by Carlo Zen
“Ngh! Anti-mage counterattack detected! Anti-air disciplined fire incoming!”
“I’m picking up mages! Damn it! We’ve got marine mages incoming!”
Her talented subordinates have an appropriate understanding of the situation, so she isn’t actually very worried. But any commander asking their subordinates to act in a situation they haven’t been trained to handle has to at least acknowledge their right to scowl.
“All hands, engage at will! Follow your company commander’s lead!”
As long as they are receiving an organized interception, it has to be dealt with, but she decides that rather than trying to control an entire battalion in the dark, it’s better to let each company operate individually. We have to regain some degree of discipline and get out of here!
“Visibility is poor. Don’t lose your depth perception! The air is dense, but don’t forget we’re over the sea! Take the humidity from the water into account. Our opponents are used to it! Maintain your altitude!”
The lower companies, Second and Third, seem to be in good positions. First and Fourth were on guard above, so they have some leeway in terms of their altitude. And as long as I’m personally commanding First Company, I want to push all the dangerous stuff onto Fourth. She makes some quick calculations and decides to adjust some things.
“Ngh, draw the mages away from the ships! Second and Third Companies, you’re the vanguard! Keep those mages busy!”
Marine mages are a threat to aerial mages. It goes without saying that exposing myself to anti–air fire and enemy mages isn’t a hobby of mine. Even the majority of my war-crazy subordinates probably aren’t into it. We’d all like to avoid working in dangerous areas.
“Fourth Company, guard the rear. Help Second and Third withdraw. A shoot-out with the ships is out of the question.”
Really, I want Fourth Company as my shield, but that’s too much to ask for.
In that case, increasing the number of decoys will probably get me the best results. From the enemy’s point of view, it must be easier to target the entire battalion.
“First Company, lament your misfortune—or sob with joy at your opportunity to earn commendations! Rejoice, for it is we who will harass the ships! Follow me!”
I’ll have my underlings do the dangerous counter-mage warfare, and I’ll mess with the boats.
““““Understood!””””
“Plunging into the fleet is a bold move! Allow us to be the vanguard!”
The elated personnel of my company volunteer, but it won’t do for me to follow their suggestion.
“Sorry, the commander leads the way. Get back.”
This is the only time believing that commanders should lead the way is useful. Don’t get me wrong, it’s not like I want to expose myself to enemy fire. Nobody with common sense wants to be out front charging into a hail of bullets.
But that’s an amateur’s calculation. Of course, I don’t want to do it, but since I know it’s the safer option, I choose it without hesitation. Reason trumps fear.
To explain it simply, most of the bullets aimed at the leader of a pack will end up hitting the people behind them.
In a little more detail, with deflection shooting, if they open fire assuming I’m coming in at two hundred fifty, all I have to do is approach at three hundred. The difference will keep me safe in the lead. But what about the ones behind me? Yes, the enemy will correct their deflection to my speed, and it’s the ones who follow who will rush straight into that.
Also, when moving away after the attack, it goes without saying that I’d rather have a shield behind me. Our eyes are in the front of our heads.
The more you think about it, the more dangerous the rear starts to sound.
In other words, being the bold commander out front is the safer policy. It’s said that in war, whether you survive or not is determined by how cowardly you can be. I’m a coward, so I want to calmly maneuver myself into a safe position.
“Follow me. I say again, follow me.”
For the moment, I look for a ship that isn’t firing so heavily.
I don’t even have to stop and think to know that only war junkies want to get up close and personal with the dense anti–air fire of cruisers or battle cruisers. You can see it in war videos or special reports. The anti-aircraft fire density of American ships was nine parts bullets to one part sky. I would practically despair just watching.
I don’t care how strong mages’ defensive shells are—I am absolutely not flying into a 127 mm high-angle gunshot.
This is a night battle, but even if we can expect some help from the cover of darkness, it’s too dangerous to aim at one of the big ships known for anti–air fire.
Of course, the sensible way to do this is to attack a destroyer. In war, picking on the weak is justice. Hooray, justice.
“…Ah. Is that a destroyer? Well, whatever it is, let’s get it!”
I can’t really tell because it’s dark, but there’s a turret firing at random, so I can make out the shape of the ship.
Considering there are no ships in consort, it must be an isolated destroyer?
In that case, we don’t have to worry about backup from other ships in the enemy fleet.
Based on that interpretation, we get into assault formation.
In order to dive all at once from forty-five hundred feet, we maintain the spindle shape and make minute adjustments to the angle of our assault.
“Gah! I’m hit! Heading back to base! No escort necessary.”
But I guess you can’t underestimate a destroyer. Just as we were about to strike, one of my men gets hit.
The main gun on a destroyer is 127 mm and can be effectively used for anti–air fire, so I reappraise the situation and decide we can’t take it lightly. My mage who got shot seems able to fly, well, fine. Still, he doesn’t look very good, so he has to drop out, I guess.
Since his mouth works, he’ll fly back to base on his own. There’s nothing else we can do for him. About the only thing we can do is hope he’s good bait.
