Rising to the surface, I look around for any signs of imminent danger. Finding none, I relax and begin to assess just what had happened. Not too far from me the smoking remains of the shore boat, slowly sink into the Pacific Ocean.
Off in the near distance I can see the still burning debris from the first downed aircraft and just beyond the shore boat, I observe more flaming wreckage that I assume must be from the second aircraft.
Slowly swimming towards the remains of the boat, looking for anything I can salvage into either a raft or aid to keep me afloat whilst awaiting rescue, my efforts are interrupted by a shadow passing behind me.
Turning, I find myself face to face with the hull of another boat I had failed to see on my earlier search of the area. Looking up I see Arizona sitting gracefully atop the hull, "Are you alright?" she asks looking down at with concern in her eyes.
"Yes, I'm okay," I answer, "I'm sure my ears will stop ringing eventually," I add.
"Sorry about that," Arizona says offering me a hand to help me climb aboard.
"Don't be," I reply taking her hand and scrambling up the side of the hull, "If you hadn't done what was needed, then neither of us would be here to talk about it."
Bracing myself against the superstructure behind Arizona, I take my time in getting a good look across the surrounding area. Taking in the sight as the last remains of the shore boat as it slips below the waves, I silently curse that I had been unable the retrieve the portable radio. "I don't suppose you are able to get in contact with any of the others?" I ask.
"Without knowing the exact frequency, they are using, the best I can do is send a message over an open channel and hope they hear it," Arizona replies, "Or you could simply use this." She finishes handing the radio to me.
Wordlessly I take the radio from her.
"I picked it up just after you jumped clear," Arizona answers my unasked query.
"You're a lifesaver," I say nodding my head slightly in response, before turning my attention to the radio to ensure it was still functional and set to the correct channel. "Can someone give me an update as to what is going on?" I ask, keying the radio.
As I wait for a reply, I continue to scan the surrounding waters, looking in vain for any sign of the chart I had been using.
My search is interrupted by a buzz from the radio, "Commander, I see you managed to deal with those planes all by yourself."
"I can't take any credit for that," I reply shaking my head in disbelief that, the first response Eugen comes back with almost makes it seem as though she is mocking me, "Arizona saved the day. All I could do was delay the inevitable and then dive overboard."
Despite the silence over the radio, I could almost sense the laughter across the distance, "Surely it wasn't as dramatic as that!" Eugen exclaims in mock horror.
"Well, I'm currently standing on Arizona's rigging, the shore boat is now heading to the sea floor, there are two separate fires from where the aircraft hit the waves and I'm soaking wet," I retort, "So, yes. I'd say most people would call that dramatic. So, if I can please get an update as to how you are handling things over there that would be great."
After a moment of silence, the radio buzzes again, "We've forced the enemy to retreat. Well, I say retreat, but it was more like they were there one moment and then gone the next. Bogue has put out the last of the fires and is busy repairing her deck." Eugen reports.
"Glad to hear it," I reply, "And the others?"
Eugen answers, "I don't think I've ever seen Kaga with a smile on her face before."
I exchange a look with Arizona, shrugging my shoulders wordlessly unable to decipher the meaning behind that answer, "What on earth are you talking about?" I ask.
You have to get over here to see this for yourself," Eugen insists.
I look back once more to where Arizona is sitting, idly listening in, "Any chance you can navigate to their position?" I ask.
Arizona nods in response with a smile.
"Okay Eugen," I say into the radio once more, "Give me your co-ordinates and we'll meet you there."
Eugen relays a set of co-ordinates before the radio falls silent once more. Arizona takes a moment before I feel the hull of her rigging begin to move, slowly picking up speed to the point where I need to brace myself against the superstructure.
As the breeze slowly begins to dry off my soaking clothes, I wonder to myself just what has occurred during the girl's engagement with whatever the enemy forces were. I'm even more curious about Eugen's statement about something I need to see for myself that appears to have made Kaga happy.
It takes almost an hour to reach the out skirts of the battlefield. The first evidence are the tell-tale signs of a recently sunken ship as numerous piles of debris are scattered in a tight grouping where they've parted company with whichever ship had slipped below the waves.
