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Chapter Text

Part 1, Scene 1: Savo Island

Your name is Choukai, and currently you’re thinking very hard about why you’re here.

You need to focus. You must stay absolutely silent if you’re to survive this – the only sounds you can hear are the faint ripples you make in the coastal waters off Guadalcanal, and Aoba’s muted breathing. The line stretches behind you in single file, the dim silhouettes of the heavy cruisers you command only just visible in the night. Their riggings are ready, their guns are loaded, and their torpedoes are primed.

But you can’t help but think about how this isn’t something that you’ve done before. True, you’ve seen action before off Malaya and in the Indian Ocean, but you’ve never faced an enemy Kansen in battle. All you’ve heard about on that front are the stories of the aircraft carriers at work in the Bay of Bengal, sending their bombers down in elegant, carefully planned waves that sent Dorsetshire and her Royal Navy friends to the bottom of the sea, or the anecdotes told to you by your older sisters over dinner at the base, whether that be in Yokosuka, Rabaul or Singapore.

They say very different things about combat – you’ve heard a variety of opinions on the subject, since, as a heavy cruiser (albeit not a very senior one) you have enough rank to ask questions to your superior officers with some degree of freedom. Kaga speaks – spoke – about it in a matter-of-fact way, but it’s clear she didn't dislike it. Hiryuu relishes – she relished it, saying it gave her the freedom she’s always wanted. They're both gone now - their advice remains, though hazy. Maya, on the other hand, doesn’t really want to talk about it.

You simply haven’t had enough experience to say for yourself what you think about battle. Hence why you were very surprised initially when Admiral Mikawa gave you this assignment.

“But why me, sir?” you remember asking two days ago – was it really that recent – when you were summoned to his office at the Rabaul base and told what you had to do.

The admiral, a middle-aged man with rings under his eyes from fatigue and stress, but whose actual eyes sparkled with experience and wisdom, put his fingers together and said, “Two reasons, Choukai. Firstly, high command wants to give all our heavy cruisers experience, since you fulfill such an important role. After Mikuma made that horrible mistake at Midway and got herself killed – apologies for the bluntness with which I state this – we simply cannot afford you, our elite skirmishers, to take losses of that sort. I understand that you come from a prestigious lineage and that your older sisters are hardened veterans, but familial experience doesn’t boost your own skills. You for yourself must lead from the front and see actual combat.”

“Secondly - and this is more personal, Choukai” - at this, Mikawa stared you straight in the eye - “I have a deep respect for you and for your fellow Kansen. I want you to prove yourselves in the battlefield in the face of opposition not only from the enemy, but from our domestic opponents. You should know that many in the Army and even some in the Admiralty question the purpose of your kind and argue that the resources would be better put to other purposes. I don’t want that. You are an honourable human warrior, just like the rest of us. I want you to be remembered like that, not as a mere weapon or a waste of money, and the operation to retake Guadalcanal should be an excellent place for you to make sure that happens. I chose you because I believe, with all my heart, that you can succeed.”

Your eyes felt moist when he said that, the sincerity so evident in his voice. “If that is the case, Admiral,” you said after a moment, bowing your head, “then I will do my duty and my kin proud. I stand ready to follow your orders. It’s just that I haven’t done this sort of thing before. I don’t know if I’m ready or not.”

Mikawa nodded his head kindly at you. “I understand; I was like you once. It’s something that we officers all went through at some point in the past.”

Then he abruptly stood up and unbuckled his katana from his belt, offering the sheathed weapon to you with a flourish, black scabbard and all.

“A-admiral?”

“A gift and a memento. Take it, Choukai, and remember my words. Fight for who you are.” He saluted crisply, his eyes twinkling.

***

It’s that katana that you now carry at your hip, your hand on its hilt, ready to be drawn at a moment’s notice. The weight of responsibility.

“Psst.” Aoba’s voice suddenly drifts into your hearing range, startling you momentarily. “Two things. Savo Island ahead to our left. Union Destroyer dead ahead.”

Luckily for you, when you sortied from Rabaul, you brought a squad of thorough veterans with you. Aoba, Kinugasa, Furutaka and Kako: they are all quite a bit older than you and vastly more experienced, having been blooded at the Coral Sea. True, they sometimes don’t act that way – Aoba for one is notorious for swooping around the base, camera and notebook in hand, always ready to pick up new pieces of gossip, while Kinugasa always trails exasperatedly behind her, picking up the pieces. Furutaka is extremely clumsy and always hurting herself; Kako is bitingly, almost childishly critical and never satisfied with anybody. Comapred to your formidable older sisters, you privately didn’t think much of them before this assignment. This was not helped by the fact that, whenever you did something clumsy in the dorm, Takao would always shake her head and mutter, “Fit for the Sixth Cruiser Division” in a disappointed undertone.

Still, you must admit that when they want to be serious, they are deadly serious. Aoba’s observational skills have come in as very useful, her sharp eyes picking out the silhouette of the little Bagley-class ship further forward even in this darkness. And all the others have been very disciplined so far, dropping easily into their well-practiced roles of heavy cruisers: the fleet's hunters and assassins, striking with shellfire and Long Lances in both day and night.

“Hold your fire,” you whisper back. “Pass the word down the line: slow down and hold your fire but train your guns on that destroyer. If she seems like she’s spotted us, then you may shoot.”

It seems strange to give that order and, for the first time during this sortie, you really feel as if you are in command. The lives of your fellow Kansen are in your hands, and you can decide whether the enemy should die or not. It is an intense, bizarre feeling.

“Roger.” Aoba turns around to pass the message to Kako, who you can see nods expressionlessly.

The little Union destroyer appears not to have seen you and your force, but you can never be too careful. Quietly and with only a slight creak (oh, how you wish you’d gotten oil to lubricate your rigging) you turn your main battery turrets towards her, tracking her every movement.

Minutes pass – you hold your breath. The destroyer is getting closer and closer, evidently on some sort of combat patrol. You can’t be too sure of her identity, but she’s small and her rigging isn’t that impressive, even for a destroyer – the equipment of that Ironblood child Z23, whom you met at a Crimson Axis conference, springs to mind in contrast. But that Union girl is still armed. More importantly, she doubtless has radar and a functioning radio.

Closer, closer - is that a quiet oath from Kinugasa? If that responsible, polite woman is showing stress, how should you be feeling as commander of this group? A brief surge of shame overcomes you, before you quickly realise how foolish it is that you're annoyed at how you're not as scared as the others. Or is it that you're not so scared because you haven't been in their position before and so, in your naivety and innocence, you're haven't considered the disaster that might lie ahead? Will a false step really kill you and your companions? It is too much to think about - you clench your fists.

Closer, closer – you resist the itch to throw caution to the wind and to fire, to get rid of that enemy before it’s too late, before she alerts the Union ships to your attack and allows them to lay waste to you with their heavy guns. No, no! Focus. Calm. It’s your first big battle – don't screw it up. Do your kin proud.

Then, suddenly, she is turning away and disappearing into the night. Miraculously, she has not seen you. The stars have hidden their fires and let you pass.

A sigh of intense relief is stifled on your lips. “Aoba,” you murmur. “Increase speed. We will move to the south of Savo Island and engage the Union ships there. Each of you is to engage at your own discretion. Every ship attack – pass that signal.”

“Roger. Glory to the empire.”

