Meanwhile, at Lunalilo Elementary, Lotte was in homeroom class with a few friends her age, chatting happily amongst themselves about how excited they are for Christmas when she and all the other children heard faint, distant explosions.
"Did any of you hear that sound?" asked Lotte.
"Yeah," replied a young girl. "But what?"
"Maybe just the military doing practice," sniggered a boy.
He and the young girl laughed, but Lotte was still concerned. She knew that military practice didn't involve explosions, did they? Then, Lotte suddenly remembered and pulled out a book from her backpack.
"Oh, I better return this book to the bin," said Lotte. "I'll be quick."
So, Lotte hurried down the hall and down the stairs. On the way, she had to go through the main building to reach the other room where the library is. But before she could go through the lobby, there was a loud crash coming from the lobby's roof. And the next thing she knew...
KABOOM!
A big explosion blew her violently back in the shockwave, letting out a scream, with some flying debris.
Nobody knew that some zeroes and bombers were flying over the civilian areas such as streets and buildings near the harbor towards the school, firing shots and dropping bombs as they went, despite having been told not to shoot civilian areas as they just couldn't help themselves. One of the bombs fell towards the school, crashing through the roof of the main building out of all the other school's neighboring buildings and exploding when it hit the ground. Luckly, that building had no classrooms inside.
The explosion made the other buildings tremble from the slight shockwave, making them scared. This triggered the school's fire alarm. The teacher quickly acted fast.
"Okay, everyone," she told the children. "Everyone, line up in an orderly fashion. Single file."
So, they did. But however, they were all about to be in much bigger danger as the explosion brought a small piece of debris, caught on fire from the explosion, landing on a roof of a school building beside the main building. In seconds, that building was going to catch fire and be engulfed.
Hickam Field was taking a barrage by zeroes, destroying 27 of their planes while most of them on the ground were trying to fend them off with whatever weapons they had; pistols, rifles, 50 calibers, etc. Some of the men were already downed and hurt, fatally or critically.
Annie rushed towards through the Hickam Hospital building to the entrance where she found Izetta and a few other nurses running towards the hospital while some zeroes flew over, shooting near it, causing Izetta and the other nurses to jump behind something solid for cover. Once the planes passed, they ran inside, where they met Annie.
"Good, you're all just in time," said Annie urgently. "There's going to be a lot of hurt people, so get all the equipment you can get right away!" she shouted as the sound of a bomb explosion sounded near the airfield.
They all did as they were told as they quickly got into their coats and hats before fetching all the tools and bringing them to the wards for work. As Izetta got some supplies, she glanced out the window to see men fighting outside with rifles, 50 calibers, any weapon they could find to shoot at the enemy planes above them window and saw a few bombs falling onto the field and the hangers, destroying many planes inside in the process.
They were just in time as some injured men started to enter, burnt and wounded. Izetta brought over the first patient to the ward and her stationed bed, laying him on it and started work at stitching his wounds.
"BOMB INCOMING!"
Hearing that alarm coming from the doorway, Izetta and other nurses in their wards quickly threw their patients towards the wall away from the windows before putting a mattress over them and their patients, mere seconds before the bomb landed near the building.
KABOOM!
The explosion's shockwave shattered the glass on the windows, blowing shards and dust inside, cutting several things inside, but luckily not the nurses or the patients, who were in just pain by their heavy shoving but all spared due to the mattresses shielding them.
Afterward, Izetta was the first to emerge in the dust cloud, coughing and covered in a bit of dust and soot before noticing the mess in the ward.
"Are you okay?" Izetta asked her patient.
"Other than being in pain from my injuries in that shoving, I'm fine!" cried out her patient.
Izetta quickly put the mattress back on the bed before putting her patient back on the bed so she could get back to work. With how things were going outside, things were looking grim.
At the Kaneohe Bay Air Station, the whole base was being attacked as the many planes started getting destroyed by the Kate bombers dropping on them, including the military sea planes.
