>>5047906
>‘There are people in these buildings. We need to get them out of there before things get worse.’
>‘Right. Get everyone to the shelters; as far away from the conflict area as possible.’
>‘Where are the Commanders?’
>Write-In

>>5047908
>‘There are people in these buildings. We need to get them out of there before things get worse.’

>>5047908
>‘There are people in these buildings. We need to get them out of there before things get worse.’

>>5047908
>>‘There are people in these buildings. We need to get them out of there before things get worse.’

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>‘There are people in these buildings. We need to get them out of there before things get worse.’

The rush of humanity is a panicked, frightened screeching mess. You rush to assist a parent who had fallen to her knees, ushering her to go on, raising and swinging your hand in the general direction of the shelters littering the coast-line streets. This place had been a fortress, once upon a time; a strategic hub in the battle against a foe many had thought to be without detriment or counter … if any place was built to withstand an onslaught of this magnitude, this town—this island—was it. You try your best to cancel out the chaos of the battle around the coast, not daring to look into the heart of what you’d been furiously denying yourself the moment you’d locked eyes with—

There are people in those buildings.

There were those rushing into or remained in what they’d perceived as the safety of the coast-line establishments, hiding under chairs … and some more than likely remaining in the upper floors. You grab the security officer’s shoulder, gesturing at the buildings sitting across the street.

‘There are people in those buildings!’ you yell out, ducking slightly as the buzz of beams cuts the air hundreds of feet above you … and shatters the side of an office block just one street down, sending it crumbling down in a dusty, broken heap. ‘We need to get them out of there!’

You don’t know if you have time … but you couldn’t leave things as they are, either. The officer doesn’t disagree with this course of action, rushing over to yell out towards another security officer who’d joined in on the task of steering the panicked masses. You cut across the road, the whines and whistles of beams and projectiles splitting the air with a myriad of colors. As bodies move past you—the smart ones who had taken the hint and decided to abandon their makeshift shelter—you yell at them to make their way to safety—as far away from the combat zone as they could manage. You pull on the fire alarm of the first building you enter—a motel of sorts—hoping that it would be enough to give people the hint to evacuate. The only assurance you get is a trio of bespectacled revelers with torn open shirts and gold chains screeching and cursing as they rush past you.

You move from building to restaurant, coaxing people to leave their spots and make-do bunkers, telling the patrons to take the lead of the masses of humanity and to abandon the coast-line. You aren’t certain whether or not you’re a convincing set, but you’re good enough to send them all out on their way; you discourage a myriad of families from entering shops to shield them from the chaos outside, directing as many people as you can towards the klaxons and horns … away from battle. None argue with you.

That was good—

The ground trembles.

You look up towards the skyline.

A building is pierced by a beam of incredible heat and power, sending it crumbling to the ground.

In the distance, you see silhouettes of—

Your breath hitches. You fall to your knees.

‘—how long have you been out of the water, Captain?’

It was that girl’s voice. That Ship—

You’re on your knees.

Defeated.

Shivering.

Weak.

‘Such a waste.’

What was—

Another explosion. Another cry.

>‘Bismarck …’ (Rush to find Bismarck)
>‘I have to get these people to safety.’ (Prioritize the civilians)
>Write-In

>>5048622
>Pull out your Wisdom Cube and attempt to bridge.

>>5048622
>>‘Bismarck …’ (Rush to find Bismarck)
Roon imma scrap you i swear to god

>>5048625
>>Pull out your Wisdom Cube and attempt to bridge.
If this is an option, do it.

Otherwise

>>5048622
>‘I have to get these people to safety.’ (Prioritize the civilians)

>>5048622
>>‘Bismarck …’ (Rush to find Bismarck)

>>5048622
>>‘I have to get these people to safety.’ (Prioritize the civilians)

>>5048622
>‘I have to get these people to safety.’ (Prioritize the civilians)

>>5048789
>>5048744
We're gonna need her guys, she's going to be extremely helpful down the line, the civvies will be fine-ish without us

>>5049102
She has her job, we have ours. We have a good chance of keeping these civilians alive, and fighting Roon on our own is suicide. We need to get the people out

>>5049156
and yet Bisko's about to get put down without us doing something thats gonna keep her alive, sometimes we gotta be stupid and suicidal if we wanna pull this shit off right

>>5049164
Well thing is unless we can link up with her for the commander mojo boosts we're just going to be a deadweight collateral damage waiting to happen and might even be a liability to her odds at surviving.

