Sentinels of Fire (12 page)

The kami was into eight thousand yards, and the gun barrels up and down the length of
Malloy
's port side were lying flat, their rate of fire if anything increasing the closer the kami got, each gun blast flattening the wake along
Malloy
's port side to a bright yellow sheen. There was nothing more to be done, no maneuvers, speed changes, gun assignments—it was him or us now. I watched in horrified fascination as the Jap suicider got bigger and bigger, seemingly coming right for me up there on the bridge, and then a wing went spiraling away in black fragments and the kami flipped several times before the remaining wing touched the surface and it went in, no farther than half a mile away.

“
Right
standard rudder,” the OOD yelled, and the ship heeled to port into a ninety-degree turn to our right. I looked to see why the turn was being made, and then the forward five-inch started firing again, this time slewing over the port bow but at a higher elevation now. A third kami was coming, this one clearly a medium bomber, with twin engines. I could see it without the binocs, but it didn't seem to be coming in all that fast, not like those modified Zeros had been moments ago.

“Baka,
baka
!” someone shouted, just as a yellow flare ignited momentarily under the bomber and something dropped away. It was a baka bomb, a long, torpedo-shaped cylinder filled with high explosive: stubby wings, three rocket engines in the back, and a lone pilot strapped into a tiny cockpit in the middle. When the Zeros came in, even in a power dive, they came at just under 400 knots. This thing came screaming down at 600 knots, which was technically beyond the computing ability of the Mark
1
-Able gun computer down in Main Battery Plot. All the gunners could do was to point the guns down the bearing of the baka, which never changed since it intended to hit the ship, and then enter drop-spots to try to force the outgoing five-inch projectiles into the flying bomb's glide path.

The bomber was turning away, headed back to Formosa to load up another one, when out of nowhere a Navy Corsair appeared behind it and shot it out of the sky in another gasoline fireball. There was nothing, however, the Corsair could do about the baka, which slashed through
Malloy
's forward stack so fast that its fuzing mechanism didn't even feel it. The baka hit the water out on
Malloy
's starboard side, which the bomb
did
feel. There was an enormous blast, strong enough to whipsaw the foremast and knock most of the bridge team off their feet. I grabbed the portside captain's chair, which swiveled out of my grasp and dumped me on the deck with the rest of them. I could feel the ship's hull vibrating along her entire length from that blast.

When I regained my feet I sensed that the ship was slowing down. Orders were being transmitted over both the bitch-box and the sound-powered phones, but I couldn't hear a thing after all that gunfire. As I looked aft, I saw an enormous cloud of oily black smoke billowing from amidships, laced with bright white steam, obscuring the entire after part of the ship. I'd thought the damned thing had just hit the stack. Then I realized what was happening. The boilers down below used the smokestack for two things: to exhaust the gases of combustion and to draw down fresh combustion air for the burners. With half the stack gone, the boilers were being starved for air, hence all that smoke.

“Ten knots,” I ordered. “Slow back down so they can get those boilers off the line.”

The OOD nodded and gave the orders to reduce speed. I looked back at that black cloud behind the bridge. It was boiling aft like some kind of incubus. The topside gun crews couldn't remain on station immersed in all that heavy smoke. I reached for the bitch-box.

“Combat, Bridge. Give me a course to put the relative wind on the port beam. We're coming to ten knots. Any more Japs?”

“Combat, aye. Wait one.” Then, “No active contacts at this time.”

“Main Control, Bridge. Cross-connect the main plant once you get One Firehouse secured.”

“Main, aye. Almost there, Cap'n.”

I blinked. Captain? Then I understood. Only the captain used the bridge bitch-box during general quarters.

“Bridge, Combat. Come to zero niner zero for wind abeam.”

I looked over at the OOD, but he was already giving the orders. The ship turned, and the cloud of poisonous, oil-laden smoke began to veer off to the starboard side of the ship. That's when I got a look at the forward stack. The baka had hit it almost in the middle. The top half was suspended by a thin hinge of wrecked metal, hanging off the back of the stump. The oily black smoke was coming up through the uptakes, and there were occasional flashes of red fire as some of the oil aerosol embedded in the smoke met fresh air topside and ignited. That was the danger, I remembered. Get enough oxygen down into that remaining uptake space and the entire cloud would ignite in a real crowd-pleaser.