The chief officer quickly arrived in his car to observe the chaos. The sight as horrific! He could already see some men were trying to fight by using their machine guns mounted on their remaining PBY planes. He couldn't just stand there and do nothing, so he rushed towards one of the planes where a fellow colleague was having trouble aiming at the Japanese planes.
"Alex, let me take that gun!" he said, pushing him aside before taking the gun himself.
"Oh, uh... yes, Chief William, sir,"
The chief found a tripod to attach the machine gun on, making a 50 caliber and stationing it outside at the right place to fire. He shot rapidly at the passing planes in the air until he saw one zero coming towards him, already starting to fire. But the chief had quick thinking and shot it upwards at the plane until it fatally shot the propeller, causing it to glide over him and crash onto the ground behind. The men cheered; it was the first enemy plane shot down all day.
At the harbor, planes were flying towards the USS West Virginia, shooting their torpedoes at the ship and hitting their marks on her with several explosions across the length.
The shaking had just stopped when the captain rushed into the bridge.
"How are we holding up?"
"We're taking a lot of damage, sir!" cried one of the men.
"Where's damage control?" asked the captain.
"Lieutenant Ricketts is already on it now, sir," replied another one of the men.
The captain rushed towards the windows and looked through his binoculars, finding the Arizona sinking really fast.
"Jesus Chist!" he muttered in horror.
Men were still jumping from the Arizona while the injured were being evacuated by the Solace's men helping them onto their boat. However, some of the men jumping off saw the Solace's boat as a lifeboat and tried to get on, only to be pushed back, reminding them it was for wounded only.
Once they got all the men they could get, they drove the boat away back to the Solace, just in time as the main deck began to submerge under the surface.
Deep inside the sinking Arizona, Jonas and some men quickly searched the dark corridors with flashlights and reached a hatchway to the next compartment to lead them topside. It can only be opened by pushing it out. But they couldn't get the door open. Worse still, the water had risen quickly above their waists and still rising.
"I can't get it open!" cried Jonas. "There's too much water on the other side!"
"Try harder!" cried another.
"I... I... caaaaann't!" strained Jonas before growing desperate and banging hard on the door. "Hey! Anybody! Somebody get us out!"
Very soon, all the men were becoming desperate and started to panic as they all rushed to the door, pushing Jonas aside as they started banging hard on it, whether to call for help or to forcefully break the door open. None of which would work.
Seeing he was all alone, Jonas immediately remembered something and started to swim back the way he came, all the way towards the bunk areas.
It was barely lit by a flickering light bulb, about to go out in seconds with the water still rising all around him, leaving only his head above the surface. The water was one foot away from reaching the ceiling, soon to be completely filled to the brim in a minute. He looked around the quarters until he finally found the photo of his family. He swam over and grabbed it.
"I'm sorry," he whispered sadly, looking at his family on the picture, pressing it to his chin as the light finally burnt out one last time. "I'm so sorry!"
At that moment, the Arizona's keel touched the seabed and the ship settled with only its superstructure popping above the surface.
Nearby, a man was swimming towards USS Vestal, which was damaged by the attack after being blown over by Arizona's explosion shockwave. He managed to reach the rope ladder and climb back onto the deck. After that, he looked at the state of Battleship Row and the rest of the harbor, catching a glimpse at the Nevada's escape. As so, he felt something grab his pants and looked down to see an injured officer laying on the deck and he knelt down, holding him in his arms.
"C... Commander Young," he wheezed. "Y... you're in charge now. We... did all we could. I want you to... tell everyone... to abandon ship! Please... save them!"
Those were his last words before his exhaled and his body went limp. He was gone! Young looked up to see all the remaining shipmates approaching him around on the deck, waiting to hear his words. He looked at the planes all around, still attacking. He knew he should tell them to abandon ship. But to him, that felt like quitting. And he was no quitter!
"Lads, we're getting this ship underway," he told them before turning to some of his men. "Engineer, tell the Black Gang down below to get this ship up to steam!"
Suddenly, Young saw fire from the Arizona's oil spreading towards the Vestal, catching fire herself on the aft and middle.
