EPISODE ONE: "Pilot"
Prologue:
The Abukuma screamed.
Her hull crumpled, and metal shrieked in violent agony as volley after volley of incoming fire bracketed the warship. The antimatter-packed shells slammed against the light cruiser’s faltering shields in a seemingly endless wash of angry electric-blue explosions.
The ship staggered under the heavy blows. Precious oxygen, the penultimate life-blood of the ship and her 300-man crew, flowed from her savaged hull in crystalline fountains. The lights inside the ship flickered as circuits failed. Both the living, breathing crew, and the mechanical embodiment of the ship were slowly bleeding to death.
The flagship of Destroyer Squadron Seven, the Abukuma was never designed for fighting her current foe. She was classified as a light cruiser more because of someone’s idea of a joke in the Bureau of Ships then because of any degree of combat capability. Compared to others of her ilk, she was under-armed, under-protected, and under-powered. The sleek lines, slender hull and battery of five-centimeter antimatter cannons of Abukuma were more fitting of a destroyer than any cruiser-type warship.
Which made her perfectly suited for her current role leading a small pack of destroyers. Against similarly-armed ships, she was a formidable force to be reckoned with. However, the ships in the distance were far from the similarly-armed foes that the Abukuma, and the elements of Destroyer Squadron Seven were accustomed to facing.
Buried deep inside the ship’s hull, the darkened Combat Information Center was the heart and mind of the 800-feet long Abukuma. Blue lighting and the shimmer of tactical displays illuminated the compartment, casting eerie shadows on the fearful faces of the enlisted ratings that manned the consoles lining the bulkheads.
Captain Isoruku Nagumo, the cruiser’s commanding officer stood stared intently at the array of red diamonds and blue circles hovering in the center of the light cruiser's CIC. His face remained impassive as ran a hand through sweat-soaked jet black hair. The tactical plot had changed little over the twenty minutes he had been fixated on it.
Five of the blue circles were arrayed in a line near the center of the sphere, these were the ships of Destroyer Squadron Seven: Abukuma and her four ‘tin-can’ consorts. Further out, near the edge of the sphere lay another cluster of blue circles, the convoy, a gaggle of fat and slow transports and supply ships. Those ships and their precious cargoes would be desperately needed when they reached their destination. If they reached their destination..
They were also the target of the four red diamonds representing hostile ships on the tactical display. Each appeared nearly half the size of the cruiser, yet, given how quickly they had decimated the Perry, each were as powerful as the Abukuma, and more than a match for than the accompanying destroyers. All four were on a direct course for the supply ships.
In front of him, a blue circle indicating the destroyer Knox, one of the ships in his meager force, flickered and a series of icons appeared alongside it. It was the first of the blue circles to show such a behavior. Nagumo knew it would not be the last one.The flickering meant trouble for the Knox, and the growing series of icons only underscored the severity of the ship’s situation.
“Knox is reporting heavy damage, Cap’n.” The thick Texan drawl of his executive officer, Sebastian Carmichael, rose above the muffled din of the room as he read what might as well have a death sentence for their comrades aboard the stricken destroyer. “She’s reporting two engine rooms are down... Main battery inoperative... Heavy casualties...”
For an instant, a collective hush fell over the CIC, orders and targeting instructions stopped, and eyes turned toward the exchange between Nagumo and his executive officer. Carmichael had been his right arm for five long years now, and their friendship had grown over time, Carmichael even going so far as to make the jaded Captain his son’s godfather. Five years of death and destruction, happiness and sorrow, and a never-ending war.
Carmichael took a step closer to his friend, and becoming aware of the listening ears of the compartment, continued in a soft whisper. “Sir, the Knox is reporting that Commander O’Hare is dead, I’m sorry, I knew you two were close...” Nagumo nodded and cut off the rest of Carmichael's report with a wave.
The world shook as a salvo slammed into the Abukuma’s hull, shorting out already-taxed computer systems, sending datapads flying and crew members crashing to the deck. Small fires raged through out the compartment, set off from the debris of exploding terminals and short circuits.
The shrieking sound of metal grating on metal echoed through out the ship. Nagumo grasped on to the side the fire control terminal struggling to stay upright. Carmichael reached out a massive hand to steady his friend, throwing him a huge grin as the ship rocked again.
"They’re getting the range on us,” he said, still smiling in spite of the dire realization. “We must be close enough for them to discern our classification.” Smoke, mixed with the scent of incinerated circuitry filled Nagumo’s nostrils as he stood, straightened his midnight blue tunic, and nodded in agreement. He could taste the tangy copper of blood in his mouth.
“That’s a valid assumption,” he said with forced formality. “It may get very hot for us here in an instant. You may want to consider moving to the bridge, disperse the chain of command, that way, one of us will still be able to fight the ship in the event one of us gets...” His voice trailed off.
