Chapter Text
Very few things made the entire Bermuda Base buzz with activity, that came down to one of three things: a Siren attack, the fleets launching their own attack, or a hurricane. Today it was a hurricane bearing down on the island that sent every resident scurrying from place to place, making sure all the warehouses were secured and nothing would rattle around inside, double checking that every window and door was properly closed and sealed. Every building was designed to handle the devastating winds of a category five hurricane, the dorms and Command Centre were extra reinforced as they were to be where everyone gathered to ride out the storms. A network of tunnels linked them together and contained a massive E-Cube powered pump system to keep everything dry, while the E-Cube power system also maintained regular power to the base.
Perhaps one of the most impressive feats of engineering that few outside of Azur Lane were aware of was the massive underground anchorage and locks system. This allowed all of the shipgirls to bring their hulls inside and keep them safe from the hurricane’s wrath, much to the joy of Spence who (highly understandably) never wanted to ride out a hurricane on the ocean ever again; several other Eagle Union girls agreed with her. There was, however, one group of girls that had to go out on patrol during the storm, the submarines. As much as they wished to join in on the fun to be had hunkering down to wait out the storm, they all knew that they couldn’t afford to be blind to any possible Siren attacks taking advantage of the storm. The twenty-four subs based in Bermuda had their rotations and patrol routes assigned already, there would always be eight on active duty while the other sixteen rested and relaxed between their eight hour patrols.
All of this preparation work left the Commander extremely busy juggling his regular work with all the reports on the progress of the preparations and the storm. Thankfully he had several volunteers taking up secretary posts for the duration, all of whom were part of his core group of secretaries that rotated turns. Zieten as his only near permanent secretary took on the role of his second-in-command and coordinated the secretarial efforts. Memphis, Yorktown and Gascogne were the three that took up the post the most while Nimi joined in, taking advantage of the lack of classes for the current time.
The Commander had just finished his call to HQ, informing them of the hurricane barreling across the ocean towards them, when Helena entered his office with a clipboard in hand. “Commander, I have the latest reports from our weather network. We should start feeling the effects of the storm by tomorrow afternoon at the latest. They’re predicting that the storm should power up to a cat-four with a fifteen percent chance of it reaching cat-five when it hits us.”
“Thanks, Helena. Do you have your SG rigged up to our sensors?” He asked, walking around his desk and taking the clipboard from her.
The cruiser nodded, “I do, Lou has hers set up as well. We’ll take turns monitoring remotely when it’s time to shelter underground.”
“Perfect, thanks for the update Helena.”
She nodded and left his office, giving him a second of peace before Zieten entered with a stack of papers needing his signature. She shot him an apologetic look as she returned to the other office, giving a startled yelp as a blonde bundle of joy blitzed past her to glomp onto the Commander in a hug.
“Eheheh☆ Operation: Recharge Kommandant’s batteries is a go!” Giggled the ever happy Blücher, snuggling into his body as best as she could.
“Blücher, can you unhand me for a moment please?” The Commander asked. Blücher pouted and released him, allowing him to set down the clipboard on his desk and face her for a proper hug. “There we go, much more efficient battery charging, no?”
The bundle of joy giggled, “I think you just enjoy hugging me, Kommandant~”
“You find me someone who doesn’t enjoy hugging you and I’ll see to it they’re committed to the psych ward.”
Blücher gave him a squeeze and let go of the hug. "Hehe☆ There you go Kommandant, your batteries are all recharged. I will see you later, I have some cutie secretaries to hug next☆"
"Well thank you for the recharge. Oh before you go, can you send Hipper a message to come see me right away?"
"Okey dokey Kommandant-ey!" And with a silly salute she left the office.
The Commander shook his head, mirth dancing in his eyes as he returned to the workload waiting for him. At least now he had a solid deadline to finish everything, by lunchtime tomorrow everything would be complete and all that would be left was to wait out the storm. A smile broke out across his face as he listened to Blücher giving her hugs to the secretaries.
