Garret and his friends had grumbled as Twitch had drilled them harder than any other gun crew on the ship. While the other gun crews had knocked off work and were smoking and eating ice cream, Twitch would only press his lips together, determined as an avalanche, and say, “Again, guys. We’re better than that.”
They had complained as he kept them up late, shaving off tenths of a second, wasted steps, even unnecessary bending and twisting as they loaded the gun.
Only now did Garret understand why Twitch had done it. Only now did Garret feel the pride that came with it. Down Kearsarge’s flank, the fire of the other guns was obviously poor. It was slow and unpredictable. Nancy fired twice as often, more accurately, and as regularly as that clockwork mechanism that hung in Garret’s mind.
Charlie, you ought to be here, buddy.
In their own small way, they had all become part of something bigger than themselves, and it was changing Garret’s attitude with every crank of the brass wheel. Running the gun was so precise, so perfect, and so necessary, that it gave Garret a challenge to aspire to, a standard to uphold, and a duty to regard above his own interests. Though he didn’t realize it, over the previous days, his duty and their teamwork was reshaping the way he regarded Molly and their baby. Regardless of what happened, Garret wouldn’t think of or treat his family the same way again. It was only the first shade of maturity, but it was real, and it was there to stay.
Pun’kin inserted the powder case and sidestepped. Theo slammed the breechblock, cranked it down and leaped clear. Then nothing happened. The break from their perfect cycle was so jarring that Garret felt as if he’d let go of a rock, but it had hung in the air instead of falling. He pulled himself away from his sight.
Fishy was out of his place in the system. Instead of being somewhere between the breech and the ammo hoist, he was standing behind Twitch. Velvet was gathering himself and his ramrod up off the deck where Fishy had just accidentally knocked him out flat. Twitch hadn’t pulled the trigger because Fishy was touching him on the shoulder. Procedure called for a double tap on Twitch’s right shoulder to halt the firing sequence. Instead, Fishy had a death grip on Twitch’s left, simply because it had been closer.
Twitch took a deep breath and exhaled. He slowly released his grip on the trigger and stepped off his platform. Garret followed Fishy and Twitch’s gaze. A hairline crack had appeared in Nancy’s barrel. It had snaked its way down the dorsal surface of the gun almost to the breech plug. Garret had no idea how Fishy had spotted it, but one thing was certain: if they’d fired Nancy again, she would have exploded. Fishy had caught Twitch a fraction of a second before they’d all blown themselves to pieces.
W
Andrew’s mouth was dry as sand. A last stand against the Audacious. Everyone acknowledged that dying was an inevitable part of living, but now that Andrew felt death looming over his head, when he tried to turn and look it in the face, it was as incomprehensible to him as the reaches of the ocean abyss.
Andrew had thought his captain couldn’t be defeated. Andrew, like a child, had thought that no matter what came, no matter how impossible the odds, his captain would become more, that he would defeat the giants, that he would defeat the sea monsters, that he would defeat the gods.
Now they were going to stand and fight. Andrew’s heart chilled and sank inside him. It would be a good death, worthy of a Navy commander. The crew though, they were young. Most just teenagers. They’d fought like men and obeyed crazy orders like men, and they hadn’t buckled, no matter how ridiculous the situation had become. Maxwell’s initial speech had indeed winnowed out the faint of heart.
“The crew,” Andrew said hoarsely. “No one will know that they did this.”
Maxwell didn’t take his eyes off of the Audacious as he guided Kearsarge in as tight a circle as possible. “I intend to live long enough to make sure they do,” Maxwell said.
The deep electrical whines ran through Kearsarge’s decks as both her turrets pivoted to broadside. Audacious’s turrets, all five of them, were doing the same less than a mile distant. So it would be four eight-incher’s and four thirteen-incher’s from the 1890’s, against ten modern thirteen point five’s. At least it would be over quickly.
