Off the coast of Siberia in the Bering Sea, between Ytygran and Arakamčečen Islands, Friday 24 June 2011, mid-afternoon . . .
"So what is it?"
"I can't say," the helmsman of the deep-draft fishing boat that had spent hours traversing the calm waters of the Bering Sea to get here from Providénija replied as she gazed on the ice-bound inlet located near the western tip of Arakamčečen, a triangular-shaped outcropping of rock 150 kilometres from the Bering Strait that divided the eastern tip of Siberia's Čukótskij Peninsula from the western tip of Alaska's Seward Peninsula. "All air surveys of this part of Arakamčečen show there's nothing but mountains and valleys here. All ground surveys said the same thing. But there's an inlet here, as clear as day to us! Why?"
"Because we're both Kosmičeskie Angely?" Maria Pávlovna Gógol'a then asked.
Hearing that, Ekaterina Vasílijovna Lébed'a blinked before she laughed. "True, Maša, true!" she said before tapping controls on the dataPADD affixed to her navigation console. As the fishing boat slowed to a hover about two hundred metres off shore, she then picked up a pair of binoculars to look herself. "Damn! This whole area of Siberia is constantly being swarmed by eco-tourists . . . and NO ONE has looked into this place before?" she demanded. "Do people avoid this part of the island . . .?"
"Wait!"
"What?"
"Earthquake!" Maria said as she pointed.
Ekaterina blinked, and then she looked herself. "Damn! A big one, too!" she hissed out on seeing the glaciers framing the inlet shake violently. "Where . . .?"
"Can't tell," Maria said as she lowered her binoculars . . .
. . . and then gaped as the hundred metre-tall wall of ice blocking off the inlet entrance quivered for a moment before it collapsed in a torrent of shattered crystals into the churning waters of the Bering Sea. "Diša Laina! That's going to be a mess!" she hissed out as the collapsing wall disappeared into the waters south of it.
"Wait! What in Lyna's name is THAT?"
Maria jolted on hearing Ekaterina's shocked cry, and then she looked . . .
. . . before her jaw dropped. "Oh, my . . . "
"It's a ship!" Ekaterina breathed out.
"An aircraft carrier!" Maria exclaimed.
The fishing boat's helmsman blinked, and then she looked again. "Oh, my . . . " she breathed out on noting the large and flat deck hovering two levels above the dark grey bow, that tipped at the bowsprit with a circular golden sigil. As her eyes also picked up row on row of triple-barrelled anti-aircraft guns lining the edge of the flight deck, she then blinked on seeing something fluttering over the deck. "Flag!"
Maria blinked, and then she scanned the area where her friend was pointing . . .
. . . and then her jaw dropped. "The Japanese flag . . .?"
Ekaterina gaped. "Are you sure?"
"Da! Red disc on a white field! And the bow end of the ship is where they fly that flag as a naval jack! Can you turn us around and get us closer so I can see more of this thing? If this is a real aircraft carrier from Japan . . .!"
"What's it doing up HERE?" the other woman said.
Maria nodded. "Not to mention still intact without a speck of rust on it!"
The helmsman sighed. "Okay, okay . . . "
With that, she tapped controls to get the engine moving again. As the fishing boat swung around and began a slow approach of the inlet in question, Maria walked over to the bow and leaned on the guard rail there as she put the binoculars back to her eyes so she could get a closer look at this quite strange sight for the easternmost tip of Russia. A Japanese aircraft carrier – yes, the golden sigil on the bow was the sixteen-pedal chrysanthemum insignia that had adorned the bows of all major warships of that nation before the end of the Great Patriotic War in 1945 – that had been trapped in a cove in an isolated island off the coast of Siberia of all places . . .!
For how long . . .?
Why were they here . . .?
And were there people still alive on this ship . . .?"
"LIEUTENANT! FISHING BOAT APPROACHING!"
Maria jolted as she spotted several people appear on the flight deck near the edge, all dressed in matching green uniforms. Well, that answers the last question, she mused as people pointed her way. What in Lyna's name are they doing here? Was this some sort of strange Gulag camp that the authorities in Moscow forgot . . .?
"Maša, they don't seem to like our being here!" Ekaterina warned.
Maria blinked, and then she sighed. She had started sensing it, too. Waves of shock, surprise and anger, all mixed with a steely grip on people's souls that could only arise from years of military discipline. "Wonderful . . . " she hissed before blinking as she gazed over her shoulder at her friend. "Is the translator on?"
"It's on!" the other Avalonian-Russian replied. "Was that English?"
"I think so," Maria stated. "You have a bullhorn on this boat?"
"Nyet!" Ekaterina said, shaking her head. "You'll have to yell!"
"Oh, wonderful . . . " With that, Maria took a deep breath, and then she cupped both her hands around her lips. "HELLO, THERE!" she called out. "CAN YOU HEAR ME?"
Silence.
"YES!" came back from the flight deck of the carrier . . . which was a rather BIG carrier, Maria was noting as the fishing boat came closer. Big – if not BIGGER! – than most surface warships on Earth that she knew of. Most likely, this great ship was the near-equal of the American Nimitz-class supercarriers that formed the backbone of that nation's surface fleet. Did Japan ever possess a ship this size . . .?
"ARE YOU ALRIGHT? THAT QUAKE DIDN'T HURT ANYONE, DID THEY?"
More silence.
"NO! WE ARE FINE!"
Maria blinked as she sensed something new coming from the men – and there were a LOT of them! – aboard this strange ship. Curiosity? Haven't they ever encountered women piloting ships before? The Čukči people whale and herd reindeer all over the area; women help out in every step of the process! Why are these people . . .?
"WHY ARE YOU HERE?"
