by Peter Albano
Cheers and “Banzai!” The old admiral focused his black eyes on Mark Allen. “I know the Arab squadrons may not be on board Mabruk and Al Hamra.” A blow of tiny knuckles on the chart punctuated the sentence. He swept the pointer over western Asia. “They can be in bases here and here in China, Korea, Indo-China.” Shrugging, he turned back to a dozen expectant faces. “But remember — all of you remember this, we will not wait in Tokyo Bay for the enemy to come to us. Yonaga is an offensive weapon and must be used in that spirit.”
“But not foolishly, sir,” Allen dared.
Brent expected an explosion. Instead, Fujita’s tone was well controlled. “That is my determination, Admiral.” Allen bit his lip but remained silent. Fujita continued, “Remember, they dared kidnap our Prince Akihito, bomb Yonaga in the bay. And one of them crashed a few meters from the Imperial Palace. We cannot tolerate these affronts — these threats to our sacred Imperial line. It is the samurai’s way to seek out and attack the enemy — savor his vengeance.” He thumped the pointer on the deck. “Admiral Allen, do you remember how Yonaga’s sister, Yamato, died?”
“Yes, sir. I commanded Bunker Hilts air groups that attacked her south of Kyushu.”
The Executive Officer, Commander Mitake Arai, broke his silence. “I remember, Admiral Fujita. I was there, commanding destroyer Rikokaze.”
Fujita gestured, Arai stood. He stared over the dozen expectant faces to another place, another time. “Her death was magnificent,” he said softly. “It was early April, Nine-teen-forty-five. Enemy aircraft ranged freely over all of Japan. We could not allow Yamato to die ignominiously at anchor, hiding like a cowardly ronin in the Inland Sea.” The moist black eyes dropped down to the upturned faces. Brent squirmed uneasily, Mark Allen sat erect, transported back. “Enemy forces had landed on Okinawa. Yamato was given enough fuel to reach Okinawa — no more. She was to beach herself, use her four-hundred-sixty-millimeter guns to blast the invaders off the island.”
Mark Allen interrupted, “She never made it.”
“No.” Arai’s eyes flashed angrily. “We were attacked by hundreds of aircraft. She was sunk — we were sunk. Three thousand of Yamato's crew died.”
Lieutenant Daizo Saiki leaped to his feet. “Their spirits surely found eternity in the Yasakuni Shrine,” he shouted, waving his pince-nez.
“Banzai! Banzai!” echoed through the room. Leaning across the table, Commander Tashiro Okuma waved a fist in Brent’s face.
Angrily, Brent slapped the fist away. “Don’t you ever wave a fist at me,” the American lieutenant spat through the noise.
Sullenly and with anger burning deep in his eyes, the torpedo bomber commander hunched forward in his chair. “We will settle this someday, Lieutenant,” he muttered, seething with rage.
“Indeed we will,” Brent hissed, eyes never wavering from Okuma’s.
Mark Allen shouted over the hubbub, “Sir, am I to understand you plan on losing Yonaga on this mission?”
The question brought an apprehensive silence. All eyes turned to Admiral Fujita. The little Oriental drew himself up and his voice came from deep in his chest as if his soul were crying out, “No! Never!” He calmed himself with an effort. “But understand this, Admiral Allen, if and when Yonaga dies, it will be gloriously, locked with her enemies in battle on the high seas — not hiding in some wretched inlet covered with camouflage netting.” He stepped close to the table, placed his hand on the Hagakure and quoted it, “‘When the moment of death is perceived, it is best to die quickly. There is nothing else worth recording.’” More cheers and shouts of “Banzai”.
The old man waited quietly until silence returned. He turned to Colonel Bernstein, “Colonel, do you have any word on the Arab landing force?”
Shaking his head, the Israeli answered. “No, sir. Nothing new. The troop-carrying Zulus and the two transports left Tripoli and Benghazi thirteen days ago along with four destroyers, as I have reported to you. Our operatives have not seen a single officer of the Fifth Special Combat Battalion or the Seventh Parachute Brigade in their usual bordellos. The Libyan papers hint at maneuvers in the Indian Ocean.”
Fujita tugged on the single hair hanging from his chin with a thumb and forefinger. “Lies.”
“They’re Arabs, sir,” Bernstein answered simply.
