Archerfish Ch. 9
11:00 hours (UTC +10), 34°39'12.5"N 154°25'00.6"E
Day +5
"Are we there yet?"
"No."
"Are we there, now?"
"No."
"How much longer?"
"We'll get there when we get there."
"Baltimore's touching me!"
"I am not, hon!"
"Atago's on my side of the convoy!"
"Arkan-san, I most certainly am not."
All of us, that is to say, Ship 142, were giggling. The other ships were looking confused, taking Kaylee wa-a-a-a-y too seriously. I debated whether to join in, and ask for a cookie, but Elizabeth spoke up, laughing so hard she could barely get the words out.
"Don't make me turn this fleet around, little missy!"
That did it. We all just fell out, laughing. Essex did not look amused, but even Taylor and Cowpens were snickering quietly.
Michele, Nicole, and I had switched to a subchannel (snerk) when we first set off, and I called to them both: "She's not wrong, though. This is taking forever."
"It is," replied Nicole, "but think of how much longer it would take if we were still moving at 8 knots."
I shuddered. That had gotten real old, real fast.
"I am sorry, you know," said Balao. "I just wasn't built with underwater speed." We had included her, of course, but her on-board radio couldn't quite interpret our bursts successfully. We ended up handing her one of our spare radios, at the suggestion of Michele's QuarterMasterFairy.
"Not to worry, Miss Balao", said Michele. "We got it all sorted out."
Indeed we had. After the first half hour of crawling through the ocean, Michele had radioed Elizabeth to ask about the snail-dragging pace. Elizabeth had, in turn, asked Essex and Iowa, who were setting it.
"We can't go any faster", Essex had said, "Or we'll lose the subs."
"The subs can go as fast as we can," Elizabeth had informed her.
"I meant underwater. We want to keep them unseen, to keep the element of surprise." Essex had replied, rather patronizingly, I thought.
Elizabeth had frowned slightly at that; you could hear it in her voice if you knew her well, and I did. "I meant underwater, too. Michigan, Archerfish, and Narwhal all have subsurface speeds in excess of 20 knots."
There was a brief pause. I imagined a startled and fearful look on Essex's face. "I did not know that," was all she said. She then called Balao to run on top, and the group started to move faster. Michele, Nicole, and I were swimming ahead, turning wide, and swimming back, letting our passive sonar tell us what was in the area, followed by an active ping every thirty minutes. I heard Iowa grumble something about "damn Yankees" the third time we did it, but I didn't ask.
Essex and Cowpens had been sending out flights of Dauntlesses and Hellcats on hour rotations, for reconnaissance. Elizabeth had sent up a few pairs of Hawkeyes, in different directions, with Hornets along for cover. After the first 90 minutes, Essex had turned to her and said "Enterprise, you should bring your planes back in. You don't want them to splash."
Elizabeth had tried to sound reassuring: "They'll be fine. The Intruders just launched to refuel them."
"You can refuel fighter aircraft in flight?" Cowpens interjected, sounding astonished.
"Of course."
I chuckled to myself. Elizabeth was going to give Essex heart failure. If we were lucky. I tried to be generous, but it still rankled that they had all drawn down on me.
It still rankled the rest of us, too, apparently. Oh we were all polite, Kaylee was her usual happy, chirpy self, but we weren't as friendly as we could have been, nor as forthcoming. And we found little ways to be mildly annoying, if only just to find out who had a sense of humor and who didn't; hence the back-of-the-car shenanigans.
Of course, Elizabeth had gotten a master prank off, too. Sometime during the night, a pair of Essex's Dauntlesses had gotten slightly lost, and landed on Elizabeth's deck by mistake. Her DeckFairies had hustled the confused PilotFairies below and not let them back up top until morning. At first light, Elizabeth had called out to Essex.
"Oh, dear! We seem to have a bit of a situation, Miss Essex!"
"Hmm? Wha? Oh! What seems to be the trouble, Enterprise?"