Kearsarge’s starboard five inch guns continued staccato fire at Audacious. There was no harmony to Kearsarge’s fives. Their undertrained, short-handed gun crews were doing their best, and each gun fired when it was ready, plumes of smoke lancing randomly from Kearsarge’s sides. The shells probably weren’t doing more than irritating Audacious’s crew, punching holes in unarmored, nonessential areas.
Andrew was still counting in his head.
Twelve. Thirteen. Fourteen…
At last, Kearsarge and Audacious reached full flanking, and per Maxwell’s earlier orders, the eights began to cut loose again. Smoke rolled and fire spouted. Across a mile of open water, Andrew heard Audacious grunt as she was hit, and again.
Then came Kearsarge’s thirteens again, both the fore and aft turrets, underlining the eights with a wallop that pushed Kearsarge’s entire three hundred and seventy-five foot bulk sideways in the water. The smoke from the guns billowed out, completely hiding the ships from one another. Per orders, Sokolov had used the old brown powder, or “cocoa powder” as it used to be called. Kearsarge must have still had a bit left even after her refit. It made smoke so thick that was hard for younger sailors to believe.
Or in this case, it made a smoke screen. They had now come full broadside to Audacious, but Maxwell didn’t unwind the wheel as Andrew had expected. He continued to swing Kearsarge as hard as she could go.
We’re not breaking off… Oh God, Andrew thought. There was a plan, and at last Andrew grasped it. His heart stuttered.
The fake turn to port had been exactly that. A fake, just enough to get Audacious to commit to following them into the turn. Then Maxwell had ordered the flank guns to cut loose on Audacious, not expecting to do any harm, but merely for the distraction of the smoke and fire. At the same moment, he’d throttled back and gone starboard full rudder, beginning to swing Kearsarge as quickly as possible the other way. Audacious was a much longer ship. The longer the ship, the larger the turning radius. So even if Audacious had been expecting the switchback, she’d have been unable to keep up.
Momentarily tricking Audacious had shortened Kearsarge’s relative turning circle by at least two minutes, eliminating one of the two shots Audacious would have at them while Maxwell executed the rest of his maniacal plan. Maxwell had continued the turn as hard as possible, bringing them to proper broadside positions.
Broadside was exactly what Audacious’s Captain and crew would be expecting. Kearsarge was outmatched and now the storm cover was gone, so they would assume, just as Andrew had, that Maxwell was making his last stand, but he wasn’t.
Maxwell had ordered Sokolov to turn the turrets to full broadside, load them with brown powder, and fire when ready, hoping that the timing would be close enough to hide his true intent for a few moments longer. Andrew could only hope it would.
He gripped the rail, waiting. He wouldn’t know whether or not it worked until the smoke from the cocoa powder had cleared. No one would know. Maxwell had bet everything on that.
Veins were standing out in Maxwell’s neck. He continued to keep Kearsarge at full right rudder. Kearsarge couldn’t complete the full circle behind the cloud of course, but maybe she could come just far enough that by the time Audacious’s officers realized what was actually going on…
Andrew waited, blinded by the smoke, gripping the rail with his guts in knots. A few heartbeats later, Kearsarge’s knife-edge bow sliced through the brown cloud and into the clear. The Audacious still lay long and broad—now almost directly before them.
Andrew grinned like a fiend as fright and excitement seared his nerves. Maxwell’s last order, given several minutes ago, finally came into play. All engines, full ahead. Kearsarge churned the ocean like the Leviathan, enraged.
The inside of the citadel was still full of the clamor of shouting men, the clang of steel breech blocks being opened and closed, and the deafening booms of five inch gun fire. Curls of gun smoke wafted in the air. Each discharge was felt as a thump through the steel and wood, like the old battleship’s heartbeat, fast-paced with the stress of battle.
Around Nancy, however, the action was over. Garret and his friends stood with arms crossed, or leaning on each other’s shoulders, or leaning on their own knees to catch their breath. Several of them were wiping their eyes from the stinging gun smoke. Twitch had opened Nancy’s breech and had them unload her. Then he borrowed Burl’s gloves and inspected the inside of the searingly hot breech.