~~~
On a certain cliff ledge towards the edge of the base Takao and Hipper surveyed the area one last time, making sure they had gathered up everything and stored it safely inside the cave. The pair had snuck off from their tasks and met up at their secret spot to prepare it for the hurricane, Takao’s training gear and Hipper's plants that they left on the wide ledge outside of the cave needed to be moved inside for protection. Thankfully for them, no one had found out about their secret spot and the Commander had proven helpful in quietly allocating resources to maintain it while the pair were away on missions or patrols. A temperature regulation system, timed sprinklers and feeders and some grow lights were added to the cave, courtesy of the Manjuu installers and Hanazuki’s help in “losing” some of her greenhouse equipment. The pink fox found it highly amusing that Takao and Hipper had a secret cave, but at least she was more trustworthy than that dummkopf Kommandant, in Hipper’s mind anyways.
One other addition was added to the cave for them, a massive boulder that the duo was currently rolling into position to block the entryway. How the Commander got it dug out of the bay and hauled onto land without raising suspicions was anyone’s guess, but some days the shipgirls just accepted he was as eccentric as they could be. Granted he had Takao and Hipper roll it to the cave but that was a small price to pay for the help in securing their cave and keeping it a secret. With the boulder finally coming to a stop, Takao and Hipper both stretched to ease their sore muscles. The cliff ledge wasn’t big enough for the pair to summon their rigging for that extra boost of strength it provides, forcing them to get a good workout pushing and rolling the rock around.
“Ugg, it’s such a pain in the ass moving that rock.” Hipper groused as she worked through the cooling stretches Takao had taught her.
Takao kept her eyes closed as she worked through her own stretches, “I recall that you were the one to shoot down the idea of having a door installed.”
“Well yeah, it would look ridiculous having a random door on the side of a cliff.”
“Then what else will we use if not this rock?”
Hipper scowled and sighed, “I don’t know, maybe if we had a way to hide the door from sight.”
One of Takao’s eyes cracked open. “What about one of your sister’s holo emitters?”
“I would love to but there’s no way to swipe one of those without her knowing.”
“Sounds almost as if you’d have to build your own emitter so she wouldn’t find out.”
Hipper looked over at her friend with a glare, softening it slightly when she saw Takao’s slight teasing smile. Neither of them would admit it but they had their moments of being like their younger sisters.
“I guess I could see if I could make one. I do have several other projects to work on as a member of the R&D team.”
“Arigato, Hipper-san.” Hipper felt her heart skip a beat at Takao’s warm smile and thanks.
“N-no problem. Come on, we should get out of here before they come looking for us.” A ping on her phone alerted her to Blücher's message. "And I need to go see the Kommandant, I wonder what he wants now."
"I think it might be an excuse to check up on the progress of securing our secret spot. I'll catch you later, Hipper. Have a good day." With a wave, Takao followed the small ledge back to the top of the cliff, idly wondering how likely it was for her and Hipper to chat during the hurricane.
~~~
At the locks to the underground anchorage the fleet was steadily making its way to safety, about thirty ships were left to move out of the two-hundred-and-fifteen shipgirl hulls stationed at the base. The mass produced ships used around the base were the first sets of ships sent down below given that they were more fragile than shipgirl hulls. A rainbow coloured girl stood near the main lock controls, overseeing the progress and making sure everything continued smoothly in her domain. Bulins and Manjuu swarmed the locks moving the ships in and out of the locks without bumping into anything. A few of the shipgirls were around as well, those that preferred to pilot their own ships over the Manjuu crews.
A purple Bulin ran up to the rainbow girl, waving her wrench excitedly. “Iridiana! We are down to thirty ships left, buli. We’re almost done!”
Iridiana was one of the few Bulins who had taken a proper name for herself; she thought it would make it easier for everyone to find her when they needed something to do with the locks, docks and underground anchorage. “Perfect, at our current pace we should be done by tonight, bulin.”
“Maybe we can get some extra candy afterwards, buli.”