The floatplane scouts overhead that you launched from your rigging earlier fly by with a soft buzz of engines, moving ahead to where the enemy is. You finger your sword hilt nervously, the grip warm in your sweating hand. This truly is not the life you’ve been living in the dorms as the kind girl you like to think of yourself as. That life has disappeared into the past, just like a butterfly takes off from a dandelion and disappears into the distance, never to return during its short life.

Minutes pass. More time goes by. Where are the enemy cruisers?

“Alert! Alert!” That is Furutaka speaking, a bit too loud for comfort – you can hear her from her place two spaces down the line. “Union cruisers and destroyers sighted, twelve klicks ahead!”

“Launch torpedoes! Open fire!” It has begun. All you can do now is pray to the war gods and hope that you come out alive. Now you will see what combat really has to offer.

‘Oh god,’ you suddenly think. ‘Is this all a mistake?’

Then the first torpedo hits the water and the guns roar, and your thoughts are drowned in a deluge of thunder. Your battle has begun.

Chapter Text

Part 1, Scene 2: Savo Island

The events at Savo Island that night, which you will remember for the rest of your existence – they all start so quickly.

As soon as you give the order to fire, you see two things. First, a Union destroyer suddenly appears dead ahead, startling close. Another Bagley-class by the looks of it, she screams abruptly and runs off into the darkness, firing star shells from her rigging in an effort to illuminate your force. Now your advantage of surprise is definitely gone, though it's not like it would have lasted much longer anyway.

“Evasive maneuvers!” you hiss. “That destroyer’s probably dropped torpedoes. Zigzag!”

But it’s now that you see the second thing. Your floatplanes overhead have dropped flares and, looming out of the darkness in the blossoming phosphorus light, you see the unmistakable silhouettes of two heavy cruisers barely a hundred metres away – one a Royal-made County-class, the other a Northampton-class. You’re pretty certain that the latter is Chicago, since no other member of that family has such luscious locks of hair. They mark her out for miles.

Chicago is clearly confused; her head is titled upwards, peering at the floatplanes as if trying to locate them. On the other hand, the County-class, probably Canberra by the looks of it, is alert and ready. Her guns are turning towards you and she’s accelerating, throwing up a higher wake in the water as her turbines roar into action.

You draw your katana. Breathe, Choukai, breathe. The blade seems so heavy.

“Fire!” You swing the blade down, and for a moment it flashes in the red light of the flares, as if it has been stained with blood.

Your turrets roar out, hurling ten gleaming eight-inch shells through the night at Canberra, while with a hiss eight Long Lances race out of their tubes and plunge into the water, streaking towards the enemy force with a vengeance. Behind you, Furutaka opens up with a barrage from her own guns. The rounds plunge towards Canberra – you see her recoil in horror and move her rigging as she attempts to block them. A vain attempt – the shells punch through her armour and she disappears, fires erupting all over her as not only Furutaka, but also Aoba and Kako proceed to pummel her over and over again. Their attack is concentrated and merciless, and lethally well-aimed – you can see through the destruction that her rigging and turrets are being gutted, generators and circuits mangled and tossed out to hiss in the water.

Canberra screams in agony and collapses to her knees, her rigging crumbling around her before it’s even had a chance to pull off a shot. Her pain pulls at your heartstrings. The County-class was never known for being especially durable, but the destruction that your fellow cruisers are meting out to that poor woman – it makes you feel sorrow for Canberra, magnified by her lack of any meaningful resistance as multiple torpedoes strike her down and Aoba slams another practiced salvo into her body. Aoba whoops with enthusiasm and says, “That should do it!”

Oh, the guns are so loud – even as you change your target to Chicago, who only appears to have understood the situation after hearing her comrade being shot to pieces, you find yourself growing sick of this mess. When Takao and Atago talked about combat, they never mentioned the horrible din of it all – the cries of the wounded and dying, the explosions of shells, the creak of shattered and burning metal. And the smell! Canberra’s oil is staining the water and you can smell it from where you are. It smells of death.

As her turrets swing into position, Chicago is yelling “Canberra! Canberra! All destroyers, counter-”

But she never finishes that sentence. A torpedo slams into her legs and she tumbles over, hitting the water face-first. Luckily for her, as she falls, a shell slices over her rigging, just where her head with its beautiful hair was beforehand. Her destroyers rush in front of her in a protective screen, firing wildly but hitting nothing, even though they’re so close. How flat-footed they must have been to have been caught like this!

“Dammit,” says Kako, who you can see is adjusting her glasses. “I only got one hit on that cruiser. She’ll be able to get away. Permission to close in and finish her off, Choukai?”

With an effort, trying to keep the rest of the battle of your mind, you shake your head. “Negative - just let her go! She can’t do anything, can she?”

“But she’s vulnerable!” Kako protests, glaring at you, her eyes and face an eerie, flickering shade of orange from the flames of Canberra’s burning oil. Behind her, Furutaka nods excitedly.

“I agree with Choukai.” Kinugasa steps in between you and the other two heavies. “We still haven’t located the other Union cruisers that we know to be in the area. Don’t let your guard down just because we’ve won this bit.”

“Grr.” Kako is vexed, but she doesn’t push her point. As a veteran, she clearly knows how to discriminate between situations and how to decide on the best path of action, despite her own opinions. You envy for her for that: the ability to make quick, decisive and acceptable judgments on the battlefield. All you’ve done so far is give some orders and shoot at two sitting ducks; now, when you’re trying to exercise command and make your own decisions, you find that you just don’t have the presence of mind to get things done. So much so that your seniors must fill in for your indecisiveness.

“Look!” Aoba is pointing, and your squad’s heads all turn to follow her finger. Chicago is staggering back to her feet, clutching her right arm, damaged but very much alive. Then, with a faint whirr of engines, she is gone, laying smoke as she escapes, her attendant destroyers following suit – they're leaving in such a hurry that they’re only shooting randomly, and they hit nothing, though some shells splash rather alarmingly close to your huddled group. Still, it’s evident that while you can see them, they can’t see you, and they don’t want any more part in this fight. All that remains is Canberra, the fires from her spreading fuel now so bright that you can vaguely see the shoreline of Guadalcanal from where you stand, a dim mass in the distance. The heavy cruiser herself lies on her side, half submerged in the water and twitching slightly. You feel gratitude at the fact that you cannot see her wounds clearly, and then cough as gases from the burning petroleum finally reach your throat.

Kinugasa nods. “See? Choukai, I’m ready to follow you.”

***

You decide to take your flotilla to the north and to move towards Florida Island, which is just to the east of Savo. Reports from your scout planes say that there are three Union heavy cruisers and some destroyers there, and that, by the looks of it, they’re wary but haven’t yet clocked that their southern force counterparts have just been routed.

Your heart is still pounding from the gunfight you’re leaving. To think that you’ve just helped to kill another person, shot them with intent, pounded them into scrap – it’s horrid. All you want now is for all of this to be over.

“Why did I decide to this?” you whisper to yourself, taking care that nobody can hear you. Your stomach is churning, even though you’ve eaten nothing for the past ten hours. The smell of gunpowder lingers in your nose and makes you want to vomit.

“Fight for who I am?” you mutter, remembering Admiral Mikawa’s words. “Who am I, if not a killer?”