“This happened a few years back on Kearsarge,” Twitch said grimly. “That time it was all the way out the end of the gun, though. Just blew the muzzle off. These old five-inch-forties should be retired.”
“But what can we do?” Pun’kin burst in. His face and hands were covered with powder smoke residue. “We gotta help ‘em out!” He gestured down the citadel.
“We could split up and give them a hand at each gun,” Fishy suggested.
Twitch stood and reluctantly shook his head as the gun thunder continued. In between reports, he said, “They all have a system, however bad it might be. At this point, another set of hands would only be in the way.”
“We’ve got to do something,” Garret insisted, just as Chief Greely rounded the blast shield. He caught sight of the crack immediately.
Twitch held up his hands. “Nancy’s done, guys. That means we’re done. I’m sorry.”
“Listen to your gun captain,” Chief Greely said, and turned to continue down the deck.
Twitch had trailed off, but not because the Chief had interrupted them. Something out the gun port had caught his attention. Like the rest of them, his face was darkened with smoke and powder smears, but his eyes grew wide and white. Garret craned his neck to see what had caught Twitch’s attention. The sea continued to rotate before him as Kearsarge swung round. Oddly, it seemed she was passing full broadside, and quickly. Kearsarge’s turn was bringing the Audacious away from her starboard flank and to her starboard beam.
“Uh, Chief,” Twitch said.
Greely reappeared.
“What are we doing?” Fishy asked, watching Audacious continue to swing round towards Kearsarge’s bow. She was almost out of Nancy’s traverse range now. Over the water, they began to hear alarms going off on Audacious.
“Holy God,” Twitch breathed. “It didn’t even cross their minds how old the Kearsarge is, and Audacious’s turning circle’s huge. They’re too late.”
“Chief, what’s he talking about?” Fishy demanded of Chief Greely.
Greely looked grimly pleased, like a man who had just slit the throat of an annoying neighbor after fantasizing about it for years. “They thought ol’ Kearsarge was going to broadside and go down in a blaze of glory. Stick this in your pipe and smoke it, Jackies.”
“What?”
Greely took hold of a bulkhead as if bracing himself, but sent a sly smile over his shoulder at Velvet. “You never noticed how Kearsarge’s got a bone in her teeth, eh?”
Garret squinted at him in confusion.
“Bone in her…?” Curtis repeated.
“Her bow wave,” Twitch said impatiently, though still staring at Audacious. “He’s asking if you’ve ever noticed Kearsarge’s high bow wave, all the white foam to both sides, like a dog with a bone between its teeth. Only old ships like this one do that.”
Greely gave a demented smile that made Garret’s skin crawl. Whatever the hell was about to happen, it was revealing something in Greely that made Garret uncomfortable.
“They don’t build ships like this anymore, men,” Greely said proudly. He pointed out the port at Audacious. “See how that shiny new Brit’s stem just drops straight into the water? Kearsarge’s is swept forward as it goes down. She was one of the very last ships built that way.”
Somewhere aboard the Kearsarge, Garret had seen a side view diagram of the ship. Her prow did indeed sweep forward as it reached the water, and as it dropped below the water, it protruded into an enormous blade-like spur, solid steel the size of a small house.
“That’s impossible,” Velvet said, his voice high with panic. “The swells! The Captain’ll never time it right. He’ll sink both ships!”
That made a horrible amount of sense to Garret, but he didn’t panic. Well not completely anyway. A tiny thought held most of the panic at bay.
And yet… Maybe Captain Maxwell can do it.
It would be incredibly difficult. Only the most experienced wheelhand would have a prayer, but even Garret could feel the swells coming and going like clockwork, regular and repeatable. Furthermore, Audacious and Kearsarge were bobbing on them almost like boxers. The aim and the timing would be complicated, like one of those crazy looking math problems that Molly had tried to teach Garret, but then, Maxwell was equally crazy. Maybe, just for once, he was the right kind of crazy.
Greely stepped forward and took hold of a stanchion. “Kearsarge isn’t a ship, son,” he said to Velvet. “She’s a twenty-two million pound battering ram. You best get ahold of something.”