“Bait us with the transports, take us from the rear with the carriers and make a landing somewhere in the western Pacific — somewhere near enough to Japan for a bombing offensive with their new long-range aircraft,” Fujita mused, staring at the chart. “Certainly, these things are possible.” Silence while everyone stared at the chart. Fujita turned slowly, “Remember, forethink if you are to foretell,” he said. “You may return to your duties.” The officers rose as one.
As Yoshi Matsuhara exited, Brent took his arm. “A word with you Yoshi-san?” he asked.
The aviator gestured toward his cabin.
“You still seek death, Yoshi-san?” Brent asked from his chair, watching Matsuhara across the flyer’s desk.
“I carry Kimio’s death on my shoulders. The burden is breaking my back.”
“And mine, too.”
The aviator smiled humorlessly. “You are talking like a samurai, again, Brent-san.”
“You have much to live for”
Yoshi raised his eyebrow. “For what? My family is dead. Kimio had become all that I had lost.”
“I led us into the trap. If there is repentance — honor to be redeemed — it is my charge, not yours, Yoshi-san.”
“It is not a question of repentance and honor.”
“You said the weight of her death was breaking your back.”
“True, Brent-san. But I must decide if existence in this mortal cloak,” he ran a hand over his chest, “is tolerable.”
Brent tapped his temple with a closed fist. “You have served the Son of Heaven well. Your karma should be powerful and nirvana within your grasp.” He dropped the fist to the desk, rubbed his knuckles on the oak restlessly. “Existence is suffering.”
“Yes. I have studied Buddha’s words.”
Brent bored on, “If a warrior carries loyalty and filial piety on one shoulder and courage and compassion on the other, and does this for twenty-four hours a day until his shoulders wear out, he will be a samurai.”
The Japanese smiled wryly. “The Hagakure. Sacred Buddha, sometimes you are more Japanese than I.”
“You agree, Yoshi-san, the good samurai can carry loads that would destroy lesser men and he will grow from his suffering?”
The Japanese sighed. “Brent-san, you missed your calling.”
“My calling?”
For the first time in six days Yoshi Matsuhara smiled. “You should have been a lawyer — a Japanese lawyer.”
“Then you agree?”
The pilot sagged in his chair. “We must all pursue our own fates, Brent-san. Perhaps I cannot die with my head to the north…”
“As Buddha.”
“Yes, Brent-san, but I will choose my own place and time and it will not just be another death — a cipher on a casualty list.”
“No?”
“No, Brent-san. It will be an act of purification”
“The purification of fire?”
“Perhaps.”
“I will join you, Yoshi-san.”
The flyer dropped both hands on the table in a hopeless gesture. “Don’t say that, Brent-san.”
“It is only right. If you are dishonored, so am I.”
Yoshi clenched his jaw in a tight line. “Your mind is a vice,” he said, staring into the hard blue eyes.
A knock took the flyer to the door. Lieutenant Taku Ishikawa was standing in the passageway. Yoshi beckoned him to a chair and the three men sat. Ill at ease, Ishikawa fidgeted and had trouble placing his hands comfortably. He spoke to Yoshi with a formal ring to his voice, “All of my fighters are ready, Commander. But many of our new pilots are green and need much training.”
Every man on the ship knew this. Brent knew I
shikawa had another purpose in mind. Yoshi continued the charade with a voice matching Taku’s formality. “Yes,” he said solemnly. “We will run them through gunnery and tactics drills at every opportunity. But, unfortunately, their training may come at the hands of Oberst Johannes Friessner and his squadron.”
Ishikawa sighed and shook his head. “They are not ready.”
“I know. We have no choice, Lieutenant.”
Ishikawa nodded and shifted his eyes uneasily to Brent Ross. Here it comes, Brent thought. “I have not discussed that incident in the sick bay with you,” the Japanese flyer said.
“You mean with Captain Kenneth Rosencrance?”
“Yes. You expect me to thank you, Mister Ross?”
“I expect nothing.”
“The fight was mine — mine to win or lose, mine to finish.”
“I would not dispute that, Lieutenant Ishikawa. I meant no dishonor. But remember, I have something of my own to settle with Rosencrance. I served myself.” Ishikawa turned to Yoshi Matsuhara. His eyes bulged and his jaw was hard and Brent knew the words he was about to utter would taste bitter on his lips. “You did not answer me when I admitted before the staff that I had condemned you too soon — too harshly after our combat with Friessner and his killers over Tokyo.”
