Taylor Anderson: Firestorm

Smoke gushed, choking Greg and Saaran on the quarterdeck until it passed. Smitty was gone, directing his guns. There was a momentous writhing splash to port, accompanied by a deep, bass, bone-tingling, moaning roar. The splash launched a wave large enough to heave the ship on her beam ends, and they saw the mighty flukes of the titanic monster rise in the air.

“Y guns!” came Smitty’s roar from forward, calling on the crews of the mortarlike contrivances that launched “depth charges.” They were the primary, most effective aspect of the AMF-DiC system. They weren’t necessarily meant to harm a mountain fish, but the acoustic assault they created was known to discourage the mammoth creatures. “Drop them a hundred yards off the port beam!” Smitty directed.

Greg turned aft. Depth charges!” he cried. “Set depth for one hundred feet! Roll four!” There were several, staggered whumps; two from the fo’c’sle, and two just behind Garrett on the quarterdeck. Heavy kegs vaulted skyward, almost straight up it seemed. Shortly after, four more kegs rolled into the sea aft, from racks piercing the taffrail. It was at times like this-virtually the only times anymore-that Garrett wished his ship had engines. Certainly, he’d love to be able to flee from a mountain fish, but he wanted to get the hell away from the depth charges they’d just dropped even more. They could break Donaghey’ s back if she wasn’t far enough away. Fortunately, the wind was in her favor. He stared at the great fish. You could never predict how they’d react. The bombs usually scared them away, but cannon fire-especially if it hit-sometimes caused the monsters to go amok and attack whatever shot at them.

Oddly, the huge beast was just lying there, wallowing in the swells like a dead whale surrounded by a school of dolphins. He’d never seen that reaction before. The bombs from the Y guns splashed down about half the distance to the fish. Breathlessly, those around Garrett waited. The Y gun bombs would detonate at thirty feet-probably at about the same time the depth charges blew. Tolson had surely fired her Y guns as well, hopefully in a pattern complementing theirs. The timbers of the ship shuddered again, and the sea around the mountain fish and in Donaghey‘ s wake spalled like cooked flint. With a mighty convulsion of foam and smoke, the waves contorted into an inverted cataract of spume. Despite their fear, Donaghey’ s crew gave an exultant cheer as water rained down on them-along with countless flashies, pieces of flashies, and a ten-foot-long gri-kakka flipper that nearly crushed a ’Cat gunner.

Garrett wiped the lenses of his binoculars with his shirtsleeve, then stared through them again. “Now I’ve seen everything,” he said incredulously. Despite the cannon fire and depth charges, the mountain fish hadn’t moved. It hadn’t dived or swum away, or even attacked. It hadn’t done anything. He looked at Saaran. “Say, you don’t suppose it’s dead?” He looked back at the fish. “You know, I think it’s dead! Smitty!” he yelled. “Get up here, you ball-headed Kraut! Your willy-nilly broadside found a weak spot and killed the damn thing!”

Smitty arrived amid enthusiastic cheering, grinning ear to ear. “I just wish I knew which gun did the trick-and where it was aimed!” There was a roar of laughter and stamping feet.

“It might have been fire from Tolson,” Saaran reminded him. “Or the combined fire of both ships. It is said, however, that the inestimable Dennis Silva once killed such a creature with a single shot from a four-inch-fifty.”

“It was four shots!” Smitty denied. “I was there! One shot might’a killed it, but he shot that big empty forehead hump three times first!”

Garrett patted Smitty on the shoulder, then looked back at the gathered Grik ships, now off the starboard quarter. The broadside they’d fired into the gaggle had left it even more disarrayed. He raised his glasses. “Helm,” he called. “Mr. Saaran, we’ll come about and finish that mob. Prepare to wear ship!” The Grik were no longer flinging gobbets of meat over the side, and the swarm of feeding fish, those not killed by the depth charges, were beginning to abandon them for the mountain of bleeding meat floating nearby. Now, most of the Grik in view, furry, upright, vicious-looking crosses between an emu and a komodo, just stood there, staring sullenly. Their plan, clearly to break the blockade by destroying Garrett’s entire squadron at one act, hadn’t workedand he was suddenly stunned that the Grik had been capable of conjuring such a scheme, not to mention implementing it. Grik always seemed ready to attack with everything they had, or flee with equal abandon. To design a plan that called on them-even Hij-to cold-bloodedly, calculatingly, sacrifice themselves for others of their kind was so utterly alien to anything they’d come to expect from their foe, it was still difficult to imagine. There was no doubt they’d deliberately lured the mountain fish, hoping it would destroy all of Garrett’s ships. They had to know it would destroy them as well. Damn.

Donaghey had come about, steering to bring her port broadside to bear on the bows of the enemy where they were linked together. Tolson was preparing to pummel the north side of the confused raft of ships. At just over one hundred yards, Garrett opened his mouth to give the command to fire. He never had a chance. With a cataclysmic eruption of fire, shattered debris, and a massive, towering mushroom of dirty white smoke, all eight Grik ships simultaneously blew themselves up.

Greg Garrett opened his eyes to see Clancy’s fuzzy, worried face hovering near. Greg was totally disoriented, and it took him several moments to figure out where he was. He decided he must be lying on his back somewhere on the quarterdeck, but looking up, he couldn’t see the sails, yards, or the spiderweb of cordage that should have been overhead. That con- fused him even more. Clancy’s mouth was moving, but at first Greg couldn’t understand anything he said. There was only an all-encompassing, high-pitched buzz, with a kind of muffled warbling creeping in around the edges. He stared hard at Clancy and began to realize part of the warbling sound was the communications officer calling his name. He shook his head, trying to clear it, and propped himself up on his elbows.

His vision was clearing, and other sounds began penetrating the incessant noise inside his head. He commenced a rapid inventory of all the new aches and pains he felt, but decided nothing was broken. Looking at himself, he saw that he was spattered with blood, but except for a few small tears in his clothing, he thought he must be okay. Most of the blood had to be somebody else’s. He suddenly realized the sky was empty because the mainmast had snapped off just below the top, taking the main yard and everything above over the side. Tangled stays and shrouds stretched taut across the deck, and the bulwarks on either side were smashed. Even as he watched, bloodied, disheveled Lemurian sailors hacked at cables, and each one parted with a sound like a rifle shot. The ship beneath him wallowed uncomfortably in the uneven swells, and there was a great grinding, pounding in the fibers of the deck from the shattered mast working alongside.

Glancing farther forward, he saw that the foremast was gone completely, snapped off at the deck of the forecastle, and its remains had already been cleared away. Looking around with increased urgency, he realized that only the bowsprit and mizzenmast still stood intact. A great many bodies lay scattered on deck, some moving, others not, and the pitiful cries of the wounded began to seep through the ringing buzz. The surgeon was on deck, along with Marine corpsmen and pharmacist’s mates, moving from one prone figure to the next. Some they quickly inspected before moving on, and others they had carried below to the wardroom. What had been a taut, beautiful, well-run ship had suddenly become a scene of devastation and chaos.