Jerry did make good on his promise.
Essex and Saratoga showed up the very next day, along with a returning Eugen.
Essex, for her part, seemed more curious than excited. She was a proper study in military discipline, as if it had never truly occurred to her that, as a KANSEN, she would never see a battlefield again. Still, she was a gracious—if awkward—guest. She didn't flinch at Atago's boisterous welcome. She didn't seem bothered by the occasional glances from other patrons. She humored Yamatani's rapid-fire questions about America as best as she could.
Oddly enough, she never asked anything about her life here.
Didn't matter. Essex probably thought it wasn't appropriate to ask those things.
Eugen was noticeably quiet, nursing her Yebisu in silence and answering Atago's teasing with the occasional shrug or wry, one-corner smile until Atago finally wised up and left her alone. She drew looks, too, but nobody seemed inclined to strike up a conversation with her.
Saratoga, on the other hand, appeared to have made it her personal mission to sample every single dish on the menu. What she couldn't finish, she offloaded onto Jerry…or Zuikaku, who was more than happy to accept free food, even from "former enemies."
Her presence alone accounted for the loudest peace she had ever seen.
"I can't believe you both are teachers," Saratoga guffawed, watching Zuikaku stuff herself with leftover karaage. She didn't seem the least bit dissuaded by the sight. "She was a menace!"
"Ara, is Miss stuck-in-the-docks Saratoga doubting my sister's and my capabilities?" Shoukaku quipped. She was smiling when she said it, serene as ever. Saratoga didn't even seem to mind the jab.
"Ouch—hey, I'm trying to make conversation here! I'm actually curious!"
Shoukaku's smile didn't falter in the face of Saratoga's exaggerated wince. It never really did.
She found herself leaning in without thinking about it. Even she could be curious.
"Right. While reintegration officially began in 1961, some concessions were made even before that," Shoukaku began, sounding very much like the teacher she claimed to be. "Prime Minister Ishibashi, in his short tenure, is the one who truly set it in motion. One such concession was education. To give us a skill. A trade. To make us 'useful', I suppose. But perhaps to help us, too."
Her gaze slid to Zuikaku, who was happily sipping chūhai, grin wide and absolutely encouraging her sister to keep going.
"…It was hard, at first," Shoukaku continued. "We had to start from scratch. We had to learn how to be students, and quickly. Why did we choose to be teachers? That's…an interesting story, if I may say so."
That was Zuikaku's cue to jump in. She swallowed her food and wiped her mouth with the back of her hand.
"Gotta thank Takao in my case. She suggested it," she said. "Said I was a natural for it. 'Cause, you know, I've always had this tendency to motivate people. In a…very direct way."
"That you do," Takao remarked wryly from her corner, earning an eye-roll from Zuikaku. But then Zuikaku's face softened into a small, genuine smile.
"Well, she was already set on instructing kendo. I watched her teaching kids once, and she was…uh, inspiring. Patient. Firm. But I thought, nah, that's too serious for me. I wanted something with less pressure. So I went for PE. I get to boss them around all day, and they think it's a game. Win-win."
Her words drew a loud, unapologetic laugh from Saratoga. Takao's cheeks had turned a little rosy, though that could have just been the nihonshu.
"Yeah, that sure sounds like you!" Saratoga boomed, nudging Zuikaku with a friendly elbow. "And you? The calm one?" she asked, turning to Shoukaku.
Shoukaku sipped her tea before answering, movements as graceful as ever. Yet her eyes had grown distant, the line of her mouth softening into something almost wistful.
"…I once kept a widow company. Her husband died aboard the ship that bore my name. She had a son."
She felt her throat go dry. Her hands slowed where they were polishing a glass. She busied herself with refilling a cup that didn't need refilling. She wanted to tell Shoukaku she didn't have to go on—but she didn't. It wasn't her story to interrupt.
"His mother was…let's say, absent, more often than not," Shoukaku continued. "I don't blame her. Grief does that to you. So I helped care for him. He was a bright child. A little lost, too. And at some point, I realized…perhaps I could help guide the young ones. Prevent them from making the same mistakes we did. It's my small contribution to peace, I suppose."
She hadn't expected the pang she felt at the mention of the boy—of what he had been to Shoukaku, and what he hadn't been allowed to be.