“You’ll have to ask the Commander about that, bulin.” Iridiana glanced at her clipboard in hand before looking back at her purple sister, “Don’t you need to get back to your work?”
The purple Bulin stared for a moment before smacking her head, “Right! Bulin away, buli~”
Iridiana sighed and shook her head, she loved her Bulin sisters but they were all a bit dumb. Granted as a MKIII she was really only marginally smarter than the other two types, Iridiana was a unique case as she was by far the smartest of all the Bulins but compared to any non Bulins she was still on the dumb side. For some reason she couldn’t explain she desired to be smarter, to help run her stations more efficiently and help the base out more. She had no idea why she had that desire, none of her sisters of any of the three varieties of Bulin had a similar desire. They were all content with their relative simple mindedness and focused on the job at hand, well as much as they could, as Bulins can be easily distracted if doing a complex task that wasn’t repair work.
Maybe after things settled down and they were waiting out the storm she could talk to the Commander or her creator about seeing if it was possible to make her smarter. She had a feeling that it would most likely be a hard road with no short cuts, Akashi and the science team can be chaotic geniuses but zapping smarts into someone was probably not possible. But maybe she could work on getting smarter, go to school with the shipgirls maybe? Iridiana the student had a nice ring to it, but again she’d have to talk to the Commander first. In the meantime she needed to get these hulls underground.
A loud crash nearby interrupted her thoughts.
Maybe we can smarten up my sisters too, bulin. She thought as she went to help the pair of Bulins that collided into each other.
~~~
That evening found the Commander finally finished with his mountain of paperwork and managing the preparations. All five of his secretaries for the day accepted his invitation to join him for dinner as thanks for their help. While he didn't rank as good of a cook as George or the others he was good enough that people wouldn't turn him down. The group made their way to the Academy’s cafeteria where the Commander quickly whipped up some garlic bread for the ladies to enjoy while he cooked.
"What's it like having him cook for all of you every night?" Yorktown asked Zieten as the group of five sat around a table and relaxed.
The battlecruiser smirked at her. "You know it's great, Hornet told me that's why you keep volunteering to be secretary so you can enjoy his cooking after a long day."
"Hornet needs to learn to not tell everyone my secrets."
"Master is an excellent cook, it is unfortunate that King George V isn't the base commander." Gascogne said.
"Oi! I heard that!" Came the Commander's voice from the kitchen.
"Affirmative. If she were the commander you would have time to improve your cooking skills." A faint smile crossed her face.
Joshua poked his head through the doorway, "Is my cooking really being sassed by an android? You can go plug yourself into a wall, there's no dinner for people sassing my cooking."
Gascogne slid her chair back towards the wall, pulled out an adapter from her pocket and plugged her tail into the adapter then into one of the sockets, all while staring at Joshua in the eyes. He narrowed his eyes at her and ducked back into the kitchen. The others laughed and pushed the table over so Gascogne could still charge herself.
"So why do you do the secretary job, Gascogne?" Yorktown asked.
The blue haired android tilted her head to the side for a moment before replying. "It was for two reasons originally. I am good at reading fast and thoroughly, likely from my android-like capabilities. The other reason was because all my sisters have positions of importance and I did not. And now I do it because I enjoy it, the work is satisfying and between the other secretaries and Master it is fun."
Zieten and Yorktown both leaned in closer to her. "And the meals?"
"I wouldn't know, he refuses to feed me."
"That's a lie and you know it!" Yelled an indignant voice from the kitchen.
Yorktown turned to Memphis next, "I'm not going to ask you, we all know you're a chronic workaholic."
"I-I'm getting better…" The cruiser protested weakly.
Nimi rubbed Memphis’ shoulder, “We know you are, even I’ve noticed and I rarely work in the office anymore.”
Memphis smiled her appreciation as Yorktown turned to the destroyer. “And you left secretarial work as the best of all of us and took up teaching.”