"I believe I have two of your planes here on my flight deck", Elizabeth said sweetly.
"Are they alright?"
"Oh, they seem to be fine. They just got confused in the dark when they landed last night. I'm surprised you didn't notice when they didn't check in." Butter would not have melted in Elizabeth's mouth.
"Hmm. Well, thank you for taking care of them. You can go ahead and send them back."
"I can't." Elizabeth said apologetically.
"What do you mean, you 'can't'? Just launch them. They can land as normal."
"I can't. They'll break apart."
"What are you talking about? Just load them in your gun." Essex seemed to be growing a little impatient.
"My catapults can launch a 100,000 pound aircraft to over 150 mph in less than 3 seconds. I'm afraid your planes can't take the stress. I would hate for them to shatter." She said sadly.
Essex was dumbstruck for a few seconds. Then she blinked once or twice, and rallied. "Why are you using the catapults? Just let them take off." she instructed.
"I can't do that, either. It violates deck safety protocol for windmills."
"Windmills?"
"I'm sorry. Propeller aircraft." Elizabeth corrected.
At this point, Kaylee started to take note. "Elizabeth? What are you talking ab-" she started to say.
"Shh!" Elizabeth shushed her sister.
"Well?" Essex had asked. "How are you going to send them back?"
"Hmm. Let me think a min- Oh! I know – a helicopter!" exclaimed Elizabeth.
"A helicopter?" asked Kaylee.
Bri had taken an interest in the conversation, as well. "What? A helicopter carrying a Dauntless?" she asked.
"Yes", said Elizabeth. "The SH60 Seahawk! It could carry it in a cargo net."
"It's not a question of how it carries it, it's a question of weight ratios." Bri answered, smirking slightly. "A Seahawk with a carrying capacity of 6,000 pounds can not carry a 9,400 pound Dauntless."
"Wait! Suppose two Seahawks carried it together?" said Elizabeth, who was outright grinning at that point.
"You mean" said Bri, trying not to laugh, "like, strung across a line?"
And at that, we all broke out laughing, to the complete befuddlement of everyone else except Essex, who looked both confused and exasperated. In the end, Elizabeth actually picked the planes up gingerly between her thumb and forefingers, just behind the wings, and delicately placed them on Essex's outstretched deck.
Essex was not amused. Even less so when Iowa looked over and exclaimed:
"Why in tarnation are they PINK?"
I had not heard the fallout of the conversation, because at that point I needed to go back out, if only to tell the other subs what had just happened. Balao didn't quite get the jokes, but she laughed at the thought of the pink planes.
Michele had spoken up over the radio once the laughing had died down.
"Miss Balao? Can I ask you a question?" she said.
"Just 'Balao' is fine." she replied. "We're all subs, and fleetmates. There's no need to be formal out here."
"Well, that's another thing," Nicole jumped in. "What is your name, then?"
There was a pause. "Balao?" came the reply.
"No, I mean your real name, not your ship name. Mine is 'Nicole', for example, although I'm also the Narwhal."
"Narwhals, Narwhals, swimming in the oce-" began Michele and I.
"Break! Break! Break! Enough with that song! You taught it to my Fairies; that's bad enough!" Nicole cried.
"Sorry, Nicole," I smirked. "It's like a trigger: I hear the word, I want to sing the song."
"Well, don't." she snapped. "So what was your name, Balao, before you were a sub?"
Another pause. "Um. I've always been a sub. I'm both a girl and a sub. Are you something else?"
We paused. How much to say, to not scare her off? I tried a different tack. "This is all very new and confusing to us. Can you tell us more about who the Goth, sorry Abyssals are, and why they're at war with us?"