Different man's voice, Maria noted. "WE CAME HERE BECAUSE MY FRIEND NOTICED THE INLET YOUR SHIP WAS TRAPPED IN!" she called back. "YOUR SHIP DIDN'T APPEAR IN AERIAL SCANS OF THE ISLAND, MUCH LESS WASN'T SEEN BY ALL THE TOURISTS THAT COME HERE!"
Still more silence.
"HOW ARE YOU SPEAKING JAPANESE?"
Maria sighed. "I HAVE A TRANSLATOR SYSTEM WITH ME THAT ALLOWS YOUR WORDS TO BE INTERPRETED IN RUSSIAN AND MY WORDS TO BE INTERPRETED BACK IN JAPANESE! IT'S AN AREA EFFECT!" she called back as she sensed Ekaterina gear back the boat's motors just in case the people on this strange ship got a little trigger-happy. While neither of them knew much about the history of Russian-Japanese relations even after living over a year in the Rodina, the fact that there was a JAPANESE AIRCRAFT CARRIER trapped in a bay on a RUSSIAN ISLAND in SIBERIA was well beyond what could be seen as normal. "PLEASE! WE MEAN YOU NO HARM! YOU'VE OBVIOUSLY BEEN HERE FOR A WHILE! LET US HELP YOU!"
Silence fell again, though Maria was quick to hear both the muttering of people close to the bow and the sounds of thumping feet on hard steel decks echoed from inside this great ship. Finally – as the fishing boat got within ten metres of the great ship's bow – a man appearing to be in his early sixties came up to stand at the forward edge of the flight deck. Gazing at him, Maria was instantly struck by both the wisdom and determination that seemed to leech out from every point on this man's body. His uniform – like all of the others on this ship she had seen so far, he was dressed in a green coverall-like suit that distantly resembled work dress aboard civilian and military ships alike these days – fit his trim and slender body like a glove. While she had no idea what the rank insignia on his collars meant, the sheathed sword latched to his work belt clearly indicated he was a high-ranked officer of some sort.
"You cannot help us, Madame!" the newcomer then said – In English? Maria gasped to herself, her eyes picking up the slightly different movement of the man's lips – as he gazed sadly on them; his voice was echoing well all over the ice-lined inlet that had shielded his ship from the outside world so well. "We are on a mission forced upon us by the authority of our late Emperor seventy years ago that demands we go forth and strike down anyone who stands in our path before we can achieve our goal! I'm sad to say that you and your friend there will have to be taken prisoner for the time being; we cannot afford to allow you to relay news of our ship's existence to the outside world, especially those our late Emperor marked as enemies of our homeland!"
Maria took a moment to absorb that. Seventy years ago? Nineteen-forty-one? What in Lyna's name would make these people come out HERE to . . .? She then paled as she recalled a certain event in that year which would definitely have involved Japanese aircraft carriers, especially something the size of the ship before her. Oh, Lyna have mercy! These people were supposed to be part of the force that attacked Pearl Harbour!
"Maša, what do you want to do?" Ekaterina hissed out.
A sigh. "We have no choice, Katja," Maria said as she gazed back on her friend before she looked up at the elderly officer on the flight deck. Much that she was personally prepared to die performing her duty, the senior sergeant of the Policia knew that this situation was worlds different than tracking down common criminals, much less doing other things to keep the order and peace within her patrol zone. "You have orders that were given to you which cannot be countermanded as those who gave you those orders are all resting in That Place beyond this life, Továrišč!" she called up. Noting the surprise emanating from many of the people on the carrier listening in on this by her calling him "comrade," she added, "Much that I personally cannot understand such life-long devotion to following orders that effectively initiated the Pacific side of the Great Patriotic War in earnest, I can sense that such was the way you were trained! I doubt that neither my friend nor I can say anything that will persuade all of you to consider otherwise, since it is quite easy to determine where you're going!"
Silence fell as the older man considered that, and then he smiled, a knowing look flashing in his eyes. "You're a soldier, aren't you? And your friend as well?"
"I'm a senior sergeant of the Providénskij District Police; the Milíciya as you might know it," Maria called back, pointing to the epaulettes of her work jacket, which had the broad gold stripe of her rank. "My comrade here is a sergeant assigned to the ocean patrol group of that same force." She waved to Ekaterina – she had on the three thinner bars of her rank insignia on her jacket – before gazing back up at him.
"You both should be at home with your families!" another man – the second fellow that had called out to them, Maria was quick to recognise – stated as a young and handsome man came up to stand beside the elderly fellow she now knew was the commander of this ship. "Why are you serving in the police? Is Russia at war?"
"Thankfully, no," Maria called back; by then, the fishing boat had drifted to a stop five metres off the carrier's bow. "But if you've been trapped in this Eternity-forsaken place for seventy years, you're coming back into a world that will be VERY alien to you." She gave them an apologetic smile. "And for that, I am truly sorry."
Silence fell over the scene . . .
The Angels of the Era of Eternity
by Fred Herriot
Based on Urusei Yatsura and Ranma ½, created by Takahashi Rumiko; Ikkitōsen, created by Shiozaki Yūji; and the Seventh Carrier series, created by Peter Albano.
Including characters and situations from Sanctuary, written by Fumimura Shō and Ikegami Ryōichi; the Jack Ryan novels, created by Tom Clancy; Kōtetsu Tenshi Kurumi, created by Kaishaku (Ōta Hitoshi and Shichinohe Terumasa); 6teen, created by Jennifer Pertsch and Tom McGillis and produced by Fresh TV and Nelvana;
This is a sequel to Long Way Home, Phoenix From the Ashes and Avalonians and Questors. This story also contains characters and situations from the fanfic series Urusei Yatsura - The Senior Year, created by Mike Smith and Fred Herriot.
