Straits of Hell (23 page)

“Suddenly, I think I understand one of the strange phrases so often used by the human members of our Amer-i-caan Navy clan,” Ruik said, blinking ruefully. “‘Be careful what you wish for.'” Gaal blinked back in utter confusion.

Task Force 11 continued pounding east-northeast in the face of the mounting gale as the day progressed, but the Lemurian Sky Priests aboard the flag were sure the wind and sea would moderate overnight. Ruik's sea sense agreed, and they were even beginning to catch occasional beams of light through the western overcast sky as the sun fell toward the sea. Nancys would lift with the dawn to make a definitive determination regarding what might be lurking over the horizon. Ruik suspected they'd find nothing, or at most the two or three ships that Gaal believed had sent the Grikbirds aloft. Still, Ruik remained uneasy, reminded of a peaceful morning stroll he once took with Governor-Empress Rebecca and her Prime Factor, Sean Bates. They'd gone sport shooting for a kind of upland birdlike thing on the slopes of the mountains beyond the New Scotland port of Scapa Flow. That pleasant diversion ended with a fight for their lives as a plot unfolded that almost destroyed the Empire.

It has become natural for me to ‘worry too much,'
Ruik decided.
But does that mean it is wrong for me to do so?
He glanced toward the line of battleships churning along in the distance.
Perhaps. Admiral Hibbs
made himself a hero in the battle off New Dublin, yet does not seem much more concerned than Lieutenant Gaal.

“Why don't you get som-teen to eat, sur?” asked his quartermaster at the wheel. “You been up here all day, wet through.” She shivered exaggeratedly. “We ain't far enough north to be this cold!”

Ruik grinned. “Ah, but the air that is here has been up there and brings the cold down with it! We get little change where we are from, around Borno and the Filpin Lands, except when the strakkas come. But the warm world lies in a much narrower band, ah ‘laat-i-tude' than I ever expected, and here it seems that the cold world can move against it quite easily from both the north and south! I do not understa . . .”

The voice tube from the comm shack screeched. Pulling the plug himself, he leaned over. “Cap-i-taan speaking!”

“
Mertz
sends more Grikbirds!
Hundreds
o' Grikbirds bear-een nor-nor'east!”

“Grikbirds!” came the cry from the foretop, and Ruik stared up and forward. Several 'Cats were pointing to the left. “Grikbirds!” the lookout called again. “West-nort'west! Bear-een, ah, tree fo seero! All the Grikbirds there is!”

“Silence there!” Ruik shouted at the rising panic in the sailor's voice, even as he raised his glass. The darkening sky was full of clotted formations of wiggling shapes, the motion resolving itself into the furious beats of hundreds of wings as he adjusted the telescope. The creatures were still too far away to reveal details, but he knew what he would see: Bright, feathery/furry bodies with slashing teeth and claws—essentially, colorful flying Grik. He had to assume they were carrying cannonballs, as usual, to fling down on the ships, but couldn't tell yet. Those weren't much of a threat to the ships themselves, but they'd kill anybody they fell on—and there'd be a
lot
of them this time!

He looked to starboard and caught
Icarus
flashing her Morse lamp, making sure they'd gotten the word. “Make smoke!” he ordered. Grikbirds necessarily had highly developed—and sensitive—respiratory systems and didn't like smoke at all, but Ruik already knew
Simms
would be hard-pressed to make enough to discourage the things in this wind. “Send to
Icarus
that we'll close with her; combine our defenses,” he ordered. Gaal thundered up from below, surrounded by other 'Cats, and Ruik caught his stunned blinking. He almost laughed. “This is no
‘scout,' Lieu-ten-aant! It would take a fleet, a big one, to carry so many of the creatures! I believe your ‘wish' is granted and the Doms are out. Coming right at us!”

The sea strobed with flashes in the northeast, as Grikbirds fell on
Finir-Pel
and
Mertz
. At first Ruik supposed the bursts of light came from the defenses aboard the two DDs, but there were too many. Way too many. Dozens of smoky sparkles twinkled across one of the ships amid bursts of water alongside. Then, even as Ruik realized what was happening, the distant ship simply exploded in a great, expanding ball of orange fire and roiling smoke. Other sparkles lit the deck of the other DD. She didn't explode, but did veer suddenly away, with flames rushing up her mizzen mast.

