Iron Gray Sea - 07 Read online

  “Of course, Lord.”

  The distant contact slowly resolved itself into a sleek, low-slung shape visible even from the bridge, and familiar to Okada, at least. It was Hidoiame. There was no mistaking the broad, overlarge-appearing gun turret on the foredeck, the high bridge, and two swept-back funnels. The ship was pitching fairly dramatically in the swells, and he caught occasional glimpses of the bottom paint at her sharply raked bow.

  The wasp comes to the spider, he thought with growing excitement. Theoretically, they’d been in range of Hidoiame’s guns as soon as they sighted her, but the destroyer was growing closer to what Okada considered his own maximum range in these seas. Hidoiame would always have the advantage in accuracy, with her sophisticated fire control, but his own well-drilled gun’s crews should manage a higher rate of fire in local control. Everything would depend on the quality of their individual marksmanship.

  “Sound general quarters,” Okada said. “But ensure that our Lemurians move carefully to their posts, and that they try to stay out of sight,” he suddenly warned. He’d grown so used to his furry people that the notion had just occurred to him, and if he could almost make out the distant Japanese sailors through his binoculars . . . “Then go to the signal lamp yourself and ask if they are who we think they are.” He chuckled grimly. “Let us maintain the fiction that we are lost and afraid!”

  “At once, Lord,” Hiro said, activating the long-anticipated alarm bell and passing the word for all the Lemurian crew of Mizuki Maru to stay down behind the bulwarks near their action stations. Only then did he step through the door into the freezing wind on the port bridgewing and began flashing a signal on the Morse lamp.

  “Range?” Okada called.

  “Tree fi’ seero seero,” came the talker’s reply.

  “Very well.” He was worried about his enemy’s ability to mass so much 25 mm fire on his ship’s bridge or guns. It was bad enough what the “light” weapons could do to any other part of his ship. He wanted a range that would make him a difficult target for them, while still giving the crews of his own four 5.5-inchers the best opportunity. He watched while distant signal flashes responded to his own, and he studied the wind and sea. “When the range reaches two thousand, we will turn to zero five zero,” he told his helmsman. “That should give us a slightly gentler ride when we unmask our guns and commence firing!”

  The gap between Hidoiame and Mizuki Maru continued to narrow, and after Kurita’s terse reply to Hiro’s signal, the lieutenant reentered the bridge, his thin mustache and chin whiskers crusted with ice. A ’Cat servant met him and helped him and Lord Commander Okada don their leather and copper battle armor, complete with the traditional weapons of the samurai.

  “Take your place aft at the auxiliary conn, Lieutenant Hiro,” Okada said formally. “Only remember: whatever happens to me, the ship, to any of us—Hidoiame must not survive this day!”

  “Hai, my lord,” Hiro snapped, and jerked a respectful bow before racing aft.

  “Two tow-saand!” the talker cried nervously.

  “Very well,” Okada said, again staring at Hidoiame, his tone almost unnaturally calm. “Come to zero five zero.” He turned to the talker. “Inform Gunnery Officer Muraa-Laak that he may man his guns and commence firing as they bear.”

  Mizuki Maru’s first rippling salvo was wild and mostly short, but it took Hidoiame completely by surprise. Even before the destroyer managed to sound general quarters, a second, better-aimed quartet of shells were on their way, and 25 mm projectiles, chased by bright tracers, groped for her. Three shells landed close aboard but one exploded with a red flash beneath Hidoiame’s port hawse and she veered quickly to starboard, throwing a sheet of water high in the air. For a few brief moments, she lay there, her screws slashing a trough, coiling for a sprint, her whole length exposed to Okada’s guns. His warriors—his samurai!—made the most of it.

  The windows shook and the deck plates quivered as Mizuki Maru’s fire grew more sporadic, but also more accurate. Okada watched the two gun’s crews forward. Those of the number one gun on the fo’c’sle were Navy professionals loaned by Saan-Kakja, and they performed their evolutions with a competent grace, even though the fur left exposed by their peacoats was white with ice. They sent a 5.5-inch shell arcing into Hidoiame right between her forward stack and superstructure. They were rewarded by a swirling black gout of smoke and a billow of yellow fire. The number two gun, exposed over the forward cargo hatch now that the sides of a crate had been taken down, was crewed by survivors of the village their enemies had razed. Their drill was not as crisp as the Amer-i-caan ’Cats, but they served their gun with a vengeful passion and also achieved a hit—this one on the enemy fo’c’sle, just beneath her forward turret.