“Main Control, Bridge,” I called on the bitch-box. “Once you get those boilers secured, keep the blowers going. Don't let that smoke accumulate in the uptakes.”

“Main, aye,” a voice answered, sounding just a wee bit annoyed, as in, don't tell us our business. I grinned. I recognized the voice of the chief machinist's mate. The snipes were a proud bunch.

I looked for my battle talker. The captain's battle talker, Chief Smith, looked back at me, waiting for orders. Well, I wasn't the captain, but for right now, I'd have to do. “All stations report damage and readiness,” I ordered. Chief Smith repeated that and then began to announce the answers as each battle station reported back.

The smoke cloud suddenly turned to gray and then began to diminish. The Corsair who'd shot down the launching bomber came by at bridge level and waggled his wings. I gave him a thumbs-up from the bridge wing as he flew past. The fighter lofted back up into the air, did a beautifully precise four-point victory roll, and disappeared into the haze.

Jimmy Enright came out of Combat. “Radars confirm they hold no more bogeys. Okinawa AOA reports a big raid in progress, but the picket stations are clear, for the moment, anyway.”

“There'll be stragglers,” I said. “When they get done down there, whoever's left will come here.”

“Let's hope the sumbitches stay down there and do their jobs, then,” Jimmy grumbled. “They're supposed to go to Okinawa and die for the emperor, not annoy the picket line.” He lowered his voice. “Where's the skipper, XO?”

“Gonna go find out, Jimmy. In the meantime, once the snipes get the main plant cross-connected, go back up to twenty knots and execute a random weave to station. Tell the gun stations to police their brass and get ready for round two in about thirty minutes. Remain at GQ.”

“Aye, sir,” Jimmy said and gathered in his phone-talkers. A loud screeching noise came from behind the bridge as the top half of the shattered forward stack broke off and rolled across the 0
1
level and down onto the main deck, smashing the lifelines flat and scattering some rubbernecking sailors, and then went over the side. As I was leaving the bridge I thought I heard one of the younger quartermasters, who looked to be at least fourteen, say very quietly, “Bye-bye.”

When I got down to the inport cabin, I hesitated. What the hell was I going to say? How was I going to explain my assuming commandlike authority, if not command itself? More importantly, what was I going to find? Without the first clue, I knocked twice and pushed the door open. The cabin was empty.

*   *   *

It took me fifteen minutes to catch up with the captain, who was by then all the way back on the fantail, talking to the crew of mount fifty-three. The gunners had been taking advantage of the lull to get out of their hot, smoky gun mount, breathe some fresh air, and relax for a few minutes. The junior seamen were corralling the brass powder cases that littered the fantail area. The gunner's mates were collected around the captain, and all of them were smoking, which was not allowed at GQ. The fact that the captain was also puffing away was apparently being taken for an exception. What harm could it do, I thought, as I walked over. There he was, doing a Henry V pep talk before Agincourt.

“XO,” the captain said, as if we were meeting at a cocktail party. “I take it we're in the clear for the moment?”

Fully aware that every crewman within range was listening, I had to consider my words. “There's a big raid over the Okinawa anchorage right now,” I said. “We may get stragglers, we may not. CAP's up, radar's up, so with any luck, we're probably safe for the next half hour or so.”

“Wonderful,” the captain said, taking a last drag on his cancer stick and then pitching it over the side. The sailors standing around were all trying to discretely palm their ciggybutts now that the exec was standing there. “I take it we're cross-connected,” the captain said. “Can One Firehouse still operate?”

“We're still looking at that,” I said. “The forced-draft blowers weren't damaged, but the uptakes are a whole lot shorter than they used to be. That was a baka. Fortunately, it went a bit high.”