Shoukaku didn't say what became of him, or of the mother, or why they were no longer in her life. She didn't have to. She had already said everything that mattered. And the table listened. They understood, or seemed to.
Even Saratoga's usual cheerful veneer had slipped, replaced by an expression of quiet awe.
"Huh," was all she managed. "That's…really something. Kudos to ya both."
Then her grin came back, sudden and bright, as she turned to Zuikaku again.
"So, Zuikaku. You must be a tough teacher, huh? What do you say to the students who can't keep up?"
Zuikaku's grin sharpened.
"I tell them, 'C'mon, you gotta be faster than that! What if you had to dodge torpedoes?'"
"…And you can?" Saratoga fired back.
"What! You can't either!"
"…Touché," Saratoga raised her glass toward her. "Touché, Zuikaku."
The banter washed the heaviness away, but the weight of what Shoukaku had said lingered under the laughter. She knew they would remember her words. She would. The ghosts they carried weren't just their own—they were the ghosts of the people whose lives they had touched. For better, or for worse.
For a moment, she thought of her sisters. Would Yorktown or Hornet have become teachers? Or something else entirely? There was no way to know.
The thought made her miss them all the more.
The sensation of being watched tugged her out of her reverie. She looked up to find Eugen's gaze fixed on her. There was no smirk on her face this time. No lazy sarcasm. Just a quiet, unreadable look.
Not contempt. Not pity.
Curiosity.
She liked to think it meant Eugen was beginning to consider a life beyond just being Prinz Eugen, the lucky cruiser. After all, that was how her own journey had started: a moment of curiosity about what else she could be.
But she didn't press. She didn't want to intrude.
A smile given, a smile returned, and that was all.
"And read my lips," Saratoga declared, planting one foot on the small rung of her stool like she was about to climb the mast of a ship, "once we're free, you bet Sister Sara's going to be a star!"
A cheer followed her declaration. Atago was easily the loudest. Zuikaku wasn't far behind. Even Takao had a small, resigned smile on her face.
She couldn't help but clap along with the rest.
"Well, aren't you a cutie pie, Sara Maru-chan," Atago giggled. "What kind of star are you going to be?"
"A singer! A movie star! A TV personality! The whole shebang!" Saratoga spread her arms wide, as if she were already on stage. "I'm gonna be the biggest thing since…since…well, me! I'm a natural, you know! I've got the looks, the talent, the charisma!"
This time, one of the patrons joined in. A lone salaryman—new to the place—who had been nursing a shōchū by the window raised his glass.
"Ganbare!" he called out, a little too loudly.
Saratoga blew him a kiss. Whether he understood her or not, it hardly mattered. People could be drawn to earnest energy in any language. Jerry raised his glass as well.
"Speaking of the future—Essex, what about you? What are your plans once we get our rights?" Saratoga turned suddenly, all that focus zeroed in on the quiet carrier at her side.
Essex looked startled to be addressed. She straightened instinctively, posture falling back into parade-ground form.
"My plans, ma'am?"
"Yes, yours! You must have thought about it."
Essex lowered her gaze to her neatly folded hands.
"I, um…" Her voice was softer than usual. "I haven't really thought about it. My purpose was to serve. To fight. To win. But that's…not an option anymore. So I guess…I guess I'll just…wait for new orders."
She looked so lost then, so utterly adrift in a world that no longer needed her for the thing she was built to do.
Just like she herself had once been, wasn't she?
Saratoga blew a raspberry at that.
"Orders schmorders. Nobody's givin' you orders anymore, girl!" She hopped off her stool and closed the distance in a few quick steps, Essex shrinking in on herself without seeming to realize it. "Fine, if you can't think of a new purpose, how about you join me? We'll be a duo! The Sara & Essy Show!"
The nickname made Essex blanch.
"Please don't call me 'Essy,'" she mumbled, face blooming red. "And…a show? I don't…I don't think I'd be very good at that."
"Fine, fine, we'll workshop the name later. Live in the moment at least. My favorite just came up, ehehe~"
"Wha—"
Martha and the Vandellas' "Dancing in the Street" spilled from the AFN, bright and insistent. Saratoga didn't hesitate. She grabbed Essex by both hands and hauled her off her seat with surprising ease for someone so small, then started to swing her around in a clumsy, exuberant dance.