WRITER'S INTRODUCTION: And so comes another sequel to Avalonians and Questors, which will give me the chance allow the world I created for that story and its predecessors to come together with the world of The Seventh Carrier, a series of alternate history action-adventure stories written by the late Peter Albano (1922-2006) during the 1980s and 1990s. If you've never heard of this series, don't be surprised; the books were pretty much your average action adventure dime store novels. Even more so, the plot itself – the Yonaga, a World War Two-era carrier from Imperial Japan that was prevented from participating in the attack on Pearl Harbour, effectively becomes the supreme weapons system in the 1980s thanks to a malfunctioning Star Wars-like defence system; also, thanks to the total breakdown of the normal Cold War-era world political and military structure, Islamic fundamentalists start to have a field day, dragging the Yonaga and its crew along for the ride – has enough holes in it to drive a tank though at times.
However, Mr. Albano's novels did had a considerable impact on a very impressionable young fan fiction writer when they came out (I began writing fan fiction stories for distribution to others when I began attending university after my time in the Canadian Forces, with the first version of The Senior Year, which I co-wrote with my friend Mike Smith, coming out in 1996 on the Internet); some of the early versions of that series do bear marks of influence from the stories around Yonaga and her crew. And despite the sometimes stilted dialogue, the biased depiction of Japanese people and their society, the quite gory battle scenes (and yes, the intimate scenes, too; these books had that as well) and the seriously off-kilter behaviour of Yonaga's old crew (which seems more reminiscent of the Imperial Army of that era and not the Imperial Navy) during this time, the series still does hold a place in my heart, though it is now tempered with growing wisdom and knowledge that, had it been applied in the series then, would have probably made those books a lot more memorable to future generations.
This story itself was directly inspired a bit by JJ Rust's Airwolf crossover story Return of the Rising Sun, which is archived in my favourites list at this website.
Note that, like Long Way Home, author's notes are contained at the end of each part.
Hiroshima, Saeki Ward, Friday 24 June 2011, late afternoon . . .
"Hiijii-chan . . . "
"Hinano-chan? Are you okay . . .?"
A surprised gasp escaped the lovely girl with the stylish brown hair and the steel grey eyes before she turned to stare in confusion at her best friend. "Did you say something, Aiko-chan?" Masatada Hinano asked before she sipped her tea.
Makimura Aiko blinked before she chuckled. "You felt something, didn't you?"
A nod. "Hai . . . Hiijii-chan seems sad for some reason . . . "
Aiko breathed out. Sharing the grey eyes of her third cousin – Aiko's paternal great-grandfather Masaharu was the older brother of Hinano's maternal great-grandmother Fujita (née Makimura) Seiko – she had short-cut black hair dyed a dark Indian red. Both were currently second-year students at Hiroshima University: Hinano was studying to be a lawyer while Aiko was pursuing a degree in medicine. They were also two of the leaders of a local motorcycle club, the Yonaga no Tenshi. The name they had chosen for their organisation – which they had formed originally as a girl's gang club while both were attending Suzugamine Girl's High School four years before – meant much more than just the poetic translation of the word yonaga to mean "era of forever."
Unfortunately for them – not to mention the other members of the Tenshi – all information concerning a ship named Yonaga had been almost lost to history.
Almost lost, of course.
Certain people – whose descendants also formed part of the Tenshi – had, despite all attempts at keeping the commissioning of the then-largest aircraft carrier totally secret from the outside world, been able to save the ship's plans and the few pictures ever taken of Yonaga as she was assembled in top secrecy at the Maizuru Naval Arsenal in the city of the same name on the Kyōto-fu coast of the East Sea.
Of course, given WHAT Yonaga had been made administratively a part of back in 1941 to ensure her existence was kept as secret as possible . . .!
"Hinano! Aiko!"
Both women jolted, and then they turned to look as a grinning woman with long brown-dyed black hair and blue eyes came up to them. "Riko-chan!" Hinano gasped. "What is it?" she asked as Sasagawa Riko moved to sit down beside them; all three of them were currently enjoying the local version of okonomiyaki at Hassei, a quaint little family shop off the Heiwa-Ōdōri that ran across the centre of town.
"Irasshaimase!" the owner of the shop called out.
"Udon-yaki, please!" Riko called out.
"Hai!"
She sat down beside her fellow Tenshi. Atop being a co-founder of the club, Riko was Hinano's second cousin related through the former's grandfather Jun'ichi, whose older sister Natsuko had married Hinano's maternal grandfather Fujita Tennosuke. "Got some news from friends up in space," she said as her blue eyes twinkled before she drew out a dataPADD from under her jacket flap to show her cousins. "Read."
Hinano took the device and flicked it on. She then blinked as the words written there literally leapt out of the screen to snare her heart. "A carrier . . .?"
"Hai! Even if all the bleeding hearts in the Diet are screaming bloody murder at the idea of us actually acquiring such an 'evil' device like that!" Riko then rolled her eyes. "People didn't complain when the Yamato was commissioned!"
"Brand recognition," Aiko stated as she took the PADD from Hinano. "NO ONE in this country would dare speak out against a ship named Yamato, even if she is a space battleship!" She then hummed. "Pity they never made a television series called Uchū Kōkūbokan Yonaga!" she then quipped as she gave her cousins a knowing look.
Hinano and Riko nodded. "Was there a name given yet?" the former asked.
"No," the latter responded. "The government is going to let Hiromi-san and her friends decide on the name for that ship. Just like they've done for practically every ship in the Earth Defence Force that's been commissioned or ordered to date."
"Doesn't say any sort of time period when this could be done," Aiko mused as she scanned the article being displayed on the PADD. "Hey, wait a minute . . . "
"What?" Hinano asked.
"Why don't we go to Tomobiki and talk to her about this?"
Silence.
"I doubt even the Moroboshi Clan know about Yonaga, Aiko-chan!" Hinano warned.