  Okada’s pulse thundered with exultation as he saw the rounds strike home, but his mind remained icy and analytical. So far, they’d had everything their way, but their target was beginning to accelerate rapidly now, and swarms of 25 mm tracers were starting to reach back for them. Mizuki Maru shuddered under their sudden, slamming blows. Smoke streamed away from Hidoiame’s aft turret, and a cataract of foam rose alongside and drenched the crew of number two, even as Okada felt a mighty blow somewhere aft stagger his ship. The stutter of impacting twenty-fives became a storm, and glass shattered and flew as some found the bridge.

  “Full ahead!” Okada commanded. “Left ten degrees rudder!” A ’Cat slammed the telegraph lever forward amid a clash of bells, and another spun the wheel.

  “Full ahead, lef’ ten de-gees, ay!”

  Another shell crashed into the ship, and Okada heard muted screams and felt the pressure of the blast and the convulsion of tortured steel. The rest of the bridge crew had something to hold on to, but Okada nearly fell. The talker held the headset against his furry ear and shouted over the tumult.

  “Number tree gun aft iz out of aaction, an half the twenty-five mounts is wrecked!”

  Guns one and two barked and jolted back. Acrid smoke filled the pilothouse through the broken panes, and Okada couldn’t see if they had any effect. He lurched toward the door to the bridgewing, but the wood was shattered and he jerked the remains from the hinges and stepped outside. Smoke swirled, and instead of the cold wind, he felt the heat of flames. Looking aft, he saw his ship was burning amidships, and the portside lifeboat was scattered around the base of the funnel near a gaping hole that belched exhaust gas. He clutched the rail with one hand and stared through his binoculars.

  Hidoiame was hurt! She had her own small fire forward of the bridge, and the forward turret had never turned toward them. It must be damaged. The aft stack was leaking smoke, low, and more smoke gushed from a pair of large holes aft. Whatever damage she’d taken didn’t seem to have harmed her engines, though, and she was still accelerating.

  “Left full rudder!” Okada roared over his shoulder. He had to keep as many guns in action as possible, and prevent his enemy from coming around behind him, where only one remained. He’d been right to fear the twenty-fives, he realized. The damn things were tearing his ship apart, and it looked like he had only one similar mount remaining with which to reply. Even now the twin guns kept up a withering fire that probed and detonated around Hidoiame’s bridge like bursting fireflies. His number four gun was still firing; he could hear it, even if he couldn’t see through the smoke. A blinding flash bloomed directly in front of his own bridge, sending the remaining glass flying among a chorus of cries. He wiped at blood that suddenly blurred his vision and saw corpses strewn around number two, leaving only a single, stunned ’Cat standing there. Number one barked again, and he spun to see the result.

  There was a small flare of light, wrapped in a white cloud that looked like steam, amidships of Hidoiame. For an instant, he felt triumphant—until there was another flash just like the first and he saw the long, concave splashes that cracked the swell at the destroyer’s side, one after another. Sato Okada’s blood turned to ice and he thought he felt his heart shatter in his chest. The flash
es hadn’t been fire and steam—they’d been torpedo impulse charges!

  “Full astern!” he screamed. “Right full rudder!” Even as he gave the order, he knew it wouldn’t matter. The range was now just a little more than a thousand yards, and the two Type 93 torpedoes—weapons of devastating power and reliability that he was all too familiar with—would arrive in half a minute. It would take longer than that just to reverse the engine. If the range was greater, slowing the ship might spoil the solution, but now only the turn could possibly help—but they’d already been turning to port . . . “Correction!” he shouted, more controlled. “Rudder amidships! Continue full ahead!” All he could do was pray Mizuki Maru would pass the point Hidoiame’s torpedo men had calculated for their weapons to intersect her path. With so little time, the chances of that were slim.