But you’re jerked out of your reverie as Aoba says “Whoa, whoa!” in a warning undertone, and moments later you understand why. The heavy cruisers you’ve been looking for are in the distance.

Three New Orleans-class ships, by the look of it, their riggings at the ready. The tallest of them, who might be Astoria – you're not sure – is sweeping the area with a flashlight while her two sisters stand back to back with her, the group forming a defensive triangle.

“Should we shoot?” Aoba whispers to you.

“No - but launch torpedoes and get your searchlights ready. We’ll start shooting when we’re closer.”

“Understood.” Soon you can hear the now-familiar sounds of Long Lances entering the water. You follow suit, depositing your remaining fish in a wide spread to ensure that at least some hit.

You told Aoba to hold her fire because you want to ensure that, if you can’t stop death being brought to the enemy – and an increasingly overwhelming sense of fatality tells you that there’s nothing you can do about that, after you've seen what your teammates are capable of – you might as well protect your fellow cruisers from that particular gentleman. None of you have been hit yet, but you don’t want to gamble with anybody’s lives tonight, not after you’ve just borne witness to the fragility of a Kansen’s existence.

Your group, hunched over and silent, moves closer and closer to the Union ships. You see that Astoria appears to be very much on edge. Her head is swinging rapidly from side to side and she’s clearly trying to see things in the night, whether they’re there or not. One of her younger sisters taps her on the shoulder and whispers to her, making her spasm in alarm. Is she feeling the burden of leadership too, the ever-present stress of having the lives of others on her shoulders? It must be even worse for her, since the Kansen under her are not just her comrades like in your case. They are her sisters.

You suddenly imagine Takao, Atago and Maya following you into this fight instead of the other heavy cruisers, and realise what poor Astoria must be going through right now. Pity, bottled up since Canberra’s destruction, comes gushing out of your heart. You feel for Astoria, who doesn’t want to be here, just like you – who would rather be at home or back in base, taking care of her sisters, cracking jokes, cooking food or just being nice. Yet now you’ve got to send her to the bottom of the sea, because if you don’t, she, her family, and all of the Eagle Union will come for your own family and kill them, simply because they’re the ‘enemy’.

Astoria is literally you, just on the wrong side. And it’s at this moment, as you see your family and her family in your mind, that you realise, for the first time, why you must fight.

Suddenly, her gun barrels swing into play and she fires a salvo. The shells bracket your squad and splatter you with water. Has she seen you, or is she firing blind?

It doesn’t matter – suddenly, you decide that, to hell with it, this terrible job’s got to be ended soon, and you’re going to be the one finishing it, because now you’ve got a proper reason to do so. “Turn on the searchlights.”

The beams of pure white radiance slice through the night and catch them off-guard – Astoria, Quincy and Vincennes, held motionless as if in a tableau. Vincennes still has one of her fingers in her mouth. Astoria is lurching back in alarm, her eyes wide, while Quincy, faced with such brightness, has screwed up her face. But one thing holds them all in common.

They look terrified. Pity pulls at your heart again, tugs at your Wisdom Cube and begs you to just let them live. And for a moment, you are so, so sincerely tempted to do so.

But then the image flashes before your eyes of your own sisters there, caught by an enemy fleet with nowhere to run and doomed to die, and somehow, you don’t know how, the pity is overridden by a nameless emotion that courses throughout your body and makes you move with such a sense of resolution as you’ve never felt before.

You point your katana at them as you feel your facial muscles relax, making you expressionless. You barely feel yourself saying the single, decisive word.

The attack smashes into their fragile bodies. They waver, stagger, and, one by one, hit the water, motionless like fallen statues that once stood proud over Guadalcanal.

“It’s over,” you say quietly as the gunfire subsides, fresh scratches on your cheek stinging with pain and one of your turrets smoking from battle damage. Moisture runs down your face in a thin stream; you can’t tell whether it’s blood, oil or tears. “Admiral Mikawa, sisters: I understand why I fight now. It scares me so much.”

Chapter Text

Part 2, Scene 1: Aftermath

It’s time for the evening meal in the dormitory, and you’re the one cooking today. It was Atago’s turn yesterday and she made some tonkatsu; although it was rather simple for her, she had to make do with the resources on hand. As heavy cruisers, your family still has enough food to keep on going, and most of it is of fair quality – however, you know very well that this isn’t the case for everybody in the fleet, and that rationing is starting to take its toll on the human units, albeit slowly. It seems wrong, therefore, as Atago explained yesterday over the food, to indulge in extravagance. Your big sister does have her bizarre aspects, but she’s still responsible and you respect her opinion greatly.

So you looked over the list of ingredients carefully while you were setting up, trying to see which combination will leave the least waste, and you finally settled on using some of the salmon that Nagara got her hands on two days ago to make some rice bowls. It was still fresh, and you knew that your abilities were up to the task. That’s one thing that you’re sure about, unlike lots of other things these days.

“Dinner’s ready,” you eventually call out as you walk with the food into the living room. Takao managed to secure this snug little apartment when your family first arrived at the base, using her rank and privileges as an elite fighter. It has two double bedrooms, self-contained washing facilities, a little power generator and a small but useful kitchen. It’s a nice place to be, a little self-contained bubble away from the chaos and destruction of the outside world, and it’s one of the few places where you can feel truly at ease these days, in character as your kind, caring self.

They are already kneeling at the table – Atago with her usual playful smile on her face as she finishes a comment on something or other, Takao blushing deeply at the remark (probably something inappropriate about men - your eldest sister just isn't good with that side of life) and Maya playing absentmindedly with her white hair, deep in thought.

“Ah, the best of us arrives,” says Atago, turning her eyes towards you. “What’s on the menu today?”

“Fish donburi and some miso soup. I did what I could – I fear that it isn’t up to your standards, nee-san.”

“Never fear, Choukai. Your cooking’s good enough to satisfy Nagato herself - or Mutsu, rather, since she eats more.” Atago picks up her chopsticks. “I’m hungry! Let’s get started.”

“Indeed,” says Takao, clearly glad to be turning the conversation in some other direction. “Self-deprecation is never the correct path to go down. I, for one, have always enjoyed your food.”

“Thank you,” you say – modesty is a useful trait, but it still pays to recognise compliments. “Well, there’s more in the kitchen if any of you want it later.”

Atago grins and tucks in. She’s always enjoyed her food and knows that you’ve made that extra portion just for her. A small smile plays across your lips as you reflect on how very childish she can be sometimes.

But Maya is picking at her food, her mind clearly preoccupied, and after a few minutes she lays down her chopsticks entirely. “Sorry to break the mood, people, but I’ve got something to say. I was waiting for everybody to be here before I said it, though.”

“What is it?” you ask with surprise, pausing as you lift your soup bowl to your mouth.

She gets straight into it - that's the thing you like most about Maya, the fact that she's pragmatic and gets thing done, frills, uncertainty and ceremony be damned. “Well, here’s the thing. I was talking with Junyou earlier at the infirmary – she was having her wounds from Santa Cruz checked – and she said that there’s going to be a big attack on Guadalcanal in the next few days. Apparently, we’ve all been detailed to take part, and Admirals Abe and Kondo are leading. Junyou said that the point of this is to get the Union off Guadalcanal once and for all.”