"Never hurts to ask," Aiko mused as she gazed knowingly at her cousins. "'Sides, you've heard all the tales about Negako-sama, haven't you?"
Hinano and Riko both blinked . . .
Tōkyō, Chiyoda Ward, the National Diet Building, that moment . . .
"This is a total OUTRAGE!"
The small collection of dietmen seated in the office of the chairman of the Japanese Communist Party didn't blink as they gazed on the ranting man. "What is so outrageous when it comes to contributing to the Earth Defence Force?" Asami Chiaki then demanded, an amused smile crossing his face. "You never objected when Yamato was commissioned last summer, Mister Chairman. Why the objection now?"
"Because an aircraft carrier is worlds different from other ships being designed now for the Earth Defence Force, Asami-san!" the chairman snapped as he tried not to glare at the upstart independent representing Metro Tōkyō's District Four. He knew – as did many others in the Diet – that this young survivor of the Rwandan genocide seventeen years ago was made of much sterner stuff. "It is a direct and flagrant violation of Article Nine of the Constitution! It's bad enough that the Maritime Self-Defence Forces commissioned the Hyūga-class ships when any one with even the barest knowledge of military matters could tell right away they were helicopter carriers and not destroyers!" He then sighed. "At least the planners were willing to come out and say what the Type Four ships were actually going to be! That makes this easier!"
"Why didn't you object to Yamato then?" Chiaki demanded, clearly unbothered by the older man's bluster. "Yamato is a combination of battleship and aircraft carrier and was designed that way right from the start. It's in the very hull classification code allocated to the Type Ones these days: SBBV. Space Battleship-Carrier."
"It's quite easy why, Asami-kun," Sengoku Shin'ichirō, the freshman from Hokkaidō's District Eight, stated, a lanky smirk crossing his face. As the elderly man shuddered at his mocking tone, the son of one of the Liberal Democratic Party's late senior statesmen added, "He watched Uchū Senkan Yamato when he was a kid!" As their elderly host gasped in outrage at what Shin'ichirō was implying, he added, "When Hiromi-san, Tsukihana-kun and Ayami-chan named those ships and he heard 'Yamato' for the ship given to Japan, he fell in with the rest of us! Swept away by a dream!"
"Besides, what's so offensive about an aircraft carrier?" the third of Chiaki's personal group of freshmen, the diminutive Yoshimaru Hidekawa from Kōchi Prefecture's District One, asked. "A carrier – as the Americans have shown time and time again – is as much a defensive weapon as it is an offensive weapon. It all depends on use and intention. Atop that, we're moving to help settle a colony planet with the Koreans, the Taiwanese and the Mongolians. Our slice of Pacifica is the equivalent size of all of Eurasia! We're looking at the possible migration of thousands if not MILLIONS of people from Japan to Pacifica! If we don't ensure the protection of those colonists 1and some pirate – or worse, some warmonger from any of the neighbouring powers – decides to try to attack them, would Yamato and Kōtetsu be enough to protect them?"
"Give the carrier to the Koreans, then!" the Communist Party's vice-chair then snapped. "They've got the pilots and personnel to man such a thing!"
"It was a trade-off at the United Nations," Chiaki stated. "We got the carrier. Both Koreas got missile cruisers." A sigh. "Mister Chairman, I applaud your party's desire to maintain and promote peace and harmony within and beyond Japan. Your people stood up – even at the risk of being called traitors to the nation – back before and during the Greater East Asia War to protest our attacks on China and elsewhere. You knew all along what such a war would unleash on us all. If the peaceful world you and your friends envision actually did appear, it would be a truly wonderful thing for all to experience." Another sigh. "But sadly, we don't live in such a world. We don't live in such a GALAXY, either. To blind ourselves to the dangers out there is a very stupid thing to do. The people are dependent on us to make the right choices for them and their future. Like it or not, the Japanese Self-Defence Forces are going into space alongside their counterparts elsewhere. Japan does have a tradition of maritime air operations, dating all the way back to when aircraft carrier technology was in its infancy. It's not a question of governmental semantics. It's a question of NEED! And not only do WE have a need for such a ship! But our neighbours do as well!"
"Doesn't your party promote EQUAL and JUST cooperation between the nations?" Hidekawa added. "That means we have to SHARE the burdens of the defence of our people – both Terran and Avalonian – equally! The Americans, the Chinese, the Koreans, the Canadians and everyone else with forces in the North Pacific Division of the EDF expect no less from us. I, for one, will not face our counterparts in Washington, in Běijīng, in Sŏul and P'yŏng'yang, in Ottawa and elsewhere and be forced to say that Japan is NOT doing its EQUAL PART to help guarantee the future of humanity." He then sighed. "You really should think about it, Mister Chairman. And consult with your constituents. Didn't nearly a THIRD of the Avalonian-Japanese living in this country vote for your party in the upper house elections last year? Isn't that betraying THEM?"
"I would believe so," Chiaki stated as he stood. "Please excuse us."
With polite bows, the three freshmen walked out of the office, heading down the hallway towards the private office reserved for the representative from Tōkyō's Ōta Ward. "Stupid idiots!" Shin'ichirō hissed as they passed several representatives, who all shied away from "Asami's Tigers" (as all three of them were known as a group) as if they were infested with the plague. "We literally get all the resources of a PLANET handed to us on a virtual silver platter . . . and what do they do?" A snort.
"Principle is one thing. Reality is another," Chiaki mused as he turned to head into his office, and then he perked on noting a smiling woman seated in the guest chair by his desk. "Eh?" he gasped before noting that she also had a dietman's badge on the lapel of her jacket. "I don't believe we've been introduced . . . "
She smiled. "Wakana Ako, Asami-kun," she said as she stood up, bowing politely to him. "Representative for the Fourth District of Kyōto. I hope I'm not intruding."
