Chapter Text
Lightning
Chapter 1:
BOOM!
Went the report of the opposing Renault FT’s cannon firing blindly into the smoke. She smirks as no shell had followed anywhere near her own FT. Emerging from the smoke confirms that her plan had worked. Madeleine’s turret was pointed in almost the opposite direction of her tank. With the enemy FT dug in, it could not rotate the hull to assist the hand cranked turret getting on target. It was perfect. She’d done it!
“Halt!” She calls to her driver, as she moves back inside the turret to put her own gun on target. As her FT begins to come to a stop, she feels it before she hears it.
BANG!
Her eyes whip open as she feels herself hit the floor of her new room.
“Gah! Merde!” She slowly lifts herself off of her floor, putting her sheets back on her bed. She looks over at her clock double checking the time as she massages the new bump on her head. She sighed, of course it was that dream again. Even when she is trying to start anew, her failure is thrown back into her face. She begins her usual morning routine, ending with her putting on the foreign green and white uniform. Making sure she has her school supplies, as well as her medicine, she begins her trek to Ooarai Girls’ Academy.
She quietly wondered what Ooari would be like compared to Maginot as she weaved her way through the crowds of white shirts and green skirts. She winced as she caught a glimpse of a girl walking straight into a street lamp. It certainly was a larger school than Maginot was, nothing like the vineyards and hedgerows of her original school “ship”.
Soon enough, she was at the gates of her new school. It definitely wasn’t as grand looking as Maginot, the pseudo-French school looking much more like a stereotypical European Boarding school, instead looking much more like a typical Japanese highschool. Taking a deep breath and straightening up, she took her first steps to her new destiny.
Said destiny apparently being Classroom 2-C. She quietly entered the classroom and after checking the chart given to her by her teacher in their office, found her seat. With her immediate objective complete her mind began to wonder what she was going to do for her elective now that Tankery was gone. Maybe Archery, a board game club, or because of her experience maintaining a tank, the automobile club.
Out of the corner of her eye, she caught a fluffy haired girl staring intensely at her. A little weirded out, she turns her attention back to the front of the classroom where her teacher has finally entered.
“Alright class, as you may have noticed we have a new student who has transferred to us from Maginot Girls’ College,” the teacher began, gesturing for her to stand up. “Why don’t you introduce yoursel-” Whatever the teacher was going to say was quickly cut off by the door at the front of the classroom opening.
Three girls entered. The one leading the small group was what looked to be a red-headed middle schooler carrying an open bag of dried sweet potatoes. Both of her companions stood two full heads taller than their leader, the ponytailed one taking up the left flank looking apologetically to the teacher, while the monocle clad girl on the right glared straight at the transfer student.
“Éclair~! Can we have a quick word with you?” The tiny red-head asked, stopping directly in front of the dark haired transfer. Immediately the classroom broke out into whispers.
“What does the student council want with the new girl?”
“She went to Maginot, does that mean she’s French?”
“Her name is Éclair so maybe?”
“Isn’t that a food?”
Éclair blinked before looking towards her teacher. The man responded with a long suffering sigh.
“Just go,” he said, before beginning to take attendance. Éclair slowly nods and follows after the apparent student council trio out into the hallway, quietly shutting the door behind her. The short girl stands directly in front of Éclair, while the two other council members box her in.
“Sorry for bothering you so early Éclair~,” the middle schooler begins, “but we had some great news we thought you would enjoy!” The girl pauses, seemingly waiting for a reaction. Éclair blinks again before responding.
“You know my name isn’t actually Éclair right?” the red-head smirks, gesturing off to the side with a dried sweet potato.
“I know, but it's just such a fun word to say, right Éclair~! Haha!” Éclair, now thoroughly confused, sighs.
“So what exactly is this ‘great news’ you are so excited to share?” The monocle girl quickly thrusts a flier into Éclair’s face as the short girl explains.
“We are restarting our Tankery team this year!” Éclair’s heart immediately jumps. “And we’d love to have you on our team!”
This was it. The chance to ride tanks once more. A chance to put those stuck-up upperclassmen in their place, especially since she would be riding against them this year. Those thoughts were immediately crushed by the memory of her failures.
The frustration of losing every match played. The failure of her Saint-Cyr style tankery. Of finally being given a glimpse of victory before it being harshly torn away. The mocking faces of her former teammates, of her former classmates outside of tankery… Of her former friends. The pain in her stomach rising and nausea began to grow.
“I-I’m-”
“Just think about it, okay?” the cheeky council member interrupts. The monocled girl stuffs the flier in Éclair’s hands before walking off. She stares down at the flier in her hands, before quickly reentering the classroom.