You suck in your breath at those names. Vice Admiral Nobutake Kondo is a big shot in the ranks of the navy and a respected veteran of Midway, Eastern Solomons and Santa Cruz; Admiral Mikawa has always spoken of him well, and it’s rumoured that he’s allowed to have private conferences with Nagato and even ‘The Decisives’, about whom so little is known. You know less about Abe, but his reputation is good as well – he was at the Eastern Solomons and at Santa Cruz as well, and did well there, leading the battlecruisers in the fray. If they’re in charge of this operation, it must really be of the utmost importance to warrant their presence.

Atago, who was with you at Midway and who was in the lead at the Solomons, and Takao, who was at both of the later battles under Kondo’s leadership, both frown deeply. Takao says, “And what authority does Junyou have to be talking about such things? Just because she’s a member of the Second Carrier Division doesn’t let her go around making holes in our intelligence network. What if news of this got out to the enemy?”

Atago sighs and pushes away her food. “You know Junyou, dear sister – she’s arrogant. She was probably told the details in advance since she’s the only operational carrier we have right now, and her head is being bloated with her own self-importance; so much so that she can’t restrain herself from telling everyone that she knows things they don’t.”

"I suppose there isn't anything we can do about it now. You can't put spilled milk back into its bottle, as the saying goes. I should find her and give her a reprimand, though, for her laxity." Takao sips her soup. "The girl just cannot match up to Souryuu or Hiryuu, though it pains me to mention their names."

“Typical Junyou,” you say. Despite your wish to be nice to your comrades, you have never liked the rookie carrier.

Maya isn’t done yet. “And that isn’t it. While I was leaving the infirmary, I bumped into Ayanami, and she gave me this.” She places a slip of paper on the table for you and your sisters to look at.

You pick it up, your heart sinking as you process its contents. “A receipt for special bombardment shells? How did she get this?”

“Apparently, she picked it up from the ground outside an ammunition warehouse while she was coming back from training and clocked what it meant. You understand, don’t you?” The distress in her voice is palpable, although she's clearly trying to hide it. It shows how much she's been thinking about this.

Of course you understand what it means. The fleet that you will be a part of is going to be getting within knife-fighting range of Guadalcanal’s shores in order to shoot at the airfield - Henderson Field, they call it, after a Union aviator who died at Midway. It seems a good idea in theory – after all, what better to wreck land-based positions than heavy-calibre naval gunfire? Except the last time this was tried, which was last month, Furutaka was sent to the bottom and Aoba barely came back alive. And you can see that your sisters comprehend the situation all too well for themselves.

“If that’s the case,” says Takao in a worried tone, “then we can expect to be at a disadvantage, no matter who our leaders are or what we bring. We don’t have radar; the enemy does. This will be like walking into a dark cave with only a flashlight and hoping to defeat the wild bear inside with a kitchen knife.”

It’s going to be like Savo Island all over again, you realise with a sudden, horrible fear. Except that you won’t have the element of surprise. It won’t just be the odd cruiser like poor Kako - she was torpedoed by a submarine after that battle, and you only found out the loss a day after getting back - who will be lost; many more will die, perhaps even your sisters...

You clench your fists. No! You cannot let this happen.

“We must speak to Admiral Mikawa about this,” you say with a force that surprises even you and that makes Takao, Atago and Maya all swivel their heads in your direction. “We can’t allow this to go ahead. It will be a slaughter.”

They look understanding, and for a moment you cherish hope that you’ve carried your point. But then Atago shakes her head.

“I don’t think we can do that, Choukai dear,” she says, although her voice is gentle. “If Kondo and Abe are in charge of this, then these orders are probably from places too high for us to challenge. All we can do in this situation is follow along and try to limit the damage done.”

“But-” Kako, Furutaka, Astoria, Canberra – their faces flash before your eyes.

“I agree with Atago,” cuts in Takao. “It would not be right if we tried to show our dissatisfaction with these orders, especially in light of the Midway defeat and our heavy casualties at Santa Cruz. We must be showing a unified front and protecting each other more than ever, rather than arguing about who is right and who is wrong. Bickering can be done after the victory is won.”

You bow your head, gritting your teeth and refusing to answer. Why are you so helpless?

“It’s not all so bad,” says Maya, who now sounds like she’s trying to be more optimistic. “I think I’ve made this all sound much worse than it actually is. For one, there aren’t any Union battleships around according to battle and reconnaissance reports, and we all know that the only carrier they have around is Enterprise - and she's wounded anyway. The bigger guns are on our side.”

“And who's providing that firepower?” enquires Takao.

“Hiei and Kirishima. I met them while coming back to the dorm when they were leaving their meeting with Admiral Mikawa and chatted with them a bit. They only got here two hours ago, and why else would they be here?”

“Ah, dear Hiei!” Atago smiles again. “How I’ve missed her. Her presence brings good luck everywhere. Did she say anything special to you, Maya?”

"Not really, nee-san. But she was very friendly."

Takao nods in agreement. “See, Choukai? Don’t fret – our forces are strong, and I trust in the abilities of the battlecruisers and the admirals to help us win the day. As much as we all appreciate your worrying for us, you should focus on building up your own strength for the battle ahead.”

“I suppose so, Takao nee-san,” you say quietly, but your mind is elsewhere. You pick up your chopsticks again and poke at your food.

Hiei... There’s a strange feeling in your heart after you heard her name. You’ve always admired her; in your opinion, she’s the most beautiful of the Kongou-class sisters, not to mention a masterful cook and kind, firm and responsible to those around her. In fact, she’s the epitome of what you yourself want to be when you’re older, though you’ve never really spoken properly to her, unlike your sisters, who have served alongside her for a long time in this war. The one occasion when you had a conversation with her was brief and formal – it was at a grand fleet review during peacetime, when you were a rookie, where the battle fleet stretched across Tokyo Bay and she led the procession of honour that sailed between the lines, the very image of majesty. You were with your sisters, and she advised you about the duties of being a heavy cruiser and serving the Sakura Empire. Standard parade-ground talk, nothing personal.

Still, that left an impact on you, and ever since that day you’ve had a wish to see her again. She was at Midway in the same section of the fleet as you – under Admiral Kondo’s command, by coincidence - but you didn’t get the chance to talk to her then. And after that, she was detached to other duties while you were sent to Rabaul, and you haven’t meet her since.

Now the opportunity has come to speak to her again, to hear her lovely voice and look into her eyes... Hang on a minute. You shake your head. What are these thoughts that you’re having when you stand on the brink of death in a few days to come? Come on, Choukai – stay focused.

Maya is talking over something with Atago, and both chuckle at a shared joke - the mood seems to have lightened. You are suddenly aware of how you have dropped out of the conversation and try to get back into the flow without making it obvious. But before you can, there is a knock at the door.

Takao looks confused. “Now who could that be, at this time?” she wonders. “Choukai, would you go and take a look?”

You nod and go across to open the main door. Then you freeze.

There she stands, as tall and graceful as ever, her white tunic and coat immaculate and her black katana at her side, her amber eyes benevolent and watchful. She bows slightly to you, her silken black hair draping over her two white horns and her flower-like hair ornaments.

“Hiei-sama...” you say in shock, not knowing what to do. You feel yourself blush and curse yourself inwardly for doing so.

She smiles. “Good evening, Choukai. Would you like to take a walk? We have a few things to talk about.”