"Of course not," Chiaki stated with a polite bow in return, and then he beckoned the newcomer back into her seat. As his friends also took their chairs off to one side of the small office, he relaxed behind his desk, gazing intently at her. "You were first elected in the 2005 lower house elections. You're Jiyū-Minshutō like Sengoku-kun here, but not part of any particular faction. Why are you here, then?"
A smirk. "Like you, Asami-kun, I had a dream when I first came to this building as the representative for the people of Kyōto," Ako stated. "We are an economic superpower . . . yet for the last thirty years and more, we've done nothing but sit on our laurels while other countries – South Korea, China, Taiwan and others – work hard to get to where we are at and are trying to surpass us. That doesn't sit well with me as I know it doesn't sit well with you." She sat back in her chair. "I know what your ultimate goal is, Asami-kun. To create a nation of people who intrinsically understand the need to SACRIFICE for the greater good of all . . . AND allow individuals to excel at whatever interests them. Fine and fair enough. I can agree to that."
"So what do you support?" he wondered.
"Initially, a slight modification to the article of the Constitution that has our friends in the Communist Party down the hall so up in arms now about our new space carrier," she answered. "But not to the degree that the militarists in this country would wish to go. I propose that while Japan still renounces the idea of offensive war – in other words, to conquer other peoples or to take control of territories which are claimed by other peoples by military force – that we respect the right of all nations to self-defence and to come to the aid of others who can't defend themselves."
A nod. "Logical."
"But it needs help to get onto the floor," she stated. "And I believe that help is fast approaching this nation. Not from the stars . . . but from the sea itself."
Silence.
"What do you mean?"
Ako smiled. "Have you ever heard of the Yonaga no Tenshi?"
All three men blinked. "I have," Hidekawa then stated. "It's a motorcycle gang. About 850 members all across Chūgoku, Shikoku and Kansai. The local equivalent to the Kōshi Kasshi here in Kantō, but they're not tōshi. Or any other type of 'resurrected warrior' as the magicals in our country call them." As all four dietmen chuckled – being in the positions they were in government, they had the right to know about all the magically-gifted of those who lived amongst their constituents – he added, "Leader is a girl in Hiroshima named Masatada Hinano. Second-year university student at Hiroshima Daigaku; she founded the group back while she was in high school with her cousins Makimura Aiko and Sasagawa Riko. While sometimes thought of as 'bōsōzoku,' they're as well-behaved as the Kōshi Kasshi, with the same type of reputation among the less-fortunate. At least a hundred people throughout southern Honshū are alive today thanks to them helping out when it comes to automobile accidents and the like."
"Where does the name come from?" Chiaki then asked.
"Yonaga is written with the kanji for 'era' and 'forever.' Or 'eternity' if you wish to get poetic about it," Ako explained as she gazed on her host. "It was also the name of a ship that should have been commissioned into the Imperial Navy before the Greater East Asia War expanded to include the Europeans and the Americans in 1941."
The three men present blinked. "Never heard of her," Shin'ichirō stated.
"You wouldn't have," Ako stated. "She was built with a level of secrecy that even made what was used to shield Yamato, Musashi and Shinano look plain in comparison. Then again, it should have been expected. Yonaga originally was a Yamato-class ship."
Silence.
"What . . .?" Hidekawa breathed out. "That's impossible!"
"Maybe not, Yoshimaru-kun," Chiaki stated. "Though I have to confess, it does sound pretty farfetched given what everyone's said about those ships, especially the ones that were ultimately launched. Where was Yonaga built, Wakana-san?"
"Maizuru. She was the first big project after the yard was reactivated in 1936. She was launched from the Number Three dock . . . after it was expanded to take a ship her size. And she was much larger than her sisterships. A design modification that was necessitated by what her envisioned mission could have been." Ako smirked. "To strike totally by surprise and hit with overwhelming force on any chosen target."
Her host nodded. "Understandable. And it would explain the odd name for her."
"What do you mean, Asami?" Shin'ichirō asked.
"Japanese battleships were named after the old Imperial provinces," Hidekawa answered. "Cruisers were named after mountains. Aircraft carriers – if they weren't converted from other classes of ship – were named after flying creatures. Yonaga was named after an interesting poetic concept. Doesn't match any potential ship type."
"A good bluff," Chiaki mused. "What else did they do with this ship?"
"They actually made her a part of Unit 731."
More silence.
"That would do it," Shin'ichirō breathed out; who DIDN'T know of that particular special unit of the Kantō Army that operated in China between 1935 and 1945?
"What proof is there?" Chiaki asked.
"The assignment of 140 naval pilots to Unit 731 in 1940."
Still more silence.
"This ship carried THAT many pilots?" Hidekawa gasped.
A nod. "Hai. And the full support facilities to make sure they could launch a mission without any major fleet support. She was a lone wolf on the oceans."
"Part of Operation Z, you mean?" Chiaki asked. "The Pearl Harbour attack."
Ako smiled. "Eventually. After Yonaga was declared in service – she was actually 'commissioned' on 11 November 1940, over a year before Yamato was – she was deployed to Kitsuki Bay in Kyūshū until she was ordered somewhere else to await the deployment of the remainder of Nagumo's force to Hawai'i." A sigh. "But that is where the actual order trail ends. Since she was an adjunct to Unit 731, operational orders were kept with them . . . and totally destroyed when the members of the unit moved to clean their bases in China when the Soviets attacked in 1945. All that was saved were the full set of ship's blueprints, some pictures and a crew roster; all by relatives of the crew or dockyard staff who managed to get them clear of Imperial authorities when the destruction of documents concerning Yamato-class ships were ordered before the Shōwa Emperor issued the Imperial Rescript ending the war."
