-Alright, Silver. We both remember the cause of Lexington's sinking, and we have a month at our disposal. I will order a huge circuit redesign.
-It's not so easy. You need some structural modifications too. Add to that the difficulty of keeping the whole thing secret. If Sakura finds out, they'll bomb it - first priority.
-Did this happen?
-Once. The first time. Because the media coverage still thinks it has free hand to report as in peacetime, the japs listened. However, the second time, I persuaded the president to shut their mouth, and put a team of welders and electrical engineers to work. First time, they barely finished. They weren't in a rush. But I made them sortie with the ship, informed them that their life is at stake and they cut the slack.
-Don't you envy the Germans or the Russians? Their media is less stupid than to leak information to the enemy.
-That's one of their few things I wish our country had.
-So... if we do this, it's all right.
-Yes, Lexington will recieve critical but not fatal damage, and she will be repaired in three months.
-That's what they said about Yorktown, and it only took her two days.
-We won't have the luxury with Lexi. As I saw it, she always was at least two weeks too late to deploy her to Midway.
-She's... quite a piece of work, isn't she?
-Old guard. Well, by '44 we'll have the Essex class, and quite a bunch of them. It's all a matter of holding on until then...and not losing a single carrier.
-Sounds so easy, but it's all a bunch of big hassles.
-Shut it. Only 5 December was any stress for you, and thanks to it you saved Arizona, Cassin, Downes, and Oklahoma.
-You should run for minister of propaganda. You put an easy task on a pedestal with harder ones. A one day challenge does not compare to the weeks I'll have to manage the trudgery on Lexington. Then, God knows how I'll save Yorktown from a berserkered Sakura.
-A berserkerer makes tactical and especially strategic mistakes.
-You know what? Let's cut the crap. We got things to do. Tell me who to hire, and how I can find the President.
Weeks later, everything was done. We went to great lenghts to divert a disproportionate ammount of submarines to the area, and an enhanced ASW auxilliary flotilla towards Midway. The subs were supposed to be circled around the general area Zuikaku would have been in the original timestrand. Except for the 30 degrees plus/minus from the arrival direction, and barely out of sonar range. A submarine cul-de-sac, in short.
Me and Silver went into a huge argument the moment Shouhou approached.
-We have to reposition the trap. I told him.
-No, she's coming a from a different angle than she did originally.
-Still, she'll pass through.
-Let's engage her quickly then!
-She'll be able to broadcast our presence to Shoukaku and Zuikaku.
-Water's wet. She always does it. That's why they come.
-They'll come from a different angle.
-Come to your senses! They won't decide to circle around if they have to rush and attack nearby from Shouhou's position, they'll come right in, with godspeed!
His logic being impeccable, I disengaged from the argument, and agreed to bomb Shouhou at once.
The enemy carriers came as usual, and we pulled our card. The torpedo trap worked, ripping Zuikaku's hull in half, and her planes fell into the water as soon as we launched ours. Focused assault, Shoukaku sank outright, her boilers exploding and bursting downwards, breaking the bottom. Unfortunately, that didn't stop her BEFORE she launched her planes into what was a final flight.
Their planes hit well, unfortunately. Lexington was hit by several torpedoes and bombs, while Yorktown was pierced downwards by a heavy bomb. But we had our great victory.
And it did not go unexploited. The Task Force 16 still carried out the Doolittle Raid, sending the Sakura Empire into the biggest political crisis since we forced them to open the borders back in the 19th century. The loss of two carriers, and the inability to permanently damage our fleet caused a lot of seppukus. The Eagle Union diplomats made it obvious that Sakura Empire's industry and fleet is much dwarfed and that if it continues, it will with certainty lose the war.
The Sakura Empire, instead of appointing Isoroku Yamamoto as war minister, which would have been convenient for us, as he is naught more than an appeaser, chose another war-fanatic, which insisted, in the memory of the battle of Tsushima, in preparing for a decisive battle, using every last carrier available.
The battle of Midway was going to happen.