“There was nothing to say. Only a fool wastes words.”
“I explained, but I did not apologize.”
“Of course.”
The fighter leader tapped his knee with a closed fist. “I am a better pilot than you, Commander Matsuhara.”
“There is a way to find out, Lieutenant.”
“When this is over?” Ishikawa waved a hand over his head. “Up there — just the two of us.”
“It has been a long time coming.”
“Since Tsuchiura, Commander.” Ishkawa fixed Matsuhara with a stare that flashed like electricity. “Live ammunition?”
“Yes.” Yoshi shifted his eyes to Brent Ross. “You think this is irrational?”
“Yes. It doesn’t make much sense.”
“Because we would duel to the death in the skies?”
“No. Because you would wait, when you could settle this thing now, with knives, in the Shrine of Infinite Salvation.”
The two flyers looked at each other. Yoshi spoke for both. “A worthy suggestion. But our way is in the sky. That is where it began and that is where it will end.” Ishikawa nodded his agreement and for the first time since Brent had known him, he saw the lieutenant smile.
*
By 0800 the next morning, the task force was one hundred miles south of Shikoku’s Point Muroto Zaki. Troubled by his conversation with Yoshi and Taku Ishikawa and unable to sleep, Brent was on the bridge at dawn when the growing light snuffed out the stars and the phosphorescent sea swirled in Yonaga's wake like a host of sea kamis bearing torches. Admiral Fujita was at his right elbow. Brent wondered if the old man ever slept.
Brent loved sunrise at sea. This morning was particularly spectacular, yet ominous, with the orb of the morning sun bleeding red on low lying clouds like a mortally wounded warrior. Overhead, the eggshell blue sky was clear, but to the west and south a buildup of cumulus clouds was gilded with theatrical flares of bright golds and silver by the slanting rays while high above cirrus reflected the growing light with the brilliance of an alpine snow field. Reflecting the sky, the sea was deep blue and smooth. “Better than Disneyland,” Brent whispered to himself.
“Better than what?” Fujita had asked.
“Ah, nothing, sir. Just a joke.”
Fujita muttered to himself and Brent pulled his glasses from the canvas bag.
The B5N scouts were gone by 0500 and the first Zero of the GAP took off at dawn. Flashing yellow-orange flame from its exhaust in the weak light, the white fighter had raced down the flight deck and clawed into the sky in a mere two hundred feet. Within four minutes, all six fighters were in the air and orbiting on the horizon. Then the training flights began. While Brent watched, a dozen fighters were lifted by the aft elevator and tied down from amidships aft, a crew chief in each cockpit, working controls and checking instruments. Casually, Yoshi Matsuhara and Taku Ishikawa appeared, walking across the flight deck trailed by ten pilots. All were dressed in brown flying suits with fur-lined helmets and swords. Every man carried a clipboard.
Matsuhara halted just in front of his fighter and called the group around him for final instructions. Talking animatedly, he gestured at the sky and waved his clipboard. Finally, with a shout of “Banzai!” the group dispersed and the pilots ran to their planes. The crew chiefs boosted themselves from the cockpits and stepped to the wings while the pilots slipped into the cramped compartments. Brent smiled, watching the crew chiefs fuss over their charges like old hens, assuring themselves the pilots were locked in, radios and oxygen lines plugged in and controls tested. Finally, satisfied that their pilots were secure and informed, the old chiefs dropped to the deck, taking positions in front of their aircraft and to the right of the propellers.
Fujita spoke to the talker and the command, “Start engines!” echoed through the PA system. Immediately, twelve new engines coughed and sputtered to life, propellers jerking and flashing silver-white in the morning sun as powerful Sakaes reverberated with their irregular volleys of cold cylinder heads, blue smoke ripped from the exhausts in tatters by the wind, airframes rocking despite tie downs and swarming handlers. Finally, with engines warm and the carrier turned into the wind, the yellow flag dropped and Matsuhara’s fighter, with its distinct red cowl and green hood of the air group commander, roared down the flight deck. With 1,700 horsepower pulling it, the little fighter fairly leaped into the sky. Quickly, the other Zeros followed and, within minutes, the twelve aircraft had formed into four sections of three and streaked into the great vault of blue overhead, avoiding the thunderhead to the south. Yonaga resumed its course.
