Iron Gray Sea: Destroyermen (16 page)

Kurokawa stared away. It was genius, of course, and he’d never even considered it. He must immediately supply his fleet with similar flags. He doubted Esshk or even the Celestial Mother would care. All the inclusive Grik banners of the Celestial House that represented all the Grik were simply red. Sometimes the shapes varied, but it was the color that mattered. Even if anyone noticed, or possibly objected, he would merely excuse it as a design meant to signify that they were all in this together. It
was
red, after all. In the meantime, the Imperial flag—his flag—would increasingly be associated with unity and authority. He suppressed a smile and looked impatiently back at Muriname.

“You may continue the practice, but you will seek my permission for such things in the future. So. What ‘unforeseen characteristics’ did you neglect?”

“Of course, sir. Ah, most egregiously, though I cautioned them to compensate for the release of their bombs, even I did not expect just how radically and catastrophically the airships would lunge skyward when the full weight was dropped. Some particularly bright, quick-thinking crews managed to stabilize their craft through procedures that have become part of the training curriculum, but quite a few were lost due to that . . . miscalculation on my part.”

Kurokawa stared at the almost-cringing man who’d demonstrated such brilliant initiative, then not only admitted a failure, but took responsibility for it! His initiative required greater control, and he would have to be punished for his mistake, of course, but not too severely—this time. Kurokawa needed men who could think and learn from their mistakes. He’d talked the Grik out of destroying all their own warriors who turned prey, after all. Even if only a few recovered, it was wasteful of those few. He would have to guard against men like Muriname thinking
too
much, however. He sensed danger down that path.

“This is a serious matter, and I will deal with you later. But the problem is solved?”

“It is.”

“And production?”

“Still improving. The techniques have reached a perfection of simplicity similar to what you have seen in the conventional shipyards, and since the labor is not as intense, the attrition of trained workers is lower.”

“Excellent. How soon will you replace what we lost?”

“In merely a month and a half, we have already replaced over a third. As efficiency continues to improve, I expect to be back where we started, with one hundred airships and even better-trained crews, within another month.”

“Hmm. And how will they protect themselves from enemy aircraft?”

“For now, imperfectly. As you directed, all efforts toward modern small arms go toward equipping our own people here.” He quickly glanced at another man named Riku, with a brooding mouth and wispy mustache, who was head of Ordnance for the Grik, but covertly served in that same capacity for Kurokawa. “But I understand the production of the matchlocks is quite simple and proceeding at a rapid pace. We will arm the airships with them, as well as with light swivel cannon that can fire blasts of lead balls. It is . . . dangerous, of course—with only hydrogen for a lifting gas—but the best we can do at present.”

“Very well. They will have some protection, then. I do not wish to give those creatures any technology beyond what we already have. You must make do.” He paused. “And what of the ‘new’ bombs?”

Muriname grimaced in spite of himself. “I presume Commander Riku has prepared a presentation on the more . . . specialized weapons we are making here, but as far as the new bombs we have made available to the Grik, training in their use is the most difficult challenge. The design and construction is fairly simple; resources are abundant. They are also light enough that they do not tax the payload of the airships. They
are
tragically wasteful,” he interjected with an almost bitter tone that Kurokawa let pass. “But they work well enough. I . . . have tested one myself.”

Kurokawa raised his eyebrows. “Indeed? Very well. You will stand ready to deploy your forces with whatever ordnance we have made available to the Grik at the appropriate time.”

“Yes, General of the Sea.”

Kurokawa looked at another man, bigger than Muriname. “Speaking of technology we will
not
share with the Grik, have there been any . . . further developments in your department, Signal Lieutenant Fukui?”

“No, ah, General of the Sea. Not since those few”—he looked around—“odd transmissions.”

One of the things they’d never revealed to the Grik was the existence of radio or any kind of remote communication. The Grik used horns operated by a bellows, and sometimes a crude form of semaphore. Kurokawa was content to let them remain ignorant. Fukui’s department had the still-operable radio from the grounded plane, and they’d produced other crude sets like they knew the Americans had done, but they could no longer eavesdrop on enemy communications because they knew they’d been burned once and always used codegroups now. Those in Fukui’s department led profoundly boring lives, sequestered from any possible contact with the Grik, and constantly listening for stray, unguarded transmissions from the Allies—or anyone else who might be out there. They never transmitted anything themselves.

