STEC Archives, Print Document Division
Curator signature: Tautog
Format: Message, Personal Object
Object: Collection, Personal Correspondences of New Jersey
Location (if known): STEC Archives
Time (if known): REDACTED
Due to the nature of soldiery, military culture is uniquely suitable for the development of urban legends and modern mythology. The extraordinary – often described by the press as “fantastic” or “supernatural” – nature of STEC’s work offers a fertile ground for such tall tales.
From: Maury (United States Shipgirl)
Cc: Dolphin (United States Shipgirl)
To: MAILIST-SERV – “Tadpoles Mk. 19”, MAILIST-SERV – “Visiting Shipgirls”
Date: [REDACTED]
Subject: FWD: A thought on some rumors
I won’t ask everyone to play along, but give it some thought please. In my opinion, Commander Jer is pretty serious most of the time, so if she’s having fun, that’s what matters to me.
Ladies,
I send this email out about once a year, so my apologies if this is redundant. However, given the influx of new shipgirls joining our ranks this year, I feel inclined to debunk one of the most persistent, albeit harmless, rumors that crops up after every major Abyssal incursion.
The story goes something like this. There’s a mysterious, unidentified shipgirl wandering around the high seas helping our forces out, often at points with the hardest and most dangerous types of fighting. Nobody knows what type of shipgirl she, but everyone who’s ever “seen” her – physically or electronically – agrees that she’s blonde and wears a distinctive mask.
I’m aware of the rumors out there suggesting that this is in fact, me, and I would like to offer you my thoughts on this specific subject. In one word, impossible. The “mysterious shipgirl” is not real, and we’ve abundant evidence proving this to be the case over the years. She’s definitely not me.
- MERLIN automatically detects and links a shipgirl to our database – it’s how we use the teleporters, after all. If this “mysterious shipgirl” is a real person, then she would be in our databases, and we would already know who she is.
- Ah, but you say, it is possible to mask a shipgirl from MERLIN. Yes, this is true, but it would require authorization from me. I have not been made aware of any masking requests involving shipgirls during combat missions, so there you have it.
- “But she looks like Jer!” There are a lot of shipgirls who are tall leggy buxom blonde beauties. This resemblance to me is a coincidence.
- “But she sounds like Jer!” It’s possible that you’re seeing things and hearing my voice over the comms channel. So, what you’re really hearing is me, and not some mysterious shipgirl or whatever.
- “But she has the same sortie schedule as Jer!” This is a coincidence, nothing more and nothing less.
- “But she literally uses the same sort of powers as Jer!” This is another coincidence, if it’s even a real occurrence.
- “But I’ve seen that mask in your office!” Yeah, about that. It’s my Halloween costume. I dress up as [REDACTED TO AVOID COPYRIGHT CLAIMS] every year.
Yes, I’m aware of the fact that there’s a high-level STEC representative who testifies to Congress who looks kinda like me, sounds like me, is about my height, and knows what’s going on as well as me, but take a closer look. She’s got a pair of sunglasses on. Have you ever seen me wear sunglasses?
Exactly.
If you have any questions or thoughts, feel free to let me know. Thanks and I hope this clears things up
Yours,
Jer
From: Dolphin (United States Shipgirl)
To: New Jersey (United States Shipgirl)
Date: [REDACTED]
Subject: FWD: FWD: A thought on some rumors
Good god, one of my girls actually fell for it for real this year.
You wanna take this, since it’s your prank? Or are ya still gonna be “in character” until the 15th?
SARGE
i’m CONFUSED IS THE MASK ShiPGiRL MISS NEW JERSEY OR NoT