“Lieutenant Ostrowski’s Officer of the Deck up topside. She's handling things up there just fine,” Carmichael replied casually as the ship rocked again. For an instant, Nagumo’s dark brown eyes, tinged with concern, met those of his friend. Commander Carmichael shook his head. “It’s not going to matter where I am on the ship, Rukh,” he said quietly. “It’s not going to make one damn bit of difference and you know it. So, with all due respect, Cap’n, I'd rather stay where the action is.”
Nagumo gave a barely perceptible nod of his head, and turned his attention back to the tactical display. He would try to buy time for the transports to escape, and keep his ship, his crew, and his friends, alive for just a little while longer.
“Mister Kauffman,” he barked over the sound of the roaring ventilators and the din of the battle. “Send to all ships, close range and prepare for torpedo attack on the lead ship... Countermeasures: get those emitters back online somehow, we need to shake their targeting solution before they rip us apart.”
* * *
Any animal, when threatened with the end of its life reacts one of two ways. It either fights with all its teeth and claws to stay alive as long as possible, or it flees. For animals that are able to outrun their pursuers, escape represents the soundest option. This was the case for the Abukuma’s task force, each of the four remaining ships were capable of outrunning their adversaries and making good their escape from the pitched battle.
For the men and women aboard the ships of Destroyer Squadron Seven, however, only one order prevented them from turning tail and escaping the onrushing warships. Destroyer Squadron Seven’s orders were deceptively simple: “Protect the convoy at all costs.”
Less than a light-hour astern of their position lay the nineteen ships of convoy FG-13. Slow and ponderous at sub-light speeds, from the instant that the unidentified ships were detected on an intercept course, the cargo ships, colony ships and tankers were in a desperate race to spin up their tired warp drives and skip to the next system.
In a brutal calculus, the lives of the squadron were being traded for a mere ten minutes. That was the differential between when the strike force would reach the vulnerable supply ships and the time they needed to jump away from threats bearing down on them. When the Knox finally foundered under a withering barrage of plasma, exactly five minutes had elapsed since the battle had begun in earnest.
* * *
Black smudges and gaping holes marred what had been the gleaming silver hull of the Abukuma. The once tall and proud superstructure was now just a twisted mass of shattered metal. Her armor plating had been long since vaporized, and now every hit struck her hull, sending small tongues of flame lapping out into the heavens, and oxygen spurting out like the blood of a wounded animal. Sensing the kill, the battlecruisers closed in and harried their hapless prey.
Foreward of the shredded superstructure, one of the Abukuma’s main gun batteries still lashed out in vain defiance at the surrounding battlecruisers. Defiantly absorbing the last desperate gasps of the dying crew, the ships hung motionlessly near the now silent Abukuma, and hammered with impunity. The battle had ceased, and was no merely an execution.
Gasping for air from the withering life support system, and without the aid of the computers the four man crew slowly trained their gun by hand on the nearest battlecruiser, the Lion, parked just off the Abukuma’s crumpled port bow. Inside the turret, the gun captain stared through the obsolete telescopic scope, aiming at the midsection of the looming capital ship, and barked azimuth and bearing data to the other three members.He nodded and cast an ugly sneer as the twin rail guns hurled a salvo towards the enemy ship in open defiance of their fate.
A minor miscalculation, an error in the input of the data sent the anti-matter-laden rounds sailed wide of their target, missing the center of ship. The rounds arced past the transparasteel windows of the Lion’s bridge and sailed harmlessly into space. In her last gasp, the Abukuma failed to draw any vengeance.
Disgusted by the cruel twist of fate, the gun crew was scrambling to reload the guns one last time when the battlecruiser’s reply slammed into Abukuma. The first massive shell ripped into the burned-out remains of the light cruiser’s bridge. The second one slammed home, destroying the pesky remaining guns of the Abukuma’s. The blast cascaded through the turret, through the open hatches and down into the stores of additional anti-matter rounds sat.
The fireball ignited the rounds in the magazine, adding to the devastation. Hull plates bulged and blistered as bluish flames shot out from the cruiser’s side.The kinetic force of the explosion decapitated the Abukuma, and sent her bow drifting away.
* * *
Thick rancid smoke filled CIC, blocking out what little lights the emergency systems could provide, and searing Nagumo lungs as he picked himself up off the deck. Shards of broken glass bit into his hands as he rose to his feet and wiped soot from his eyes. His eyes stung as the smoke lingered in the compartment, as he noticed the absence of the whirring ventilators for the first time.
"Lieutenant Ostrowski, damage report,” he barked as he gingerly made his way though the devastated CIC. Near the auxilliary fire control panel, Nagumo could make out Commander Carmichael’s form, still crumpled on the deck were he fell. The captain knelt down beside his friend’s inert body, never looking away from the young lieutenant struggling to call up data on one of the few still operational systems. “I’m sorry my friend,” he whispered.
