a torpedo, but at least reduce was going well.
And then there was one.
[Abyssal Cruiser]
Paperwork was peaceful. Occasionally boring, but to her it was better than combat. Combat was loud and dangerous. Perhaps this was why her Princess always left her behind to do paperwork; she was the only cruiser that never complained about paperwork duty. Well, after the disastrous assault on Singapore she was the only cruiser left.
The assault force was meant to retreat after a few days of fighting, in order to trick the humans into thinking they had wiped out the Java Sea Princess' forces. Instead of a few losses as planned, though, the entire surface force that landed at Singapore was wiped out. Heavy artillery, airstrikes, and mines turned the small city into a meat grinder for the Abyssals. Technically, the plan worked because the humans thought they had defeated the Java Sea Princess. Mostly because by most definitions they had defeated her.
Fortunately, her Princess had already ordered more reinforcement units to be made from the Midway Soul Forges before the operation. They were brand new units, first of their type built. And right now, her princess should be on the way back, ready to wreak havoc and destruction on the humans- BOOM!
What the- ?
Suddenly more explosions rang out, shaking the room each time. Until they finally stopped.
Did those stupid subs detonate the ammunition bunker?
Frowning, Abyssal Cruiser opened the door to check what had happened. She saw a strange black blob, floating just a short distance away from the door.
"Huh, it's actually kinda adora-AAH, NOO!-" BOOM!
Aboard the black blob that was a Seal Delivery Vehicle Mark 9, two fairies hi-fived each other to celebrate a successful kill using a Mark 37 torpedo.
[Trigger SSN-24]
After retrieving the Mark 9 SDV, I flashed "AC" to the shipgirls. Taking the cue, they left the room and started to swim to the surface. Their radios were working, although their rigging had not reappeared because there wasn't enough raw materials for the instant repair buckets to regenerate the rigging. Still, they would be able to call for help. In the meanwhile, I'd stick around the base to gather information on the Abyssals and also to guard the shipgirls from enemy subs until they could be rescued.
That dead abyssal cruiser had been surprisingly organized. Thanks to that it only took me and the ROV an hour to scan all the documents and paperwork we could find. And just in time too. My sonar picked up a helicopter coming in close. That was my cue to leave. I sprinkled a few more mines as I left, and fired off two sound decoys in case the heli tried to sink me. I slipped away, a successful raid complete. And yet I could not rest. The files recovered from the Abyssal base had revealed a time sensitive target. The kind that would place millions of lives at risk if I couldn't stop it in time. No pressure.
[JS Harukaze]
As the winch finally pulled Natori into the helicopter, Harukaze let out a breath she didn't know she was holding. It was over. The humans had found them and they were heading home. All thanks to the scary-looking but surprisingly nice sub. Apparently her name was Trigger. Her SEAL had told Harukaze to tell Naval command that Trigger was friendly to humanity, despite being part Abyssal. And if that wasn't weird enough, she was designed in the Cold War too! Although for some reason she didn't mention what class. Harukaze supposed Trigger must have had her reasons. Still, for the first time in forever, Harukaze looked forward to tomorrow.