Additionally, duty bound german engineering she is she might not be appreciative of having been prioritized over the civilians she is meant to be protecting, unless she calculates her value in lives saved further down the line, though that's a dangerous line for sentient machines of war to be taking.

Although I guess if it is indeed possible to connect to her by going for >'Bismarck...', then that would be objectively better, seeing as whatever we might be able to do about civilians it won't amount to much if Roon is rampaging unchecked.

>>5049182
thats why we need to get to her, getting the civvies out aint gonna mean jackshit if Roon tears through our girls

>>5049187
You know what, you're right. Amending >>5048726

to simply >>5048622

>>‘Bismarck …’ (Rush to find Bismarck)

Time for some inpromptu battlefield bonding.

Sorry guys. There was a passing in the family and I was roped into sorting things out for the folks the last 24-36 hours. Mom's a mess, dad's doing his best to manage her emotional state and my bro-in-law is an MVP. I'll be back after prayers.

>>5049554
Condolences, OP.

>>5049686
Thanks. Mom's still in hysterics, but dad's calmed her down somewhat. I didn't know her uncle that well, but judging by the reaction, he was pretty beloved in his hometown/among the extended family.

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>‘Bismarck …’ (Rush to find Bismarck)

It’s only a mere instant that flashes by.

The world around you continues to devolve into chaos. In the distance, beams and orbs of blue fire light up the horizon; columns of smoke erupt from buildings as a relentless assault tears into what was once a sunny cityscape, mere intervals of pause the only thing giving the authorities a chance at evacuating what citizens they could. For some reason or another … you don’t feel like you’re there. Your head turns left and light, your gaze growing unfocused with every careless bump and hit that you take, standing in the middle of the weeping rush of bodies crying for help. You can feel it, but at the same time … don’t experience it. Hazy flashes of gray, red and white slowly rip you away from your task. You turn right to see red and feel an oncoming sensation of pain that should come but doesn’t. You spin left at the next flash of white only for you to almost stumble and emerge as the target of a series of curses from an angry man, who shoves you to the ground in frustration before joining the rushing masses once again. A migraine dominates your thoughts as you scan the sky-line, drunk on something and clutching to what little awareness you—

The Wisdom Cube’s color dulls in your hands …

You abandon your post, fear grasping at you in a way you’d never thought it could.

You whisper The Captain’s name.

And you feel everything.

Your elbows pop you out of the mass of rushing men and women. None of them apologize for smacking right into you, nor are you given the opportunity to apologize yourself. You’re rushing up the slope—the same slope that you’d been on not hours prior, before everything went to hell—with the shadow of frustration and the noose of desperation tying its knot around your net. Beams and projectiles cut through where the platforms and stands had once stood, now nothing but decimated wastelands. Your mind briefly strays to Abigail and Connor, wondering if they were all right … only to get shaken from that strand of thought by hitting the deck right as a silhouette cracks not fifty feet above you, embedding itself into one of the few buildings that remained erect along the coast-line with a deafening, thunderous rumble.

That silhouette … belonged to Light Cruiser-type Jamaica.

She gives as good as she gets.

Destructive projectiles launch from the cracked nook she’d been embedded into, firing a straight short towards her pursuer, who is knocked out mid-air by the timely strike.

The impact is strong enough to send you to the ground.

But it doesn’t even faze her opponent.

‘Destroyer type … Hatsushimo …’

But this couldn't be—

‘Oh?’

She sees you.

>Write-In

Session is running right now. Sorry, was supposed to post half an hour ago, but I forgot that I had ordered dinner and had to walk my ass all the way to the guard house to pick it up.

>>5051436

>Will you come with me and help me protect my friends?

Hatsushimo is one of the raiders, or am I misreading this?
Anyway it seems she's aware of us now so talking seems to have better odds than diving behind some destructible piece of cover. Only other thing that comes to mind would be "what's that behind you?".