"Damage control, get hoses to put those fires out," Young continued to the men on damage control before turning to some other men. "Deck men, cut all the lines! Go quick!"
Near the entrance of the harbor, the HA. 19 was sitting on standby as the two men watched the chaos unfold.
"Looks like we didn't make it there first after all," Inagaki pouted.
"Who cares?" shrugged Sakamaki. "We achieved success in the surprise attack. Just look, their ships are already starting to go down. If we're lucky, we just might strike one of them with our two torpedoes."
That said, they began to move the sub further towards the entrance when suddenly, Sakamaki heard the sonar pinging and looked to find something that made his eyes go wide.
"We got a ship coming our way!" he called. "Dive! Quick!"
Inagaki quickly switched the diving controls and their mini sub dove under. They dove until they gently touched the bottom, which was deep enough for a ship to pass over them.
"Easy!" groaned Sakamaki, feeling a jolt. "You already ran us aground twice you know!"
"It's not my fault our compass is faulty!" grumbled Inagaki. "I told you we should've had it checked over days before this!"
Regardless, they waited and waited, but they didn't hear the noise of a ship coming over them. A minute had already passed.
"Maybe it never saw us," said Inagaki.
"There's only one way to find out," said Sakamaki. "Surface carefully."
Nearby, a Bagley-class destroyer, the USS Helm was scanning through the entrance, already sustaining damage from a few attacking planes on their way out of the harbor with some of their men strafed down on the deck. One of the ships firing guns shot down one of the enemy planes, which crashed into the sea.
"I never would've guessed the Japs would be sore at us," grumbled the captain, standing on the bridge. "All those talks of peace were just a ruse so we'd never see this coming!"
He looked through his binoculars, looking around the water.
"Those lookouts better not be screwing with me. I don't see a sub," he said. "It's not like submarines can enter the harbor underwater anyway."
That's when he saw the midget sub slowly break the surface.
"There it is!" shouted the captain before turning to his leutenant. "Tell them to fire at 10 degrees port!"
They turned the ships guns to the very sub while, at the same time, the two man crew noticed them dead center.
"Dive back under! Dive back under!" shouted Sakamaki.
Inagaki just started to dive the sub again when... BOOM! Their shells mearly struck the top bridge, not destroying it but rather damaging it, causing the sub to shake violently before feeling a minor spray of water.
"Find something to stop that leak!" exclaimed Sakamaki desperately. "And lets try to get out of here while we can!"
Inagaki tried hard to get the controls to function due to the damage they were taking. All the sub could do at this point was limp its way out.
On the USS Tennessee, the men were doing their best to fight back against the enemy planes in the sky, managing to take out a few so far. They had also hoped that they would sail away from the onslaught, but because of the other ships surrounding her, not to mention the burning oil that was leaking from the West Virginia and burning, the ship was boxed in, and they were trapped. Some of her was covered in oil from Arizona's explosion and at risk of catching fire herself.
Suddenly, a bomb each fell from two planes towards her, one on one of the turret guns, somehow a dud, and the other on another turret, exploding upon impact and blowing several men near it away and damaging its guns. On the bridge, the captain began to see the fire getting closer towards the vessel.
"Sir, our magazines are flooded!" panted the first officer.
"We gotta keep all these fires away from her or we're doomed!" he exclaimed. "I want damage control to keep them back!"
At the Solace, the lifeboat returned with some wounded men and men on the deck pulled on the ropes to raise the boat back up in place so the nurses could bring them to their wards.
"Let's go!" called Benjamin to the nurses. "Bring them to their wards! Let's go! We need to help as many as we can!"
Bianca picked up a sailor, covered in severe burn marks on his body from the Arizona's fire and carried him to her ward.
"Hang on, sir!" said Bianca sharply. "I'm not going to let you die, you hear me?!"
She carried him to her stationed ward and started to treat his burns. With little luck and a few ice packs to keep them cool despite the stinging, Bianca managed to wrap all over his burns. The sailor screamed in pain, possibly so loud her ears hurt. She could hear the sounds of gunfire and explosions outside. But she couldn't think about that right now and could only focus on wrapping her patient.