Chapter Text

Part 2, Scene 2: Aftermath

“That is a lovely flower you have in your hair, dear Choukai,” remarks Hiei, glancing at you with a smile.

“Oh, this?” you say, self-consciously touching the three-petalled white ornament. “It’s nothing special, Hiei-sama, but I’m glad that you like it.”

“May I ask where you obtained it from? Good flowers such as that are difficult to find in these times.”

“There was a trader who passed through here a couple months ago when the mail was being delivered to the human troops. I got some off him for a fair price. I have to be careful though, since they’re hard to find and they don’t last for that long...” You realise that you’re starting to ramble on and cut yourself short.

Hiei nods. “I like it. It reminds me of the stars above.”

There’s just the two of you on the dockside – all the other Kansen are either in their dormitories, on guard and patrol duty or, if they’re particularly small, asleep. You’ve been talking with Hiei – a part of you still can’t believe that you’re actually doing this – for a good half-hour now about this and that, walking about the dormitories, the base shrine and the gardens; now, standing next to her with your hands clasped behind your back, as she sits on a bench with her katana by her side, you follow her gaze and look at the night sky, decorated with little lights and with the huge pale moon taking centre stage amongst them like an emperor amongst his subjects. Their reflections dance in the slowly rippling water of the port. “It’s a beautiful night,” you whisper.

“One of the best I have seen,” agrees Hiei. “This bodes well for the future, don’t you think? It shows that the war gods are with us.” But something about her voice seems off, as if she doesn’t fully think what she is saying.

“Do you believe in the gods too, Hiei-sama?” you ask tentatively.

“Sometimes. My belief was stronger before Midway, but after that – well, can any of us say that we retain our old beliefs without any modifications or doubts?” The battlecruiser sighs, and suddenly, for the first time during this evening stroll, she looks very tired. “I am an Imperial ship, and I have served the Sakura Empire for nearly three decades, so I should trust in the gods – not only should it be part of my very nature, but my years of work should have taught me to do so without question. But, in my darkest moments, I wonder whether, if they exist, they will let us win this war or not.”

“But we have done well,” you protest. “The Union has only two carriers left in the Pacific, and the Royal Navy has had its teeth drawn in the Indian Ocean. And our forces grow from day to day.”

Hiei looks at you, this time sadly. “You say this, Choukai, but I am inclined to disagree. You see, the night before Midway, I had a conversation with Akagi.”

Voices from beyond the grave. “W-what did she say?”

“We were talking about such an eventuality as is happening to us now. I said to Akagi, ‘Hypothetically, now, do you think we would have a chance at winning this war if we were to lose tomorrow?’ Not very seriously, of course; I was more confident then. She looked me straight in the eye, her usual condescending smile gone, and said ‘Not a chance in hell. I – we must win. We’ve already been incredibly lucky to get to this point, and we must pray for that to continue.’ Now if Akagi, of all people, was saying such things, one can see how bad the situation really must be.”

“Surely that was just her stress before the battle, or something else...”

“Look at us now, Choukai,” says Hiei, her voice gentle but imploring and no longer that of the politely socialising superior she was until a few minutes ago. “We are fighting on a shoestring. Our carrier forces depend on Shoukaku and Zuikaku for victory, and ever since Santa Cruz happened even they are burnt out, poor girls. The Decisives won’t, or cannot, leave port, and Nagato and Mutsu are honour-bound to stay with them, while our other battleships are not strong enough to fight the enemy on even terms. Our light cruisers can’t stand up to the enemy; our heavy cruisers are falling, as you yourself should know. Our destroyers and submarines are becoming more outnumbered day by day. And this is not even touching on our human forces, or our ammunition, oil and food reserves. I repeat: a shoestring.”

You are silent for a moment. “Is this what you wanted to tell me then, Hiei-sama?” you ask.

Hiei sits back on the bench, as if suddenly returning to her previous state. “Of course not; no. I let my thoughts run away from myself. My apologies.”

“No need to apologise, Hiei-sama. If anything, the fault is mine. I shouldn’t have disturbed your mind by trying to argue with you.” Yet as you say this, you reflect on the fact that you’ve found yet another way to connect to the battlecruiser, unfortunate thought it may be. She, too, is incredibly worried and stressed – after all, who wouldn’t be in her position? She is one of just four capital ships that the Empire has the frontlines and nearly a year of constant deployment has taken its toll on her. She, too, wants somebody to talk to about those worries and to comfort her in her difficulties. And you start to see that, behind the image of the dignified, stately warrior that you’ve been so used to thinking about and have so admired, there lies a core that is all too human and fragile – just like your own.

Abruptly, she stands up from the bench – but even her abruptness is so elegant, and you find yourself catching your breath at her body's swift and beautiful movements. “We’ve been here for too long,” she says in a different tone, as if trying to be more optimistic. “Come, let us walk some more. That should allow us to converse about different things.”

***

Slowly, you walk with Hiei back towards the dormitory gardens. This is a place that you like to go to a lot, since it has a small but well-tended fountain in the middle that makes pleasant gurgling sounds almost like those of a happy baby. It is sweet to listen to and, more than once, you have sat there with a book or just thinking for a long time as the sounds lulled you into a deep sense of relaxation.

The pebbles of the path crunch quietly under your feet as you move into the garden. Her silhouette clear against the surrounding dusk, Hiei has not said much in the past few minutes, and you are starting to wonder what she is thinking about. You don’t want to disturb her; indeed, it would be impolite to talk to her if she doesn’t want to speak, given how superior she is to you. Yet at the same time, you feel that such an opportunity as you have now to spend time alone with your idol won’t come again, and you wish to make the best of it.

So you say, in a casual way as if you are talking about the weather, “How are you sisters, Hiei-sama? I apologise for not asking about them earlier.”

“Oh? They are well. Kirishima, as you may know, is here with me on the base, and eager to be going into battle – Kongo and Haruna are back in Truk, training and getting some reinforcements ready. And how are yours?”

“In good health and in good spirits,” you say – yet as you do so, Takao’s comment about the flashlight in the bear cave and Maya’s worries about the upcoming mission spring to mind, albeit reluctantly, and you realise that you’re short-changing Hiei on the truth. “Although...”

“Carry on, dear Choukai. We are alone; you are free to express your private opinions.” Hiei chuckles slightly, even though the way in which she does so is ambiguous. “Hehe. However, your tone doesn’t bode well.”

“Then perhaps I shouldn’t.”

“No, no! Just an observation. Besides, I have already gone so far as to unload my worries on you; at least out of politeness, I should hear something from you if you want to say it. And I’m not just being polite; I am genuinely interested.” She smiles in a motherly way. “How can I help?”

“Well, it’s - it’s the fact that my sisters are worried about the upcoming operation. We know about our orders to bombard the airfield; based on what happened to my comrades Aoba and Furutaka at Cape Esperance, we’re not very optimistic about the chances of success. Of course, we shall do our duty to the Empire, and we shall try to claim victory – but the night is a cruel master, and we may be going to meet him blind.” You speak in metaphor, like Takao does sometimes, trying to lend a more solid and considered basis to your fears.

She nods.

“And so, Hiei-sama, I must admit that we are all rather scared and worried of what’s going to happen in a few nights’ time. That’s why I cannot say that my sisters are perfectly well.” What a banal, boring ending – there was no elegance in saying that. But you’ve said your point, despite the difficult emotions that surface because of it.