The three men in the room nodded. "So why tell us all this?" Hidekawa then asked. "It's an interesting historical tale, but . . . " He then paused. "Wait . . .!" he breathed out. "If such a ship actually existed, then what happened to her? If she was sunk, there would be a record of it somewhere, even in Russia!"
"There is a theory. My chief administrative assistant is a member of the Tenshi: Ushimatsu Kurumi," the dietman from Kyōto explained. "Her maternal first cousin three times removed was a Lieutenant Commander Matsuhara Yoshi. A multiple ace in the war in China before he was re-assigned to Unit 731 to become part of Yonaga's crew. He was a dōhō from Los Angeles who returned to fight for the homeland against the Chinese." As the others in the room nodded, she added, "Back last April, there was a fire in an apartment complex in Hiroshima where dozens of Avalonians had gone to live after they came here to Earth. A small group of Tenshi – Kurumi-san included – were involved in getting the place evacuated. No one died, fortunately." A sigh. "As a result, the local ashi'cha elected to help allow all the Tenshi become Avalonians themselves." As the three men in the room grinned in understanding – having Avalonian administrative aides came in quite handy when dealing with potential political opponents – Ako added, "After that, those of the Tenshi who are directly blood-related to the missing members of Yonaga's crew started having dreams of them."
The three men blinked. "What sort of dreams?" Chiaki asked.
"Very vivid ones, Asami-kun," Ako answered. "Far too vivid to be products of one's imagination; Kurumi-san has allowed me to actually 'see' her memories of them. Have you experienced something like that?" At his nod, she added, "And those dreams showed that wherever she is, Yonaga is afloat, fully manned with a living crew, all in good physical shape . . . and they are fully ready to carry out their mission."
"That's impossible!" Shin'ichirō snapped.
"Not so impossible, Sengoku-kun," Chiaki then stated. "Remember the case of Onoda Hiroo-shōi. He was the holdout soldier who survived for thirty years on Lubang Island in the Philippines virtually alone until he was finally contacted by his former commanding officer and told to stand down once and for all. There were other holdouts hidden all over the Pacific. Some made it home, some didn't. And being isolated like that, it IS potentially possible for such people to literally defy time. When he came out of the jungle in the 1970s, Onoda-shōi barely looked older than he did when he was assigned there in the 1940s." A nod. "Yes, it is possible, even to this late date . . . " He then perked as a knock echoed from the door. "Come in!" he called out.
The door opened to reveal a pretty girl in her early twenties with brown-shaded black hair and dark brown eyes. She was dressed in a proper business suit with the insignia of a dietman's administrative assistant on her jacket collar. "Excuse me for bothering you, Asami-san," she said with a polite bow to him before she gazed on Ako. "Ako-san, the girls are coming to Tomobiki today. They'll be there by nightfall."
Ako blinked. "Why?"
The newcomer – who Chiaki and his friends were quick to sense was one Ushimatsu Kurumi – took a deep breath. "Hinano-chan had a dream of her great-great-grandfather being sad about something . . . but at the same time, many of the others sensed a lot of happiness from all of the crew of Yonaga," she said. "They're free, Ako-san."
Silence.
More silence.
Still more silence.
And then . . .
"Oh, dear gods . . .!" Ako breathed out.
"Kurumi-san, you're saying that an aircraft carrier from World War Two – one of OUR carriers – has broken free of whatever place it had been trapped in . . . and is now possibly heading towards Hawai'i at this time?" Chiaki demanded.
A nod. "Hai, Asami-san."
"What the hell do we do?" Shin'ichirō demanded.
The survivor of the Rwandan genocide smiled. "We turn this over to the one person in all of Japan who could potentially stop this," he said.
The others gazed on him, and then they nodded . . .
Heading south from Arakamčečen Island, early evening . . .
"We didn't have any darkness to protect us from being seen when we left Arakamčečen, Admiral. We may have been spotted."
Standing on the navigation bridge of His Imperial Majesty's Ship Yonaga, Vice-Admiral Fujita Hiroshi took a deep breath. The sun was finally setting over the low mountains of the shoreline bordering the Anadyrskij Zaliv three hundred kilometres to their west. "I'm aware of that, Captain Ogawa. It was a risk worth taking when the ship was able to move finally," he answered in English, speaking with the slight American accent he had gained from his period of study at the University of Southern California between 1919 and 1921. He took a moment to scan the calm seas surrounding his flagship through his binoculars. "We have a duty to perform and we must perform it, even now. Especially now."
Hearing that, Yonaga's commanding officer, Captain Ogawa Gorō, nodded. "Hai. To believe we finally managed to break free after nearly SEVENTY YEARS . . . "
"And we've only physically aged nearly SIX YEARS," Fujita noted with an amused smirk.
Both men laughed, as did the seamen on lookout watch nearby, not to mention the radioman by the speaker-tubes connecting the open deck with the pilotage platform many decks below. Taking a deep breath, the native of Sendai then scanned the seas around his ship. "How is it possible, Admiral? We were isolated, of course, but . . . "
A shake of the head. "I can't say, Gorō-san." The admiral tried not to grin too much at his flag captain's asking that question; the fact that their bodies' aging process had noticeably slowed down – even for the elderly members of the crew – had always been a conversation starter aboard Yonaga, where topics of conversation had been in rather short supply given their effective total isolation from the outside world. "None of the doctors – not even Eiichi-san – have been able to determine the cause," Fujita noted. He then smirked. "But it doesn't matter anyway. The ship's crew – especially the pilots – need to be young and spry, especially with all the potential threats we must face."
A nod. "Hai, true." He sighed. "What of the two Russian police officers?"
