Maelstrom (19 page)

Esshk waved a clawed hand. “Total. All three ships were destroyed. An explosion of the black dirt that burns destroyed two. It seems a fire began.” He jerked his snout upward in a gesture Kurokawa had come to equate with a shrug. “The other suffered damage to its sails and went ashore. The ship of the prey was also damaged, but managed to avoid running aground as well. It was, in fact, attempting to return to the scene when our other three ships with cannons arrived and drove it away. Perhaps they were trying to rescue some of their people left behind on the island?” He paused, considering. “I would not have thought it possible, but . . .” He looked at Kurokawa with what might have been respect.

“If I had not given the . . . unusual . . . command that some effort be made to rescue doomed crews, we would not now know what transpired in the fight, or how well the new cannons worked. As it was, almost a dozen Uul were saved from the grounded wreck. Perhaps the prey are doing the same? Trying to learn what has happened here since they left?” Esshk paused and jerked his head again. “As a further gesture, an experiment, if you will, to test the possibility you might be right yet again, I have not ordered the survivors destroyed. They were defeated, but they were not, after all, made prey. It was the ground upon which they stood that fled, not they. We will let them pass their experience to others and see what may transpire.”

Kurokawa was surprised. He’d often tried to explain to Esshk how wasteful it was to kill defeated troops. All of them, anyway. Sometimes it was necessary. The Grik were perfect physical predators. Even the Uul were born with such strength and such an awesome array of personal weaponry, no creature he’d ever heard of could hope to match one unarmed. They were like cheetahs, and every other species, including man, were sheep compared to them. But with the exception of the curiously elevated Hij, the physical gifts of the Grik were balanced by some rather peculiar and apparently instinctual behavior patterns. Chief among these was a total—indeed, pathological—inability to understand the concept of defense. They comprehended only attack. Like a cheetah attacking a lamb, feeble attempts by the lamb to escape, or even defend itself, only made the cheetah attack more aggressively. As long as it was attacking, it was winning, no matter what injury it had sustained. But if the attack were ever blunted or hurled back . . . the cheetah that ran from a lamb could never be a cheetah again.

Something happened to the Grik that ran away. Something sprouted within their primitive, retarded brains, and there was not the slightest hint of its existence until the instant it took place. Kurokawa saw it after the Battle of Aryaal, when dozens of ravaged ships limped back to Singapore. They’d been advancing with the Grand Swarm, and he’d seen hundreds of Grik destroyed by their own comrades in what seemed, at the time, a mindless frenzy of wild butchery. Since then he’d given the phenomenon considerable thought and believed he knew what triggered the sudden, primordial, all-consuming urge in defeated Grik—those “made prey”—to flee, and never find it within themselves even to look back. It was panic, fear, the sudden realization that they’d encountered a predator greater than themselves. Just as the Grik attacked as a mob, they were capable of panicking as a mob if things went against them. It was a contagious thing that had to be snuffed out at once.

Kurokawa had tried to explain to Esshk that sometimes defeat in itself was not always the same as being made prey. Sometimes the heart was still willing, even when the ship beneath it could not carry on, for example. Warriors . . . removed from the hunt in such a way might not always be unfit to rejoin it. He’d used this argument, in part, because that was what happened to him when
Amagi
was torpedoed on the way to Baalkpan, and he wanted to establish firmly in General Esshk’s mind that Hisashi Kurokawa had
not
been made prey. It was a selfish gesture, but practical as well. If, when they inevitably resumed the offensive against the Tree Prey—and Americans!—they continued to kill or abandon their trained crews simply because their ship was sinking, they’d lose valuable resources and delay their ultimate victory. It seemed Esshk was willing to give it a try.

Kurokawa reflected momentarily while General Esshk regarded him with his intense reptilian eyes. Finally he spoke. “But the prey escaped the other three?”

“Regrettably.”

“The Americans . . . The prey will now know we’ve matched their advantage. That knowledge might be costly.”

“Perhaps. But they cannot know to what extent we have surpassed them.”

“Surpassed them?” Kurokawa inquired.

“Indeed. The factories your workers established in Ceylon are performing wonders. Again, you were right when you suggested they be treated differently from other Uul. They thrive with better treatment and are industrious. You Japanese never cease to amaze me! So frail, yet so useful. And to think Tsalka wasted so many of you on his table! I am sure he has certainly changed his mind!”

“If he lives,” muttered Kurokawa bitterly.