Shading his eyes, Brent watched as the flight broke into two groups of six; one led by Matsuhara and the other by Ishikawa. Then the mock warfare began, first one group attacking and then the other. Always the Zeros flew in their “threes”, twisting, rolling, climbing and diving as one. Watching a particularly close attack by Matsuhara on Ishikawa, Brent was dazzled by the sun. Turning away, he suddenly saw Mayumi, a persistent warm-eyed vision with lips parted, head back, folds of hair tumbling to her waist. Wherever he turned, she was there, burned on his mind like the sun on his retinas, flashing after images. Sighing, he stared at the cool blue depths of the sea, shook his head like a man tortured by migraine. Fujita’s voice shocked him, “Sometimes it easier to fathom the depths of the Kyushu Deep than the mind of a woman.”
Stunned, the young American whirled. “I will not allow my personal affairs to interfere with my duties, sir.”
Brent heard a step behind him and there was a new presence on the bridge. “Permission to come on the bridge, sir,” was chorused by two little old men.
“Permission granted,” Fujita said.
Brent smiled when he saw the pair: original members of Yonaga’s crew, Lieutenant Yoshiro Takii was the pilot of the B5N Tora (Tiger) and Ensign Morisada Mochitsura his navigator. Although Takii was whitehaired and bent like a wind-racked shrub, he was a superb pilot whose half-century in the same cockpit had endowed him with automatic reactions and molded him to the aircraft as if the designer had drawn him into the blueprints.
Mochitsura was a wild-eyed man who had spent too many missions in an open cockpit, skin tanned by the sun like saddle leather and, sometimes, Brent suspected, it had addled his brain, too. The old navigator spoke in bursts as if his brain generated words faster than they could be spoken, spraying his syllables through a gap in his front teeth. Brent had flown with them — with Fujita’s reluctant approval — as gunner-observer in the Mediterranean and had shot down a DC-3 with the observer’s machine gun. To Takii and Mochitsura, Brent Ross had the eyes of an eagle and was the best shot in the world.
“You fly with us tomorrow, Brent-san,” Takii said.
“Admiral,” Brent said. “You gave your permission.”
“We need him, sir,” Mochitsura said, spraying the s of sir.
Wiping his cheek, the admiral pondered and Brent knew the uncanny memory was suffering one of its incongruous lapses. Fujita sighed. “All right, Lieutenant Ross.”
“Banzai!” the two old men shouted.
Mochitsura shook a fist at the sky, “Tomorrow we fly to the straits, the Sea of Japan, Korea. We will find the convoy and show those goat-eating Arab dogs the power of the samurai.” He tried to whip out his sword but a sudden roll bent his weak knees and he stumbled against the windscreen. Brent caught him with a single hand and pulled him erect.
“Please, Ensign, no swords on the bridge,” Fujita said curdy. He turned to Brent Ross, dark eyes glossed with moisture, “Remember, Lieutenant, a disciplined gunner uses his ammunition prudently. You only have eight hundred rounds. Lead your target and never fire at a range of over two hundred meters.”
“Aye, aye, sir. I understand, sir, and I will remember.”
Fujita turned back to the old men. “You are dismissed,” he snapped. Takii and Mochitsura snapped to attention, bowed and left. Brent could hear them singing and dancing as they walked down the passageway.
*
The next day the tension on Yonaga was palpable. Steaming south of Kyushu bows pointed north at the Korean Straits, everyone knew they were on a collision course with the Arab convoy and that the four ships might be sighted at any time. And every crewman knew Khadafy’s carriers were at sea and might be closing on Yonaga from the south. Anxiety was a hard thing found in every man’s shifting eyes, jerky speech and short temper.
At noon, wearing a fur-lined flight suit which was tight and uncomfortable, Brent walked across the flight deck following Lieutenant Yoshiro Takii and Ensign Morisada Mochitsura. Four Nakajima B5Ns, each equipped with three auxiliary fuel tanks, were tied down aft of the retracted barrier. Crew chiefs were seated in the pilots’ cockpits making their usual checks while six handlers stood by chocks and tie-downs. As the trio approached the lead aircraft, the crew chief pushed himself up out of the cockpit, stepped down to the wing and then slid to the deck. “Torn is ready, sir,” he said, saluting Takii.