"They will be treated well," the admiral stated. "Maria-san and Ekaterina-san came aboard willingly when we told them what had to happen. I had Masao-san take charge of them. They're being held in senior enlisted quarters, under watch." He sighed. "They reminded me too much of Hinano-chan and her friends," he added.
Ogawa nodded. He also had a relative among the Yonaga no Tenshi, a great-great-grandniece named Masanaga Nanoka, who worked as a clerk at the Junkudō Fukuoka bookshop in the city of the same name. Much that he was inwardly scared of how different people in Japan were these days – as were other members of the ship's company who had dreamt of still-living relatives . . . and all GIRLS at that! – he was glad that there were parts of his family still alive and well. And hoping that he would finally come home. "Pity we had to sink that fishing boat of theirs," he mused. "It was a sturdy ship."
"Hai, but necessary. As far as their superiors will be concerned, they're lost at sea. Understandable in this part of the world, even with the change of weather patterns in the last few years." Fujita pointed to the southwest. "Once we fully clear Cape Čaplino, we'll steer west-southwest to put as much distance between us and Northwest Cape on Saint Lawrence Island as possible without risking any detection from the Russians. Even if the American air force station on that island was said to have closed down in 1969, the chances are there that they may have reserve forces based on the island. At least, I would consider having such units based there, especially with the closeness of Russian territory to my own territory. We won't launch our first aircraft patrol until first light tomorrow, sending reconnaissance flights towards Saint Matthew and Hall Islands. There were American Coast Guard units based there during the war. They might still be there, Gorō-san."
"Hai!"
Ogawa headed off to relay the orders to personnel in the ship's operations room to prepare the necessary course changes to ensure the carrier would make the first leg of her destined journey to Hawai'i – from Sano Bay on Arakamčečen Island to past the Aleutian Islands chain between Attu and Médnyj Islands nearly 1300 kilometres to the southwest in twenty-six hours at the ship's present speed of 50 kilometres per hour – without being spotted by Russian or American ships and/or reconnaissance aircraft. Now left alone save for the junior seamen behind him, Fujita took a deep breath.
Seventy damned years . . .! the native of Nagoya and later adopted native of Hiroshima mused as he scanned the beautiful ocean before him. Fortunately for the crew of Yonaga, the seas were quite calm today; the Bering Sea was known for its incredibly rough weather and the vast majority of the crew hadn't been on the open ocean since 1941. Still, they would survive the voyage to Hawai'i; the on-board medical team had long developed homeopathic cures for seasickness thanks to the intensive research many of the crew's amateur biologists and zoologists had done on local plant and sea life.
They would make it.
They WOULD climb Niitaka-yama!
They WOULD complete the mission assigned to them in Operation Z!
And they WOULD return back home in triumph . . .
. . . or never return at all.
And the people back home . . .
Fujita shuddered as the image of a pretty girl flashed past his mind's eye.
Hinano-chan . . .
His great-great-granddaughter, Masatada Hinano.
Hiijii-chan, when are you coming home . . .?
Another shudder ran through him as he remembered that teary plea . . .
Hinano-chan doesn't understand . . .
A deep breath later, he relaxed himself.
What's happened back home all this time?
Of course, Yonaga's crew had monitored signals coming from Japan and elsewhere over both shortwave and AM frequencies since she was trapped by a freak earthquake that collapsed a massive glacier right over the entrance of Sano Bay one late September day in 1941. Even if many of the signals were simply impossible to believe . . .
After pondering deeply the general trends of the world and the actual conditions obtaining in Our Empire today, We have decided to effect a settlement of the present situation by resorting to an extraordinary measure . . . We have ordered Our Government to communicate to the Governments of the United States, Great Britain, China and the Soviet Union that Our Empire accepts the provisions of their Joint Declaration . . .
It was impossible!
It was simply IMPOSSIBLE!
Japan – the Son of Heaven – would NEVER SURRENDER!
NEVER!
So the duty was clear.
The duty demanded of all samurai sworn to serve their Emperor and nation . . .
We will climb Niitaka-yama . . . or we will never return home!
To be continued . . .
WRITER'S NOTES:
1) The original book of Mr. Albano's series, The Seventh Carrier (ISBN 0-8217-2056-2, published in 1983), was inspired by many stories of Japanese soldiers and sailors who, cut off from their support bases, refused to believe the transmission of the Shōwa Emperor's rescript for surrender on 14 August 1945 and continued to fight on. The most famous of those people – and one of the last to finally come in out of the wilderness – was Imperial Army Second Lieutenant Onoda Hiroo (born in 1922), who continued to fight a nearly-lonely war in the mountains of the Philippine island of Lubang until 1974, when he was convinced to surrender by his former commanding officer (thanks to the efforts of a Japanese college dropout, Suzuki Norio). These days, Onoda splits his time between Japan and Brazil.
2) The Čukótskij Peninsula is the Scientific Romanisation of what is better known as the Chukchi Peninsula, located on the very eastern tip of Siberia, across the Bering Strait from Alaska. According to The Seventh Carrier, the Yonaga was caught in a glacial bay on the south coast of that peninsula, facing into the Bering Sea. Please note, that when Russian words and names are Romanised, I use the Scientific system; when there is a caron over a "z," "c" or "s," it indicates a "zh," "ch" or "sh" sound. Arakamčečen Island is a triangular island located off the eastern coast of the peninsula in the Čukótskij Autonomous Okrug (Čukótskij Autonomous Region) at the far eastern end of Siberia.
3) Russian translations: Kosmičeskie Angely – Cosmic Angels; Diša Laina – Lyna's Soul; Da – Yes; Gulag – acronym of the term "Glávnoe Upravlénie Ispravítel'no-tridovýx Lageréj i Kolónij" ("Chief Administration of Corrective Labor Camps and Colonies"); Nyet – No; Čukči – name of the indigenous natives of the Čukótskij Peninsula; Rodina – Motherland; Policia – Police; Továrišč – Comrade; Milíciya – Militia (name of the Russian police during the Soviet era); Anadyrskij Zaliv – Gulf of Anadyr (the arm of the Bering Sea south of the Čukótskij Peninsula to the west of Saint Lawrence Island).