There were no rules against dancing in here. Not that anyone had tested it before.
But then, the last few days had been nothing but precedents being smashed. She decided to let it happen.
"See? This ain't so bad, is it?" Saratoga shouted over the music, laughter contagious. Essex looked terrified, movements stiff and wooden, but she was trying. She was a good sport. She took it in stride.
It was oddly endearing. Especially considering Saratoga barely came up to Essex's chest, yet somehow she was the one pulling the taller carrier around the floor.
Naturally, Atago joined the chaos in short order. Saratoga passed Essex off to her without missing a beat. At least Atago was more graceful, more measured. She held Essex's hands with surprising gentleness, guiding her through the steps with a playful smile. Essex looked as though she'd have preferred to sink beneath the floorboards, but she didn't pull away.
Eugen audibly snorted into her glass.
"Americans," she muttered. Still, her eyes were glued to the spectacle, and the way her lips twitched suggested she was trying very hard not to laugh. She certainly didn't laugh when Saratoga caught her eye and stretched an arm out toward her.
"Heeey, princess! Don't just sit there and brood! Show Captain Halsey what he's working with! This song is short, ya know!"
For a second—just a second—Eugen looked like she was actually considering it.
"It…does seem fun."
The words slipped out of her mouth before she could catch them.
Eugen turned slowly and gave her an incredulous look.
"You…" was all she said.
She polished off her second glass of Yebisu and stared at the counter, as if studying the wood grain for the meaning of life. The song ended, only to roll straight into something even more frenzied—Jerry Lee Lewis. "Great Balls of Fire." Saratoga cheered and promptly dragged Atago and a thoroughly flustered Essex into another dance.
"She's a menace," Eugen declared, louder this time. The music had gotten louder too; it didn't matter.
"A menace to boredom," she replied, setting a glass of water in front of her. Eugen glanced at it like it was a personal insult, but took it anyway.
"Well, there is no shortage of boredom in my life," Eugen took a sip, exhaled slowly. "I…suppose I'm a little jealous."
"Of Saratoga?"
"Of her freedom to be a menace," Eugen said. "She's not afraid of being ridiculous."
It was an astute observation. Saratoga wasn't performing for someone's benefit; she was simply being. Without apology. No wonder she and Atago had hit it off so quickly.
"Some freedom is up to you to take," Jerry remarked from his stool. He'd been watching the exchange with an intent, slightly distant expression.
Eugen's guard went back up in an instant. She snapped him a sharp look.
"That's easy for you to say, Herr Kapitän. You're not the one on a leash."
Jerry didn't flinch. He just held her gaze levelly.
"Not one you can't chew through, if you want it enough."
The tension between them hummed like a live wire, even over Jerry Lee Lewis hammering out of the speakers.
"One more," Eugen said at last, pushing her empty glass toward her, deliberately ignoring Jerry. "And don't give me that look. I'm paying."
The third Yebisu was down to half a glass in no time.
"Oh, hell," Eugen muttered eventually.
One look at Essex, awkward but clearly smiling now as she followed Atago's lead, and another at Auntie Okazawa—who had apparently decided that trying this "American dancing" wasn't the worst idea—must have done it. Eugen slid off her stool, straightened her dress, and walked toward the makeshift dance floor with the deliberate, slightly uneven gait of someone who had made a decision and intended to see it through.
She didn't ask to join.
She just joined.
She tapped Saratoga on the shoulder. For a heartbeat, with the music swelling, it looked as though she might actually push Saratoga aside. Instead, she gave the smaller carrier a slanted smile and said something that made Saratoga's jaw drop.
Whatever it was, it was probably sarcastic. Possibly cutting.
But Saratoga, bless her, just laughed and grabbed Eugen's hands, pulling her into the mess.
She glanced at the half-empty beer glass, then at Eugen purposefully not looking Saratoga in the eye, then at Jerry, whose expression had softened into something almost—almost—proud.
"Was this what you had in mind, Jerry?" she asked quietly, raised voice barely carrying over the music. The Supremes had taken over now, "Stop! In the Name of Love" bouncing off the walls.
He lifted one shoulder in a small shrug.
"I just opened the cage," he said. "I'm not the one who has to decide whether to fly or not."