“He does. Word arrived today. That is one reason I summoned you: to tell you he not only lives, but basks in the glow of the Celestial Mother’s favor. The fast ship he sent to request an audience with Her returned with Her benevolent blessings for our strategy, and instructions that he continue as your patron. She extols the virtues of the Japanese helpers of the Hunt! Just think on it, the Celestial Mother Herself knows you exist! It is a great honor!”

“Indeed,” Kurokawa hedged.

“Soon all the Grik will share the benefits of these glorious cannons of yours. By the next time the moon passes into darkness, ten more ships will arrive from Ceylon, each already armed. In their holds will be more than two hundred guns—enough to arm ten of the ships we already have! A moon after that a like number will arrive, and Tsalka will accompany them at the head of another grand fleet to add to the Swarm. With your
Amagi
and over forty ships armed with cannons, and hundreds of conventional ships filled to overflowing with hundreds of thousands of Uul, the prey can do nothing to stop us! That is when we will strike!”

“A month and a half. So soon?”

Esshk peered closely at the Japanese officer. “I do not understand your face. You seem pleased, yet wary. What troubles you? Surely you do not doubt our fleet will easily sweep the prey from the sea?”

“I do not. They have few ships, and even though the large ones are formidable, they cannot maneuver. The only thing concerning me at all is the iron ship, the American destroyer. Its guns have much greater range than ours.”

“
Amagi
will concentrate on the American iron ship. Surely its guns cannot outrange yours?”

“Of course not . . . I . . . I only hope
Amagi
will be ready.”

Esshk’s eyes narrowed slightly. “Will it?”

Right then Hisashi Kurokawa knew his very existence depended upon his next words. He contemplated the progress of his ship’s “refit” so far and almost shivered in horror. The project was the most ghastly thing he’d ever seen. There was no dry dock in Aryaal, not on this Earth, as far as he knew, but somehow they’d had to get at
Amagi
’s underwater damage. After much discussion with Esshk and what passed for Hij engineers, they’d settled on a cofferdam. At low tide, weighted down by the bodies of thousands of Grik, they’d run his ship aground in the silty mouth of the river below the fire-blackened walls of Aryaal. There, a massive pile driver encircled
Amagi
with titanic beams dragged for miles through the almost impenetrable jungle beyond the plain still littered with bones from the battle fought upon it. When the framework was complete, Kurokawa’s own engineers began devising ways to plank it up. Heavy, prefabricated sections were prepared and lowered into place with the ship’s cranes, but they couldn’t decide how to secure them to the pilings. The answer was simple: Uul warriors were ordered to jump in the water and do it by hand.

Kurokawa still lived aboard his ship, so he was there to see. As much as he hated the Grik, he was sickened by the sight. Uul by the hundreds, each covered in armor and holding a length of line, shrieked a battle cry and leaped into the water. The armor carried them down—it would be a one-way trip—and protected them slightly from the silvery fish that arrowed in from the bay at the sound of splashes. If they were lucky, they sometimes managed to tie their line before being torn to shreds. Slowly at first, but quickly growing to a nauseating pink, white, silvery roil, the water began to churn. Pieces of bodies and buoyant debris rose to the surface, only to be snatched down by ravening, gaping jaws. On command, hundreds more leaped to their doom, each clasping his piece of line. Most of the Japanese sailors couldn’t watch, but Kurokawa stared, transfixed, as much amazed as horrified. Such obedience!

The second wave probably didn’t fare as well as the first, but when the third command was given, the boiling water had simmered down. Perhaps the fish were sated? This time a few Grik wouldn’t go. It finally occurred to their primitive minds that if they did, they wouldn’t come back up. Instead of refusing or attempting to flee, however, they turned on their comrades in a wild attack. All were disarmed, but no Grik was ever truly without weapons, and they used their terrible teeth and claws on those around them. They were quickly subdued, killed, and thrown in the water, but after that first incident, there was an ever-growing number that had to be “destroyed.” During this entire procedure,
Amagi
’s pumps were at work, using steam from her few remaining boilers. Finally, Kurokawa noticed that the water level inside the cofferdam was slightly lower than that outside, and he suggested a halt to further wastage of warriors.

The cofferdam was built, and within a week they began repairing his ship’s underwater rents, but at such an appalling cost! Surely thousands had died. He’d learned a valuable lesson that day, besides the crystallization of his theory regarding how panic affected the Grik. He’d learned that to the Hij, all other creatures were simply tools, no matter what they said about the Uul being their “children.” Life had no value beyond how useful a tool it might be.
Amagi
was just a tool . . . and so was he.

