"Turn back towards the convoy, we need to find another target," you order the helmsman. The cruiser was dead in the water and the convoy was moving away, so if it was still a threat it would only be for a short time, especially considering the prevailing weather. You had more pressing issues. You leaned forwards to your speaking tube.
"Wireless! Update the convoy--enemy cruiser hit, listing to port. Any reply to our message?"
"We've been acknowledged--
Yodo and her destroyers are on their way." The light cruiser and her destroyers had been standing further away from the convoy to screen it--somehow the enemy and slipped past them.
"Good!"
The deck shifted under your feet as the helmsman turned, water spraying up as the boat crashed through a wave and back toward the convoy. Ishinari kept an eye on the cruiser retreating into the distance behind you, still sending shells scattering down towards your position with increasing inaccuracy, but you weren't particularly worried. The odds of a hit were low, and dwelling on it wouldn't stop it from happening if it did.
"Ensign, port and starboard tubes." You ordered, giving him a task to keep his mind in the game. He nodded and descended the bridge towards the tubes, getting the men together to run out the torpedoes. Hopefully they'd be in place in time: the rear tube was awkward to use and you didn't want to have to rely on it.
Something burst quite near the ship, close enough that you heard something patter off the side of the hull. A shell from the stricken cruiser in a near hit. The Caspian gunners were still incredible. You walked up to the helmsman and quietly ordered him to make some gentle evasive turns for the final stretch. Couldn't hurt.
Finally, the convoy came back into sight as you emerged from a fog bank and into summer sunlight that seemed far too bright after groping through fog and rain. Four ships now, and one of them had a fire in the superstructure, soldiers rushing to and fro on the decks to help put it out. There were still shells coming down into the water nearby, and you watched the prow gun on the Okinami fire at something unseen in the fog. You followed its trajectory as best you could, and sure enough, it revealed an enemy vessel bearing down on the convoy. It was a destroyer of some kind, sleek and fast as it emerged from a squall of rain, forward guns banging away towards the Okinami. The outline of its prow torpedo tubes stood out from the jagged, swirling paint scheme, and you felt a jolt of anxious panic. If it got those to bear on the
Okinami, it was going to the bottom, no question.
"There's our target! Torpedoes?"
"Tubes one and two are ready!" Ishinari shouted back from the deck.
"Get us lined up with that destroyer!" You shouted to the helmsman. Decorum could wait. You glanced back to your former posting as a shell burst against the loading crane on its superstructure, bringing the assembly crashing down to the deck. There wasn't much time. "Range to target?"
"1500 meters, captain!" The rangerfinder replied. You could see the men aiming the torpedoes on the Caspian deck. There was nothing for it. It would be the extreme edge of your effective range, the angle on the target was all wrong, but you had to do something.
"Tubes one and two, fire!"
To the credit of your crew, there was no second guessing. With the usual 'whoosh' of compressed air the torpedoes leapt from their tubes and began racing toward the destroyer. You watched their trails speed through the waves. You focused your binoculars on the oncoming enemy.
"Helm, put us across her bow. I want us between her and the convoy--!" There was a moment of hesitation next to you and then you felt the boat heel over to one side as the wheel was cranked hard over. The range was closing rapidly and you knew, with a chill deep in your heart, that they might well ram you--run you over and crush you into scrap. Forward and on the starboard side, your little guns went into action, firing as fast as they could at the enemy destroyer despite the range. There were puffs of water forward of her and then--then the enemy turned hard away in an effort to avoid your torpedos. That left you just the two for the aft tube. The wireless operator's voice sounded far away and tinny through the tube.
"Captain,
Kamome reports that she has sighted the enemy." One of your fellow torpedo boats.
"Which enemy?"
"They are not clear."
Great. Wonderful. Excellent. Fucking useful. You wondered sometimes how some of your fellow officers even breathed with brains so small, clearly-
"Thank you. Good luck to them." You replied. Now wasn't the time for that sort of thing. The destroyer was twisting away, your torpedoes going wide. You managed to bite back a curse, slamming a hand down on the compass stand next to you. You still had decorum to worry about.
"Get the boys to run the aft torpedos up front. We're only going to get one more shot at this, and I'd rather not do it while running away." You ordered Ishinari, gesturing the action widely. "Double time now! Helm, get us set up for another attack, I want to come in straight on from the side!"
The boat started shifting under your feet again as every available member of the crew rushed back to manhandle the torpedo. There wouldn't be room to pass it by the stacks properly, so instead they were going to have to form a chain and shuttle it along man to man. The gunners on the forward cannon even joined in as the turning boat obscured the destroyer. The men stumbled, having to keep their feet on a spray-slicked deck as the boat heeled hard over into her turn, and for a moment everyone ducked onto the deck as a shell thundered so close overhead your ears popped.
"That was a big one." You muttered to yourself, pulling your binoculars back up. They'd almost hit you with their forward gun, which they ought to have been pointing at the convoy. They were either scared or furious with you.
That was your job here, though, wasn't it? The voice tube whistled again and you bent to listen.
"
Kamome reports: 'I am attacking enemy destroyer. May the Empress reign for ten thousand years.' Her spark is so loud, she has to be right on top of us, ma'am!" You looked up, scanning the sea around you, and then one of the other men on the bridge spoke up.
"There, captain!" You followed his pointing finger and spotted the other torpedo boat crashing through the waves on an approach to attempt an attack on the other side of the destroyer, lean and low in the water. She was a more modern design with a jagged prow like a sawtooth bayonet and a triple set of forward tubes, and you were briefly envious of her.
