John Schettler - Devil's Garden

“Yes, well have them answer my question, and be quick about it.”

The seconds passed as Chekov first told Nikolin what to send in characters, and it was tapped out on the telegraph set.

“They say they are the Tatsu Maru and behind them is Kanto Maru , both bound for Dalian and carrying rice and soy, sir.”

“Dalian? Isn’t that on the coast of the Yellow Sea?” Karpov went to his Plexiglas map and noted the position, seeing that it was just north of the old Port Arthur. “So this is a supply ship bound for territories lately seized by the Japanese-territories that were formerly controlled by Russia, I might add. How very interesting. Well, tell them they are to reverse course and make for the nearest Japanese port. No Japanese ship is authorized to enter the Yellow Sea from this day forward.”

Nikolin gave the Captain a wide eyed look, but then quickly began to piece together a message with Chekov. It was some time before they got a response. “They want to know who we are, sir?” Nikolin adjusted his headset, a little nervous now, as he could almost predict how these events would transpire.

“Send that we are the Russian battlecruiser Kirov . Send it in International Morse code and they are to respond in kind.”

Again there was a very long pause, and Nikolin could hear that the ship was also tapping another signal to any nearby shore station to indicate they were in contact with a Russian vessel.

They can see us now, thought Karpov. Good… Let them have a good long look. He even came a few points to starboard to present the full profile of the ship, and display its massive silhouette. Nikolin reported what the Japanese were saying to shore: Large ship sighted. Russian colors. Ship of war.

“Well?” Karpov’s impatience was obvious now. “What do they reply?”

“Still waiting, Captain.”

Karpov could see the steamer making a turn, away from Kirov but still obviously heading for the Sea of Japan. “Tell them they are to assume a course of 090 degrees east and return to Japan at once.”

Even as Nikolin sent that instruction, Chekov was translating the last signal from the Japanese, still truculently in Kana code in spite of Karpov’s order to the contrary. He passed the information to Nikolin as he finished sending. They received only four characters, which Chekov had translated as: “sa-yo-na-ra.”

“They say goodbye, sir. That is all.”

Karpov just looked at him, somewhat perturbed. “Goodbye? Nothing more?”

“Still waiting, Captain.”

“Well, perhaps I can hurry them along,” said Karpov, this time turning to Samsonov. “Activate the 100mm bow gun,” he said tersely.

“Aye, sir,” said Samsonov. “Gun ready!”

Karpov watched the forward turret quickly rotate to bear on the steamer. Mounted right out on the bow of the ship, it had been moved there during Kirov’s redesign to allow for the installation of the larger 152mm twin batteries behind the main missile deck silos. The bow gun was a single cannon, a 100 mm/L60 DP gun from the original battlecruiser Kirov that was retained in the refit. As he watched the turret smartly turn Karpov passed a fleeting moment thinking that this could be the first round of the war that would change all future history from this point forward, his private war on history itself, to redress the wrongdoing of so many nations who had opposed Russian ambitions and curtailed his country’s rightful place here in the Pacific and the world. That would all change from the moment he gave the order to fire.

Then another memory suddenly returned to him like a haunting ghost. He recalled that brief moment on the quay at Vladivostok when Admiral Volsky had called to him from his car, just after they received word that the Chinese and Japanese were fighting one another over the Diaoyutai islands.

“…Do what you must,” the Admiral had told him. “But we both know that there is something much greater than the fate of the ship at stake now, something much bigger than our own lives. We are the only ones who know what is coming, Karpov, and fate will never forgive us if we fail her this time.”

He could still see the look in the Admiral’s eye as he slowly drew out his missile key, handing it off to Karpov-the same key the two men had struggled over in the North Atlantic. Volsky was handing him more than the power and responsibility that key represented. He was also handing him his hope for a future they might win together.

Another memory crowded in behind that image. It was the conversation he had with Sergeant Troyak soon after he had formally returned to the ship, mending fences with the indomitable Marine. He remember how he apologized for his behavior in opposing Volsky.

“Sergeant, I have come to apologize to you for what I did in the Atlantic; for the position I put you and your men in, trying to set you in opposition to the Admiral. I was a stupid fool. I should have been severely punished, and instead I was handed forgiveness. I am here to see if you might spare me a little as well.”

Troyak nodded gravely, and the Captain continued.

“I was wrong to do what I did, and I have only the Admiral’s grace to hold for the fact that I am standing here now and still wearing these stripes. I should be in the Brig, or worse, but Volsky gave me this chance and I am pledged to the service of this ship. I won’t let him down, or this crew down, ever again. Understand?”

I won’t let him down…ever again… The words seemed a searing brand on his face now, considering all that had happened since he left Vladivostok as nominal commander of the fleet. What had he accomplished? He engaged the Americans, first jousting verbally with Captain Tanner on the carrier Washington , then engaging that battlegroup in a brief, violent battle in the waters just south of the Kuriles. Who knows how it might have ended were it not for that Demon of a volcano that sent us careening into the past?

Then he had the temerity and headstrong will to confront the entire US Pacific fleet in 1945-eighteen carriers, six battleships, over twenty cruisers and ninety destroyers with more than three thousand aircraft at their disposal as well. What was he thinking? The hubris and arrogance he had demonstrated quickly led to the loss of the Admiral Golovko , and all hands aboard, and probably the loss of Orlan as well. What kind of commander was he in the end? Every time things came down to a decisive moment, he had reached for the overwhelming power of the nuclear warheads on the gleaming tips of his missiles.

Now the words he spoke to Sergeant Troyak that day seemed to lash at him. The Sergeant had given him his much needed absolution, and pledged his support.

“You can rely on me, sir.”

“Yes…But I think that will be the easy part for us, Sergeant Troyak. When it comes to a fight we will know what to do easily enough. Yet we have both seen what was left of the world on one black day after another. Something tells me we are steering a course that way even as we speak. I don’t know how yet, or what we can do about it. I once thought that if I could just get the ship home safely it would be enough, but there is something more in front of us now. We may be called to war soon, but if we are ever to avoid that other world we saw, we’ll have to become something more, you and I. We’ll have to become men of peace as well.”

“I understand, sir….At least I think I do.”

“You are the business end of a platoon of highly trained men, Sergeant. But not every blow is struck to do harm. This is the only way I can think to understand it. Sometimes we fight to do some good, and we do what we must when it comes to battle. But Fedorov once told me to think also of what we should do, and this time I will keep his advice in my front shirt pocket, and heed it well.”