"I know this hurts, but I promise this will help you," Bianca reassured.
While so, she could also hear the crying of a nurse who had failed to save the sailor in her own ward, who had passed away due to his severe injuries. Bianca could already tell this was going to be a tough job. Never in her life had she expected a crisis such as this to happen.
On the West Virginia, the men on the deck were fighting for their lives as they tried to shoot the planes as best as they could. Miller soon came up on deck on the starboard side to see all the chaos. He noticed some of the men cowardly backing away while their leader told them to get up and fight. When he saw planes coming in, shooting at them, he got behind cover.
There was worse to come. Seven torpedo planes flew in from the port side, dropping their torpedo towards the ship, but not all in unison. One missed, but one hit the stern and another hit the belt armor while three more hit underneith it, making two big holes in the ship as water began to cascade in through both of them.
Miller held tightly to the deck as he felt the ship shudder and as the vessel began to lean over, very very slowly. At that moment, the remaining torpedo zipped through one of the holes and detonated on the slightly listed second armor deck, causing major damage and some men on the ship's machine guns to go flying overboard.
In a flooding area of the ship, Lieutenant Ricketts was standing in knee-deep water with a few men work, holding onto something solid as the ship continued to lean.
"Get everything that's heavy to the starboard side!" called Ricketts as he climbed the ladder. "Use any means necessary to even us!"
Quickly, the men got every weight piece of supplies to the starboard side, whether it's down below or up on all the decks.
On the deck, Miller noticed the fire control officer extinguishing the fire on the deck. Then he looked over to find some men carrying a wounded Captain Bennion down some stairs.
"Captain! What happened?!" cried Miller as he approached the men.
"Shrapnel from the Tennessee got him!" said a crew member. "Now stay back!"
"Wait!" exhaled Bennion, motioning Miller over before speaking to him. "Listen, Miller. I want you to go around the deck, and if you see any... empty gun on the ship, I want you... to use it! The time... is now!"
Miller gasped. He never expected something like this to happen already. He hadn't had the training for it.
"But sir, I-"
"That's an order!" breathed Bennion weakly. "Please!"
Knowing he couldn't argue, seeing that the captain might not make it, Miller looked around one last time and nodded before the men carried him away. Then Miller rushed around the deck and found one empty one, seeing it's gunman already shot dead. He immediately took the gun, armed it, and aimed at oncoming zeros flying towards them before firing, letting out a loud battle cry. And, as if by miracle, some of the shots hit one of the planes on the wing, tearing it off before it spun out of control, crashing onto one of the ship's cranes. Miller cheered at his victory before going on to shooting more planes.
At the Tripler Hospital, Finé had arrived just in time to see all the other nurses come. They all could see the wounded men, covered in oil approaching.
"Thank goodness you're all here!" said Gertrude urgently. "Please, get every ward ready and take them to their wards for treatment. The emergency room's going to be very busy today."
With that, Finé and the other nurses got the wards ready. As she got some supplies, another nurse was expressing her some guilt.
"Oh, why did I wave back to that pilot in that zero when he waved to me while flying by?" she said tearfully.
"Never mind that," said Finé sternly. "We've got more important issues to worry about now. Go! Go! Go!"
They brought the supplies ready just in time as the first patient came in all wounded and dirty. Finé grabbed the next one, all covered in oil and blood, brought him to the empty bed, and started treating him right away. She tried stitching his wounds and wrapping bandages around it tight. Then she found an open wound in the artery, bleeding fast. Finé had to think fast, no bandage was going to stop it, so she plugged some fingers into it to stop it, it worked only by little.
"I need the doctor!" cried Finé loudly.
Finé called out for him a few more times while the whole ward got completely filled until the doctor finally came and saw what she was dealing with.
"Okay, I need some string, a hemostat, alcohol, and towels." said the doctor. "Go! Quick! I'll hold onto this for you!"
