Satisfied that there were no other ships on the surface, Tanaka studied the supertanker.
“Sonar shows the torpedoes pinging on their target, sir.”
Tanaka saw the supertanker explode before sonar heard it. The white mushroom cloud blossomed into an orange-and-black flame cloud as the oil hold detonated.
Tanaka could feel the blast shaking the ship as the shock wave traveled through the water.
Then the second torpedo hit.
“Mr. First, you should see this,” Tanaka said, not wanting to watch anymore.
Mazdai looked out the periscope, watching the supertanker on fire. The Second Captain displays showed the view out of the periscope, the flames rising miles into the sky, the supertanker sinking, breaking in half, the bow vanishing from view, the aft section going down by the forward section, the superstructure, when it was visible, tilting upward as the ship drove into the sea. More of the hull vanished underwater, until all that was visible was a part of the superstructure and the stern, the huge screw and rudder pointing to the sky, the structure lit by the light of the fires from the oil. Soon that was gone too, the ship sinking and taking with it most of the flames, the remaining oil slick still naming but at a fraction of the brightness of the supertanker.
It had taken ten minutes for the supertanker to explode and disappear.
“It’s over for us,” Mazdai said as the ship went deep again, the order given to avoid fouling the periscope optics on the oil slick. “They sank a supertanker—”
“Don’t panic, Mr. First,” Tanaka said, his voice flat. “There are still the Russian airlifts to resupply us. It may not be enough to keep us prosperous, but with the airlifts Japan will survive.”
The first missile hit the Firestar fighter escorting the Russian Ilyushin transport on final approach to Narita International Airport. The transport was the first of the planes to be flown from Russian Republic airfields in support of the Japanese. The pilot of the transport. Col. Ushi Valenka, saw the runway ahead by only a halfmile, the lights of it guiding him down. He saw the missile from the Americans hit the Firestar escort. The moron flying that fighter had taken Valenka’s missile.
Valenka looked over at the port wing, where the second Firestar fighter was escorting the flight into Narita Airport.
As he watched, a flame trail slammed into the Firestar, which exploded in a spectacular fireball a single wingspan away, pieces of the Firestar falling into the fields below.
Valenka concentrated on the runway ahead. He was almost there. If he could get the airplane on the ground, could he fly out, or would the Americans try to blow up the airplane when it was empty and leaving Japan? The lights of the runway threshold came toward him. He throttled up, his altitude too low, trying to keep his mind on the landing gear that would soon hit the runway, trying to keep the airplane in the center of the concrete strip.
The missile hit the Ilyushin below the tail, blowing it off. The airplane dived for the deck, the runway coming up swiftly and smashing into the windshield. The cockpit blew apart, and Valenka’s brief luck gave out as well.
The fuel in the wings exploded in a fireball that rained down on the runway, the missile explosion still spending itself. Nothing was left of the Iluyshin or of Valenka but smoking metal parts lying in flames on the runway.
“So may I assume we are in agreement?” Prime Minister Hosaka Kurita asked.
Adm. Akagi Tanaka sadly realized he had no real argument to offer Kurita. History and destiny had once again led Japan to this threshold of war. Tragic, but how could he suggest they not fight? The die had been cast.
All he could do was fight honorably and pray that his son, Toshumi, survived.
Tanaka had kept the American submarine under surveillance since the sinking of the supertanker. He had been called to mast-broach depth by an emergency transmission on the extremely low-frequency radio, the set able to receive radio signals even though the antenna was deep, the radio waves generated by a powerful set of huge antennae on Japan’s northern coastline. The ELF radio waves, since they were such low frequency, took a long time to send a signal, one alphanumeric symbol taking three minutes to be received. The two-number signal was received into the Second Captain, which called Tanaka in his stateroom.
Tanaka walked into the control room and ordered Mazdai to bring the ship to mast-broach depth. He waited until the ship’s UHF antenna in the periscope received the emergency transmission from the director of the JDA.
Unrestricted warfare against the Americans. Tanaka would start with the sub that sank the supertanker.
“Battlestations, Mr. First.”
“Secure battlestations, XO. Station normal underway watches. I want a section-tracking team stationed in control at all times, though, for the rest of the time we’re in the Oparea.”
“Aye, sir.”
Keebes returned to his stateroom, shut the door behind him and dropped the portable sink behind the door.
He ran water in the basin and splashed it on his face.
He thought he would throw up.
How many men had he just killed? The images of the sinking supertanker would not fade. He shut his eyes for a moment, never aware that if he had opened them, if he had been able to see through the bulkhead of his stateroom, through the hull of the ship and through seven miles of ocean, he would be staring at an incoming Nagasaki torpedo bearing down on him.
“Nagasaki in tube one is away. Captain. Lining up to fire unit two.”
“Wait one, Mr. First,” Tanaka said. “Let’s see what the American does.”
The control room crew sat in their control chairs watching the Second Captain displays, waiting for the indication that the torpedo was detecting its target.
“Detect and homing on the target, sir.”
“Very well, Mr. First.” Tanaka scowled. The force should have been ordered to attack days before, not now that the aircraft-carrier force was within spitting distance of the Home Islands. As soon as the American submarine was put on the bottom, he would run at maximum speed to intercept the aircraft carrier. He wanted that carrier.
“Any detection of our weapon by the target?”
“Not yet. Captain,” Mazdai said. “He hasn’t changed speed or course.”
“Very good.”
The crew waited, the second Nagasaki ready for employment.
Keebes yawned, drying off his face. It was only a little after 1900 local time but he was tired. He considered going to the wardroom to screen a movie with the off watch officers but decided to hit the rack.
He was half-asleep when the circuit-one blasted over his head.
“TORPEDO IN THE WATER; TORPEDO IN THE WATER! MAN BATTLESTATIONS!”
Keebes ran to control.
“Sir, incoming torpedo bearing north, I’ve got it in the edge of the starboard baffles, running at flank speed.”
“Set up to counterfire down the bearing line, Mr. Becker,” Keebes said, staring hard at Becker, seeing his panic right below the surface. “Come on, line-of-sight mode on Pos Two, bearing north, set the range at five miles. That’s it.”
Keebes stepped up on the periscope platform. “Attention in control, snapshot tube three, assumed target bearing north. Ready, Mr. Becker?”
Jensen arrived in control barefoot and in boxer shorts, putting on his wire-rimmed glasses, his contact lenses obviously out for the night.