>>5051442
She did just kick Jamaica like a hundred or so feet into a building and Jamaica did retaliate, but I left the "Write-In" option there for you to draw your own conclusions.

>>5051445
Thank you!

Anyway, maybe asking her to join us outright is too far fetched so maybe some indignant distraction would work better.

>"Hold! What you are doing to us is wrong! Why do you do this thing?"

>>5051454
Supporting

>>5051436
>Guess you all aren't here to enjoy the festivities huh ma'am?

>>5051454
Isn't it obvious? Humanity didn't even make it a decade past the war with the Sirens before we decided to start killing each other again.
We're back to red versus blue.

>>5051436
Like many of your write-ins I'm not sure where 'player choice' comes into being when we have no tools or options and the other side is a nigh-omnipotent warmachine.

How about...

>Just keep running to Bismarck.

>>5051926
>Like many of your write-ins I'm not sure where 'player choice' comes into being when we have no tools or options and the other side is a nigh-omnipotent warmachine.
You'd be surprised at some of your fellow players. I know I've run my head into a wall at least a dozen times.

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>"Hold! What you are doing to us is wrong! Why do you do this thing?"

It’s unmistakable.

The rippling threads of the dark blue dress, those long sleeves, that set of blood-red eyes … she couldn’t have been anything but. What fear that should have swept you away … does not. You’re numb all over, fingers twitching and leg muscles replaced by cement and foundation, rooting you to the shattered road underneath your feet. The flames of her all-engulfing power radiate with an awesomeness that you’d been witness to, prior, but had never been at the brunt of. Destruction, devastation … they were but the symptoms and affects of the potential of Shipgirls. It is as though you are standing before a storm more than a young girl, more than a mere mortal such as yourself.

But try as you might, you can’t fight off the first words that come to mind … and the betrayal that eats your fear without mercy.

‘Why?’ you let out, feeling your tongue go slack even having to ask such a question.

Your answer is a … playful shrug and brief hum. Hatsushimo’s eyes are on you—no, it’s not as if she’s looking at you at all. She’s looking right through you.

A hand raises into the air, and guns swiftly move to train on you.

But you’re knocked on your butt from the sheer impact of something where Hatsushimo once stood, sending concrete, dirt and metal into the air.

Jamaica, battered and her face full of fury, glares at you from the middle of the small crater, her knee buried in the rubble and her guns rolling towards an invisible target, shakily attempting to regain their coordination. She opens her mouth to yell something at you, only for Hatsushimo to emerge from a spot just outside her realm of vision, making contact with her shoulder and clashing her guns against Jamaica in a tussle for dominance. Hatsushimo’s visage, previously one of coy, mild interest, morphs into a crazed, maddened grin as she attempts to match Jamaica for power, only for the Light Cruiser to make the difference obvious with one slam of her elbow and a swing of her guns, throwing the Destroyer into the air before peppering her with a barrage of loud, thunderous volleys; you’re sent to your knees clutching your ears, the heat of the power discharge almost cooking your face as you find yourself a witness to a combat engagement you would have never believed to have been possible before, your eyes wide and dry from staring at Jamaica’s launching of herself into the air to meet Hatsushimo’s counter, their projectiles exchanging in a tremendous pattern of bright, shrieking explosions.

Hatsushimo is pushed back towards the beach, but Jamaica falls back to the ground, clutching a shoulder and leaning on one knee. She is intent on pursuit. You—

‘GET OUTTA HERE, YA WANKER!’ she yells out, struggling to get to her feet.

>>5052026
>‘You’re hurt.’ (Move to assist her)
>Get to Bismarck
>Abandon your mission and get to the shelters
>Write-In

>>5052026
>>Get to Bismarck
need to get Bisko up and running at full power

>>5052026
>Get to Bismarck

>>5052027
>Get to Bismarck

>>5052026
>Get to Bismarck

Looks like she’s got it. Let’s return to the task at hand. Thanks, Jamaica!