  Another impact forward sent the crew of the number one gun sprawling, but most of them rose and returned to their posts, quickly sending another shell toward their tormentor. Okada lurched back into the pilothouse, where the talker was shouting a steady stream of damage reports, punctuated by the constant drumming and staccato explosions of those wicked twenty-fives. A gout of hot steam gushed through the doorway as something ruptured amidships, and Mizuki Maru staggered sickeningly and began losing way. For just an instant, there was near-total silence on the bridge, and Okada’s eyes swept the gazes that met him.

  “I have failed,” he said simply, brutally. “My oath is spent and hollow. Wasted.” He paused. “Brace yourselves, my samurai,” he breathed softly. He turned to the talker. “Have the signalman transmit code letter G with our current position . . . and my apologies, if he has the time.”

  The Type 93, twenty-four-inch torpedo was, hands down, the best weapon of its type in service with any navy in the world when Sato Okada crossed the mysterious gulf aboard Amagi nearly two years before. Almost 30 feet long, weighing close to 3 tons, and blessed with a speed close to 60 knots and a 1080-pound warhead, it was designed to rupture the thick armor and break the backs of battleships. Probably only desperation, or possibly panic, had induced Kurita to waste two such precious, irreplaceable weapons against Mizuki Maru, so in that sense, Okada felt a sudden, perverse surge of pride that his ship and crew had forced him to resort to such a drastic measure. But the disproportionate expenditure was on a scale with shooting a beer can with a high-velocity rifle.

  Ultimately, the sudden course change, the heavy sea, or the haste with which the torpedoes were launched caused the first weapon to miss its target, speeding invisibly past, mere yards behind Mizuki Maru’s rudder. That was irrelevant, because seconds later the next torpedo slammed into her side and detonated with a stupendous dark geyser that dwarfed the ship—and blew the entire stern, aft of the engine room, completely off. Steam and black soot vomited skyward from the stack and gushing fuel oil ignited with a snarling rush.

  Mizuki Maru stalled as if her legs had been torn from her hips—which might as well have been the case. Her stern, propeller shaft, and most of her machinery was already nothing but mangled wreckage plummeting to the bottom of the sea. A widening field of burning oil coated the waves around her and lapped at the boat deck, already dipping low.

  Sato Okada heaved himself from the deck, practically climbing the aft bulkhead. His left leg didn’t feel right at all and he wondered if the concussion had cracked it. The helmsman slid backward and impacted the bulkhead with a cry as the murdered ship settled quickly aft, and her dripping bow left the tumultuous sea and reached for the sky. A naked, oil-soaked ’Cat crawled in through the shattered doorway, wide, bright eyes questing in dazed confusion amid black, matted fur.

  The dying roar of Mizuki Maru was terrific. Tortured steel groaned and tore with dismal shrieks of agony, and the wooden deck cracked and splintered like rifle fire. Heavy machinery tumbled loose and crashed down deep in her bowels as the bow continued to rise until it was virtually perpendicular. Dimly, Sato Okada saw the number one gun, some of its crew still clinging to it, rip loose and fall against the forward bulkhead of the pilothouse. The bulkhead smashed inward under the impact, and girders pierced and pinned him.

  I failed! He railed silently at himself through the waves of agony. So long he’d shunned the friendship of the Alliance, and then only when he personally was affected did he act. Shinya had been right all along. The day did come that my honor demanded more of me—but my pride held me back until it was too late, and my arrogance made me promise what I could not achieve. I failed not only the Alliance that deserved my allegiance, but my crew—my people—who deserved my protection!

  Suddenly, a bloody, blackened face appeared before his eyes. It was the mad cook! Okada realized with searing shame that he’d failed him too—perhaps more than anyone—and he didn’t even know the man’s name!

  “Come, my lord,” the cook said in a soft, gruff voice. “I must get you free!”

  Just then, the boiling, flaming torrent of water and oil burst into the pilothouse, and Mizuki Maru quickly slid, blowing and booming, beneath the frigid, tossing waves of the iron gray sea.

  CHAPTER 1

  ////// USS Walker

  Central Pacific

  February 22, 1944

  The sea was brisk beneath a bright blue sky, marred only by cotton-candy streamers of white. No land was visible in any direction, and the one thing that might catch the eye of some far-ranging, broad-winged lizard bird was a lonely wake that stretched behind a battered, rust gray shape pitching tiredly across the long, deep swells. Such a creature might turn to join several others of its kind, seemingly effortlessly coasting along, pacing the strange ship. The flyers stayed off either beam, avoiding the hint of foul-smelling smoke blurring the tops of two of the four funnels standing high above the narrow hull. Occasionally, one of the lizard birds dropped back and snatched a morsel from the foaming wake, but most maintained almost unerring stations as if shepherding the exhausted ship along.