Then, a couple of weeks before, they’d picked up—on the radio—a very weak voice transmission! Shortly after, there was another transmission from what sounded like a different source. The problem was, neither message sounded like English, but they didn’t think it was Japanese either. They just couldn’t tell. They considered the possibility it might have been Lemurians speaking, but whatever language the voices used, they sounded like human tones. It was a mystery.

“Hmm,” Kurokawa said thoughtfully, drumming the table with his fingers. “Keep listening,” he commanded.

Almost as an afterthought, he cocked his head and regarded Fukui. “I wonder if it might have been Miyata. Perhaps he reached the southern hunters at last, and they had some means of communication?”

Young Lieutenant Toryu Miyata had been on an expedition south to the cape of Africa, to contact some obscure, probably human “hunters” the Grik knew resided there. The Grik considered the region too cold and uninviting to conquer, especially while locked in an unprecedented battle for survival. General Esshk had sent Miyata and two other men, along with a Grik escort to make the Offer to the southerners to join the Great Hunt. This had never been done before, making the Offer without first testing the foe, but these were extraordinary times. The choice Miyata was to convey was basically “Join or die,” and Esshk told Miyata to stress that regardless how busy the Grik might be elsewhere, they could easily spare the meager force it would require to crush the people in the south.

Kurokawa had not been pleased by Esshk’s summary order, not that he cared anything for Miyata and the others, but at the time, he was in no position to refuse.
Yet another slight that Esshk will one day regret!
he promised himself.

“I . . . cannot say, General of the Sea,” Fukui answered his question.

Kurokawa shook his head and waved his hand dismissively. “It is of no consequence at present, but do get word to me, however you must, if you hear the voices again and are able to make sense of them.”

“Of course, General of the Sea.”

The conference continued into the early afternoon, while Kurokawa listened to reports, made comments, and occasionally harangued the speakers, but with only a shadow of his old venom. As much as it sickened him, he knew he needed to coddle these men for now, and in dealing so long with the Grik, he’d learned to hide his true thoughts well. At last, he stood abruptly, quickly followed by the other men.

“Soon,” he said, “within days, the Great Fleet we have built for the Grik vermin will move at last, and I—
we!
—will crush the enemy that invests India! It is the same enemy, my people, who brought us to this world and marooned us here! Again we will face the Americans, our
natural
enemy, and the Grik will face theirs: the Americans’ ape-man lackeys! In that, if nothing else, we share a common cause! It is still the Americans—and now their puppets too—who stand between us and our destiny. And only by destroying them utterly shall we achieve it!”

CHAPTER
8

////// Respite Island

March 3, 1944

S
andra woke slowly, savoring the soft, clean sheets that felt so smooth against her skin, and the large, firm mattress she sprawled upon. She’d always been a sprawler, and the tiny, claustrophobic berths she’d slept in for most of the past two years had been excruciating, despite her small size. Golden sunshine streamed through the open, curtained windows and a steady, cool breeze circulated in the bedroom of the surprisingly luxurious little bungalow. For just a moment, she was disoriented. Her eyes opened wider when she saw the dark hair and firmly muscled back of the man still sleeping beside her, and it all came flooding back: the hurried, awkward, glorious wedding; the boisterous reception that followed; the carriage ride to the secluded beachfront bungalow; and the night of gentle, soaring, laughing, whirlwind . . . electric passion that followed. She smiled, utterly content. They’d waited a long time, and sometimes she’d despaired that last night would never come, but it had been worth the wait, and more.

Matt lay on his side, taking only a small portion of the bed.
He’s far more accustomed to tiny beds than I am,
she reflected.
He’s . . . economical in many ways; in tastes and often in words, but he’s extravagant in all the things that matter,
she realized. He’d proven many times that his love for her knew no bounds, and he was maybe a little too generous of himself for his own good as far as his ship, crew, and cause were concerned. She gloried in the former, and had learned to accept the latter. That was part of the deal she’d made to have him, and she was wise enough to know he couldn’t—wouldn’t—ever change in that respect. As much as it worried her, she also loved him for it. It was why he was
who
he was.