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Guys, question: I've been wondering if you'd be all right with a third-person insertion from the perspective of the Shipgirls to better provide context. I'm not sure of putting it myself because of the lack of agency, but it'd make pictures clearer moving forward. I don't mind not doing it (or even doing it), however, I'd need your approval to proceed with this decision because it might just emerge as the norm (going back and forth between you and your girls/relevant cast memeber). Or we can try it in the next few prompts right away and then I ask for feedback on it moving forward.

Your call.

>WAITING FOR PLAYER INPUT

>>5052265
>>WAITING FOR PLAYER INPUT
I have no strong feelings one way or another. I trust you're capable of delivering well in either case so as far as I'm concerned, go for whichever feels more comfortable for you to write.

>>5052265
I agree with >>5052271

>>5052265
I quite like the idea. I would think it will help improve context for us, better help set scenes, and also just make for a more interesting narrative perspective, so I would certainly be fine with it.
If you think it would work well with the quest, go for it.

>>5052265
sounds good to me

>>5051998
>You'd be surprised at some of your fellow players. I know I've run my head into a wall at least a dozen times.

That is... a reasonable rebuttal. Touché.

>>5052265
I'll concur with the others that including the occasional 3rd person bote perspective would be nice.

Sorry, between a recent death in the family and assignments, I haven't been able to update. However, I just got my results for my first two big tests and I scored top in both. I'm so fucking happy. I'll be running tomorrow, Inshallah, and I'm sorry for being so quiet for so long without any notice.

>>5066434
Congrats m8, keep it up!

>>5066436
Based on my averages right now I can technically score a 51 in my final exam and still average a low Credit.

The last two and a half weeks have been nothing but a barrage of bad news:
-Compressed exam schedules
-Last minute exam changes
-My planned trip to the USA being cancelled pending a 3-dose shot for those looking to go overseas
-A Christmas surprise spoiled
-Floods along the West Coast

But let's get on with it.

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>Get to Bismarck

Your first instinct is to assist Jamaica … but the growl and warning that follows—coupled with the sheer power she emanates, despite being on land—has you realizing that you would only ever be a hindrance in an exchange of this magnitude. You hold your arms up, raising them just ahead of your line of sight as debris flies all around, tiny shards of dirt and concrete scratching and bouncing off your locked stance. You are but a distant to concern to Jamaica as she leaps into pursuit … right as a stray bolt of plasma cutting through the landscape, causing you to lose balance and land on the seat of your pants; you look away, trying to keep the dust and dirt from entering your eye, squinting them tightly but not so much that you’re blind to your surroundings. The cracking thunder of the exchange of high-yield armaments rocks your senses as you realize just what you’d—on your own brainpower—foolishly decided to wade into, immediately getting to your feet and going into a full sprint, hunched low and arms flailing a mix of the world’s clumsiest cat and a penguin attempting a half-waddle.

Many thoughts race through your mind, but for some reason, one—a consideration that would have been alien to you in almost every sense of the word prior to this morning— completely and utterly dominates your concerns. Buildings crumble as beams and projectiles wildly miss their target—or hit them—bringing what was once an escape in luxury down to its most basic components. You stumble and grunt, struggling to maintain the pace that your heavy feet had set, the gravity of this connection, this link that had not been there at the crack of dawn now almost certainly holding you to its unsaid promises. Even weaving through what could only be christened a war-zone, leaping over over-turned pieces of street and melting ticket devices, you muse the indistinguishable state of that of you and a fly buzzing towards its death … but you do not and will not … alter your course.

Not while Bismarck fights for her very life.

Your eyes face forward and your hands grasp air with every quick, clumsy step that you take.

You can feel her struggling for an advantage, drowning on land as she fights outside of her element. Her enemy laughs at her attempts at cracking open a gap, but between her enemy is relentless—no, her enemy wasn’t relentless, not at all. You catch a glimpse of one hand—half the fabric of the glove that housed it incinerated from combat, with only the thumb and pinkie covering her bruised and bloodied skin … catching a blow and staring into a smile so wide it would have put canyons to shame.

‘Come on, now, Captain … put some back into it.’

A knee to the gut has you keeling over, vomiting spit.