“It is a passion of mine and I’m glad all of you that have taken over from me are doing an excellent job. Of course I came back to see if the rumours about the food are true.”
Joshua called out from the kitchen, “So what I’m hearing is all of you are doing this for the food?”
“Sweetheart, who would turn down free food?”
“Fair point.”
The conversation was interrupted by a couple of new arrivals, “I thought I smelled something good. Got any spare food, Josh?”
Bremerton and Laffey had come to the cafeteria to find some food and Nimi, who had forgotten to tell the others she was going out for dinner. Laffey made it quite clear how unhappy she was by sitting in Nimi’s lap and refusing to move no matter how much Nimi protested.
“Gascogne isn’t getting fed so you can have her share, Bremmers.” Joshua appeared with more garlic bread as Bremerton pulled a chair over and joined the table, Gascogne stuck her tongue out at him. “Laffey do you want food or are you taking Nimi’s?”
“Mmm..Oxycola and I’ll eat Nimi…zzz…”
Nimi instantly turned as red as a tomato, “Laffey! You can’t fall asleep in the middle of a sentence like that!!”
The others shared a look, the destroyer squad’s relationship with each other was one of the worst kept secrets. Laffey was the most open about it, possibly too open when she got handsy with Nimi’s bust. Javelin’s mind easily wandered off to her fantasy world if anyone suggested she do anything romantic with the others and Nimi was the most easily embarrassed of the four, her outbursts giving away all her secrets. Ayanami was the only one who could keep her cool in public, although thanks to the other three letting things slip, everyone knew she was as bad as Laffey in private.
The larger group resumed their chats while they waited for Joshua to finish cooking. Loading up a trolley, he wheeled out more garlic bread and bowls of pasta for everyone including Gascogne, though they did have a stare down as he set the bowl in front of her. Laffey woke up when her Oxycola was placed in front of her and shuffled off of Nimi and onto a nearby chair. A spot was saved for Joshua next to Zieten, the pair sharing a quick kiss before diving into their dinner.
“So why did you choose rotini and not the classical spaghetti? You could have shared a classical moment with Zee~” Teased Yorktown as they ate.
“Do you want us making out in front of all of you?” He teased back, “I didn’t realise we had so many voyeur friends~”
Nimi and Memphis both choked on their food, hastily downing their cola’s and pounding a fist into their chest. Yorktown blushed and looked away while Gascogne and Bremerton watched with amusement, Laffey flashed a thumbs up. “I didn’t mean that, just a kiss like that old animated movie.”
Zieten joined in teasing Yorktown “Maybe another time, Yorkie. We could arrange something for you to watch~”
“Th-that’s not what I meant!”
Joshua shrugged, “Despite that, the simple reason is there was no spaghetti. You’ll have to forward your complaints to the kitchen stocker for the week, who is your favourite destroyer I believe.”
Yorktown sighed and returned to her meal, the group enjoying the food and watching Laffey attempt to swipe Nimi’s Oxycola. Everyone went for seconds, praising and thanking the cook for the good food. Joshua took everyone’s order of alcohol when he went back for his third bowl, taking the cart with him to transport everything. No one seemed inclined to leave the little gathering, evidenced by Bremerton bringing the conversation back to the approaching hurricane.
“How strong is it supposed to get?”
“I was going to update everyone after this, but according to our latest reports it’ll be a cat-four for sure with a chance of cat-five.”
“How likely is it that the Sirens are going to try something?”
“Not very, but the subs have their patrols planned out already.”
Memphis shook her head as she shuddered slightly, “Does this feel weird to anyone else? I can’t help but think this is an unusual storm.”
“You’re overthinking this, Memphis. I think you are agitated because there hasn’t been a hurricane to come close enough to lock us down in five years. Most avoid Bermuda by a wide enough margin that we only dealt with stormy weather. Besides,” Joshua leaned closer to the table. “Shinano hasn’t seen anything so trust that at least.”
The cruiser nodded and took a swig from her beer, “I’ll try at least.”