She focused on the numerous white or purple puckered scars on his back. She remembered when he got most of them. The big, ugly one across his left shoulder blade had come from a Grik spear at Aryaal and had nearly killed him. Clusters of smaller scars had not been serious, mostly caused by tiny fragments of steel or glass she’d plucked from just under the skin. There was a long, jagged, older scar across his lower back, and she traced it softly with her finger, wondering what had caused it. She’d seen it before, of course, but it predated their acquaintance, and she’d forgotten about it. Suddenly, how he got it—like so many other things about him she didn’t know—became vitally important to her, and she cuddled up to him, molding her body to his.

“That can get you in a lot of trouble,” he warned in a pleasant, muzzy tone. She chuckled huskily.

“
That
kind of trouble I can handle, sailor,” she said.

“Well, never say I didn’t warn you,” he said, mock serious, rolling over to embrace her.

“Wait!” She giggled. “We barely know each other!”

He blinked. “What do you mean?”

“I’m serious! I want to know everything . . . like, where’d you get that scar on your lower back?”

“I was bitten by a whale!” he said, clasping her close and kissing her.

“Tell me!” she insisted, and he paused.

“Right now?” He looked at her. “You’re serious!”

“Sure, I am! We’re
married
now. I want to know.”

He started to speak, then paused. After all this time, they really didn’t know a lot about each other. They knew all the things that
mattered
, of course, but almost nothing about each other’s lives before they met. He shrugged. “I fell off a horse on a barbed-wire fence when I was fourteen.”

“That’s it?”

“Scout’s honor.”

“Were you a Boy Scout?”

“No.”

Sandra laughed. “You’re terrible!”

“Absolutely.” Matt brushed back her hair and smiled. “I’ll tell you something else, now that we’re married. You’ve got to quit looking at me—that way you do—when you think I’m about to pull some nutty stunt that’ll get me hurt. You know which look I mean! I’ve always been a sucker for big-eyed, pretty girls, and when they stick out their lip and squirt tears at me . . .” His smile faded slightly. “It makes it a lot harder to do what I have to do.”

“I do not ‘squirt’ tears at you!” she denied. “My arguments against your sometimes very foolish behavior are based on reason and practical concerns!”

“And when I don’t see ‘reason,’ you resort to anger. When that doesn’t work, you hammer me with the Look.”

Sandra frowned, creating a face much like the one he’d described but without the tears. “Reason should be enough,” she said at last, as if surprised it wasn’t. “Reason
and
anger work with everyone else, but not you! You’re too damn stubborn!” She sighed. “So maybe the tears come with frustration because I
love
you, you big dope! I don’t make them come—you do!”

“So . . . no deal?” he asked with such a pitiful tone and solemn expression that she burst into a fit of giggling. She struck him with her pillow—which disrupted the bedding in a pleasantly revealing way—and Matt embraced her again.

“Look,” he said, softly laughing, his hand gliding across her skin. “I’m sorry I brought it up. You’re right, though. We have a lot to talk about. I’ll tell you every little thing you want to know about me: every scar, every hobby, even my favorite ice cream. We’ve both got in-laws . . . somewhere . . . we don’t know anything about! I want to hear all about that privileged childhood you said you had, about every scraped knee, and even your favorite color . . . but later. We don’t have an awful lot of time together—like this,” he reminded gently. “I respectfully suggest we make the most of it.”

They did.

* * * 

The Bosun slogged through the sand, breathing hard, and stepped up on the porch of the servants’ bungalow where Diania was staying and where Juan joined her during the day to prepare meals and such for the newlyweds, or in case Matt and Sandra wanted them for any reason. Both stewards had, for all intents and purposes, insisted. Even so, there was considerable distance between the two structures, and Gray wasn’t too happy about that. He didn’t like it whenever the Skipper—or Sandra—didn’t have anybody around to protect them. Captain Reddy had specifically prohibited a guard detail this time, however, and Gray could even understand. The location of the honeymoon was supposed to be a secret, and he doubted any Company sore losers would find them in the short time they had. He supposed somebody might have followed
him
out from the ship . . . but he doubted it. Why would they? Who here would know that he was an overprotective mother hen?

