Her pilots were readied, she had her tank half-full, enough for the return trip. Her enlisted men were tense as trees, but still they worked with astonishing efficiency. Inside her bridge, her officers were giving orders, somewhat unnecessary, given that most of her crew had already memorized their training so much so that they could have their brains removed and their corpses would still be fully capable of continuing the mission.
Her radiomen were somewhat enjoying themselves, listening to Honolulu's various radio stations, with subjects ranging from Christian talk show, business, and music. Many of her crew enjoyed western music, and so did Zuikaku. The one they played that day had a calm, conservative tone, yet full of energy, An odd combination, but Zuikaku found it refreshing.
This music and the radio wave that delivered it would act as an extra guiding hand for her first wave of air strike.
"Is the war declared yet?" she asked to her fellow ships. Mentally, of course, because even if she had developed a soul, she's still in essence a floating hunk of metal without a mouth.
"We already sent a telegram to our embassy in Washington, they should've received it by now." Said Nagato, far away back from the main carriers location, ready to cover their retreat.
"But we're attacking a bit too soon, don't you think? What if they don't receive it? Wouldn't this be an undeclared war?"
"They blockaded our supplies and froze our assets." answered Kaga at the forefront of the formation. "I'd say they started this."
Well, a blockade was often generally accepted as an act of war, but...
"It's their own oil, shouldn't they be free to sell it to whoever they want? Also, they have only frozen our economic assets in their own land."
Kaga sighed. Figuratively, of course, represented by a small puff from her sideway smokestacks.
"Zuikaku, do you know why we are here?"
"Well..."
"Because of their blockade, we will soon need a steady supply of oil that we could call our own. China doesn't have the infrastructure necessary, that's why we're going south." Kaga started. "And they're going to try to stop us. They simply cannot fathom a non-white race to be an equal colonial ruler."
Zuikaku noticed Kaga increasing her speed by a knot.
"And that's why we're attacking first."
Zuikaku wanted to disagree, but even as young as she was, she was wise enough to know that her country had committed too much to stop at that point. She could argue that her country didn't need to go to China, or that starting a war with the United States was not exactly a good idea. And she would not be alone in that sentiment, as the battleship Nagato, the flagship of Admiral Yamamoto, and a few other ships which had developed a soul were also opposed to the idea of creating another battlefront with the Americans. Even the army thought it was a bad idea.
Even so, she knew that opinion was in the minority. The IJN would do anything to take the glory away from the IJA in china, and Zuikaku also found herself unable to argue in support of the fairness of the then current international system, which was, at least to the Japanese, was largely biased towards the already established nations.
So she stayed silent, keeping the only noise coming out of her to be the sounds of her crew and engines, ready to put her name in history, for better or worse.
Under Akagi's command, all the carriers turn into the wind, and with outstanding coordination, they sent their planes away, with each air group leaving their respective carrier deck almost within a second from each other. Zuikaku felt a sense of melancholy as the sound of the roaring engines of dive bombers and their limited fighter cover mixed with the sound of the Pacific waves hitting her hull.
Her country had the best torpedoes among the navies of the world. But torpedoes would play only a limited role in this operation, since they're going to attack a fleet anchored in shallow waters. The few torpedo equipped bombers from the first and second carrier divisions would need to fly especially low in order to reduce the cruise depth of their torpedoes.
The majority of the bombers were equipped with armor piercing bombs, to sink the battleships and carriers of the opposing force, and to damage the various airfields and bases around the isles. As Zuikaku planes passed the calm community of Hawaii she, from her pilots' perspective, noticed that a few of the people below were not that different from her own crew.
She wondered how those Japanese-Americans, both the ones born on their soil or as an immigrant, would be treated by their own neighbors in the years following her attack. She knew for a fact that they had a few spies in Hawaii as of this point, who provided critical intelligence for this particular mission.
Like where to put their submarines, for example.
The submarines were the first of their force that was noticed by the enemy force. But their communication was sluggish, and their planes were not prepared until her aircraft were already strafing their soldiers.
Zuikaku's planes moved in towards the army air bases, focusing most of her planes on Wheeler Air Base as was instructed by the high command based on the intelligence provided by their spies. She began bombing and strafing both soft flesh and hard steel, breaking them beyond repair. The resistance of the enemy was pathetic, giving Zuikaku enough leeway to let her mind wandered.
In an ideal condition, for each death caused by her, at least two people would want to seek revenge, and if the person killed had a loving family, his children would want revenge. Her wife would work harder in their factories, constructing ammo and equipment exceeding her quota in hope that one of them would kill the one responsible for making her a widow...
Suddenly, she heard Kaga's panicked anguish.
"Where are their carriers!?" she shouted.
Then Zuikaku noticed that no carrier was present anywhere in the vicinity.
Zuikaku started to panic. Was this an ambush? Did the enemy knew that they're coming? Was it a military feint, drawing most of the enemy force to break them in a single blow? Or was it a political one? Letting the attack to happen, allowing the Americans to enter into a just war and demonizing the Japanese while keeping their most important assets safe?