Ignoring the rivulet of crimson blood running from underneath the bandage wrapped around her head, Lieutenant Beth Ostrowski cursed at the faintly flickering computer readout, and pounded at the controls with her one still-working arm. Each time, the battered system brought up the same data with a mathematical coldness. The Abukuma was dying.
Nagumo studied the young woman’s facial expression and knew the outcome before she said. He had not even needed to bother asking, no one knew his ship better, or the heart-breaking sounds that the ship made as her hull buckled under countless volleys. Primary fire control, gone. Without the primary fire control room, the crews in Abukuma’s gun turrets, however many were still operating, would have to aim their cannons themselves. Damage Control was also gone, along with the ship’s countermeasures and main propulsion systems. Life support, the precious life blood of the Abukuma’s human complement was, like the ship, fading fast..
"Captain," Ostrowski said as she limped over, struggling over fallen support beams and dangling wires. “It’s over. It’s time for us to go.” Nagumo just stared silently at her. The flickering lights cast a martial look on the girl’s angular face. Her left arm, wrapped in a splint, and the blood soaked bandage on her head gave her the air of a figure from a military painting.
She’d been out of the academy for just six months, she was one of only three members of the crew to escape the conflagration that had consumed the Abukuma’s bridge. Of course, her luck had only prolonged the inevitable. ‘Quite the soldier, she would have had a good career as an officer,’ he thought seconds before his world exploded.
* * *
Captain Isoruku Nagumo, commanding officer of the light cruiser Abukuma, stood patiently. Above him, circling gaily, seagulls climbed and dove, calling out to their winged brethren. The sun was hot, but yet, not unbearably so. Inhaling deeply, he let the sea breeze fill his nostrils, the sound of the waves crashing upon the shore engulfed him.
Onjuku beach, nestled in Chiba province.
He was home.
At last.
And content.
Out in the frothing surf of the Pacific Ocean, waist deep in the blue-green sea, Akina and Jiro frolicked, their high-pitched shrieks of delight as the waves rushed by towards the shore drowned out even the calling of the gulls. They were laughing, jumping and waving anxiously for ‘Chichi’ to come join them in their play.
As he had promised.
Closer in, her eyes focused upon her young like a watchful mother bear, Kohana watched the children. Now and again, she admonished the children. “Don’t go out to far,” or “Jiro, come back towards me.”
She was resplendant. A beauty out of a Hiroshige painting. She was a specter of romantic set against the beautiful rising hills, a sentimental landscape. The setting sun cast shadows in odd angles and shapes and silhouetted Kohana in an exquisite outlines. As she always had, the beauty of her feminie form had a profound impact on Isorku.
“Isoruku,” she said, diverting her attention ever so briefly from the children towards her husband. “Come and join us. Please.”
She gazed upon the solitary man standing on the beach. He was not’t the same as when they had married. The ravages of time had not been pleasant with him. Long since gone was the youthful exuberance he had demonstrated during their courtship.
The lean chiseled edges of the fresh-faced academy graduate were replaced by jowls and sunken-in eyes. The meddlesome gleam in his eye was still there to be sure, but years of orders and rations had taken their toll upon him.
Isoruku knew this.
He knew she would leave him.
A week later, after returning from the beach, they had fought. Another combat deployment, the third in a row, and for her, another year as a ‘Navy widow.’ She left, with their young children. Beautiful Akina, nearing her first year of primary school, and the rambunctious Jiro. He was so much like his father.
And yet, here they were.
With him.
He could feel the warmth of the sun upon his face, the warm wetness of the ocean, the salt spray on the tip of his tongue. They were real, and this was so much more tangible than the dreams. The dreams he had every night. And then the screams came from across the vast blue of the ocean.
Eyes wide, struck mute in shock and terror, he watched as the ocean
bubbled and frothed. Jiro and Akina, caught too far out from shore by the sea’s nightmarish transformation, cried out in agony. The ocean rolled as it boiled hotter and hotter. The heat consumed the children. He stared, transfixed on the sight of Akina’s raven-black hair bursting into the flames as the waters consumed them.
He tried to run to them, to rescue them or to die with them, he knew not which, but his feet would not move. He stood mesmerized, frozen stiff as they disappeared beneath the searing surf. The heat of the ocean spread rapidly, turning the sand ablaze.
His wife, his little flower, stomped her feet in desperation as flames burst along the seams of her linen gown. She looked out at Nagumo, arms reaching out as she screamed. The terrible sound reverberated in his ears, and yet he could only idly watch as the inferno engulfed her as well. He felt the wall of flames that had engulfed all that he had wash over him, the searing heat stung his eyes, scorched his throat and scorched his skin. Despite the pain, the mind-numbing shriek of his nerve endings, he remained unable to move.
His last thought, as the flames consumed his body, was a solitary thought:
"It wasn’t supposed to end like this.”
