Girls und Panzer: Downfall

First day

Michael woke up to the horrible sound of his alarm ringing. As soon as he realized where he was and as soon as he started gaining some consciousness, he felt stiff all over his body. 
"Ugh..." 
He turned the alarm off and rolled over, but didn't realize he had no more room to roll over on and fell on the floor with a scream. 
"Ahh...dammit, why am I feeling so stiff?" He whined, staggering up. Michael felt terrible. He felt like a zombie, even though he'd gone to sleep pretty early the night before. He quickly got ready and left the apartment, heading to the cafeteria to have breakfast. He took some cereal, a cup of coffee and a croissant with jam and sat down. He silently ate his food and drank his coffee, with a face similar to the one of a dead fish. Not only was Michael tired, but he was in a horrible mood. He'd just woken up on the wrong side of the bed that day. 
"Fucking adolescence, making me have these mood swings..." Michael muttered as he put his tray away and headed to his first class of his first day. As he walked in the room, the teacher signed him in, gave him his school badge and gestured him to sit down. Michael didn't notice Miho was beside him until she called his name.
"Michael?" 
The boy jumped a little in surprise and let out a gasp. He wasn't expecting Miho to be there. 
"Ah, good morning. Did you sleep well?" He asked casually. 
"Yes, I did! How about you?" Miho asked. She was able to guess the answer by Michael's looks.
"I'm afraid not. I'm feeling really stiff, and tired." Michael explained, cursing himself and his usual habits. He'd always have a hard time sleeping anywhere that wasn't his bed at home. He'd just have to get used to the new accommodation. 
"Oh, I'm sorry about that. You'll shake it off in no time, I'm sure. Plus, today tankery training begins!" 
Michael had completely forgotten about that. He suddenly felt better, both emotionally and also physically for some reason. Hearing Miho talk about tankery had woken him up, sort of.
"Right. I completely forgot..." He whispered, cursing himself again. 
"Alright everybody, let's begin. First of all I want each of you to stand up and present yourself to the class, and me." The teacher started, interrupting Michael and Miho's chat. 
"Here we go..." Miho mused. 
"And so it begins..." Michael added. 
A new school year started in Kuromorimine, and a new adventure started for Michael. He had high hopes and high spirits, and nothing could stand between him and tankery. He wanted it with all his heart and soul, and he would have done anything to keep going. 

-_-_-_-_-_-_

In the afternoon...