The latter was rather unlikely given the general unpreparedness of the enemy, but Zuikaku was not thinking clearly.
"Forget about the carriers! Just target the battleships!" commanded the flagship Akagi.
Zuikaku split her second attack wave to attack Hickam Airfield and the battleship row alongside most of the planes of the first and second carrier divisions. Zuikaku's planes were concentrated on the USS Maryland and the USS California. Most of these ships would be stranded in shallow waters after their bombing and be re-floated and repaired within a few months, as was the nature of attacking a fleet moored in harbor with repair facilities literally within walking distance.
But it would give her country time, crucial time that they would use to solidify their defense in the pacific and hopefully force the Americans to sue for peace on their terms.
Hopefully.
The carriers of the Kido Butai unleashed their ordinance onto one of the battleships that was trying to run for the open sea. Zuikaku watched with slightly morbid amusement as the battleship beached herself when she realized that she would block the entrance to the harbor if she was to continue trying to escape under the relentless bombing and sunk, disabling the port for good.
So far, the enemy resistance had been minimal, as to be expected. Most of their experienced pilots and newest technology were being deployed in Britain as of the Americans 'Germany First' policy, and the force stationed in Hawaii were mostly to act as a deterrent, a show of force to 'scare' the Japanese into ceasing hostilities in the Pacific. Yet again another proof of western arrogance and ignorance of the Japanese resolve, as some of her countrymen had called it.
"Zuikaku! Above!" her sister called, just in time for one of Zuikaku's bombers to turn into a massive fireball.
Zuikaku realized that she had been engaged.
Her Zero fighters moved in, expecting enemy's Peashooters, P-40 or F2F, or maybe some F4F, but instead...
"Bombers?" Zuikaku heard Kaga sneered. "Stupidity itself."
One fighter squadron from Kaga's air group separated itself from the rest and start engaging what Zuikaku's pilots could identify as Dauntless naval scout bombers. At that point, it was clear that the fact the American carriers were not present was not an indication of a cleverly planned ambush. The carriers were definitely nearby, but they're also clearly just as unprepared as the rest of the enemy fleet.
Kaga's fighters immediately let out a hail of bullets and cannons fire towards the seemingly vulnerable bombers, but their tail gunners started opening up, wounding one Zero and driving away the rest.
If Kaga actually had a face at the time, Zuikaku reckon she would be able to see her surprised expression.
The first casualty suffered by the enemy bomber squadrons was not actually the result of the excellence of Kaga's fighter pilot, but to the stray flak fire from Pearl Harbor's own ground based anti-air defense. The bombers were being targeted by their own side. Zuikaku could figuratively hear Kaga and few other ships starting to laugh.
But even then, Zuikaku could see the resolve within the pilots and gunners of the Dauntless group. They did not try to run as the imperial propaganda had led them to believe they would. Instead, a few of them directly engaged the Zeros, while few started engaging the bombers targeting the battleships. scout bombers, purposely engaging a thorough-bred air superiority fighters.
A group of Zuikaku's own Zeros engaged one of the bombers. Dropping his bombs in the empty sea below him, the Dauntless' pilot started to engage in a dogfight with the Zeros, and to Zuikaku's surprise, the lone bomber managed to shoot down one Zero before being shredded by the others.
'Who are you?' Zuikaku thought.
When a number of battleships were already sufficiently on fire and Pearl Harbor lied in ruin, Akagi called a retreat.
"We should continue." Protested Kaga. "The carriers are definitely nearby, and we could attack their oil reserve."
"No, we're not engaging in search and destroy so close to an enemy base." commanded Akagi. "And also we should stick to the plan. The oil tanks were not in our plan. This operation is a success and we have accomplished most of our objectives. We're going home."
Under protest from kaga and few other ships, Akagi led the withdrawal of the fast carrier task force back towards Japanese waters.
As Zuikaku recovered the last of her airplane, she took one last gaze at the flaming Pearl Harbor. There were some brave people there. Somewhat incompetent and undertrained with outdated equipment, but brave nonetheless.
Zuikaku was especially curious about the carrier of which the Dauntless must had disembarked from, seeing how most of the airfields nearby were on fire at the time.
As Zuikaku's planes were engaging the Dauntless, she could feel anger, vengeance, sorrow and regret emanating from each roll, dive and turn the Dauntless made as they engaged in a futile combat that could only lead to their deaths. But she also could taste determination and willpower within them that were almost...Japanese.
What kind of carrier would such mad pilots call home?
Whoever that carrier was, Zuikaku felt that she would see her again. In another life, perhaps the two of them could be friends, or at least allies, and Zuikaku would very much like that.
But not today, not in this life.
Unbeknownst to Zuikaku at the time, said carrier would be the most powerful force that drive the war of the Pacific, and she and her sister would stand in history as the only worthy foe...of the carrier Enterprise.
