The North Atntic roared with fury, the storm shing the sea into mountainous waves that cwed at the sky. Rain sshed sideways, a relentless curtain of cold steel. Thunder cracked overhead, lightning ripping jagged scars across the bckened heavens.

  Through the chaos, a wounded queen fled.

  Bismarck ran at full speed, engines straining, smoke trailing from the ragged wounds that marred her once-proud frame. Her rigging, battered and broken, groaned under the strain. Her crimson cape was torn to ribbons, pstered to her soaked uniform. Pride burned in her chest, a fire that refused to die, even as her body screamed for rest.

  Ahead: the faint, desperate hope of a Siren rally point.

  Behind: death incarnate.

  ===

  USS New Jersey cut through the storm like a predator through bloody water. No hesitation. No mercy. Her guns thundered, heavy shells tearing the ocean apart in pursuit of her quarry.

  There was a massive explosion as another siren drone ship went up in fmes winning at turret toss.

  USS New Jersey cut through the storm like a predator through bloody water. No hesitation. No mercy. Her guns thundered, heavy shells tearing the ocean apart in pursuit of her quarry.

  There was a massive explosion as another Siren drone ship went up in fmes, winning at turret toss — a twisted, fming wreckage spiraling into the sea as New Jersey thundered through the debris without slowing. The glow lit her armored form in hellish hues, casting her as something more myth than metal.

  Her rigging growled, the humming of overdriven turbines blending with the storm's fury.

  A few Siren destroyers tried to rally — small, desperate things firing scattershot salvos at the battleship in a vain attempt to stall her.

  New Jersey answered with contempt.

  Secondary batteries barked rapid fire, streams of tracer rounds chewing through the enemy like paper. One Siren vessel took a full volley amidships and simply ceased to exist, swallowed by a massive north atntic wave as a fire ball erupted.

  "Keep moving," New Jersey muttered to herself, voice tight through the comms. "Stay on her."

  Through the fshes of lightning and rain, she caught sight of her true prey again: Bismarck. Wounded. Slowing.

  New Jersey's eyes narrowed. The wounded queen fought with the ferocity of the damned, but the weight of her injuries was dragging her down like an anchor. Another minute — two at most — and it would be over.

  That was when radar picked up a rather rge object in the sky.

  The blue-haired battleship looked up to see Siren designation Purifier coming down to greet her.

  A streak of violet and silver fire smmed into the ocean with a sound like the world ending. Water and steam exploded upwards in a column hundreds of feet tall, the shockwave hammering even New Jersey back a half-step. Her rigging growled and flexed to absorb the impact, but her gaze stayed locked on the descending figure.

  Purifier.

  A Siren elite — one of the worst.

  And from the manic grin splitting her face, she was thrilled to have caught New Jersey's attention.

  "Yo!" Purifier cackled through the storm, riding a ptform of crackling Siren tech, her hands glowing with energy. "Did you really think you were getting a clean kill without a boss fight?!"

  New Jersey grimaced, adjusting her course slightly, guns swiveling upward to track the new threat.

  "Of course not," she muttered, pnting her feet. "Wouldn’t be the North Atntic without some stupid unfinished business."

  Without waiting for another taunt, Purifier unched the first volley — a barrage of twisted psma nces hurtling toward New Jersey like a meteor swarm.

  New Jersey moved.

  With a roar of engines and muscle, she surged sideways, shells smming into the sea where she’d been a heartbeat before. Her secondaries barked, streams of tracer fire hammering at Purifier’s shielding, forcing the Siren to weave and cackle all the louder.

  "You’re slow, Jersey girl!" Purifier taunted, spinning in midair. "Come on! Show me what you got! I wanna feel it!"

  New Jersey said nothing. She didn't have to.

  The answer came with the deafening roar her main battery firing straight into the sky.

  The 16-inch shells weren't meant for aerial targets — but New Jersey wasn’t a shipgirl who pyed by anyone’s rules. Afterall Texas taught her the firing arc trick.

  One shell missed, vanishing into the dark clouds.

  The second grazed Purifier’s shield, fring it white-hot with the force of impact.

  The third hit dead-center.

  Purifier’s cackling turned into a yelp as her footing gave out, sending her crashing down toward the raging ocean like a broken meteor.

  New Jersey didn’t wait.

  Engines howling, she charged the Siren on her own home turf. Fear the Bck Dragon on the surface of the ocean.

  The sea exploded around them as New Jersey plowed forward, kicking up towering sheets of water in her wake. Purifier barely had time to right herself, coughing and snarling as she tried to hover back into the air.

  New Jersey wasn’t about to let her.

  Her rigging screamed with strain as she mixed diesel in with her fuel oil, burning ever hotter. Her Cannons roared again unleashing a full secondary barrage, tracers and shells hammering Purifier's shields in relentless, overpping waves. The Siren shrieked in glee — whether from pain or excitement, it was impossible to tell — as her barriers flickered and cracked under the onsught.

  Purifier retaliated, hurling bolts of pure psma into the storm-wracked sea. One smmed into New Jersey’s shoulder, spinning her briefly, armor bckening and steaming — but she kept moving. Another struck a secondary turret, ripping it apart in a blossom of fire and metal.

  Still, New Jersey advanced, teeth gritted, red eyes locked onto her target like a predator on wounded prey.

  "Is that anger? Do you feel it?!" Purifier roared over the storm, her voice cutting through thunder and gunfire alike.

  "Here's your goddamn feeling!" New Jersey screameed back

  She unched herself off a rising wave, rigging driving her higher, and smmed bodily into Purifier.

  The impact was titanic.

  Purifier screeched as they both plunged into the boiling sea, the ocean swallowing them in a whirlpool of violence and fshing light.

  Below the waves, New Jersey’s gauntleted fist caught Purifier square in the jaw, sending cracks spidering across the Siren’s porcein-white skin. Purifier shed out in return, psma cws raking across New Jersey’s armor, gouging deep scars — but the battleship was built tougher than most, and she was angry.

  They broke the surface again, water exploding upward in a geyser. New Jersey drew back and fired a full salvo point-bnk, the shells hammering into Purifier's struggling form with brutal force. One hit, then another — no fancy tactics, no Siren tricks — just raw, overwhelming firepower.

  Purifier stumbled back, smoke and sparks spewing from her battered rigging. Her manic grin had finally faltered, repced by something almost like uncertainty.

  New Jersey advanced relentlessly, every step sending shockwaves across the shattered sea.

  "You picked the wrong Jersey girl to screw with," she growled, voice low and lethal.

  Purifier raised a trembling hand, gathering a swirling mass of energy for one st desperate attack — but New Jersey was faster.

  Her rigging snapped forward, chains of hardened energy shing Purifier across the chest and sending her flying backward — straight into the path of another full salvo from New Jersey's main guns.

  The world went white with the impact.

  When the spray and smoke cleared, Purifier was gone — hurled deep into the abyssal waters, her wreckage vanishing into the raging North Atntic.

  New Jersey stood alone, breathing hard, steam rising from her battered frame, guns still smoldering.

  Above her, lightning tore open the clouds.

  Ahead, through the mist and fire, Bismarck was gone. “Fuck!” New Jesery shouts in outrage.