So, Finé let the doctor hold his artery while she went to get those tools. It was hard to get to because of other nurses rushing in to get some from the same cabinet, but she soon managed to dig through and get some before bringing them back. Then she went back to holding onto his artery while the doctor worked on stitching him as quickly as he could.
"I... I don't wanna die!" the patient whimpered.
"Hey, listen. You are not going to die!" said Finé strongly before hearing him scream from the pain. "Shh! Shhh! Just talk normally, okay? Now tell me what ship you're from."
"It's... the... Arizona!" whispered the patient. "Some of us got out... last saw Jonas down below... don't know if he got out!"
"Don't worry, we'll find out later," comforted Finé. "We just have to keep praying."
As Finé worked, she began to hope Izetta's time at Hickam wasn't so bad.
From Hickam Field Hospital, Annie watched as the nurses treated their men before she looked out the front door.
From the distance, Annie could see dozens and dozens of sailors, all covered in oil, either running or limping down the road towards the hospital like mad zombies. It was such a horrific sight. She knew they weren't their field, and their hospital didn't do this heavy medical work, but she couldn't just sit and do nothing while they were suffering.
Annie called the nurses out and Izetta, and all the other nurses rushed out to see them and help them in.
"Nurses, find any empty ward you can find and take each patient inside!" called Annie. "And lay them comfortably on their beds!"
"But this hospital can't hold all of them!" exclaimed Izetta, looking at the huge mob.
"I don't care! Just DO IT!" Annie yelled. "Empty out some rooms for makeshift wards if you have to!"
And they did just that before they started to treat their wounds. Some of them looked small, but some of them looked serious. They didn't feel quite sure they could heal them all.
Izetta brought an oil-covered sailor into one of the beds and started to check his injuries. But just seeing him in such a burnt and bloody state almost made her vomit, as it reminded her about some of her own people looking like that back at the camp and how she could've looked like one of those as well. But just because she couldn't save her people in the camp that time didn't mean she couldn't help these people now. They needed help, and she was willing to do whatever it took. So, she swallowed and started to stay focused on her current patient as fast as she could.
"Please... help!" wheezed the patient. "I don't... I don't wanna die!"
"Sir, listen to me," said Izetta firmly. "You're not going to die, okay? I'm going to do everything in my power to patch you up!"
She could only hope that she could, seeing so much blood and injuries made it all difficult to tell as she started stitching his wounds as best as possible. As she worked, Izetta could see she wasn't the only nurse at work as she saw several other patients being carried into their beds by other nurses. She could only hope it will be enough.
"Finé, I could really use your help right now!" Izetta thought to herself.
At the drydock, it was all mayhem as the men on the Pennysylvania, Cassin, and Downes were already on deck and firing at the planes with their guns. But it wasn't just them, some on the drydock had guns as well and were doing everything they could to shoot the enemy planes down. Some of the dock was damaged by torpedoes but not penetrated.
George Walters was ducking for cover from the on slaughter. But when he looked over and saw Zeros strafing some men on the Pennysylvania's deck, he decided he will watch no longer and do something about it. He looked around and saw the big crane. Having an idea, George rushed over to the crane and climbed up the ladder until he locked himself in the cabin. He saw a flew planes coming and, using the controls, he raised the arm up and turned the cabin, turning the arm with it.
The surviving men on the Pennysylvania's deck watched as the crane swung around at the plane. And the zero, too late to fly around it, ran into the tip of the arm, demolishing the plane upon impact. The men on the deck cheered and so did George.
"Yeah! Eat metal you motherfucker!" cheered George, flipping the bird at the destroyed plane.
Suddenly, a few bombers began flying over it, dropping a bomb from each towards the three ships. One hit Downes, and two more hurtled down towards the Pennysylvania. George swerved the crane around and was able to knock one bomb away from the vessel, exploding at the edge of the dock to prevent further damage as the other ran through the ships deck, exploding in castmate 9.