-_-_-_-_-_-_

"Alright everybody, listen up. Among you first years, 8 new commanders have been elected, by looking at the results of the tests you took yesterday." 
Some agitated chatter started among the group of first years. They were about 40, a consistent group. 
"I will call each of the new commanders' names. If and when you are called, step forward and I will direct you to your tank." Maho explained. She took a look at her clipboard, and cleared her throat. 
"Akaboshi Koume." 
A short girl, with a skinny silhouette, short brown hair and marble grey eyes stepped forward.
"Hm. Next we have...Itsumi Erika." 
A middle height light blonde haired girl, with light blue eyes stepped forward. The "roll call" went on for a few minutes, until 6 commanders had been chosen. Michael and Miho were still standing among the crowd though.
"Our 7th commander is...Shigure Michael." 
Michael sighed in a low voice and stepped forward, joining the other 6 girls in a line. He was the only commander who wasn't a girl. 
"Last but not least...our new vice-commander, Nishizumi Miho." 
A lot of murmurs rose up from the crowd as Miho stepped forward and joined the line. She had an indecipherable expression stamped on her face. 
"Now...you each have been assigned to a tank. We have...2 Panzer IV, a Panzer III, a Jagdpanther, a Tiger, a Königstiger and 2 Panthers." 
Maho then proceeded to assigning every commander to their new tank. As expected, Miho got a Tiger and Michael a Panzer IV. He was standing in front of his new tank. He observed each of its features carefully, and ran a hand on the smooth but hard metal of the hull. He took a look at the Schürzen, the roadwheels, the gun and the hull, and he guessed what variant it was.
"Rubber roadwheels...Schürzen only around the turret...and the L/48..." 
He wasn't extraordinarily happy with finding out that his Panzer IV was an Ausf. J. It had only one major difference from the H, but it was significant: a hand crank turret drive. Which meant it was very slow, and very slow was even diminishing according to Michael. 
"An Ausf. J. Oh well, I guess it'll have to do..." He took another walk around the tank, looking at its paint job. The other Kuromorimine tanks were painted with different shades of brown, while the two Panzer IVs he could see were light grey. They still had the same school insignia on the hull and turret's side though. 
"Don't worry about the paint job. We hadn't used Panzer IVs in a while and they still use the previous paint scheme. It was a miracle we managed to get 2 ready by today." 
Michael turned around and saluted immediately when he saw Maho and Miho together.
"I got it, Commander." He answered. 
"Are you satisfied with your tank?" Maho asked with a knowing look. Michael smiled lightly and nodded.
"Yes ma'am." Michael said convinced.
"Your crew will arrive shortly." Maho said and walked off. Miho smiled at Michael and followed her sister. To comfort himself, Michael tried to think about other successful tanks with slow turrets. 
"Let's see...there's...well, there's the Panther D, but that didn't have a hand crank turret, even though it was pretty slow. There's the...oh, there's the M10! Yeah, that's good. The problem is that the M10 was a tank destroyer...well I'm fucked." 
As Michael turned around, he saw 4 people in front of him. 3 girls and a boy. And they'd heard everything.
"Ah..." 
The boy thought about what to do, and decided he should have behaved like a commander. 
"... ahem. Please, introduce yourselves." He ordered. The boy stepped forward and saluted, but the movement was very clumsy. That made Michael cringe a bit. 
"I'll be your driver. My name's Ren." The boy said. He was about Michael's height, but unlike Michael, who had light brown hair and blue eyes, he had black hair and black eyes. As Michael turned to the three girls, he saw two of them looked alike. Actually, they were identical to each other. And in fact they stepped forward together. 
"I'm Noriko, I'll be your radio operator!" 
"I'm Noriyo, your loader!" 
Yeah they're twins alright, Michael thought to himself. The last girl stepped forward. She looked to be a bit nervous.
"H-hello, Commander...I'm Sakura...your gunner." She muttered in a low voice. 
"I'm not gonna bite you, you know. I mean we're all the same age here so let's try to get along, right?" Michael said in a friendly tone. The four seemed reassured by what Michael had just said, and relaxed a bit. When he looked back at the tank, he saw 5 uniforms, neatly folded, laying perfectly next to each other, just below the turret.
"Oh, hold up..." He muttered. He went to grab the 5 uniforms and handed one to each of his crew members, keeping the one for the commander to himself. 
"Listen up everybody." Maho's voice resounded in the distance. All the new tankers turned to look at Maho, who had Miho standing beside her. 
"Everybody, get to the gym and change. It's just over there, and you will be given a key to your locker as soon as you enter. Once you're done changing, come back here and we'll start." 

-_-_-_-_-_-_

Half an hour later... 

-_-_-_-_-_-_

"Panzer, marsch!" 
All 9 of the tanks moved forward. Maho's Tiger was leading the way, the others following in arrow formation. 
"Keep a steady pace and follow the lead tank." Maho's voice was heard in the headphones of all commanders. 
"Ren, keep this speed up, we're doing good. I think." Michael ordered. 
"You got it, Commander." 
Michael's tank had been given the call sign "Rheinland 7", which meant he was 7th in rank of that formation. 
"Tanks on the right side, turn your turrets 30 degrees to the right. Tanks on the left, to the left." Maho said through the radio. Michael got more and more nervous with every order, afraid somebody in his tank would mess up at any second. He wasn't actually putting much trust in his crew members.
"Alright...Sakura, turn the turret 30 degrees right." Michael ordered, trying to hide his nervousness.
"Roger..." 
The two Panzer IVs were the last to finish, as Michael had expected. 
"Load AP." Maho continued.
Michael distractedly gave Noriyo the order to load, and she did it surprisingly quick. The three girls in Michael's tank had already some experience with tanking from middle school, while Michael and Ren were new to the subject.
"Nice job, you're quick." Michael said, feeling a little reassured.
"Thank you, Commander!" The twin answered with a proud tone.
"All tanks, fire for 500 meters." 
"Sakura, aim for 500 meters and fire." Michael said repeating Maho's orders like a parrot.
"Okay..." 
All of the tanks in the formation fired more or less at the same time. Michael felt his heart skip a beat as that happened. He was thrilled. 
"Let's keep going. Shift to third gear."