=== WINTER ===
"You can turn around now."
Winter didn't move.
"I'm dressed...just wet." Atago murmured while trying to push down the embarrassment of getting caught naked. She rushed to put on her clothes and didn't have the time to dry herself off. There were no towels, and the shipgirl had hoped to dry herself while hidden in the bushes.
Winter slowly turned around, making sure to look down and away from Atago lest he draw her ire again.
"Admiral, now you're going to act shy after peeking at me?" Atago rolled her eyes. "At least you have the decency to be ashamed." Many other people on the base hollered or whistled at the girls when they thought no one was looking. Atago enjoyed the attention somewhat, but sometimes they were just too much.
Winter blinked once his eyes landed on Atago.
Once again, he was momentarily stunned. Atago was already drop-dead gorgeous at the base in her uniform. Seeing her wet look and lightly blushing face made her look cute rather than sexy at this moment. Surprisingly, she wasn't in her uniform as he had expected.
Atago also wore a white tunic that stuck to her body, highlighting her curves. The wet fabric clung to her chest, following the swells of her breasts, barely concealing her hardened nipples. The cloth of her shorts stuck tightly to her legs, the water droplets glinting under the sunlight like diamonds. Her damp tail swayed as she stood, just as wet as her hair.
Wait...hardened nipples?
Winter smartly acted like he saw nothing by latching on to the first detail he noticed.
"Wait, did you also wake up with clothes like these?" The commander tugged on his own cotton shirt.
"You did too?" Atago raised an eyebrow. "I woke up wearing these in the morning."
"Morning? I woke up around lunch. I thought this was a prank." Winter blinked.
Atago let out a short, amused huff. "So you also laze off, huh?" When Winter gave her a deadpan look, the girl quickly moved on. "Do you know where we are?"
Atago's words nudged Winter out of his dilemma.
"No. I was actually hoping you would know. That's why I was running to you." Winter answered. "Does your GPS work? You should have one uploaded in your software, right?"
"That's the problem...it's not working." Atago rubbed her forehead in annoyance. As shipgirls, they were also partially technology. They have a humanoid body and all, but in addition, have some modifications that allow them to perform functions as ships. Radar, GPS, Internet. You name it, the shipgirls have them uploaded in specially designed software integrated within their bodies. Their brains weren't even 100% organic material. The scientists back at the base used lab-grown brains as the foundation to keep the intellect module intact and independent should the implants lose connection with supporting networks.
Yes, shipgirls were indeed truly part ship. Literally.
Winter didn't even know how the scientists even managed to replicate ship-level strength and condense it into a human-sized body- errr- girls.
"So...we're both lost." Winter concluded.
"Didn't they teach you basic land navigation in the army?" Atago fired back. "You can figure out where we're heading, right?"
"I honestly have no clue. There weren't any lakes near the base. I wouldn't recognize this place, nor have I come across any landmarks aside from this lake."
The situation was terrible. They had no clue where they were, much less what to do going forward aside from hope running into any roads. They were both silent for a few moments until a growling sound came.
"Sorry that was mi-" Winter paused. No, that sound hadn't come from him. He blinked and looked at Atago who's face blushed redder.
"You didn't hear anything, Shikikan~"
Winter knew what to do next.
"I'm hungry. How about we find some food." He offered.
"I was fishing until you came along." Atago smiled while her eyebrows twitched. Winter sensed irritation behind it. "I hope Shikikan doesn't intend for me to fish while he's watching, right? I can't get my poor clothes to dry then~"
Seeing as Atago had already judged him guilty of a crime he didn't commit, the best Winter could do was to begin repaying for his sins.
It was all worth it for a glimpse of heaven.
"How about I try to fish and you dry off while searching in the forest? How about that?"
"My clothes will be wet for a couple more hours."
This girl...
"Exaggerating is not going to help us find food." Winter deadpanned. She wasn't the only hungry you know! He was also starving the longer he didn't eat.
"Fine, fine." Atago replied while waving her hand in the air. "Good luck catching fish, commander~" She smiled with a teasing tone.
Winter knew he was in for a tough time. He had no experience catching fish and heard of how difficult it was without tools. They were in the middle of nowhere with nothing to help them. The only things he had were his bare hands, his wit, and Atago who probably could catch fish on her own.
Winter couldn't help but sneak a look behind him while Atago walked away. The view was immaculate. The way her shapely butt moved unconsciously-
Winter turned an instant before Atago snapped around.
"Admiral...were you just-" Atago narrowed her eyes suspiciously. Her sixth sense was telling her that Winter just peeked at her.
"Do you mind if I hang my shirt at your hiding spot? It's bad enough I'm getting my pants wet before night." Winter looked at her with a calm facade. His heart was thrumming, but he didn't allow it to show. When he felt his control slowly crumbling the longer Atago stared at him, Winter hid his expression by slowly pulling his cotton tunic off.
"...fine." Atago relented after a few moments. It was not like they were separating later. The two of them had to work together until they found a road back to base or when the marines found them.
=== ATAGO ===
"Pfft-" Atago snickered while spying on the admiral as he attempted to fish. Contrary to their agreement, she hadn't gone out to forage for food right away. Atago stayed back to spy on him for some amusement. Fishing with bare hands was difficult, and the fox wanted some entertainment.
At first the commander stood in the water. Atago took a moment to eye his figure before discarding his light physique as average. She had seen better men at the base who worked their asses off and gained quite the hulking and sexy figure many girls could respect. Admiral Winter simply looked…ordinary.