She watched Eugen. She wasn't a natural dancer any more than Essex was. Her movements were precise, almost mechanical, like she was calculating the trajectory of each step. But there was a certain sharp-edged elegance to her. She wasn't as fluid as Atago or as wild as Saratoga, but she held her ground. She didn't let Saratoga dictate the rhythm.
She found her own.
Takao eventually got dragged into the fray by Atago, and by then the scene looked like something out of a movie: five women who had once been instruments of war, now dancing to Motown and rock and roll in a cramped bar in Asakusa.
Shoukaku and Zuikaku sat this one out, but that didn't mean they were idle. Yamatani had shyly approached them during a lull to ask about their experiences at college. Zuikaku spoke animatedly, hands flying as she turned even a mundane first-exam story into something dramatic. Shoukaku was more subdued, but her eyes shone with fondness at the memories.
When their talk ended, Yamatani stood and bowed deeply to them before retreating to a corner with a letter. She didn't need to guess twice who it was from. The small smile on Yamatani's lips was answer enough.
"ENTTTYYYY! If you aren't serving, you're dancing!" Saratoga's shout cut through her thoughts like a shell splashing too close to port.
She felt a blush creep up her neck like an unwelcome tide and shook her head.
"No, I'm good. I'm working—"
"Nonsense!" Atago sang as she slipped away from Takao, gliding over like a shark in a silk dress. "You can't just stand there and let us have all the fun! You're the host! You must participate!"
It suddenly felt like every eye in the room was on her. AFN chattered on, oblivious, now playing The Beatles' "I Want to Hold Your Hand."
Speaking of hands, Saratoga's was already extended toward her across the counter.
"C'mon, Skipper! Show 'em how it's done! The Grey Ghost on the dance floor! It'll be legendary!"
"Um, maybe we—" a very flushed Essex tried to intervene, but Atago silenced her with a manicured finger gently pressed to her lips.
"Shh. Let the master work her magic."
She turned to Grim. But what was she thinking? Expecting rescue? Ridiculous. In the end, all she got was Grim cocking his head, blinking slowly, and letting out a "Mrrp?"
Traitor.
Jerry wore that same patient, warm expression. He lifted his Coke in a small, wordless toast, as if to say, Go on. It's alright.
"…And why don't you?" she shot back before she could stop herself.
It came out sounding much more like a challenge than she'd intended.
And he just grinned, that infuriatingly ambiguous grin that could mean anything.
"When the time's right," he said.
Saratoga waited, hand outstretched. Atago bounced on her heels like a child on Christmas morning. Takao, ever composed, gave her a small, encouraging nod. Zuikaku looked like she was positively eating this up. Shoukaku's eyes sparkled with quiet mischief.
Eugen had paused halfway through a turn, watching her with a look that said: Well? Are you going to?
She glanced down at her apron, at her hands. These were hands that had known the jarring slam of a pitching deck, the sting of salt spray. And these legs of hers? They had carried her through uncharted waters and hostile seas.
But dancing? In a bar? To a song about holding hands?
Which battlefield was that supposed to be?
Neither.
She had crossed the world once, alone, determined to be more than a weapon. Determined to become a person. To earn a new life.
She could dare this, too.
The decision slipped from her like a breath she hadn't known she was holding. She untied her apron, folded it neatly, and placed it under the counter.
The burst of applause that followed felt almost blinding.
A smaller hand than hers—calloused, scarred, strong in its own way—caught her own. The damp heat of Saratoga's grip was strangely grounding.
For a moment, she felt like a bird dragged into a whirlwind.
Then she inhaled. Felt the floor under her feet, the vibration of the speakers through the wood, the steady beat threading through the room.
One-two-three.
One-two-three.
She had no idea what she was doing.
But she was doing it.
And for once, she found that was enough.
"That's it, baby! Shake it!" Saratoga whooped.
Surrender, then. She'd never been made for surrender.
But this wasn't surrender.
This was letting go.
She could do that. She could try.
As she stumbled through the steps, movements still unsure, she happened to catch Eugen's gaze again. The German cruiser had stopped moving, arms folded loosely, watching her with an intensity that might have unnerved her once.
She braced herself for a smirk. For a cutting remark.
None came.
Eugen's lips curved, slowly, into a small, genuine, unguarded smile.
It was a small smile. A private one. But it was there.
And she felt, deep in her chest, like she had done something right.