She looks thoughtful, and then replies, “I see, Choukai; now let me ask you something about yourself. What is it that you fear most about what is coming? Is it defeat? Or is it something else?”

You cannot respond to that. You know very well what it is that you fear, and you don’t want to mention it, because then the war gods in their all-encompassing yet unseeing cruelty may hear it and make it reality.

“Then let me guess. I don’t think you fear the defeat of our forces, Choukai – or, if you do, that isn’t your main concern, given your good track record. It’s about your family, isn’t it?”

You nod assent, your heart beating rapidly. In fact, you do fear defeat, rather naturally - but given what happened to Kako after Savo, sometimes you fear the overconfidence of victory more. That, however, is not your primary concern; Hiei identified that first-time. How did she?

“You don’t want them to risk themselves on the battlefield. It is not your self-preservation you fear, since you would willingly die for them. But the thought that they will die while you survive, even in victory – that is too much to bear, is it not?”

It is too much. You feel your eyes welling up, and before you know it, you are crying. You curse yourself inside as the tears runs down your cheeks for showing such weakness in front of Hiei, but you cannot help yourself. All the emotions that you have kept tightly bottled up week after week, month after month, come pouring out like a waterfall. You see the images of your nightmares – of your sisters lying dead in the waters of Guadalcanal surrounded by the enemy, of smoke and fires raging over their corpses, and of their lifeless eyes never seeing the rising sun again; just like what happened to Astoria and her family months ago. It is what has haunted you ever since, and it rips your heart out every time you think of it.

Suddenly, you feel a new weight on your back, and you realise with another shock that Hiei is embracing you; holding you to her chest, she strokes your hair softly and soothingly.

She is so close...

“I said too much, didn’t I?” she whispers. “I am so very sorry, Choukai. I didn’t mean to touch that chord.”

“No, Hiei-sama,” you sob, your voice muffled. “You did nothing wrong. It is I, I …" But you break down before you finish. All you can do is cry.

And so that is what you do for the next few minutes, while Hiei – the woman you have admired so much for all your life and career – the only person for whom you have felt the stirrings of feelings that you don’t want to put a name to, for fear that they will be tainted – Hiei holds you tight and strokes your hair, while you gurgle and weep like the fountain in the garden.

“It’s all right,” she whispers to you. “It will end well, Choukai. I understand your pain.”

She has sisters too; she has the same fears; she wants them to survive too. She tells you that then and there in the dark, and you love and respect her all the more for it.

Eventually, you manage to calm down and wipe your eyes. “S-sorry, Hiei-sama,” you stutter as you pull away. “I didn’t mean to cry so much, and now my tears have stained your tunic-”

“They are pure tears, Choukai. I am honoured to receive them” she replies, her voice emotional too. “Choukai, remember the words that I say to you now.”

She puts her hand under your chin and tilts your head upwards, so that now you are looking straight into her wise, beautiful amber eyes, and she speaks the words that sear themselves into your memory.

“Do you understand?”

“... Yes.”

Chapter Text

Part 3, Scene 1: Kantai Kessen

The bombs keep on falling from the morning sky in an iron hail, unseeing and merciless. Five strike Kinugasa and blow her straight into the water, her crimson blood staining the blue surface of the water. She dies quietly, while Suzuya yells her name in despair and rushes to her corpse’s side.

Maya takes a hit to her legs and staggers, swearing angrily and desperately directing her anti-aircraft guns at the dive bombers, each emblazoned with the infuriatingly simple star of the Eagle Union. They swoop down, not caring a jot about the flak barrage, but keeping steady on their course to rip into the transports. You hear the screams of the poor infantrymen trapped in those lumbering hulks as the fire consumes them, and one of the transports snaps apart in a huge explosion that tears at your ears as the ammunition stored in its hold cooks off, blowing it sky high.

The Dauntlesses keep on coming – you have lost count of the number of times they have attacked by now. You fear them like you fear no other plane after what they did at Midway, where they effortlessly dispatched the First and Second Carrier Divisions – the elite of the elite were no match for their attacks. For all you know, these planes are coming from Henderson Field, from some other Union island base, or even from the Grey Ghost herself, rumoured to be in these waters and still fighting even after the death of her sister and her mauling at Santa Cruz.

Oh, how you wish you had air cover! You curse as you dodge another bomb while trying to move towards your wounded sister, who is still standing but clearly in trouble. Fighters are coming for her – Wildcats with their machine guns blazing. Maya’s guns roar out and curtains of flak fill the air, but the atrocious 25mm guns that she has been equipped with do essentially nothing, and her heavier weapons cannot keep up with the nimble Wildcats. Bullets spatter the water around her and draw blood from her skin.

Maya yells in defiance and spins her katana so fast that it’s almost a blur, deflecting the remainder of the bullets away, sending some back at the Wildcats and causing one to drop into the sea in flames. But the others pull away unharmed, and though they may now be leaving along with the dive bombers they escorted to the area, you are sure that they will be back.

“Maya,” you shout, your voice nevertheless faint in your deafened ears. “Are you all right? How badly are you hurt?”

She winces, her amber eyes filled with pain under her singed eyebrows. “Well, I’m alive, but I think my left leg is busted – I can barely stand.” As if to reinforce that, she finally begins to fall over. You rush over and support her scarred body with your shoulder.

“Thank God!” you say explosively, glad that the attack has not done more damage to your sister. Earlier she was rammed by a Dauntless that came in too low on its attack run, and you remember your heart stopping as the explosion engulfed her, followed by a huge sensation of relief as the smoke cleared to reveal her burnt and limping, but still alive. “I thought you were done for.”

In response, Maya gives a small smile. “It’ll take more than that to kill me, Choukai. How are you?”

“I’m fine,” you say hurriedly, though in truth you are not. Although you haven’t taken any bomb hits, you’ve had to dodge a lot of torpedoes and several near misses from heavy bombs have riddled you with shrapnel and you can feel a particularly large piece grating next to your thighbone. It hurts mind-numbingly, but your discomfort is nothing compared to your elation that Maya will survive.

Yet poor Kinugasa... Suzuya is cradling her body and weeping now that there are no Union planes to disturb her, and you feel a void in your heart too that flushes out your earlier happiness. Kinugasa, the last of the Savo Island team, whom you have relied on so much for good sense, wisdom and combat advice, and with whom you thought you were becoming good friends, is dead. The thought of what you will now have to tell Aoba rushes to mind; you push it away. There are too many other things to worry about.

The rising sun has brought no help to your task force since you finished bombarding Henderson Field - the main force failed to reach its objective, due to Admiral Abe’s incompetence. Why did he not finish the job? The Union forces had no capital ships and they should have been brushed aside easily; yet reports from the battlefield around Guadalcanal say that your comrades have been thrown back and that they cannot continue, despite heavy enemy casualties. This sounds like nonsense to you; the battlecruisers, at least, should have survived without much problem. Instead, you and your fellow heavy cruisers were suddenly pulled from escort duty (highly important escort duty at that, since the men you were protecting were the Guadalcanal invasion force) and sent in during the night to attack the airfield while the enemy was broken and recovering. To your team’s credit, you accomplished that, although you are unsure about how effective it was. It was only on the return trip to the transports that it all went horribly wrong, when the Union air attacks came with the breaking of the day.