What she could respect was his ability to make an endeavour hilariously funny. When dundering about while stabbing his hands in the water in a vain attempt to catch fish didn't work. When dundering about while stabbing his hands in the water in a vain attempt to catch fish didn't work, Winter tried another method.
Throwing himself at the fish.
Atago gaped when Winter did it again, leaping into the water not forwards, but in an awkward angle that flattened his horizontal profile as much as possible before he completely submerged into the water. The utter commitment to send his full body sideways from her perspective launched a full set of giggles from the shipgirl, who found the entire scene hilarious.
"Ha- haa- hahaa- I should- I should really go." Atago huffed heavily after another round of silent laughter. If she stuck around any longer, then she wouldn't be able to leave.
.
.
.
Atago made several trips over the next two hours. She couldn't carry much with her arms alone, so she borrowed Winter's shirt and used it like a makeshift pouch to carry whatever she deemed edible. She also collected branches and thicker wood for the eventual campfire they'd need for the night.
As she expected, nothing came out of his end.
"Seems like someone enjoyed playing in the water." Atago shot the drenched commander a raised eyebrow while smiling.
"Not. A. Word." Winter groaned. Two hours. He had failed for two hours.
"That is why we are working together, right~" Atago clapped her hands together brightly. She didn't have to get soaked fishing and was much dryer than she was two hours prior thanks to her walk in the woods.
Winter shifted his head to look at her with a tired expression. Fishing in the water took all the energy out of him. "Do you know if those are edible?" He looked at the small pile of fruits and berries Atago brought. He couldn't recognize them. "If not, we're starving tonight."
"You're lucky I'm a shipgirl." Atago's lips curled into a light smirk. "We are too valuable to lose so they designed us with a lot of protections in mind. We're not completely immune since we're still part-human, but we have programs that can identify if what we eat is safe. Also helps us control our diet when we can filter out excess nutrients."
"No wonder you girls always eat so much desserts back at base. We just assumed you don't get fat." Winter nodded sagely.
Atago narrowed her eyes at him.
"What? It's not wrong." Winter continued, missing the danger. When Atago continued to give him the weird look, Winter reran the last few seconds through his head.
"Oh."
"Oh is right, Shikikan~" Atago's light playful tone reached him. Her expression was bright and cheerful, but Winter had already caught on to the foreboding atmosphere behind it.
"…I'm too tired to even bother." He surrendered. "How about I just owe you a favor later. Can you tell me how you identify whether food is safe or not?"
Atago watched the admiral slump on the ground like a puppet with its strings cut. Seeing his current situation, she relented on the harmless joke. "We can't scan food like we can identify targets based on radar. We have to ingest it and our system scans the extracts. From there, we can tell if it's safe to eat or not."
"You girls have that capability?" Winter rolled over. A small amount of disbelief was stretched on his face thanks to what he was hearing. "Even admirals are not privy to most details on shipgirls. We're only provided on your battlefield capability."
"Then it was most likely for our safety." Atago assumed while leaning over and picking up the first of her haul. "I'll start eating some and tell you whether they're safe or not."
…
Turns out, most of them weren't edible. Though thanks to her unique digestion system, Atago was able to avoid all the problems that came with eating food in the wild. For every fruit and berry that was safe to eat, the two of them had to ration it between themselves. At the end, both had only a little over a quarter of a meal.
"We really need to find another way to gather food." Atago glanced at her only companion. "I think we can hunt some meat tomorrow. We could do it while looking for a road."
It's been a couple hours since sunset and there were no signs of any search and rescue teams being dispatched. There should have been helicopters scanning the forest, but their apparent lack of appearance only further reinforced the abnormality of the situation for the two.
"If we do find a road." Winter grunted while poking their makeshift campfire with a stick to adjust the fuel. "Everything has been weird so far."
Atago couldn't deny that. She was a shipgirl. They were considered the navy's highest asset. They should've tracked them by now. Just exactly where were they? There were many guesses on her mind, but Atago didn't like to dwell on them. Kidnapped? Then it made no sense to take Admiral Winter too. He wasn't anyone special.
"You're definitely right about that…" Atago murmured while staring up at the night sky. Their naval base were some ways off from other settlements, but the lights of the base hindered the view of the night sky. Out here, nothing stopped her from seeing the beautiful galaxy spread above them.
"Can you take the first shift?" Winter asked while he tried to position himself comfortably as best as he could on the ground. "Wake me up after 5 hours. You have an internal clock right?"
"Yeah we do." Atago checked on her software to see that Winter's estimation of their time was close. It was about 8pm and sunrise was in 10 hours. "Don't bother. I don't need sleep right now."
"We all need sleep. You'll be tired tomorrow." Winter yawned. He had no more energy after an entire day of trekking through the woods and an afternoon of fishing.
"I'm a shipgirl, remember?" Atago looked over to him. "We're designed to go for weeks without sleep when we're out on missions."
"Oh…right."
"Yes, now go to sleep. We need to move tomorrow."
Atago watched the commander go to sleep as the campfire died down, leaving her alone to bask in the view of the beautiful heaven above.
=== CHOICE ===
What happens next? Comment your choice and I will read them to see the most popular pick.
1. The Admiral and Atago roam around the forest for a couple days to learn and experience a little bit more of survival in the wild. [0 picks]
2. The Admiral and Atago find a road and make their way to a village. [0 picks]
===
Author's Note
I'll just assume that if readers aren't voting, then I'm free to decide on my own. Also, is it normal to get this many readers for a new fanfic? These numbers seem like bots.