"Nobody really knows who they are and what they want." Balao began. "A little over five years ago, a fleet of dark ships came out of the middle of the ocean, comprised of human-sized vessels that varied from cruisers and destroyers to great battleships and super dreadnoughts. They were merciless in their attacks, and they ultimately destroyed the full-sized navies, and all other shipping in the Pacific. And then, at the nadir of hope, a new set of ships appeared to take up arms and fight back. They were girls who possessed the spirits of historic warships, and they became known as the Fleet Girls. At first, they were all ships from the Imperial Japanese Navy. They trained hard and fought many battles against the Abyssals, culminating in the Battle of Mi, three years ago, which destroyed the main Abyssal base at Midway Island. We thought they were completely defeated then, but they regrouped and took a number of smaller islands, including Wake and the Marshalls. They have also made attempts to cut off Fiji. That was before my time, though. Over the last few years, more Fleet girls have been summoned, called into being, most notably from the Royal and the United States Navies. I woke up at Naval Base Coronado in San Diego two years ago, along with Tench, Fletcher, and Guest. We trained together, and then Guest and I were assigned to Yokosuka. We've been doing mostly patrols, with a few small battles. Then five days ago you all showed up, and we were sent as a welcoming committee."
"With a great deal of force," Michele observed.
"With enough force to rescue you, if needed," Balao replied. "Or to eliminate you if you turned out to be a threat. The Admiralty was very concerned that you would decide that WWIII had started, and attack Russia or China, if you weren't met in person. They were very afraid of sending the wrong message and having you launch an attack, which is why they didn't return your calls. We were only expecting Archerfish and Michigan, and were rather surprised to find the rest of you."
"Then why did they all shove guns in my face when I showed up? You knew I was there!" I asked.
Another long pause "That . . . was not our finest hour. I do apologize, Archerfish. You were very . . . unexpected."
"Why?" asked Nicole.
"Because you really don't have boys on your planet, do you?" I asked, as the realization hit me. "Girls. You kept saying Fleet Girls, Ship Girls. All the ships, even the Abyssals – you're all female, aren't you?"
"Um. Yes."
Well, that hit me like a cinderblock to the face. I was going to need to take a few minutes to process that. Michele knew me well enough to sense my unease. She changed the subject.
"My NavFairies are a little concerned. They are telling me that the storm track that they've been monitoring has shifted unexpectedly and is now heading in our direction. It should break on us in about 4 hours. The seas should start turning rough, up top, and that the Fleet will have to slow a bit. It won't bother us that much, but do you think we should turn back and ride closer to everyone else? Or range out even further?"
"How rough?" asked Balao sharply. "And how fast did this come up? My fairies haven't said anything."
"We've been tracking it for about twelve hours, but its predicted path put it north of our course, so it wasn't an issue. It just shifted, and will cross us in about -"
"That's not a normal storm," interrupted Balao. "That's an Abyssal Force, most likely a Princess. They cause weather disturbances and storms. We need to tell the others."
"Elizabeth already knows," said Nicole. "I just got off the horn with her. She told the old-timers –"
"Hey!" cried Balao
"Sorry, no offense meant", replied Nicole. "She told them about the weather, and they told her about the Princess. She wants us to go deep forward and harass them before they can get here. The storm interferes with their radar, but our sonar should be able to tell what's what."
"Alrighty then. We're a good 10 miles south of you, Nicole. Go on ahead, we'll catch up."
"Miss Balao?" called Michele, "I'm really sorry, but I think you should wait on station until the rest of our fleet shows up. We're going to be moving faster and underwater, and you aren't going to be able to keep up with us anymore. Plus, they'll need your sonar back there."
"I really don't like the idea of leaving you girls, er – I mean kid- um, rather, young subs, to face this on your own."
I couldn't stop from laughing. "It's okay, Miss Balao. I figure I'm going to have to get used to being 'one of the girls' from now on. And please, don't worry about us. We're not as experienced, but we have speed, stealth, good armament, and some serious firepower. As long as we listen to our fairies, I'm sure we'll be fine."
"Yes, please", said Nicole. "And this gives you a chance to recharge as well."
"Very well." She said. "Good hunting."