Iron Gray Sea: Destroyermen Read Online Free PDF Page A

position . . . and my apologies, if he has the time.”
    The Type 93, twenty-four-inch torpedo was, hands down, the best weapon of its type in service with any navy in the world when Sato Okada crossed the mysterious gulf aboard Amagi nearly two years before. Almost 30 feet long, weighing close to 3 tons, and blessed with a speed close to 60 knots and a 1080-pound warhead, it was designed to rupture the thick armor and break the backs of battleships . Probably only desperation, or possibly panic, had induced Kurita to waste two such precious, irreplaceable weapons against Mizuki Maru , so in that sense, Okada felt a sudden, perverse surge of pride that his ship and crew had forced him to resort to such a drastic measure. But the disproportionate expenditure was on a scale with shooting a beer can with a high-velocity rifle.
    Ultimately, the sudden course change, the heavy sea, or the haste with which the torpedoes were launched caused the first weapon to miss its target, speeding invisibly past, mere yards behind Mizuki Maru ’s rudder. That was irrelevant, because seconds later the next torpedo slammed into her side and detonated with a stupendous dark geyser that dwarfed the ship—and blew the entire stern, aft of the engine room, completely off. Steam and black soot vomited skyward from the stack and gushing fuel oil ignited with a snarling rush.
    Mizuki Maru stalled as if her legs had been torn from her hips—which might as well have been the case. Her stern, propeller shaft, and most of her machinery was already nothing but mangled wreckage plummeting to the bottom of the sea. A widening field of burning oil coated the waves around her and lapped at the boat deck, already dipping low.
    Sato Okada heaved himself from the deck, practically climbing the aft bulkhead. His left leg didn’t feel right at all and he wondered if the concussion had cracked it. The helmsman slid backward and impacted the bulkhead with a cry as the murdered ship settled quickly aft, and her dripping bow left the tumultuous sea and reached for the sky. A naked, oil-soaked ’Cat crawled in through the shattered doorway, wide, bright eyes questing in dazed confusion amid black, matted fur.
    The dying roar of Mizuki Maru was terrific. Tortured steel groaned and tore with dismal shrieks of agony, and the wooden deck cracked and splintered like rifle fire. Heavy machinery tumbled loose and crashed down deep in her bowels as the bow continued to rise until it was virtually perpendicular. Dimly, Sato Okada saw the number one gun, some of its crew still clinging to it, rip loose and fall against the forward bulkhead of the pilothouse. The bulkhead smashed inward under the impact, and girders pierced and pinned him.
    I failed! He railed silently at himself through the waves of agony. So long he’d shunned the friendship of the Alliance, and then only when he personally was affected did he act. Shinya had been right all along. The day did come that my honor demanded more of me—but my pride held me back until it was too late, and my arrogance made me promise what I could not achieve. I failed not only the Alliance that deserved my allegiance, but my crew—my people —who deserved my protection!
    Suddenly, a bloody, blackened face appeared before his eyes. It was the mad cook! Okada realized with searing shame that he’d failed him too—perhaps more than anyone—and he didn’t even know the man’s name!
    “Come, my lord,” the cook said in a soft, gruff voice. “I must get you free!”
    Just then, the boiling, flaming torrent of water and oil burst into the pilothouse, and Mizuki Maru quickly slid, blowing and booming, beneath the frigid, tossing waves of the iron gray sea.

CHAPTER 1
     
    ////// USS Walker Central Pacific
February 22, 1944
    T he sea was brisk beneath a bright blue sky, marred only by cotton-candy streamers of white. No land was visible in any direction, and the one thing that might catch the eye of some far-ranging,