4) Other translations: Yonaga no Tenshi – literally "Angels of the Era of Forever"; -fu – Name suffix for an urban prefecture (used only for Kyōto and Ōsaka Prefectures); Ōdōri – Great Street; Udon-yaki – Okonomiyaki made with udon wheat noodles; Kōkūbokan – Aircraft carrier (literally "aviation mothership"); Jiyū-Minshutō – Liberal Democratic Party of Japan, which effectively ruled Japan from 1955 until its first major defeat in the 2009 lower house elections; Hiroshima Daigaku – Hiroshima University; Dōhō – Compatriot; Shōi – Army second lieutenant, Navy acting sub-lieutenant/ensign, Air Force pilot officer (NATO rank code OF-1, U.S. Armed Forces pay grade O-1); Niitaka-yama – Literally "New High Mountain," the Japanese name for Yùshān (Jade Mountain), the highest mountain on Taiwan (which was a Japanese colony from 1895-1945).
5) The districts represented by Asami Chiaki and his friends are as follows: Tōkyō District Four incorporates the part of Ōta Ward that is not represented in District Three (which also includes Shinagawa Ward and the Izu Islands); Hokkaidō District Eight includes Hiyama and Oshima Sub-prefectures and the city of Hakodate; Kōchi District One encompasses most of the city of Kōchi in the prefecture of the same name on Shikoku; and Kyōto District Four includes the Kyōto city wards of Nishikyō and Ukyō, the city of Kameoka and the counties of Funai and Kitakuwada.
6) The Japanese Starship Kōtetsu (hull classification code SFF-119) is named after the first ironclad warship of the Imperial Japanese Navy. Built originally for the Confederate States Navy in 1863 in France, the ship underwent five ownership changes (including a career as C.S.S. Stonewall from 6 January-6 May 1865) until she was given over to the government of Japan in 1868. She was renamed Azuma in 1871 and finally decommissioned in 1888.
7) The Hyūga-class helicopter carriers (officially classified as "helicopter destroyers" or DDH in the Maritime Self-Defence Forces) were first commissioned in 2009. Designed along the general lines of the British Invincible-class VTOL carriers (which were known originally as "through-deck cruisers" to avoid political opposition to the construction of such ships), the Hyūga and her sistership Ise (commissioned in 2011) are believed to be capable of launching V/STOL-type aircraft like the Lockheed-Martin F-35B Lightning II fighter, but currently only carries Mitsubishi SH-60K Seahawk anti-submarine helicopters.
8) The official English text of Article Nine of the 1947 Constitution of Japan states as follows: Aspiring sincerely to an international peace based on justice and order, the Japanese people forever renounce war as a sovereign right of the nation and the threat or use of force as means of settling international disputes. To accomplish the aim of the preceding paragraph, land, sea, and air forces, as well as other war potential, will never be maintained. The right of belligerency of the state will not be recognized. Debates over Article Nine and its amendment or repeal have haunted Japanese politics since the founding of the Self-Defence Forces in 1954. The debate over Article Nine was a major theme throughout the Seventh Carrier series and it also made an appearance in Sanctuary.
9) Unit 731 (officially the "Epidemic Prevention and Water Purification Department of the Kantō Army") was Japan's top-secret biological- and chemical-warfare research unit that was active before and during World War Two. Operating from 1935-45 in northeast China, it was responsible for many of the war crimes committed during that conflict on the native population. However, given the considerable political and military necessities of the Cold War that began right afterward, those who were involved in Unit 731 were granted amnesties by the American occupying authorities after the surrender in 1945. In the background story of The Seventh Carrier, to ensure her existence would remain top secret from potential enemy intelligence forces, the Yonaga was administratively commissioned as an element of Unit 731. The Kantō Army (known often by the Mandarin name Guāndōng Army) was the Imperial Japanese Army formation that was formed in 1905 to protect the Guāndōng Leased Territory (Guāndōng meaning "east of Shānhǎi Guān," which was one of the major passes of the Great Wall of China in modern-day Qínhuángdǎo City of China's Héběi Province) on the southern part of the Liáodōng Peninsula where the city of Lǚshùnkǒu (known historically as Port Arthur to the West and Ryojun to the Japanese) was located. This was also the formation that – thanks very much to the influence of the Kōdōha ("Imperial Way Faction") group that advocated the overthrow of civilian government and the installation of a militarist regieme – provoked the Liǔtiáohú Incident (known more commonly as the "Mukden Incident") of 18 September 1931 which effectively instigated the invasion of Manchuria that year and (in one sense of the term) launched World War Two in earnest.
10) As historians will know, the code-phrase "Climb Mount Niitaka" (in Japanese, Niitaka-yama nobore) was the command to execute Operation Z (the attack on Pearl Harbour) on 7 December 1941 (8 December 1941 in Japan).
11) The quote at the end of the text comes from the Gyokuon-hōsō (literally, the "Jewel Voice Broadcast"), which was the radio broadcast on 15 August 1945 made by the Shōwa Emperor (1901-89) when he issued the Imperial Rescript on the Termination of the War (in Japanese, Daitōa-sensō Shūketsu-no-shōsho) that officially ended World War Two in the Pacific Theatre. Given how they were trained before they became part of the Imperial Japanese Navy, the concept of their own head-of-state – which they also view as an arahitogami (a kami living as a human being) – doing something like surrendering to the enemies of Japan was totally incomprehensible to people such as Onoda Hiroo . . . much less the crew of the Yonaga.