As calmly as she can, Éclair moves back to her seat, ignoring some of the stares being sent her way by her new classmates. She quickly puts the flier under her notebook, and as discreetly as she possibly can, takes a pill for her stomach.
Thankfully the staff had already been informed of her condition, which at least allowed her to not worry about being called out by a teacher for it. However, thinking of her classmates, Éclair quickly takes a second pill before turning what little attention she has to the class.
Thankfully the day had managed to pass by relatively quickly after that. After homeroom, Éclair had managed to calm herself down to where she could actually focus on the classes. That fluffy haired girl continued to give her strange looks, however by lunch it seemed like was focused on stalking someone else. The only other event of the day would be the small girl coming in just just before lunch looking as though she was going to pass out at any moment.
Besides the morning, it was a good start to Éclair’s new school life. However on her way back to her apartment, thoughts of what the student council had told her began to bubble back up.
Should she do it? She specifically came to Ooarai to get away from Tankery, and the memories it brought up about Maginot. Would her competitive streak get her into trouble again? How long would it take before she repeats the same mistake she made a Maginot? Thoughts of the judgemental faces, and notes left in her belongings bubbling up again with the pain in her stomach. As Éclair took another pill, she resolved herself.
Éclair would not be doing Tankery at Ooarai.
Her second day started off uneventful. Same walk to school, though she did see the fluffy haired girl stalking the brown haired girl who walked into the pole. Lunch, however, is when the student council made their move. The classroom was mostly empty, with the fluffy-haired girl and the seemingly narcoleptic student being the only two students besides Éclair when the council entered.
The trio approached her desk, much the same way as they did the previous day with the monocle girl taking the lead this time, the red-head content to sit back and enjoy her dried snack.
“We gave you time, now what is your answer?”
“What?” The girl leaned forwards, looming over Éclair at her desk.
“What do you mean ‘what’? Are you joining our tankery team or not?”
“Momo…” the ponytail girl put her hand on the newly dubbed Momo and pulled her back slightly. Éclair began feeling the pain in her stomach begin once more. She supposed this worked out since she did have her answer. She quickly reached down and took a pill before answering.
“I will not join your team.” Éclair quickly continued before any of the trio could get a word in. “I came to this school specifically to get away from tankery.”
“And now we’ve brought it back, seems like destiny right~?” the red-head chimes in from behind Momo.
“That still does not change my answer.”
“You sure? We can make it worth your ti-”
“NO. I am not joining your team!” Éclair interrupts, moving to stand up. “Now can you pl-”
“Don’t interrupt the president when she is speaking.” Momo moves to cut off Éclair and trap her at her desk.
“Momo, lets just-” the ponytail girl tries and fails to bring down the situation.
“Yuzu, you know why we have to do this!” Momo turns on her fellow council member. Before Yuzu can say anything else, the apparent President intervenes.
“Ok Éclair~. We’ll see if you change your answer later.” Momo moves to follow the president out of the classroom. “We’ll be waiting for you~!”
Yuzu turns back to Éclair, offering an apologetic smile.
“I’m sorry for them, they are just desperate to give the new tankery team the best start. We don’t have a lot of members currently, and well, you are one of two students who has any experience.” Yuzu waves as she leaves the classroom.
Nausea quickly overtakes Éclair, and she quickly takes another stomach pill before sighing. Hopefully the council won’t ask her every day to join the team, she doesn’t need the stress. Though with how her luck has been going recently, it probably would happen.
She takes out her bento, not noticing the look the fluffy-haired girl was giving her from the classroom’s rear door.
And thus Éclair’s fear came true. For the rest of the week, the student council would arrive during lunch and continue to pester her about joining the tankery team. Each time, Éclair would deny their offers, slowly but surely burning through her medicine as she did.
Friday had an interesting start, as she, literally, ran into the narcoleptic girl on her way to school. Helping the poor girl up, Éclair helped her to school, thinking it as the least she could do. The duo arrived at the gate about five minutes after homeroom had begun.
“You’re late!” One of the two identical looking girls manning the gate called out to Éclair. “What excuse do you have thi-oh. Reizei” The girl strung over Éclair’s shoulder popped to life at that.
“Sodoko…”
“My name isn’t Sodoko! Ju-just get to class” Sodoko huffed before turning to Éclair. “And you! You’re getting a free pass for today, but next time you won’t! Just leave her if you see her.” Reizei stumbled off of Éclair’s shoulder and began shuffling into the school quietly followed by the transfer student.