We soon come across the smoking remains of a dark formidable cruiser listing heavily to one side, a number of large holes along the waterline indicating either impact from a torpedo or large calibre cannon fire.
As I shade my eyes with a spare hand, a trail of destruction slowly emerges, with a number of oil fires still burning fiercely to mark the spot where aircraft and ships alike either crashed into the ocean or took critical damage.
"It certainly looks like they had their hands full," Arizona comments quietly.
"It sure does," I admit as I observe another large cruiser painted almost jet black with dark red accents wallow in the waves, "I don't know which is more concerning. The evidence of just how vastly outnumbered they were, or finding out how one of the enemy ships was sliced so precisely in three."
Slowly navigating through the battlefield, Arizona finally clears the last of the debris field to enter a wide expanse of ocean with no evidence that a battle had occurred. "It looks as though Eugen was right," I muse aloud, "This certainly looks as though the enemy simply was here one moment and then gone the next."
Continuing to scan the area, as Arizona continues on towards the position Eugen had relayed to us over an hour ago. In the distance, I can barely make out what appears to be smoke, "Do you have anything on radar?" I ask.
"It would seem that there are three contacts just over three miles away," Arizona replies.
"Two of those might be the Prinz Eugen and Bogue," I answer, "As to the third. Maybe they've been able to capture an enemy ship intact."
"That would be good though?" Arizona asks, "The others said you were a researcher."
"It might be good and it might be bad," I reply with a slight shake of my head, "If we can get the ship back to the team at Midway, they'll be able to study it."
After a brief silent moment, where the only sounds to be heard are the low waves hitting the hull of Arizona's rigging, the outline of the three ships slowly start to take shape.
"It would appear as though the left most ship is the Prinz Eugen," I comment aloud, "I can just make out the bridge from this distance. The other two are just out of my line of sight at this range to make out any details."
The last leg of the journey took a little over twenty minutes. During the time I was no closer to learning the identity of the mystery ship as the hull of the Prinz Eugen now blocked my view.
On reaching the Prinz Eugen, I grabbed hold of one of the boarding ladders hanging from the siderail. Climbing a couple of rungs up, I wrap an arm around the ladder before reaching down with my free hand to help Arizona. Who on taking hold of my outstretched hand and placing one foot on the lowest rung, deactivates her rigging which vanishes in a faint purple shimmer.
Rapidly climbing the last few rungs of the ladder, I effortlessly vault over the siderail, before turning once more and help Arizona on board.
"You make that look easy Commander!"
I turn to see Eugen a short distance away casually walking towards us.
"I've spent nearly twenty years out on the water in a boat of some kind," I reply, "Boarding a ship kind of becomes second nature."
Eugen laughs at my reply before answering, "You'll get a bit more practice today then."
"Okay," I say, "Enough with the games. Can you just tell me what's going on over here?"
Eugen turns and begins to walk away, looking back with a hint of a smile, beckoning me to follow her.
Shaking my head in disbelief that despite my request, Eugen seems intent on continuing to try to have fun at my expense. Following her past the Number Two forward battery and passing behind the rear of the Number One battery to the port side of the ship.
Taking a moment to shade my eyes to the glaring sun, I look out across the ocean to find myself looking at a pair of aircraft carriers. I turn to face Eugen to find she is holding a pair of binoculars out for me.
Silently taking them, I raise them to my eyes and adjust the focus, bringing the closest into clear sight. Atop the flight deck I can see both Bogue and Graf Spee at work.
"It looks like they are ripping up part of the flight deck," I comment.
"No surprise there," Eugen says, "She took four direct hits from the enemy cruisers and three from their planes."
I turn back to Eugen wide-eyed at this announcement, "How is she still afloat taking that kind of damage?"
"No idea," Eugen replies, "Some of the enemy ships went down without putting up much of a fight. And after the first cruiser scored a hit on Bogue, it changed the tide of battle completely."
"How so?" I ask.
"Well by that time the last of the enemy air cover that was airborne was finally subdued, which allowed for direct air strikes against their carriers," Eugen explains, "And then Spee sliced one of their cruisers in three."
"She did what?" I ask in disbelief remembering back to the sight of the damaged cruiser.