>Shift POV: Third-Person
>Keep POV: First-Person

>>5094163
>>Shift POV: Third-Person

>>5094163
>Shift POV: Third-Person
hpn8p

>>5094163
>Shift POV: Third-Person

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>Shift POV: Third-Person

Bismarck keels over, gasping for an intake of air that she would not have otherwise required. Roon doesn’t give her an opportunity to gather herself, slamming her knee up into her upper thorax, close enough to her throat that she could feel her systems almost being sent into shock. If she were a human being, that blow would have disintegrated her upper body into meaty chunks; due to her structure, however, she was blessed with the mercy of there only being a burning, agonizing sensation that spreads from her shoulders and into her skull. It’s as though a spear of pure electricity had pierced her right to the base of her brain. Pain, however, is no stranger to her—to her, especially—and the fraction of the moment that Roon gives her to enjoy her handiwork is enough for Bismarck to seize on the opportunity to grab onto her enemy’s thigh and pummel her with the barrel of her extended gun, with full intent on blasting her apart.

The difference in power, however, is apparent upon contact.

The guns go off a second late, their projectiles cutting right past their intended target as Roon forces Bismarck down with a quick blow to her shoulder, bending her guns and causing them to whistle right towards one of the many ruins that littered the battlefield. Bismarck swings again, putting her whole body into the motion in an attempt to repel Roon, but the latter catches the back of her neck with her arms, slamming her head first into the ground. She’s pinned in place, again, the disappointing chuckle of her enemy—

But she’d bought enough time.

A thunderous explosion sends her—and her enemy—flying. Bismarck’s sight shifts between that of the air, dirt and the ruins around, before finally regaining her bearings and digging her fingers into the ground to bring herself to a grinding halt. Hair sticking to her nose and nursing indignant cuts, she holds herself as she steadies her feet, staring the smoking—

‘How annoying …’

No. That had been hoping for too much.

Roon remains.

Formidable holds herself up against the lone standing wall of the ruins of a devastated building, one arm bent at an odd angle while the other—her left—gestured towards her drones up in the air, ready to strike; Belfast, far off on the other side of the field, trains her broad-side cannons onto her target, huffing and puffing as her bloodied visage, ear half-torn and hair sticking to the caked blood-stains stares hatefully at Roon’s detached, teasing expression.

‘I would have assumed that those of your ilk would care to mind their manners; Belfast … Formidable …’

They begin to—

>Stall for … something (Talk to Roon)
>Allow Formidable and Belfast to re-engage
>Write-In

>>5094234
>>Stall for … something (Talk to Roon)
xydvy

>>5094234
>>Stall for … something (Talk to Roon)
Hopefully we can get a clue as to what the bloody fuck she is doing.

>>5094234
>Stall

So has this attack been long time coming, or did something happen to spur this treachery?

>>5094234
>Stall for … something (Talk to Roon)

3 papers down, 1 to go. Resuming in 27 minutes.

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>Stall for … something (Talk to Roon)

It’s hard to even one’s breathing, especially when one wasn’t used to having to consciously gauge the extent of the damage one had taken over the course of a beat-down as severe as the one that she had just taken at the hands of Roon … but she manages to do so just the same. A series of damage reports detailing the extent of the limits that had been pushed, broken or severed in the last few exchanges flashes upon her HUD, which she ignores with a singular mental over-ride. Most of the internal response protocols and systems had gone into over-drive in trying to compensate for the extent that she’d been declared adequate to proceed by, but as she is, there was no way to even capture a fifth of the potential that she would have other-wise been capable of … hence the numbing pain that was everywhere between the her lower abdomen and her neck. The protocols had been at work from the moment of contact, but with only her independent, self-locked engagement resources available, compensation in regards to force, was more than just merely lacking.

Roon had rolled laps around them. By the words of Bismarck’s old handlers, it was like trying to catch up to a performance vehicle with a stock-set off-market, mass production model. Her speed, endurance, resistance, destructive potential … all of her constituted her status as one of the PR-Class Shipgirls, even when stacked up against a Shipgirl of a theoretically superior threshold in potency.

If she’d just had a Commander or even an artificial bridge, then …

‘Oh, is that it?’