Éclair’s weekend was spent restocking her medicine and unpacking the last of her belongings from Maginot. Her black M20 tank jacket hangs with the rest of her French tanker uniform. Éclair had bought it all for a photo-op Maginot did where the team wore authentic French tanker gear. She had thought it was stylish and kept it after the shoot was done, finding the helmet actually helped a bit with visibility in the Souma. She doesn’t know why she bothered to bring it to Ooarai though. She won’t be using it anymore, and all it did was bring up more painful memories of her former friends. She sighed at the thought of the student council harassing her tomorrow.
“So… what did you think Éclair~?” the president asked, the council trio having cornered the girl in the hallway again. “Tempting offer is it not?”
The offer in question was the one made at the school wide assembly to promote tankery. 200 late passes and 100 vouchers for the cafeteria. Though the offer seemed much too good to be true.
“I’m still not going to join, president,” Éclair answered. “Nothing you say or do will change that.” At that, the trio frowned. A worried look passed between Momo and Yuzu before they refocused on the president.
“Oh, we’ll see about that~. Have a nice day Éclair~!” And with that the trio was gone.
The moment they left her sight, Éclair quickly covered her mouth and slumped to the floor. She took another pill to fight the nausea and quietly waited in the empty hallway to settle down. It took a good half an hour to recover, before Éclair slowly began making her way to the nurse’s office.
There was no way she could focus for the rest of the day. The stress of missing class, combined with the student council's constant pestering was just too much. She quietly stumbled home after the nurse gave her the okay to leave for the day.
The next morning, Éclair pulled herself together, took some pills preemptively. She used the walk to the school to build her resolve, to push through whatever nonsense the council was going to try to get her to join the team again.
She was expecting the student council to rush her in the morning, but to her surprise, she was called into their office near the end of lunch. Éclair quickly finished her lunch, washing it down with cranberry juice before moving to find the council room. Once she found a map, She was ready. Outside the room, Éclair took a moment to brace herself. She could do this. Tell them once and for all to shove off. Éclair opened the door, and entered the surprisingly dark room to face down the midget monstrosity sitting behind the president’s desk. Momo and Yuzu flanked the desk on either side, Yuzu looking extremely guilty, while Momo seemed to take a moment to steady herself as Éclair walked up.
“Ah, Éclair. Good to see you,” the red-headed devil began, none of the usual playful tone in her voice. “This is our final offer. You join the tankery team, or you are expelled.”
Éclair immediately froze. Yuzu looked away from the transfer student.
“W-w-what?”
“You heard me. Join, or you are gone.” The president placed a club signup sheet for tankery on the desk.
“This is insane!” Éclair shouted, “You can’t do this! No student council can expel a student over not signing up for a club!”
“Unfortunately for you, we can,” Momo stated, placing a second form onto the table. This form appeared to be a request for expulsion, fully filled out and signed by the student council and the principal.
Éclair stared at the expulsion form, eyes wide in horror, before clutching her stomach and mouth. She fell to her knees, and puked over herself.
“Éclair! Anzu! Oh my god!” Éclair faintly heard Yuzu begin to panic. She felt someone start fussing over her as she tried to stop dry heaving on the floor. Once she does, she shakily begins to stand up again.
“Guh, Putain! Agh!”
Momo, who had been trying to help Éclair on the floor immediately moves to help her up, apparently not minding being covered in vomit to do so. Éclair wipes her mouth with her sleeve, shakes Momo off of her arm, and glares at Anzu.
“Fine. You win. I’ll join.” Éclair spits out. Anzu sighs, standing up.
“I’m sorry it had to come to this Écl-”
“No, just…” Éclair interrupts, “Just don’t.” She begins to move to the desk to fill out the club form. The student council members awkwardly watch as she fills out the form, not exactly sure what to do. Yuzu eventually moves around to one of the counters and begins filling out a different form, while Anzu and Momo watch Éclair.
When Éclair finally finishes the form and turns to leave, Yuzu intercepts her, nurse’s pass in one hand, blanket in the other. Éclair grabs both without a word.
“Ah, practice starts tomorrow by the…” Éclair glares at Yuzu, blue eyes burning a hole in the brunette. “Tank… hangers… See you there…” and leaves the office in silence.
“…”
“…”
“…“
“Well that could have gone better.” Anzu states, staring at the door. Yuzu sighs before walking head down to the phone, avoiding the red puddle in front of the desk.
“I’ll call the Janitor.” At this point Momo breaks out of her shock, quickly remembering the front of her uniform is smeared with puke.
“Gah! I’ll take a shower.”