Azur Lane: Konvergenz

Chapter 6: Startup Protocol - Rewritten

Location: Azur Lane main naval base / Pacific Ocean

Coordinates: [NOTICE: GPS RELAY STARTUP PENDING]

Current time: 16:33 - Afternoon

Weather: [NOTICE: WEATHER RADAR STARTUP PENDING]

Objective/s:
Provide emergency assistance for Azur Lane rescue fleet --COMPLETED--
Wait for further instructions / possible debriefing upon aircraft recovery

Kansen active: /

Kansen undergoing maintenance: FGS Hessen

________________________________________________________________________________

Hessen looked out to the sea from the comfort of her helipad, happy that her short-term plan had worked with the added bonus of no losses. Carefully steering her two helicopters back home, she waited for the return of them and their occupants.

She had already notified Vestal as the situation developed. The reaction she produced upon hearing that Enterprise had sustained heavy damage was... expected.
Anyhow, the repair teams of the base have been alerted and were ready to receive any kansen who required repairs – even if a majority of those teams mainly consisted of manjuus. It was always interesting to observe them in their work – despite their tiny and in fact adorable forms, they still seemed to display excellent efficiency.

What Hessen was truly surprised about, however, was that her helicopters sustained minor to almost no damage. She knew that deploying such aircraft would be risky - after all, a bulky multi-purpose helicopter was a much bigger and slower target than even an old propeller plane. A single blast of AA gun fire would have shot one down, and yet it did not happen. She even managed to directly engage the enemy with it in close proximity.

She must be more careful next time around. Losing even a single one of her aircraft would be a very bad situation. They only managed to survive unscathed in this instance because the enemy had underestimated them until it was too late.
Despite it all, she was still glad that she was able to provide support even if it was limited.

If her engines were not damaged, though...

...

Well, things would be much more different.

Waiting for her helicopters to return gave her a lot of time to think. She wondered how the nations of this world were like, particularly in regards to culture and beliefs. Especially Germany – well, whatever form the 'Germany' of this world took on, at least. Problem was, visiting the same nations you were enemies with was not an option. Unless you visit them with non-peaceful intentions...

Her thoughts shifted again. What was going on back home? What about her comrades? She still hung onto her hopes of returning home, but she couldn't help but wonder: How does a nation react when one of their kansen mysteriously disappeared? Maybe they were already working on manifesting a replacement for her. She had heard about a project called 'Future Air Defender' for a new anti-aircraft frigate class. Maybe that project would be accelerated to fill the gap that her disappearance caused in the German navy?

After a few minutes of continued speculation, she decided to put this matter aside. She had other matters to worry about, such as her own repairs and her next steps.

Upon the successful recovery of her capabilities – which was undoubtedly delayed since Vestal was occupied with the returning kansen, but still – she would most likely be able to help massively in the conflict.
If she exploited her advantages as effectively as possible, she should be capable of single-handedly taking out every single ship of this world who was foolish enough to get into radar range. Well, 'taking out' may be formulated too strong – her weaponry was nearly useless against the armor a majority of the kansen possessed, so she would instead focus on turning 'hard' targets like battleships into useless floating hulls by striking core systems such as fire-control radars and weaponry. If an enemy could neither aim nor shoot, they were effectively taken out of the battle.
Taking out targets from incredible ranges is a specialty of every single modern ship there was, including her. She had the speed, the stealth, the equipment and most importantly the precision to maintain a safe distance and comfortably fight.