On the West Virginia, the ship tried to hold on. But it was now being touched by Arizona's burning, flaming oil and was starting to catch fire. The men started fighting the fire with whatever water and extinguishers they had. But at last, the vessel could stand no longer and began to sink faster, upright thankfully.
Some men jumped and some evacuated by the Solace's boats, but other men decided to stay in the fight, including Doris, for he knew the whole ship couldn't go fully under due to how shallow the waters were. Plus, this battle wasn't over until it was over. He had to hold on as the keel gently touched the seabed, leaving only the deck and the superstructure on top of it above the surface. But now, their only obstacle on the ship was fighting the spreading fire.
On the USS Nevada, the men did the best they could to protect their ship and themselves from the enemy planes in the sky as they managed to shoot some down, even after getting torpedoed only once at the port torpedo bulkhead, which only held little as it made leaks down below, which was countered by counter flooding from damage control to avoid the ship capsizing. All the while, the man in charge of the ship, Ensign Joe Taussig, returned to the bridge, limping inside after having a leg injured in the attack.
"How are we doing?" asked Joe.
"We're managing," replied one of the crew members. "We shot down four planes and damage control is counter flooding on the starboard side to keep us from rolling over."
"I sure hope we're still afloat when this is done," said another.
Joe looked outside through the window and watched all the horror. The Oklahoma and Utah rolled over, the Arizona and West Virginia had gone down. He had had enough.
"Okay men, unmoor her!" said the Taussig. "It's time we all get the hell out of here!"
Hearing this announcement, the men looked towards the quay of Ford Island they were moored to, but he couldn't see any men down below to unmoor them so they could cast off. They didn't know what to do about it. However, surprisingly, one man started to speak up.
"Listen everyone, we gotta get those lines undone. If we don't, we're as good as dead."
"But Chief Hill, how the hell can we if we don't have men down there to unmoor us?" asked one of the men.
"If no men on land are coming to unhook us, then we'll have to do it ourselves!" said Hill bravely. "Here's the plan. Some of us jump overboard so we can swim to the quay and undo the lines. Once that's done, we'll swim back here while the rest of us onboard shall bring down the net ladders so we can climb back onboard! Lets go!"
There was no time to argue, so he and some men following him jumped overboard while the remaining stayed on, hoping they would pop out alive.
Luckly, they did and swam towards the quay and climbed up the metal ladder one by one. At the top, they ran towards the cleats, where they undid the ropes, releasing the ship. Then, they jumped back in the water and swam towards the ship, where the men onboard released the rope ladders so the men could climb back on the deck. As they climbed, the ship's engines steamed up down in the forward dynamo room, where a man, Donald Ross was supervising.
"Hurry, get that engine moving and fast!" he ordered. "We can't afford to waste anymore time!"
The men worked their hardest to get the dynamo engine running. By the time the engines were fully functional, all the men who unmoored the ship were back onboard and the ship started moving her backwards before moving forwards, turning her gently to avoid the other sunken ships that were in front of them. With no ships beside them, it was alright for them to move, but they had to move carefully in order to keep their ship afloat.
On the Vestal, the Black Gang had finally gotten the ship's boilers steaming strong. The men on deck cut the ropes and, under the command of Young, the repair ship started to move itself away from the Arizona and the fire. The ship was still on fire, but men were still fighting hard to fight the fire, which somehow continued to grow slowly but surely.
Far away, on the Akagi, Yamamoto and Genda were waiting on the bridge for news. They knew that the attack had already started by now and were sure that the harbor was in chaos. There was no way they could go wrong. America was fighting a losing battle, and they knew it. Then the radio operator entered the bridge.
"Just got word from the leader pilot," he said. "We have achieved surprise!"
"Excellent," smirked Yamamoto. "Time for the second wave! When we're done, America will never stand in our way! It's the fall of a nation!"
So, they called the second wave pilots to the deck of each carrier, where they got into their planes and were signaled to the sky, on their way towards Pearl. Yamamoto watched them leave in satisfaction. Their plan was working.
"If they thought the appetizer was bad," he thought. "Just wait until they get the main course! And that comes right before... desert!"