“They're not carrying solid shot this time!” Ruik shouted. “They've got
bombs
!”

“How?” Gaal demanded. “Doms don't have percussion fuses, and Grikbirds daamn sure ain't gonna light a bomb!”

“I don't care how!”
Ruik roared. “All hands on deck! Everybody but the comm division and a minimum watch in engineering! Anyone not already assigned to antiair weapons will draw small arms and prepare to defend the ship!”

A fair-size clump of Grikbirds broke away from the swarm bearing down out of the Northwest and angled toward
Simms
and
Icarus
. Ruik felt his spine turn to ice. “Staand by!” he cried, wishing his ship had been equipped with at least a few of the new machine guns.

“Here they come!” someone squeaked.

Maybe two dozen Grikbirds suddenly tucked their wings and stooped, plummeting down out of the sky at about forty-five degrees. A few dropped their bombs almost immediately, but most bored in.
Simms
could protect herself against Grikbirds attacking in the “same old way,” dropping heavy rocks or roundshot and then going for her crew. The flying monsters had no hands for weapons and had only those they were born with in their jaws and on their feet. They were savage opponents but quite vulnerable to gunfire and the bayonet.
Simms
had little defense against explosives dropped from the air, however. A large number of swivel guns, loaded with tins full of musket balls, were mounted on her rails, and the Allies had actually taken a page from the Grik and employed what were essentially portable antiair, muzzle-loading
mortars that could spray heavy charges of shot. These were tried and relatively true, performing on the principle that if one put enough lead in the air at the critical instant, some was bound to hit. The problem was, even massed as they were, their effective range was only about three to five hundred feet—and they'd only get one barrage. After that, it would be down to small arms. All the Allin-Silva breechloaders to arrive in the theater had gone straight to Shinya, and he still didn't have enough.
Simms
's crew had only Baalkpan and Maa-ni-laa Arsenal percussion-fired smoothbore muskets. All would be stuffed with “buck and ball” or heavy loads of “Grikshot.” They'd be effective inside a hundred tails—and
very
effective at thirty or less, but were slow to load. That left only several “Blitzerbug” SMGs belonging to the pilots in
Simms
's tiny air division, close-range weapons as well, and chances were the Grikbirds would already be dropping by the time they opened up.

Ruik wished he could maneuver, but
Simms
was already too close to
Icarus
now. The Impie ship had very similar armaments, and he hoped their combined fire would be enough. “Ready . . . ,” he yelled, timing his command as closely as he dared, knowing all the shooting would be over in a matter of seconds. After that, his ship would be helpless.

“Fire!”

Ten swivels and eight mortars barked almost as one, their operators yanking lanyards that slammed brass hammers against musket caps. A cloud of white smoke enveloped the ship as a rain-dense rush of lead lifted to meet the attackers. As they'd drilled for conventional attacks of this sort, the rest of the crew now opened with their muskets. Several bombs detonated dully alongside, probably the early drops he'd seen, throwing desultory splashes as high as the rail. He strained his eyes to see the effect of their fire.

The wad—“formation” was an inappropriate term—of Grikbirds had been shattered, and quite a few were tumbling, broken, toward the sea. Others had dropped their bombs, hopefully short, and were clawing at the air with ragged wings. The rest—maybe half—came on, finally drawing the fire of the Blitzers and some of the more independent-minded crewfolk who wanted actual targets for their muskets. Some were hit, but it didn't much matter. At a little more than mast height, all the remaining attackers dropped.

Ruik watched the weapons fall. They
looked
like cannonballs, maybe
a little bigger than usual, and they weren't smoking or anything like that. . . . Most landed in the water, jolting the ship with detonations on and under the water. Some didn't seem to go off. One hit the main top, bounced, and exploded in the air over the waist with a bright flash and screech of flying fragments. Three landed on the deck. One went off under the left wing of the Nancy, where it sat on its catapult over the main hold, shredding it and flipping the wreckage almost over the side. 'Cats went down, screaming or silent, and the plane, tangled in the foremast backstays, sagged almost to the water. Another bomb had landed on the fo'c'sle, and was rolling aft as the bow pitched up. Ruik, crouching now, saw that this one
was
smoking. When it suddenly burst, it didn't do so with the same force as the others, but with a much greater flash. Opening his eyes, Ruik saw flames spreading across the deck, toward the wrecked aircraft, and back forward toward the guns lashed there. More screaming 'Cats rolled on the deck, flailing at themselves, while others raced to help them or ran for hoses and buckets of sand. Ruik realized with pride that
Simms
's crew was reacting with all the professionalism he could ever hope for, their damage-control instincts kicking in without thought. A few had even already reloaded their muskets and were chasing the rising Grikbirds with fire. Only then did he remember feeling the jar of a third bomb strike the deck, not far behind him on the quarterdeck. Subconsciously, he probably hadn't expected to live long enough to turn and see. Now he spun to the rising cries just as the thing rolled toward the wheel. 'Cats dove away from it, but the quartermaster watched it come, eyes widening as she still clung to her post. It wasn't smoking. It wasn't doing anything—yet. “Secure that, before it blows!” he roared.