“Master, I think she doesn’t know what to do with this vacation being forced on all of us.” Gascogne opined.
“I-I’m not that much of a workaholic!”
The sleepy Laffey pounded back the rest of her bottle, having returned to Nimi’s lap once more. “Commander…where are you sleeping?”
“Oh right, there’s no tunnel branch to the Kommandant’s house.” Nimi said as she remembered the maps of the tunnel network.
“It’ll either be in my office or in the bunker, not really anywhere else I can stay.”
Yorktown looked over at him in surprise, “You have six wives, how do you not have anywhere better to sleep? Plus Zee is almost always at the house too.”
“I’m bunking with my sisters during this, everyone else has someone else with them in their dorms.” Zieten leaned back in her chair, finished with dinner and drinks.
“Howe, Zee and Lexi are all staying with sisters. Kashino is crashing at Shinano’s since her place by the warehouses isn’t part of the tunnel network either. Hana bunks with some of the other Sakura destroyers and Dunkerque has been bunking with Algerie while the water pipes get repaired.”
“How did her water pipes get broken? Did you break them while doing some fun at her place?” Bremerton teased, earning an eye roll from Joshua.
“I wish, she was teaching Le Malin how to make some deserts and somehow the pipe burst in the kitchen. I’ve read the report a dozen times and it still doesn’t make any sense at all.”
“What about wherever you seven go when everyone gets together?” Asked Memphis.
“House or someone’s ship, usually Zee, Shinano or Lexi’s since they’re the only ones to have modified their living spaces to something large enough for everyone.”
Bremerton shot him a grin, “Well guess you’ll have to enjoy sleeping in the bunker then, Josh.”
“Thanks Bremmers, I’m glad you care so much.” Joshua stood and gathered up the empty dishes. “Well thanks for the fun meal ladies, I’m glad everyone enjoyed it.”
“Thanks for cooking, Commander!”
The group dispersed back to their dorms, everyone getting their last quiet night of sleep before the storm hit. Joshua and Zieten went back to the house and grabbed what he needed for a week of staying in the bunker. Zee at least made his first night of sleeping in there worthwhile~
~~~
The morning of the next day was spent making sure all preparations were complete, everything was ready when the storm started to hit at around two-thirty. Fortunately the hurricane had yet to power up to a cat-five but a cat-four kicked up some strong winds and waves as it came closer to the island.
The tunnel network had some handy extra places in case the dorms ended up compromised in any way. A large room and a kitchen of a similar layout to the Academy cafeteria was set up as a gathering place for anyone taking refuge underground and acted as an emergency place for people to sleep. Not too far away was the heavily fortified bunker that Joshua was using as his room for the duration. It was in this large room that most, if not all, of the shipgirls had gathered to chat, hang out, play board games, sleep or read to pass the time.
It was here that a commotion grabbed everyone’s attention as they saw their Commander get dragged by a gaggle of younglings and the sunniest girl on the base.
“Commander, tell us a story!”
“Yeah, make it a good one!”
“And a long story! We have plenty of time to kill!”
“Make it a story of great heroism!”
“A story with love!”
“Please make sure it’s a true story, Master.”
“Something exciting!”
“Ok, ok. Everyone calm down and let me think.” Joshua said, laughing at the enthusiasm of everyone dragging him into the room. The younglings had a space on the floor cleared of tables and had built a nest of blankets and pillows pilfered from the emergency supplies in the tunnels. They sat him down on a few pillows on the edge while they claimed their spots in front of him.
“I think I have a story that fits your requirements. A true story filled with excitement, heroism and courage. There’s not too much love, besides love of duty, there’s a little in the aftermath of the story if that works for you, Little Illustrious.”
The carrier nodded, happy enough to have a story. “What’s the story about?”
“It is a legendary story, especially in the Maple Monarchy. A few of your friends were there too.”
That got everyone’s attention, the older girls knew this story and many gathered around to hear it properly told.
“This is the story of how the Battle of the St. Lawrence went down.”