Roon flexes her fingers, stretching her arms above her head as the space around her seems to warp at the sheer power she emanates. Belfast’s guns lock right on as Formidable painfully snaps her arm back into place, growling as her drones—Type-3 Customs—ready for their next set, intent on tearing her apart as much as she does. Roon’s absent grin neither fades nor widens, her coy gaze set on her target.

Bismarck, however, knows better than to meet overwhelming force head-on.

‘Roon,’ she begins coolly, eyes narrowed and countenance as dead-set as she’s able to maintain. ‘Is this the Axis’ doing?’

Roon cocks an eyebrow, her grin dissipating as a look of tired disappointment carves itself from her brows to the wrinkles of her nose. ‘Are you really satisfied having such an obvious inquiry being your last—’

‘Answer me!’

There is no measure of amusement left upon the visage of the Heavy Cruiser.

‘What a let-down,’ comes Roon’s reply. ‘Well, I suppose something so obvious … deserves something obvious in return.’

She shrugs nonchalantly, glancing towards Formidable, then to Belfast.

‘Did you really think that human nature would allow them to just stop at where they left off?’

Bismarck's eyes widen.

>Write-In

>>5094465

Immutability of human nature is but one of platitudes we use to shield ourselves from discomfort of uncertainty and variability. Alliances and treaties are honoured until they are broken, comradery lasts until first act of treason. Or do you know the day on which you'd be scuttled?

>>5094490
Supporting

>>5094490
works for me

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>Immutability of human nature is but one of platitudes we use to shield ourselves from discomfort of uncertainty and variability. Alliances and treaties are honored until they are broken, camaraderie lasts until first act of treason. Or do you know the day on which you'd be scuttled?

Roon shrugs nonchalantly, even as everything goes to hell all around. She doesn’t seem to be the least bit concerned with what Bismarck threw right back at her. As a matter of fact, she looks almost … snooty at the prospect of having to respond to it. Resting her right elbow in her left palm, Roon leans into the open hand of her right as she coyly bounces her attention from the pointed Bismarck, to the itchy-fingered Belfast, to the ever-ready Formidable, before going back to Bismarck. Her expression morphs into one of disappointment before shaking her head, making a motion akin to a parent closing their door to the rebellion of their adolescent charge. She doesn’t, however, move to go back on the offensive, seemingly more keen on fortifying whatever ethos she’d chosen to lump herself with rather than answer with another blast to the gut.

For that, Bismarck—as well as Formidable and Belfast—is glad.

Roon’s methodology was brutal and deliberately inefficient.

She had the cracks to exhibit that claim.

‘Annoying … disappointing,’ Roon sighs, audibly enough for even Belfast and Formidable to hear. ‘I would have taken you to be of a more practical sort. Have you really put that much thought into it?’

‘You mean you didn’t?’

Bismarck smirks cruelly as she massages her wrist, glaring straight at Roon.

‘I wonder which one of us is the real disappointment here?’

Roon stares straight ahead, unhooking her elbow from her palm. ‘Really … and I thought that the Royal Navy were the ones with such tongues,’ she remarks, her voice a league steadier than the whirring turrets and mechanisms of her armaments. ‘I am not, however, the one at a disadvantage right now?’

Bismarck does not answer.

‘Not that I’m not thankful for it, but really … how careless can you get? Allowing your guard to drop to such an extent; you would have been able to keep up with me, even beat me, if all of you hadn’t decided to rest on your laurels.’

Roon cricks her neck from one side to the other, digging her toes into the ground as she absently hums. ‘Oh, wait, I’m sorry … my apologies,’ she follows up, stretching her arms above her head once again. ‘It’d only be natural for those tossed aside like trash to follow their logical progression.’

Roon laughs.

‘Thinking yourselves as anything beyond the accessories of the whims of the whimsical! It almost makes me yawn.’

Belfast is the first to move.

Bismarck’s order comes too late.

>Engage her up close
>Take her on at range and whittle her down
>Hook around her defenses for a welcome shot
>Stall Further (As Belfast)
>Write-In

>>5095369
>>Hook around her defenses for a welcome shot

>>5095369
>Hook around her defenses for a welcome shot

>>5095369
>Hook around her defenses for a welcome shot

I reckon things are going to get too messy for long range support once/if Belfast uses her smoke screen if she has that on her.