“Great,” the captain said. “Our luck holds.
Malloy
is a lucky ship, isn't she.”

“Yes, sir,” I said. The ship heeled as the OOD kept her twisting and turning. I looked around the horizon, which was indistinguishable from the metallic gray sea. “If I may have a word…?”

“Keep your eyes peeled, boys,” the captain said to the group of sailors around us. “This is when they come out of nowhere.”

Then we headed forward, up the starboard side. When we got to the place where the forward stack had taken out the lifelines, we found two shipfitters kneeling on the deck, already welding in new lifeline stanchions. The captain went about ten feet forward of where the welders were scratching their arcs, well away from straining ears.

“You did well, XO,” he said. “And how do I know? Because we're still here.”

Enough of this play-acting, I thought. “What's going on, Captain?” I asked.

“Beats me, XO,” the captain said. “But I'm damned glad
you're
here.”

“But, sir—”

“But me no buts, XO. Which were you more scared of: the Japs, or screwing up?”

I didn't answer immediately. The captain had a point: My main concern had been not to make a fatal mistake.

“Thought so,” the captain said. “Look, you did very well. I was listening on the JA, the
1
JV. You did everything right.”

“No, I didn't,” I said. “I downed the air-search radar because I thought the bastards were homing in on it. That left us blind until the last minute. That—”

“And that might have worked,” the captain interrupted. “But
I
think they're bringing a radar-equipped bomber with them, a multiengine job that hangs back and gives them vectors. Kinda like our Freddies: They're being radar-directed. When you think about it, though, this is a visual game, at least when you get down to the short strokes. Someone sees the kami, cues Sky One onto it, and then you start shooting. Once the forties and the twenties can see where the five-inch are shooting, they get into it. Weight of lead, XO; weight of lead. That's all we got.”

“You weren't on the bridge, sir,” I said. There, I thought, I said it.

“No, I was not.”

“What the hell, Captain?” I asked, softly. “We need you up there. We
all
need you up there.”

The captain's eyes lost focus for a moment. I let out a long breath. A sudden blast of low-pressure steam erupted from the truncated forward stack, startling both of us, but then it quickly subsided. A fine, warm mist settled on us as the steam condensed in the early afternoon air. Then we heard director fifty-one's amplidynes propel the director off to the port quarter, where its radar array went into a tight sector search.

“Back to work, XO,” the captain said. “You're doing fine.”

“Multiple bogeys, low and fast, inbound from astern,” came over the
1
MC loudspeakers. “Reman all battle stations. Check setting of Condition Zebra. Make manned-and-ready reports to the bridge.”

We were standing next to a ladder that went from the main deck up to the midships torpedo deck, from which another ladder led up to the bridge. The captain pointed to the ladder. “I'm going to take one more turn about deck,” he said. “You go to the bridge and take charge.”

I was totally baffled, but ten years of instinctive discipline took over. Go to the bridge and take charge. Aye, aye, sir.

Up I went. As I climbed the steel steps that familiar feeling of mortal apprehension churned my stomach.

Which
was
I more scared of: the Japs, or screwing something up so bad we lost the ship?

Both, I decided—and whatever had begun to derange our skipper's mind.

*   *   *

“Bridge, Combat. We've lost 'em. Last skin painted at thirty-three miles, bearing two six five true. Estimating four bogeys, but there's weather out there.”

“Bridge, aye,” I responded. “Watch your surface-search radar, and be alert for a pincer.”

“Combat, aye.”

It was time to maneuver. “Officer of the deck, come to zero zero zero, speed fifteen. Forward lookouts scan from the bow to the port beam; after lookouts from the port beam to the stern. We're looking for low-fliers.”

The OOD started barking orders to the helm and lee helm. I went out onto the port bridge wing and joined the small crowd with binoculars glued to their eyes. A pincer was the worst case: The Jap formation would split up about twenty miles out, with two planes turning south and two north. After five minutes they'd all turn inbound on
Malloy.
We'd have to split the gun batteries, which would cut the effective fire on any one plane in half.

“Sky One, Bridge,” I called.