“You . . . you think it ain't gonna?” Gaal asked nervously, but trotted forward, scooping up a coiled line. The bow pitched down and the bomb teetered, started to move, and Gaal gently dropped the rope down around it. After the slightest hesitation, he clenched his eyes shut and crouched down to grasp the bundle and hold it in place.

“I hope not,” Ruik answered, his legs gone weak. He looked around, saw the shooting had stopped. The Nancy was on fire, but hoses were already on it and he doubted it would catch the tarred rigging aflame before it was jettisoned. Damp sand was still being thrown on the deck, but none of the flames from the “firebomb” had caught the wet wooden
deck and whatever had been in it was quickly burning out. He glanced at
Icarus
, but couldn't tell if she'd been hit at all. She seemed undamaged. Far beyond, amid the rest of the fleet, the scene was less reassuring. The Grikbirds were leaving, their strike complete, and Ruik marveled that the Doms had trained them so well. Unable to match the Allied aircraft, they'd made do with what they had and somehow turned Grikbirds into something more like partners than mere tools, at least to the extent that they could make them perform more complicated, less instinctive tasks.
We've already been seeing that in the air,
Ruik sourly reminded himself.
Now, instead of continuing the attack with claws and teeth, they're heading back where they came from, to rearm, most likely.
The only good thing was that Grikbirds got tired, and the Doms couldn't possibly “turn them around” as fast as the Allies could their own air power.
That's something, at least
. He raised his glass.
And we must've gotten a lot of them,
he thought hopefully.
Not near as many are flying away as came in against us. But they hit us hard,
he realized, sobering. Columns of smoke rose from seven ships that he could see, and whichever DD hadn't been destroyed outright in the north was now fully aflame.
Probably really ganged up on them, since they were closest,
he thought grimly.
Finir-Pel and Mertz. Both gone
. He didn't have time to contemplate all the friends he'd just lost. He shifted his gaze. Admiral Hibbs's ships of the line had suffered too; a couple smoking, one afire and lagging now. . . .
Looks like one of the antiair DDs is dead in the water. . . .

“Cap-i-taan,” Gaal said, joining him now that others had taken charge of the unexploded bomb. His tone was more formal than Ruik had ever heard it sound. “From
Mars
, sur: ‘Large Dom Fleet sighted, bearing zero two zero. No numbers, sur. Just ‘large.'”

Ruik glanced up at his own lookouts. Most in the maintop were dead or wounded, just now being brought down. The lookouts in the foremast hadn't raised an alarm. He trained his glass on Gaal's bearing but couldn't see anything. Too dark now.
Mars
had much taller masts, however, and her lookouts would have the advantage. They might've even seen the enemy ships signaling one another—or their returning Grikbirds. “Our orders?” he asked.

“
Achilles
and
Tindal
are undamaged and now closest to the contact. They'll try to close with and shadow the enemy, discover its disposition,
and pass their observations to the flag. We are to close with the battle line and prepare for a night fleet action.”

Ruik nodded. Of course. How easy it had sounded when they set out: “Find out what the enemy is doing at El Paso del Fuego. If you run into more than you can handle, retire back to the rest of the fleet.” But how many ships had been crippled in the Grikbird attack? How many
could
retire? He took a deep breath. “Aacknowledge.” He gestured at the 'Cats gathered around the bomb, gently shifting it to a large, padded pass box. “And find out what makes that daamn thing tick. Take it apart in the launch, towing behind us if you have to, but I want to know if it represents as big a jump in Dom ordnance as I'm afraid it does, and if we'll be facing exploding shot from their great guns by morning.”