That is not the end of it. You have so many other questions on your mind: where are the god-forsaken Zeroes? Where are Junyou and her promised air support, or the fliers from Rabaul? Why aren’t counterstrikes being flown against Henderson? At this rate, your force will not survive for much longer. You hear Admiral Mikawa on the radio, asking for status reports.

“Kinugasa-” your voice chokes as you see the body of the calm, kind veteran heavy cruiser, who was with you at Savo, who held the line at Cape Esperance and has been almost been a mentor to you during those long-gone training periods, rocking the waves. “Kinugasa is dead, sir; we can’t salvage her. Maya is wounded; Suzuya is operational, as am I.”

“Choukai, you cannot continue with the mission.” Mikawa sounds unlike himself: normally authoritative and sure of himself, he now seems out of his mind with worry and stress. “We’ve already lost six transports and a seventh is too damaged to keep up. At this rate you will be chewed up as well. Turn back! Head to Rabaul with the cruisers and take two destroyers with you for escort. I will attempt to push the transports through to the beaches.”

“Admiral, that’s suicide!”

“No, it’s not – it's what is necessary. Now follow my orders!” Mikawa yells over the channel. You imagine what his face looks like right now on his command ship, wallowing there in the middle of the broken formation surrounded by the burning transports, with lifeboats plying furiously to and fro and little destroyers desperately trying to get any survivors out of the boiling water.

You don’t want to leave him – this is Vice Admiral Gunichi Mikawa, your commander, to whom you have sworn allegiance as part of the Eighth Fleet, and with whom you have fought in these waters for months. Leaving him would be like leaving your father to die, if you had one, or betraying the emperor himself, on whose authority the admiral leads you.

Yet – he is ordering you to do so, and that leaves you torn. Amongst the other things that have been drilled into your mind as part of your training with the Imperial Navy, it is that orders for your superiors must be followed – nay, they are damn near sacred. Disobeyance is tantamount to wounding your commander personally, and so it should never be considered.

What do you do? The same indecisiveness that wracked you at Savo is back; you thought that you had changed since then, grown more experienced. What folly, now that you look back on it – you have not changed at all. You are still naïve, callow, scared Choukai, unfit to be a combat commander in any sense, always reliant on your subordinates and getting them killed as a result. You want to throw your sword into the sea and yell in despair.

Cruel reality intervenes to force you to a decision. Now you can hear the drone of aircraft engines on the horizon and spot the tiny dim silhouettes of Avenger torpedo bombers approaching, with Wildcats flying in escort above them. They are bringing death, and you know that Maya no longer has the strength to fight them off. Nor do you, you realise suddenly – you are absolutely spent, and the shrapnel in your leg starts hurting like the devil again, as if to reinforce this point.

Yes, it is cowardly on your part, but it is the only thing you can do. You reactivate your microphone.

“Yes, Admiral Mikawa. May the war gods be with you.”

“Godspeed, Choukai.”

You turn back to Maya. “Stay still,” you warn, taking a syringe from your hip pouch. “This may hurt.” Maya glowers but does not complain as you bend over and inject the painkiller into her leg; she knows that it will dull her agony enough to allow her to move, albeit more slowly, for the next few hours.

But as you rise and signal to Suzuya and to the light cruisers to get ready to withdraw, your thoughts are elsewhere. Above all other questions, even that of how you will survive on the retreat to the base, one now remains overwhelmingly predominant in your mind.

Is Hiei safe?

Chapter Text

Part 2, Scene 2: Kantai Kessen

“You’re lying,” you whisper, staring wildly at Kirishima as she stands across from you in Vice Admiral Kondo’s room, holding that thing in her hand. The battlecruiser, her face scarred and burnt from shrapnel and her sword scabbard dented and battered, shakes her head in a way that suggests she is barely holding her dignity together. Nagara, her loyal lieutenant, bruised and with bandages around her head, stands by her side, the little light cruiser looking fearful and shattered with dark bags under her eyes.

“I’m sorry, Choukai.” Kirishima’s reply is curt, guarded, cold – so unlike her normal playful tones.

“No!” you shout. “What you’re saying simply isn’t possible. She can’t be dead. She’s your older sister, for God’s sake – you should know how good a fighter she is. She should have fought her way out of there; she should have succeeded; she should have...”

“I’m telling you that I’m telling the truth. I left her there myself.”

“Why, oh why?” you scream, “Why did you leave her, when she could easily have-”

She snaps. “Shut the fuck up, Choukai,” she snarls viciously. “Do you know what you’re saying? What makes you think you have any right to judge my sister’s actions, or what I did to try and save her? Do you know who you are talking to, you fool, huh? Do you know who you are talking about – what your words mean to her? Accept the truth, brat – my sister Hiei is dead!”

The words blow you back, make you teeter on your feet, make the world spin around your head in a dark dance. “B-but, Hiei-sama...”

Kirishima howls and throws her sword onto the floor, weeping now. “She’s dead – don't you get it? I couldn’t save her; you couldn’t save her; nobody could save her. She...” She doesn’t finish her sentence as her words are drowned out by her cries, and she collapses to the floor on her knees, while Nagara rushes to her side and tries to calm her down.

At his desk, in the middle of this, Vice Admiral Nobutake Kondo – that stern, respected veteran – looks like he can barely believe the news either. He sits in shock, not reacting even as you stagger against the table and lean on it for support, breathing heavily, while Kirishima sobs and sobs, and cradles the thing in her hands.

The thing? You shake your head at designating it that way, forcing yourself to look at it properly.

A shattered, faintly glowing Wisdom Cube, one of its corners entirely sheared off and with pieces of metal still embedded in its core, ruining its perfect symmetry and harmonious structure, is what is cradled in Kirishima’s hands, only now tears are dripping off her face and falling onto its one intact face – falling with an intensity as if the battlecruiser is unconsciously trying to hydrate the Cube and return it to its former life and glory.

It’s Hiei.

***

“How did she die?” you ask Nagara in a dead voice, after the crying Kirishima has been escorted away to the engineers with what remains of her sister. There are just three of you in the office now: you, her and Admiral Kondo.

“Slowly,” the light cruiser says – she has been crying too but is at least in a state to speak. “We ran into a Union cruiser formation in the dark, and Admiral Abe ordered her and Akatzuki to turn their searchlights on to search for targets. Then all hell broke loose, because they found a light cruiser right after the lights came on and they started firing at her – but there were other ships around and they all started shooting at Hiei-sama...”

With an effort, Nagara slows down and carries on.

“There was one Union destroyer – a Benson-class, I think – who went right up to her and started shooting her with everything she had. I thought that small-calibre gunfire couldn’t do much, but Hiei-sama couldn’t react fast enough in the dark and in all the chaos, and the little girl just ran in close and hit her over and over again. And Hiei-sama's turrets couldn’t track her because she was too close, so that destroyer got off damage-free.”

“She got hit by several torpedoes after that and one of the heavy cruisers shot out her left knee, so she couldn’t maneuver, and because she couldn’t protect the flagship, Admiral Abe and his staff got attacked by that same destroyer and were badly wounded. But she was still alive when we withdrew from the battle area.”

“Why did Abe turn back?” interjects Admiral Kondo. “When I inspected your fleet coming into the port, a good few of you looked like you were still capable of combat, Kirishima especially. Surely Abe could have ordered her and those of you who were still in good shape to continue on and bombard the airfield.”