"Turns out that those claws on her rigging are very effective at slicing through the enemy hulls," Eugen says in response.
"Okay then," I say, still not quite sure how to process this information, "How large was the enemy force?"
"Three carriers, about a dozen or so cruisers and four ships the size of a destroyer," Eugen answers, "Oh and one I couldn't recognize."
"You get a good look at it?" I ask.
"Not really," Eugen replies, "Whatever it was, it was standing on one of their carriers that got away. Although it seemed to be independent from the carrier itself."
"Yeah, about that," I start, "How exactly did they get away? You said it was like they were there one moment and gone the next."
"It's as I said," Eugen replies, "One minute I'm lining up a shot at one of the larger cruisers from their fleet. I take the shot and when the smoke cleared, they were gone. So was the rest of the fleet aside from those we had already sunk and the carrier over there." She finishes pointing towards the second boat floating a short distance astern of the Bogue.
Raising the binoculars once more, I scan across the length of the new ship for several minutes, taking in the details. "Looks almost double the length of Bogue's hull." I comment aloud.
"It certainly provided us with a lot of trouble during the battle," Eugen comments, "Just before the rest of the enemy fleet vanished, the foxes where both lining it up for a multi angle attack with everything they had."
Lowering the binoculars I ask, "So why is it still afloat and seemingly undamaged?"
"Every single bomb and torpedo missed," I hear from behind me.
Turning towards the newcomer's voice, I find Akagi standing in the early afternoon shadows of the bridge.
"How?" I ask simply.
"The ship simply stopped dead in the water," Akagi answers darkly, clearly annoyed, "My dive bombers where less than one thousand feet above the target. I had no time to correct."
"And I'm guessing that the torpedo bombers had already released their payloads prior to this sudden stop?" I ask.
Akagi merely nods her head in reply.
"That certainly explains the lack of damage," I admit, "But not why the ship is still there, when the rest of the enemy fleet retreated. Do we know if it's safe to go over there?"
"It should be okay," Eugen replies, "Anything on board that might have been a threat would have had to deal with Kaga by now."
"Deal with Kaga?" I ask, "Didn't you mention that she was in a good mood?"
"No," Eugen says, "I simply said I'd never seen her smile until today. Although thinking about it now, it was less smile and more dangerous grin. Like she was looking forward to a challenge."
"Right," I finally reply, "I think I know the look you are talking about." I add looking back across at the abandoned carrier, "Given the lack of any signs of activity over there, I reckon its time to go find out exactly what the enemy abandoned when they retreated."
After quick detour to change into some dry clothes and pick up both the satellite and my mobile phone, I arrive back on deck just in time to find that Eugen has navigated the cruiser alongside the abandoned carrier and was busy securing a second mooring rope to tie the two ships together.
"No word from Kaga?" I ask.
"Nothing," Eugen replies with a shake of her head, "And I last saw Akagi when she went in through that hatchway." She finishes pointing to a half-open hatch leading into the forward superstructure near the bow.
"Well given how pissed Akagi was at failing to hit this ship," I begin, "I won't have to worry about potentially being captured by any of the crew if there are any."
Scanning the length of the carrier before me, I spy a suitable boarding location where the height difference to the lower deck is only slightly higher that that on the Prinz Eugen.
"You sure about this?"
I look behind me to find Arizona standing a short distance away.
"No," I reply honestly, "I've got a weird feeling about all of this. Ships that operate without a crew, sentient beings seemingly from another planet attacking without warning and now this."
I look up at the carrier in front of me, taking in the sheer enormity of the forward metalwork that was involved in supporting and bracing the flight deck above the hull. "Something about this feels off," I add, "Its almost as though I've seen this before, but can't put my finger on were."
Mentally shrugging off my concerns, I climb up onto the upper side rail, take a deep breath and leap up towards the carrier's side rail. Managing to just grab the lower rail with one hand. I slam heavily into the side of the ship.
Hanging by one hand for a moment, I painfully twist around and manage to get hold of the rail with my other hand and lift myself aboard.
"Are you okay?" I hear Arizona call up to me.