  It had been a tough couple of wars for the old U.S. Asiatic Fleet four-stacker destroyer USS Walker (DD-163). The first one nearly killed her. This one, a far different war on a wildly different earth, had destroyed her—for all intents and purposes—once already. Refloated and rebuilt after the desperate Battle of Baalkpan, where she defended the Lemurians against the hated, semireptilian Grik and the mighty Japanese battle cruiser Amagi in a place that should have been Borneo, Walker had steamed straight back into action against new enemies across the vast Pacific, or Eastern Sea. Again, she and her mixed human and Lemurian—American—crew had accomplished more than anyone had a right to expect, but it had cost her dearly in bruises and blood. Now she was nearing the Imperial island appropriately called Respite, where she’d lick her wounds and catch her breath before heading “home” to Baalkpan and a much-needed overhaul.

  “Ten-SHUN!” rumbled the hulking Chief Gunner’s Mate Dennis Silva, practically guarding the fancy Lemurian-embroidered curtain that separated the passageway from the wardroom. Chairs and stools squeaked and clattered against the . . . less-pleasant shade of cracked green linoleum on the deck, as those in the crowded wardroom stood. (Stools still seemed out of place, but chairs were uncomfortable for Lemurian tails).

  “As you were,” Lieutenant Commander (Captain) Matthew Reddy responded mildly, escorting several others into the compartment. He was tall, with premature gray threading his brown hair at the temples. The pace of operations had also cost him considerable weight, giving his finely tailored Lemurian-made khakis a slightly disheveled appearance. His intense green eyes and quick smile undermined any possible impression that he was overwhelmed by his responsibility, however. Captain Reddy commanded Walker, but he also bore a great many other burdens on this strange world. Not only was he “High Chief” of the “Amer-i-caan clan,” which now encompassed virtually all Lemurian Marine and Naval personnel, but he was also Commander in Chief of All Allied Forces (CINCAF), by acclamation, of all the powers united beneath (or beside) the Banner of the Trees. The wars had been as hard on him as they�
�d been on his ship, but, like her, like nearly everyone, he’d risen to the challenge.

  Those gathered in the wardroom quickly resumed their seats, making way for Matt, Nurse Lieutenant Sandra Tucker, and His Excellency Lord Bolton Forester, the new ambassador from the Empire of the New Britain Isles, to find theirs at the battered table in the center of the compartment.

  “Good afternoon, gentlemen . . . and ladies,” Matt amended for Sandra’s benefit, and for that of Lieutenant Tab-At, or Tabby, the newly appointed engineering officer. Tabby was modestly dressed in a T-shirt and kilt (wearing a top was something she did more often now that she was an officer), but the clothing did little to hide the fact that she was female. The silky gray fur on her arms and face was still blotchy in places where it hadn’t quite covered all her steam scars, and Sandra winced slightly at the sight. Her expression turned into a satisfied smile at the thought that Matt—and every other human in the Navy—was going to have to start getting used to the idea of female officers of all sorts. She almost laughed out loud when Matt frowned at her.

  There’d been female ’Cats aboard ever since Walker started supplementing her dwindling human crew with Lemurian cadets. That was the Lemurian way, and if Matt wanted sailors, he had to take both genders. All were “Americans” now, having sworn the same enlistment oath as Walker’s original crew. The Marines and the Lemurian Armies were also entirely integrated. Many of Walker’s losses in the recent campaign had been made up with former Imperial women, however, and incorporating human females into the Navy and Marines made almost everyone uncomfortable except said females—and the Lemurians, of course, who didn’t know what the big deal was.

  Sandra had initiated the integration aboard the new Lemurian purpose-built carrier USS Maaka-Kakja (CV-4), originally recruiting women from Respite who were escaping the then-all-pervasive institution of indentured servitude that most women in the empire endured. Matt was furious when he found out, but by then it was a fait accompli. The Imperials were (publicly) furious too over the equality the move implied, not to mention the almost unavoidable precedent it set for their own navy.