“Go on, get outta here. Okay, everyone, prepare explosion formulas. Given a typical destroyer’s armor, we should be able to take it out if we aim for exposed depth charges or the torpedo tubes.”
Tanya’s able to instantly twist her body to evade a shot as she approaches, most certainly a result of her training. “Well, would you look at that? I can dodge them,” she murmurs. She makes a mental note that her unit probably needs additional training as she returns fire.
The ones firing off interceptor formulas from below must be Entente Alliance direct support. Since they’re a destroyer’s escort, there are probably only a few, but if they’re brave enough to come up here, they can’t be discounted.
Just as she’s thinking that, she seems to recognize one of the enemies, a mage who gave her a lot of trouble in the fjord. He looks an awful lot like that fanatically patriotic monster.
Maybe it’s a coincidence, but you can kill a lousy enemy with less guilt than a good one. In that sense, it’s a plus that this guy resembles a lousy one. It’ll be refreshing to shoot him.
She changes gears and turns her attention to how best to attack. A heavy explosion type would blow up a wide area, but she’d be a sitting duck while she’s using it. Out of the question. Shoot with her rifle? That probably wouldn’t even count as harassment. Rejected.
That’s when she realizes: A dive at this speed must have a ton of kinetic energy. All I have to do is literally assault him—with the sharp end of my rifle.
A fleeting intersection.
But Tanya’s bayonet, propelled at the speed of her dive, cuts through the Entente Alliance mage’s defensive shell and twists into him. A bayonet thrust by a mage going over four hundred knots is far more damaging than a lance charge from a medieval heavy cavalry member.
She jabs it in and, in satisfaction, watches the stunned face of the enemy soldier, who seems hardly able to believe something is piercing his abdomen, but when she tries t
o pull her bayonet out, she frowns slightly because it seems to have gone too far in and gotten stuck. Even the barrel is sticking into him, and Tanya struggles a bit to remove it.
“M…Mar…”
The enemy soldier, murmuring something that’s not even a word, is fatally wounded. Geez, what’s that about? she thinks, when she realizes he’s groping at the air, trying as hard as he can to bring his writhing right arm around to the submachine gun on his back. So she decides to make a trade.
“Auf Wiedersehen.” She murmurs the curt farewell with a smile. I admire him for his unexpected stubbornness, but I don’t have time to go along with his futile resistance—I have to hurry on ahead. Shoving his right arm out of the way, she steals the submachine gun. Then she kicks the corpse away, already pushing it out of her mind, and takes a quick look at the weapon she’s acquired.
It’s a standard submachine gun. But oddly enough, it accepts imperial magic bullets. How nice, this trophy will prove unexpectedly useful. A Christmas present to myself. Anyhow. Tanya smiles at her clear path, feeling quite refreshed, and murmurs, “Now there’s nothing in my way.”
Yes, she’s literally kicked the obstacles out of her path. All that’s left is to evade the ship’s wimpy anti–air fire, strike her blow, and disappear under the veil of night.
That said, war is a gentlemanly fight for survival wherein one must be the first to do what the enemy hates. And as a civilized individual with an education, Tanya will not use her pretty hands for a sophisticated game of cricket;12 she understands the need to unhesitatingly kick the enemy’s ass.
This situation demands the enemy’s intentions be thwarted.
So what is the best way to bully them?
It’s simple. The enemy fleet is currently being pestered by submarines, so they have to take counter-sub measures. If I use an explosion formula with short activation time and get either the ship’s depth charges or their torpedoes to blow in a secondary explosion, this thing will go down easily.
Those torpedoes can be used against even a battleship. If I can get them to explode, the destroyer won’t stand a chance. If I concentrate my attack on the stern, even with low expectations, there’s a possibility of speed reduction and rudder damage, too. And if it dumps the torpedoes to avoid the danger of secondary explosions, the destroyer’s ability to counter the submarines will definitely take a dive.
Not so much risk on my end. This is perfect.
“There’s no law that says a mage can’t sink a ship. I’m gonna rock this!”
“We drew off the mages! Holding them at a distance now!”
And the one thing I was worried about, the marine mages, had been pulled away right on schedule. They made it extremely easy by dropping their altitude to work on the subs. Now I should be able to dive without worrying about being attacked from above like an idiot. And I’m nominally here to harass them, so this is too perfect.
“Good. Keep them far enough away that they can’t support the ships.”
“““Roger!”””
It’ll probably be difficult to hold them until our fleet can get here, but they’ll surely be rewarded for hastening the enemy’s attrition. After all, we already did a great job by locating the enemy fleet, and we’re even coordinating with our submarines, though that was rather sudden. All I have to do is report to the brass that we did all we could with a split-second decision.
The best thing to do right now is give the enemy one good hit and RTB.13 Fighting the ships is a secondary objective.
If we return fire, I figure our part of the search and destroy mission is accomplished. Destroying the Entente Alliance ships is the Northern Sea Fleet’s job.
“Okay, First Company, if you don’t want to be called a bunch of no-achievement knuckleheads, it’s time to go to work.”
We begin accelerating again to dive. Unlike air-to-ground attacks, the humidity from the water makes this descent uncomfortable. But we’re also in the rain. As expected, the intercepting shots can’t catch me, and they fly past.