"I don't think I'll be doing that again in a hurry," I say back, gently rubbing the left side of my chest to make sure I hadn't broken any ribs. Finding nothing major of concern, I mentally note to make sure I have the medical team take some scans when I get back to Midway, "I should be okay," I add, "Hopefully just some bruising."
"Do you want us to come with you?" Eugen asks, joining Arizona.
"No," I reply, "You two stay here. Keep an eye out in case they come back. I've got the radio so you can reach me."
Turning to the open hatch, I walk the short distance from the side, before stepping through the door into the room beyond.
A cursory glance tells me that whatever function this compartment was normally used for, it was not being used at the moment. Aside from a couple of portholes in either side there was only one other door at the opposite end of the room.
Finding it open as well, I continue on. Now finding myself in a long corridor which appears to run the length of the ship, along with a set of stairs leading to a number of upper levels. Taking a moment to plan the best course of action to quickly search the mystery ship, I decide to take the stairs as far up as they'll go, in hope that I'll eventually find my way to the bridge.
After over twenty minutes of searching, I finally locate on the upper most level within the ship another set of stairs which lead up. Taking these, I eventually find myself standing in a space, clearly used for navigation and planning at some point, as a number of charts are pinned to a large table that dominate the room.
On the far side of the table however the room opens up, surrounded with large glass windows giving a one-hundred-and-eighty-degree view of the outside world. Only a couple of chairs bolted to the deck, along with a basic wheel and telegraph occupy the space.
After studying both the wheel and telegraph briefly, noting that both where labelled in Kanji a sudden realisation strikes me. Stepping out onto the wing I, I look first to the stern of the ship and then to the bow.
"It can't be," I say to myself, "I was there when they found the wreck."
Taking the satellite phone from my pocket, I dial a number from memory. The line buzzes for a moment before with a click the other line opens. "Kenji, I hope I didn't get you at a bad time," I say.
'No, I was working on my thesis,' Kenji replies, 'How's life aboard the Intrepid?'
"That's a long story for another time," I answer, "I'm not aboard the Intrepid. But it's good to hear that you're working on your thesis. Hopefully you'll have the answers I need to hand."
'Sounds urgent,' Kenji says.
"Assuming you can help me prove it," I begin, "You might need to rewrite your thesis from scratch."
'Okay then,' Kenji replies slowly, 'What do you need?'
"You mentioned that your great-grandfather worked in the naval yards in the early twenties," I explain, "Any chance he happened to list in one of those books he left your father any of the ships he worked on?"
'Yes,' Kenji confirms, 'You're timing is perfect. I was just going through one of them now. Any ship in particular?'
"The Kaga," I reply, "Anything that could help me identify the ship."
'You do remember that my great-grandfather only worked on the turbines?' Kenji asks, 'Besides, we were both there on the day they confirmed the location of the wreck.'
"I remember," I say, "And trust me. I know this sounds insane, but I have every reason to believe that I'm currently standing on the bridge of the Kaga as we speak."
'Are you sure you haven't caught too much sun out there?' Kenji asks sounding sceptical of my last statement.
"Well, that would explain a lot," I answer with a laugh, "But humour me on this. If I'm wrong, then I'm wrong."
In the background I can hear the rustle of old pages from a book being carefully turned. Knowing not to rush Kenji in handling a near one hundred-year-old book, I finally hear his voice again on the other end of the connection, 'There's not much here,' Kenji begins, 'Looks like the Navy censored quite a lot of the notes from this period.'
Silently admitting to myself that, that made sense given the secrecy that most military services operated under even to this day.
'Okay, got something,' Kenji finally says, 'There is a listing of serial numbers related to the turbines.'
"Did he happen to list the position of each turbine within the ship as well?" I ask.
'He was a perfectionist Nathan,' Kenji laughs, 'Of course he did. I wouldn't be surprised if some of the censored notes don't list the amount teeth in the reduction gears.'
"Brilliant," I answer, "Can you send everything to my email. As I can't guarantee not losing the phone link once I head to the engine room."
'You're really serious about this?' Kenji asks.
"When have you ever known me not to be serious about something," I comment taking my mobile phone out of another pocket, and opening the email to see a dozen photos showing yellowing pages from an old book.
Turning the satellite phone off once more after Kenji had hung up, I begin my descent back into the ship to find the engine room.
