Chapter 7

KYUSHU AIRFIELD, INAZUMA, KYURII ISLANDS ARCHIPELAGO

Minoyama Mizawa sat on the beach, humming quietly as she watched the seagulls swoop by, occasionally diving down for a scrap of bread she hurled into the sky. They were such intelligent birds, she thought fondly, always able to quickly locate where food and danger were. She watched the waves lap against the rocky shores, when she heard the silence.

Her seagulls had gone quiet.

The air raid siren blared barely a second after she spotted 30 Tu-22M Backfires approaching in a tight-knit formation with some Ilyushin IL-7 escorting fighter jets. The Tupolev Tu-22M was infamous for its ability to broach Mach 1 despite being heavily armoured and capable of resisting dozens of 40mm high-velocity bullets.

As she scrambled for her Kawasaki Ki-144 multirole fighter jet, her radar picked up on 40 large blips and countless tiny blips, where the tiny blips approached the island almost 6 times faster.

Oh. Oh, no. Oh, no, no.

The tiny blips were missiles - hypersonic T-43 Plamya missiles. Each weighed almost 2000 kilograms with a 600-kilogram warhead. The entire runway would virtually disintegrate upon contact - there was no way she could take off before the missiles hit.

Coming to her senses, she leapt out of her cockpit and dashed towards the edge of the forest.

She almost made it.

One of the Plamyas found an underground gas tank, blowing the storage of jet fuel sky-high. As she was thrown into a rock, all she could see in her dimming vision, tinged with red, were the Backfires turning around for home.

Her last thoughts were of her adorable younger sister waiting for her at home, her mother's wrinkle-lined face, her girlfriend's gentle touch before Emma-ō, the lord of the Underworld, took her.

ASTRAEN SEA, KYURII STRAITS, 30 NAUTICAL MILES OFF OZAWA ISLAND

"Ship in view, this is Inazuman Navy Aircraft on your port beam. Please identify, over." Tupolev handed the bridge-to-bridge phone to a major.

"Navy, this is Akebono Maru A277. How are you?" Kaganovich could barely understand Japanese. The major's Musashi accent might as well be alien language for all he knew. They could barely make out the haze-grey patrol aircraft that was now circling the ship, he noted.

"Amplify, A277." the terse, feminine voice ordered.

"We're out of Furong Naval Base bound for Ozawa Island. What's the big fuss?"

"You're at least fifteen miles off a course to Ozawa. Explain, over."

"Have you been receiving reports? It's dangerous out here, and we've been told to travel from one friendly area to another. Hell, you wanna escort us some distance?"

"Copy, A277. Be advised, there are no submarines in the region."

"You guys guarantee that?"

This drew a laugh from the plane. "I guess you'll find out, A277. Out."

The plane circled once more before departing. They did not see the two crewmen holding handheld antiair systems.

Kaganovich wondered quietly to Tupolev, "People talk like that?" Tupolev chuckled, shrugging. "It is a hard-to-learn language. Nasha lutcha." Ours is better. Indeed, Kaganovich nodded as he nursed his cup of tea. Nasha lutcha.

As they approached the island, they could see fires raging on the island hewn from rock. A Kawasaki Ki-155 zoomed overhead, its twin trails barely a kilometre above the Arkhangelsk. One of Tupolev's crewmen panicked and fired off an Igla handheld antiaircraft missile. It failed to lock onto the Ki-155 and blazed off directly into the low sun.

"Idiot!" Tupolev growled. The smoke from the rocket motor didn't even come close to the aircraft. "He'll shoot at us now. All ahead flank! Helmsman, be alert!"

"Rocket coming in, low on the horizon, portside." Tupolev estimated the distance to the horizon,

"Ship in view, this is Inazuman Navy Aircraft on your port beam. Please identify, over." Tupolev handed the bridge-to-bridge phone to a major.

"Idiot!" Tupolev growled. The smoke from the rocket motor didn't even come close to the aircraft. "He'll shoot at us now. All ahead flank! Helmsman, be alert!"

As Tupolev expected, the Ki-155 turned back and released one of its missiles at the Arkhangelsk. The projectile slammed into the ship's portside a second later, hitting the LST six feet above the waterline. The warhead exploded instantly, but the missile body kept moving forward, spreading two hundred pounds of jet fuel that fireballed into the lowest cargo deck as the ship disappeared behind a wall of smoke.

Nobody saw the Ki-155 come in. The water around the Arkhangelsk turned to froth from short-falling rounds, then her main deck was hidden with dust. A sudden orange fireball announced the explosion of one of the Pontic helicopters, and burning jet fuel splashed across the deck.

The next target was the superstructure. A moment later, the bridge was peppered with several hundred rounds as the now-depleted Ki-155 limped toward Syonan. All that was left were warm, bloody piles of meat and a list to starboard as Tupolev stumbled out, holding his intestines inside him. Only the Colonel had had the sense to duck behind something solid. Kaganovich surveyed the carnage and wondered again why he was so lucky.

"Comrade Captain, you're hurt," Kaganovich observed as Tupolv laughed dryly. "I realized, Comrade Colonel. But we must get this damned hulk to the blyat island. Cyka..." Cyka, which translated to bitch, had much worse connotations in Russian but was the perfect word Kaganovich had for that Sangonomiya Kokomi and navy.

Kaganovich observed with worry as the ship slowly advanced towards a wall of black rock. "We are not docking, Comrade Captain?" he asked with feigned casualness, earning a strained headshake as blood seeped between Tupolev's fingers. "My men are dead. Your men do not know how to dock this hunk of metal. This is the only way. Hold on, Comrade Colonel."

The ship rammed into the rocky shores as water flooded into the already critical lower chambers. A colossal eight-inch tear was ripped from the bow, and the troop transport ship slid to the shallow depths. The Arkhangelsk would never sail again. But she had fulfilled her purpose.

The men slowly began to unload as Kaganovich announced to Tupolev, "Well done, Comrade Captain. But now you will take morphine tablets and plasma. I will have no other way."

As Tupolev was wheeled into a room, his thoughts were hazy. Kaganovich had practically pulled a pistol on him to force him to get medical attention. And who knows, he thought, if the regimental medic is good, I might even live...

Kaganovich watched as the Spetznaz unloaded mortar and light armored pieces as his soldiers mopped up resistance. As he watched, a Valkyrie was ripped to pieces by a BTR-80. With enough luck, the heavily cratered runways would be repaired rapidly for Pontic fighter jets. But first... "Set up the antiair missiles first. I fear the Inazuman fighter-bombers."

"We have three usable missiles, Comrade Colonel." a major replied. "What? Three? Out of fifty?" Kaganovich wheeled around, his fists clenched. "When we collided, seawater flooded into the lower levels. The missiles are the land versions, and were corroded by seawater. Four more we can probably clean off. Sorry, Comrade Colonel."

Kaganovich reeled in his anger. So. Something no one had thought about. They should have requested the naval version of this rocket instead. It was always the little things. "Not your fault. Prepare the 9K33s instead." Yes, Comrade Colonel."

Half an hour later, as an Antonov An-72 plane rolled off the runway of Polyarnyy Airbase in Murmansk with 50 SA-10 missiles bound for Ozawa Island, Commander Viktor Tupolev of the Pontus Navy died on an operating bed on Kyushu Airfield.