Unless the enemy are hopelessly incompetent, the rest of the company behind me is in danger. Using your subordinates as bait to survive and climb the ladder is a constant in a corporate setting and the military.
“…All hands, deploy your formulas!”
That said, to my happy miscalculation, no one has dropped out. Considering it’s a destroyer, maybe the last guy who got hit was a fluke? That would make sense.
The company efficiently deploys their formulas. The concentrated attacks fly one after another toward the stern of the ship.
“This is Fourth Company with an impact report. The enemy ship seems unharmed.”
After confirming impact, I pull up sharply to get out of there. Even if my subordinates are acting as a shield behind me, human flesh is fragile; their presence is enough to ease my mind somewhat, but I still move at full speed.
Only an idiot gets shot down while hanging out observing the results of their attack. A unit spotting from a distance reports the outcome.
And according to Fourth Company, regrettably, the ship is apparently fine. I knew already since there wasn’t a secondary explosion, but it’s still disappointing. All we do now is hope is that they’ve jettisoned their torpedoes.
“Good enough! We achieved our aim of throwing them into confusion! Let’s get out of here!”
Following the swiftly withdrawing First Company, the other three also begin to move away, keeping the marine mages in check as they go.
In order to get out of there all at once, I pull us into return formation as fast as possible. Well, we didn’t do so badly.
We failed to take out the marine mages, but the strategic win of locating the enemy can’t be ignored. Basically, any further combat would just wear us down without gaining anything. We should let our fleet get some of the credit here.
“How did we do?”
“Six mages down and probably moderate damage to an unknown ship. For a destroyer, it’s moving pretty slowly. Its engine must be hurting. If we’re lucky, the submarines will confirm. What’s our damage?”
“We also have six with serious injuries and a bunch with scrapes.”
Anyhow, no one died. That’s a blessing in this curse. If we had been up against an American ship, there would probably be heaps of corpses…
Taking a look at the actual damage, it’s not as bad as I expected. Considering we were up against a destroyer, we could have come out far worse. I’m kind of glad VT fuses14 aren’t unleashing their fury yet.
“…We basically lost. How can we show our faces back at base?”
But the mood is heavy because we weren’t able to deal much damage. The lack of secondary explosion could mean that they had already used up their depth charges, but still… That’s probably wishful thinking, Tanya laments.
“But if we encountered the enemy in these waters…they’re advancing too quickly!”
“Major, if you’ll forgive me…considering the speed of a destroyer…”
“Yeah, you’re right. It’s possible. Still, I can’t believe we missed our chance to take out a destroyer…”
All Tanya can do is bemoan the unexpected encounter. In other words, she wasn’t prepared. It was possible for the Entente Alliance ships to be moving faster than the estimate she’d been given if they had a group of faster than average ships.
And for just a quick destroyer…it was definitely possible.
Calling it unexpected was basically a confession of incompetence.
“It’s possible, but…what about the enemy coastal defense ship…? This is going to give me a headache.”
Still, the fact that a superior was wrong is no small matter. Well, the fleet coming after us has a powerful attack in store. This probably won’t be viewed as that much of a problem. After all, to our fleet of powerful ships, a destroyer is easy prey.
At this point, it’s more constructive to think about the damage my unit has taken and apply for their retraining and rest periods.
>
Thinking it nearly makes her crack a smile. Of course, I have plenty of experience controlling myself and faking a sorrowful expression. Nah, I should be genuinely sad. The damage to the unit I spent my time training really gets me down.
“Mages were able to hold their own against an enemy battleship. That’s a fine achievement.”
“We’ll leave the rest up to our friends. Back to base!”
We accomplished our mission, Tanya consoles herself, biting back a sigh, and orders her soldier with the long-range wireless set to radio Command. After a few coded exchanges, Tanya is told she’s gotten through, so she takes the receiver and gives a straightforward summary of the situation.
“Pixie 01 to Urban Control. That’s it for my report.”
“Urban Control, roger. We’ll take care of it. Can you stay on the enemy?”
The enemy fleet is several ships, including a battleship. They’re on a course heading north. They’ve had contact with our submarines. When I promptly gave Command coordinate data and the details of their speed, they asked us to pursue.
“With all due respect, we’ve been flying patrol for hours and can’t take much more fatigue. Is it possible to spare us further anti-ship combat while we’re flying with wounded men?”
“Understood. I’ve made arrangements for you to land at the nearest base. Wishing you a safe return.”
“Thanks. Over.”
To Tanya, all she had done was say indirectly that she wanted to go home. The controller probably hadn’t been expecting much when he asked. She had no problems getting permission to return to base.
But Tanya doesn’t know that on the way to the nearby base the controller was considerate enough to get them accommodated at, she’s about to have a rather lovely run-in.
IMPERIAL ARMY NORTHERN PATROL AIRSPACE, B-47
Magic Major Tanya von Degurechaff is the most senior officer in the airspace at the moment. And the senior officer has to make a decision at one point or another. That’s why they’re given the responsibility and authority. And the decision, when it comes down to it, will be whatever they believe is the best thing to do.