“He did not appear to be in the best state himself when he gave that order, sir,” replies Nagara. “His flagship was badly damaged and he was hit by shrapnel; his chief of staff was killed next to him. It was not entirely his fault.”

“You’re just trying to defend him,” says Kondo in an accusing tone.

“Perhaps I am, sir,” states Nagara bravely. “But I’m just telling the truth.”

“Of course, of course.” Kondo slumps back in his chair, waving a hand. “When Admiral Yamamoto and Nagato hear about this... Continue.”

“Yes, sir. Admiral Abe then requested air support from Vice Admiral Kakuta, who ordered Junyou and the Rabaul squadrons to deploy combat air patrols at dawn to protect Hiei-sama, because the Union were sure to try and finish her off. Kirishima-sama was supporting her sister then, and I was ordered to make a protective screen around her with what I had left. Unfortunately, there followed repeated air attacks from Henderson Field from both light and heavy bombers, and also carrier based-aircraft.”

So that’s what Junyou was doing earlier, you realise, hearkening back to the transports and to Admiral Mikawa. You regret cursing the woman – indeed, you now wish with all your heart that she had been doing what she had been ordered to do more effectively. If only there had been more Zeroes available...

“Our planes did their best,” Nagara is saying. “Hiei-sama was hit repeatedly by the land-based attack planes, but the damage done was moderate and as the afternoon came around we thought that she could be saved. Even Admiral Abe said so – he ordered Kirishima-sama to strap up her sister’s broken leg and to help her back to base.”

“But then the worst thing possible happened – our formation was attacked by torpedo planes from what is believed to have been the carrier Enterprise. They hit Hiei-sama twice, and they broke her other leg as well, so that now she was totally crippled and unable to steer again. She was also blind in one eye as a result of an attack from the Union destroyer and, when I was trying to tend to her wounds, I found that her left shoulder and three of her ribs were broken as well. By this point she was in severe pain and her rigging had lost nearly all its power, since her Cube had taken heavy damage from the repeated impacts. Admiral Abe therefore ordered her scuttled.”

She looks like she doesn’t want to go on. “And then?” you say harshly. You must know how it ended.

“Kirishima-sama refused to do it; she was adamant that her sister could be saved. Admiral Abe told Shigure to torpedo her and ‘put her out of her misery’, but she refused too. So all we could do was leave her behind, after removing her Wisdom Cube. When I was sent back thirty minutes later to check that she was gone, I found nothing.”

Nagara finally stops her report, her last words coming out shaky. The silence that ensues is profound and charged; you feel an emptiness inside you as you process what she has said, imagining the horrifying scenes that she witnessed in the night and ensuing day, imagining the pain that Hiei went through hour after hour, imagining the hope with which her comrades believed that she might be saved, only for it to be all quashed by the Grey Ghost.

Admiral Kondo sighs heavily. “Thank you, Nagara. Choukai, I already received your report detailing Vice Admiral Mikawa’s situation. And that reminds me, I have news for you; he was forced to break off the troop attack and is now on the return journey to the base. I have filled him in on the situation and he has told me that he wants to meet with you when he gets back.”

“Yes, sir.” You can’t bring yourself to say anything more than that in this situation.

“Now you’re both dismissed. I’ve got to send a message to Tokyo.”

Hiei is dead.

***

You meet Admiral Mikawa as he is disembarking from his damaged flagship in the dock, a bloodstained bandage wrapped around his right hand. He sees you, and his eyes speak volumes.

Aged, bowed and exhausted, he walks slowly towards you.

“Choukai. You made it back. How are the others?”

“Well, sir. Maya is in the infirmary having her wounds tended to. It’s good to see you survived too, sir.”

He gives a small smile. “Thank you. Come to my office; let’s have a drink. You look like you need one.”

‘And so do you,’ you reflect, but you nod silently and follow him on the long walk to the small, familiar room with the portrait of the Emperor on one side and a tasteful collection of flower paintings on the other. It is hard for you to believe that, barely forty-eight hours ago, you were there with him and poor Kinugasa, discussing plans for the attack that was supposed to have retaken Guadalcanal.

“Sit down,” says Mikawa wearily, motioning at one of the chairs as he pulls out a bottle of sake from one of his desk drawers. “This is some stuff I’ve been keeping for a while. I had another bottle, but I drank it by myself after Cape Esperance.”

“I see,” you say quietly, sitting with your hands folded on your lap, clasping each other. He pours out two cups and pushes one across to you. You both down the lukewarm liquid in one go.

“I know about Hiei,” Mikawa says.

“Yes, sir. Admiral Kondo told me that he had informed you about the situation.”

“No, not that. Well, I mean, yes, he did tell me that, but I mean something else. I mean that I know the things about which you and Hiei talked about a week ago.”

“Oh.”

“Hiei told me herself and asked me explicitly to go along with the promise that she had made to you. That was why I chose not to assign Takao and Atago to screen her attack force, and why I had Maya join the convoy as part of its escort, despite the fact that, on paper, they could have changed the balance of power significantly and kept her safe.” Mikawa pours himself another glass.

“So she protected them,” you whisper. “She kept them out of harm’s way as best as she could.”

“Yes; personally, I’m amazed that she went to such lengths for you, Choukai. Hiei was always a brave woman, but this was on another level. She brought your family time, did she not? The week after you spoke with her, did you not feel that you had far more time to spend with your sisters, instead of them being constantly called away to train for an upcoming operation? She cared deeply for you and for your siblings, because she knew from her own experience how precious they were to you.”

“But wasn’t it all for nothing?” you burst out. “Now that she’s dead, only Kirishima-sama is available to attack the airfield, and I’m pretty sure that my older sisters will have to go into battle now since they’re the only other heavy units available. Her protection lasted only as long as she lived.”

“That was the flaw in her reasoning, Choukai. Forgive her for that – she did as best as she could, as you said. Even she could not plan for everything.”

“S-she shouldn’t have made that promise,” you say brokenly – there are no tears this time, but only because you’re already spent after the scene in Kondo’s office. “It’s all my fault; if I hadn’t been so childish with her, she wouldn't have worried about my sisters. She would have had an adequate screen and she wouldn’t have been hurt so badly by the Union ships. I burdened her; I made her vulnerable. I made her die.”

“Would she want you to think in that way, Choukai, after what she did for you?”

“...No.”

“Then we must be grateful. Come, let’s have another glass.”

Wordlessly, you eye the sake cup. How pure that liquid looks – it's as pure as Hiei’s heart, you realise, that self-sacrificing, brave heart, which did not even worry about the foolish request put on it by your selfish emotions, but willingly accepted that burden, and did all it could to fulfill that request, until it gave out and disappeared into the nether. Will you - no, can you ever match up to that?

Can you?

Yes.

Yes, you hear yourself say inside, as you raise your glass. That’s the standard you will try to match up to now. This is the only way in which you can atone. Like Hiei did before you, you will help those around you without question – you will bear their loads, fight for their survival and happiness, and aid their desires, however self-centred or petty, because this is war, and that is how you will become worthy of the woman you loved. You will carry her spirit into the future, no matter how grim and dark the conflict becomes.

Somebody must do the sacrifice, and now it shall be you.

“To Hiei,” you say as you drink.

Admiral Mikawa nods. “To Hiei.”