Besides,
he reassured himself as he glanced surreptitiously at the other bungalow,
even with just one leg, Juan’s got plenty of guts, and he can shoot.
He hesitated before going inside, stomping the sand off his shoes.
Okay, that’s all true. So why am I here
? Was it just because he was overprotective, or did he have another reason to leave the ship when he had so much work to do?

Suddenly, the lightly built door swung open in his face and Diania confronted him, surprised. She’d ditched the goofy dress, he saw, and was back in dungarees and T-shirt. He gulped at the . . . glaring effect of the transformation.

“Why, g’marnin’, Mr. Gray!” the girl said a little nervously. “I hared a tarrible stampin’, an’ thought the island was a-tremble.”

“It was just me, uh . . . Miss Diania,” Gray stammered.

Diania was stunned. The Bosun had never actually addressed her before, other than to give her summary commands. She’d heard him refer to her as “that damn woman” a time or two, which set her apart from the other female humans aboard only in that he called them “that
other
damn woman” or “those other damn women.” At best, he might refer to them occupationally, like the “water-tender broad,” or something like that. Diania had to admit it hurt her feelings, because she rather admired the Super Bosun, and everyone else treated her much better than she’d ever been treated before. The thing was, she knew he didn’t resent her for being a woman suddenly elevated from her obligated status, like an Imperial man might. He just resented her for being a woman on his ship. She hadn’t understood at all until Lady Sandra explained the metaphor of old dogs and new tricks, and described the way things used to be in the Bosun’s “old” Navy.

“What did ye call me?” she asked, almost breathlessly.

“Well . . . Miss Diania, I guess,” Gray growled in a more normal tone. “We ain’t on the ship, and neither of us is on the watch bill, so we ain’t really on duty. ’Sides, this is kinda like me showin’ up at your off-base housin’. I got manners.” He looked around. “Where’s that little Flip on a stick?”

Diania collected herself. “Ah, ye mean Mr. Marcos? He took coffee yonder ta the Captain an’ Lady Sandra.” With a small smile, she pointed at the strange tracks in the sand. “He was very insistent that the Captain’d never forgive ’im if he neglected that duty.”

Gray grimaced. “Jeez. That’s a helluva way to bring the newlyweds back down to earth!”

Diania chuckled warily. She didn’t drink coffee and had taken Juan’s statement as fact. She took a breath. “So, ah, what brings ye here?”

Gray waved his hand. “Oh, I was ashore, roundin’ up a few lost sheep after the shindig last night, and then I had to make personal sure that maniac Silva got on the damn plane—and stayed on it this time! Skipper’s orders.” He shook his head. “Wasn’t really such a chore once I found the big lug, and then he went peaceably enough . . . not that he was in any shape to make a fuss!”

“Where was he?” Diania asked, boldly she thought. She was amazed that she was actually carrying on a conversation with the terrible Bosun.

“Hidin’. At least he thought he was. He must’ve picked his spot while he was . . . less devious than usual. And besides, Chack ratted him out.” Gray didn’t mention that he’d finally found Dennis Silva curled up and passed out inside an overturned barrel in the . . . sailor’s recreational district, and that he and Chack had rolled the barrel almost three hundred yards down to the dock. His sea bag was already awaiting him there, but they had to hose the insensible giant down before the “Clipper” pilot would let him aboard the plane. Gray shrugged. “Anyway, so then I thought I’d wander out here and check on things.”

Diania steeled herself. “Then ye must stay fer yer breakfast,” she said as firmly as she could. “I’m about makin’ it, anyway . . . as soon as Mr. Marcos returns ta oversee me skills. One more mouth’ll make no difference, an’ . . . I’ve so many questions about the Navy life!”

Gray looked at the exotic, dark-skinned girl—
She
is
just a girl, damn it
!—and scratched the white stubble on his chin.

“Well, I s’pose the fellas on the ship can make do without me for a little longer. Thanks.”