"Do your best,
Kamome." You said quietly, watching as the guns focused on you started to pivot and face the new threat. It was a heart-breakingly beautiful moment. The little torpedo boat charging forward in the face of overwhelming odds, all banners flying like a mounted warrior. As it closed, the side launcher tubes on the superstructure sprayed white phosphorous around it, haloing it in smoke and dancing lights in an attempt to conceal its course until the final moment. The boat's captain was holding his course, closing in on the destroyer even further than you'd dared. 1000 meters. 800 meters. He had to fire, didn't he?
The destroyer's side erupted in smoke and light and you heard an eerie screaming noise carry across the waves as a barrage of small rockets hurtled out across the waves, matching and overpowering the smokescreen laid by the Kamome. The battle was obscured a minute, the smoke drifting back over the destroyer, and you shared a glance with Ishinari as he stepped back into the bridge, the torpedo nearly loaded in.
"Helm, start us on a course to attack the destroyer's last position. Just in case." You ordered. You held out hope the
Kamome had hit them, but if not, you had to move now, while their guns were facing the wrong way and the smoke in their eyes. You lifted your binoculars again, trying to get a glimpse of the action. You had swung away--you were perhaps 3000 or 4000 meters from the battle now, far enough away that the enemy wasn't worried about you. For now.
The smoke cleared and the
Kamome was in view again, listing heavily and her deck seeming completely ablaze with a bright, intense flame that hurt your eyes to stare at for too long. Munitions were cooking off, including the remaining smokescreen tubes which flashed into the sky like fireworks. Then the forward tubes went in a huge blast of smoke and water, and the rest of the boat vanished in seconds.
Ishinari leaned against the bulkhead of the bridge with a wordless moan. You wanted to lecture him for such demoralizing behavior, but you simply couldn't muster it.
"Ensign, is that torpedo ready?" You needed to focus. Giving him something else to think about would keep him from worrying about such things.
"Y-yes. Yes ma'am." He said.
"Go make sure. We can't afford to miss." You ordered. He nodded, looking pale but motivated now with something to do. You settled down to examine your target one more time.
"Helm, bring us in on an attack course again." This was it. Your last shot. "Stand by, port and aft tubes!"
"All stations report ready for attack," Ishinari reported a few moments later. His voice sounded strained and reedy, but he was reporting. That was the important part. You were still moving at flank speed, so there was no need to make an adjustment there. You lurched forward, skipping across waves as you moved in one the enemy again. 2000 meters. This was where things would get risky again.
At least their main turrets were still coming around. The first of their lighter guns were already firing ranging shots, yellow tracers lazily passing overhead.
"Range, 2000." The man at the rangefinder reported.
"Helm, hold this course."
"Aye, captain."
"1500 meters." It seemed like you had blinked and your target had come closer. You had fired at this distance before and hit nothing. You needed to be more sure.
"Steady." You said. Was that for yourself or your helmsman?
There was a machine-gun on their deck shooting at you. You were far out of effective range for it, it was just spraying rounds uselessly into the air.
"1200 meters."
Something pinged off the railing of the conning tower and whined as it whirred on to splash into the sea. A bullet was still a bullet even if it hits you without purpose. There, you were starting to get into a range where they had a hope of hitting you. A shell rumbled overhead to explode aft in a shower of yellow dye. They were trying to find the range.
"900 meters."
"Steady," you repeated. You weren't going to miss this time.
"700 meters!"
"Tubes one and two, fire!" You dropped your hand in a chopping motion and you heard Ishinari:
"Torpedoes running, ma'am!"
"Helm, hard to port!" The boat heeled over, crashing through a wave as you turned away from the destroyer. A shell exploded where you would have been a moment ago if you had held your course. You turned to look aft at the destroyer, gauged the angle. Ishinari glanced back to you nervously.
"Do you think we might have missed, ma-"
The side of the destroyer burst into smoke and flame, the same eerie screaming noise carrying over the water. This time even more bone-chilling because it was getting louder as whatever the destroyer had fired barreled directly towards your retreating boat, then it merged with the sound of the impacting torpedo, a cacophony of discordant noise that overran your senses. You looked up, following the trajectory of the incoming rockets as they spread wildly across the sea, at least four dozen of them sailing towards you, and your eyes locked with one that was making a perfect arc. It was just a flat, unmoving circle in your vision, growing larger.
Then it clattered off the side of the bridge onto the deck, and you glanced down to see the spent tube lying inert, smoke trailing from the exhaust vent. It sounded like at least one other had hit the boat somewhere aft. You were about to order a man to kick it overboard when your vision went suddenly, painfully blank, like staring at the bulb of a camera flash, and it felt in just a moment like you were in an oven.
"Incendiary!" You called. "Fire!" You pulled yourself away, shielding your eyes with your remaining sleeve, and when your vision blinked back and you were far enough way that most of the heat had dissipated you found the fabric burning, ignited despite you standing at least a meter from the device. Horrified, you attempted to pat it out as it spread up your arm, the heat growing unbearable, before switching to using your hat to pad it out. That resulted in a smoldering, useless piece of headgear that you discarded to the deck, and crisp fabric coming away in strips as you tried to pull it off your skin.
You noticed only now there was screaming on the deck behind you, and the men rushing to put out the fire stopped as petty officer Ono pulled them aside, knocking the buckets of seawater from their hands.
"What's going on? Sailors, put it out!" You ordered.
"Ma'am! Water just makes it flare up!" Ono said, turning to you. "The other one exploded the moment we tried!"
His face was already caked in ash and soot. You glanced back aft, and sure enough there was a blaze burning behind the stacks, far larger than it ought to be.
"What do we do?"
What do you do?
