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“All guns! Surface action starboard!” he shouted, just as the side of the enemy ship vanished behind a dense, white cloud of smoke, lit by dozens of flashes of yellow lightning.

Spanky McFarlane was half deafened by the thunderous blows that hammered his ship. Something had gone insanely wrong. A moment before, he’d been standing there, near the throttle station with Miami Tindal and a centrally located damage-control party. He’d been drinking coffee from his favorite remaining mug-the one with the Chevy emblem, the hula girl, and, ironically, the aerial view of Oahu. In the next instant, he got the blurred impression of roundshot punching a hole in the hull beside him, bowling through the party of Lemurians gathered there, along with a spray of splintered steel and rivets. The shot rebounded off the bulkhead, the hull, and finally came to rest somewhere in the bilge. Miami had been talking and now he was just.. . gone. Spanky blinked and wiped his face with his sleeve. For some reason, he couldn’t see very well. That was better. He noticed then that his sleeve was soaked with blood, and all that remained of his sacred cup was the porcelain handle in his hand.

He blinked again and saw the ’Cats at the throttle staring at him, blinking horror. He did a quick inventory of himself and as far as he could tell, he wasn’t injured. Looking down, he realized the same wasn’t the case for three of the four members of the damage-control party. At least two were dead. One might be, and the fourth was sitting on the deck plates, stunned. Miami… Well, he was dead. Spanky shook his head, clearing the fuzz, and realized the turbines were winding down.

“Shit!” He lurched to the speaking tube. They didn’t rely much on electronics in battle anymore. “This is McFarlane in the forward engine room. What’s going on up there?”

“Commaander McFaarlane!” came a relieved cry. It was Minnie. “You come to bridge quick! You needed on the bridge!”

Spanky paused, looking at the air lock to the aft fireroom. “Uh, what’s the story on the boilers? Why’re we losing steam back here?”

“I don’t know!” came the panicked but strangely distant reply.

“Well, put somebody on that does!” he bellowed.

“I can’t!” the girl-he always thought of them as girls now-practically screeched back at him.

“Well… who’s got the conn?”

“I DO! ”

“ Jeez! ” That’s why the voice sounded so distant. “Okay, okay, pull yourself together! I’ll pass the conn off to auxiliary from here, then I’m on my way! Get, uh, Finny! You got Finny on the horn?”

“I got Finny and Tabby in the forward fireroom! Everything fine in there!”

Thank God. “Tell Tabby to bypass the aft fireroom and route steam back to the turbines! Finny needs to take his party topside and get their asses in through the deck access to check on numbers three and four! Warn him to vent the space before they go in. I’m on my way!”

He opened the cover of the tube to the auxiliary conn on the aft deckhouse and was further deafened by the heavy bark of the Japanese

4.7-inch gun. “Bashear!”

“This is Bashear.”

“Listen, you got the conn until further notice. We got the talker steerin’ the ship! What the hell’s goin’ on up there?”

“I don’t know, Spanky. We just got clobbered, and there’s steam and smoke gushin’ everywhere. I can’t see forward of the searchlight tower! It looks to me like one o’ those big bastards suckered Frankie in close and then shotgunned us!” Bashear sounded harried.

“Okay, stay loose. You should have number two back on line directly. Try to get us the hell away from whatever’s poundin’ on us. You still got Campeti on the horn?”

“Yeah.”

“Tell him to pour everything he’s got at the closest target. Use the HE in the Jap gun. Blow the bastards off us if you have to! I’m gonna try an’ get to the pilothouse!”

“Aye, Spanky!”

Spanky glanced at the blood and gore around him, then looked at the throttlemen. Other ’Cats were beginning to arrive from aft. “Listen,” he said to Bashear once more. “We got wounded down here. Call around. See if you can round up a corpsman.”

“I’ll try, but most are ashore with Chack and there’s a lot of wounded up here too.”

“Right.” Spanky directed one of the newcomers to the apparent corpses. “Check them fellas and do what you can for the hurt.” He paused and caught the eye of the steadiest-looking throttleman. “I gotta scram, so you’re in charge for now. Keep these guys cool down here,” he admonished, then launched himself up the ladder to the main deck above. If the aft fireroom was full of steam, he didn’t dare open the air lock and let it in.

On deck, he was greeted by a hellish scene, grown all too familiar. Steam and smoke swirled up from the starboard side, filling the deck.’Cats ran back and forth, some hauling hoses, others just running, screaming, their fur scorched black. The Japanese antiaircraft guns hammered his ears and the number three gun added its smoke to the mix even though its crew couldn’t see and had to be suffering in the choking air. That was Pack Rat’s gun now, and he knew the Lemurian gunner’s mate would never leave it. The Dominion liner lay to starboard, a little aft now, and even through the heavy haze caused by burning wooden ships, he saw it had been riddled with holes. Another comparatively feeble broadside blossomed from its side, punishing Walker further with a few more hits. Spanky felt the shot strikes pound through his shoes like trip-hammer blows, but he also noted several small splashes in the sea alongside. Not all the enemy shot was penetrating, he realized. Maybe not even most. Thank God. If it was, after the blows he’d felt, they’d already be sinking. The ship had slowed almost to a stop, however, and was beginning to wallow in the swells.

He ran into Jeek, directing his division in throwing a curtain of water on the smoke, trying to get it to lay. Reynolds was probably still in the wardroom with Kari. Jeek yelled that he had no idea whether there was fire under all that smoke, but he wasn’t letting it anywhere near the aft deckhouse where the last plane and all the aviation fuel was stored. Spanky repeated what he’d said to Bashear about corpsmen, but Jeek just looked around and shrugged. Spanky raced on, under the amidships gun platform on the port side of the galley, headed for the bridge, but was brought up short by Earl Lanier, calmly sitting on his precious Coke machine and eating a sandwich.

“What the hell are you doing?”

“Guardin’ my machine!” the fat cook snarled. “What’s it look like? All my mess attendants is on report! Bastards didn’t stow my baby below before this fracas, they just hauled ass to their battle stations! I had to drag it around here from the other side by myself!”

“Why aren’t you at your battle station?” Spanky demanded.

“I am! Why ain’t you at yours?”

Shaking his head, Spanky resumed his sprint. At least Earl was doing something. His usual battle station was in the head.

It was awful on the bridge. The new battle shutters covered the windows, so there wasn’t much broken glass, but at least one shot had come through the thin side plating of the starboard bridgewing and plowed up the wooden strakes in its passage. The chart table was shattered and twisted askew, and the handle had been sheared clean off the engine room telegraph. The damage to the bridge wasn’t what caught his eyes at first, however.

Four bodies lay on the shattered strakes. Norm Kutas was alive, but had splinters running up the backs of his legs, all the way to his buttocks. A pair of ’Cat pharmacist’s mates had already arrived and were trying to get him on a stretcher. Ed Palmer, hair scorched and face blackened, seemed okay otherwise, though winded. Two ’Cats were obviously dead, their blood dripping through the strakes from terrible wounds, and the brave Lemurian talker was still at the wheel, holding it in an iron grip even though she no longer controlled the ship. Others began to arrive, grabbing bodies and carrying them away, but none touched Frankie Steele.