Andrew watched from the twisted and scorched flying bridge as Kearsarge charged the Audacious. Battleships never got close together on the ocean. Usually, one of them sank the other not long after they crested the horizon, sometimes even before.
Audacious’s long, heavy flank was laid out before Kearsarge’s ram bow like a soft, tender pork loin. Kearsarge rushed ahead, both engines at maximum. She poured smoke from her stacks, blackening the ocean sky for miles behind her. Her bow lifted, her wickedly white bow wave announcing to the world what lurked just beneath the water.
Audacious was churning the ocean behind herself, trying to get out of Kearsarge’s way, but Maxwell had already anticipated the move, and despite Audacious’s power, 28,000 tons of battleship couldn’t change direction quickly.
At least, not quickly enough.
The Kearsarge ran down on her, cresting the last gentle swell that still remained. Kearsarge’s bow lifted with the speed, momentarily bringing her ram close enough to the surface to be seen. It was a hideous thing, rounded and unspeakably large, like a ram’s horn, or a shark’s dorsal fin, hidden in the dark water for years, waiting for the day it would be needed.
The Audacious grew larger before them, a corpulent armored elephant. Strong, but slow.
“Sound collision!” Maxwell yelled.
The yards spooled away between the two ships, each ton of ocean split by Kearsarge’s ram and flung aside to be lost forever into the deep. Kearsarge closed on Audacious, one steel mountain sliding across the earth to T-bone another steel mountain. In the last seconds, Audacious opened fire with her four inch flank guns, a desperate and pointless move. Kearsarge’s armor shed the shells with an assortment of plinks, dings, and ricochets. Audacious had risen to the top of the last gentle swell, and Kearsarge charged up it to meet her.
W
Garret and his friends huddled around their cracked gun. As soon as Greely was sure they had hold of something and positioned themselves so they weren’t likely to fly into one another, he nodded to them, but said nothing. They all stared out Nancy’s wide port, watching Audacious’s flank swell until it seemed to fill the whole world before them. The pressure mounted, and the Audacious grew larger. Velvet crossed himself, and the Audacious grew larger still, filling their futures.
Then it happened.
When the two ships collided, it was a sound that had not been heard since Zeus flung his brother Hades down from Olympus. It was not just a clash of gods, but of brothers, betrayal and grief turning the world red around them. The British Empire had given birth to Garret’s nation, and now both of them had become as heedless as the vain god Zeus, casting out the only equal he would ever have, throwing down to the underworld the o
nly person who could truly understand him.
Perhaps that was the only way to describe the sound as the battleships met: it was the sound of history shattering. More than a century of it, broken to pieces, gone beneath the waves in an instant. Eleven thousand tons of American steel slammed into twenty-eight thousand tons of British steel. Garret looked up at Twitch just before they were all flung off their feet and into whatever obstruction caught them first.
Garret flew through the air and hit the bulkhead hard enough to wind him, but in the years to come, all he would remember was the sound. It penetrated Garret’s skull and impressed itself indelibly on his memory, because in that moment, Garret knew that Chief Greely was right. His anthropomorphizing stories weren’t the ravings of an old man, they were something far more.
Kearsarge was a powerful destructive force, Audacious even more so. Yet, both ships were built by hand. Every rivet was placed, ever plate was laid, every gun was bolted to the deck by human touch, and at the cost of human sweat and human blood. Furthermore, since the moment Kearsarge had been completed, she’d been cared for by hand. Every bolt had been tightened, every valve cleaned, every boiler fed by men’s sweat and blood.
Garret had worked with his hands since not long after he could crawl. Everyone he knew had done the same. Whether they were planting a field, or like Garret, pounding iron into shape, each person invested part of their own spirit into each thing over which they labored. So with each passing year, that investment of human spirit had compounded in the Kearsarge until it became her own. Each piece of Kearsarge’s spirit had been left behind by one of the men who had touched her, cared for her, even died upon her. And so it was as real as they had been.
Ironclad Page 41