Meeting General Esshk’s gaze, he finally nodded. “She can’t be finished that quickly. There is still much damage to her engines and boilers, so she won’t be as fast as she once was, but she’ll be ready for battle.”

Esshk seemed to relax, and Kurokawa did too—slightly.

“Excellent,” Esshk said. “So now we may turn to another subject: the American flying machine, their ‘flying boat,’ you called it.”

Kurokawa’s cheeks burned. During the campaign against Aryaal and the abortive thrust toward Baalkpan, the damned Americans had unveiled a dilapidated PBY Catalina. His inability to prove he’d destroyed the plane still rankled. Aside from its value for reconnaissance purposes, the plane had caused a lot of damage, and the fact that it could fly higher than
Amagi
could engage it damaged his prestige.

“It must have been destroyed,” he said. “I sent one of my own aircraft, an observation plane, to engage it. Since then, it has not been seen.”

“But your ‘observation plane’ never returned, so we cannot know for certain. Perhaps they destroyed each other, as you speculated, or perhaps your plane was destroyed and theirs only damaged. If so, perhaps they do not have the . . . capacity, I think you said, to repair it. But perhaps there is nothing wrong with it, and they hold it back only until it can do the most harm. I cannot tell you how disconcerting that machine was to our Uul.”

The plane, armed only with machine guns, caused an amazing amount of damage that couldn’t be defended against, and the psychological effect had been profound. A shocking number of Uul turned prey merely at the sight of the thing.

“If you’re still concerned about it, it’s only prudent to attempt to discover its disposition,” Kurokawa said, a little heatedly.

“Then do so.”

“How?”

Esshk hissed exasperation, and Kurokawa knew then that the Grik general had boxed him in. It was suddenly clear who was manipulating this conversation. “Your precious aircraft, of course.”

Amagi
had only one observation floatplane left. One was lost chasing the PBY, and the others were destroyed, ironically, when a Japanese dive-bomber crashed into them during
Amagi
’s first encounter with the two American destroyers that somehow resulted in their exile to this place. That the plane crashed into his ship because one of the destroyers shot it down only added to his hatred. All that remained was a single Nakajima Type 95 biplane. It was old-fashioned, slow, and short ranged. Kurokawa had off-loaded it before his ship began repairs. He hadn’t considered it necessary to the success of the upcoming campaign, and meant to leave it behind because he didn’t want to risk losing it. If he was right and the PBY was truly gone, his was the only airplane in the world. It could so easily be damaged or destroyed by a lucky shell or bullet while sitting exposed on its catapult. Also, fire had always been a big part of the way Grik made war—a sometimes indiscriminate use of fire—and the plane, and the limited fuel he had for it, was an increased hazard to his ship.

The plane had languished, floating peacefully at the dock ever since, under guard by its flight and support crew and a much larger contingent of Grik. Esshk said the guard was to protect the plane, but Kurokawa knew it was really there to prevent it from flying away. Given the treachery of his crew, that was something Kurokawa himself was a little concerned the pilot might try. He’d given strict orders that the plane be properly maintained, but the crew was not to even start the engine. He didn’t want them to waste a single gallon of the precious aviation fuel—or give their captors the slightest excuse to harm the irreplaceable pilot and plane.

So far, he’d resisted every “request” by Esshk to use the plane. It was his “ace in the hole,” as the Americans would say. At his orders, the Japanese sailors had cooperated with the Grik in every way. They’d given them as much technology as their primitive industrial base could exploit. He supposed that had brought them up to the seventeenth century, militarily speaking, at least as far as weaponry was concerned. But the plane represented his greatest example of truly modern technology. It was proof that, no matter how far the Grik progressed, they could never hope to match the magical powers Kurokawa possessed, and most amazing of all to the Grik was the power of flight. He was certain the PBY had been destroyed or seriously damaged. He’d even ordered the pilot of the other Type 95 to ram it if he had to, to return with his shield or on it, or his flight crew would be executed. With that threat to motivate him, Kurokawa was positive the pilot must have resorted to the final option, since he never returned, but neither had the PBY. Ultimately, whether or not the flying boat actually crashed was immaterial; he was certain it would never fly again. There was simply no way to repair it—just as there was no way to repair his own last plane if it was damaged. He therefore basked in the reflected glow of its importance while hoping he’d never have to actually use it. His reluctance was the source of growing strain between Esshk and himself.