Able Fire: The Next War - 2025 and Beyond

Chapter 7

Admiral Wu Jinlong was outraged to the point that his face reddened as the anger simmered and boiled within him. Zhendong, the ship he had fought so hard to save in the South China Sea, was gone. The smoke still hung heavily over the scene, making a mockery of his entire operation. He watched through the view panes on the flag bridge of Taifeng, seeing the desperate effort to rescue the stricken crew, so many men in the water as the ship died. He was now standing on the only carrier in the Chinese Navy operating south of Taiwan.

All 36 bombers failed to put even one American airfield out of operation, he thought sullenly, and Beiying, the North Star, is a wreck. Now this…. That entire air wing is gone, except for ten planes that were aloft. It was the Siberians, damn their souls. Something has to be done about them. They make peace on the Amur River line, but continue their war at sea. This is the third carrier they have sunk with those demons they fling at us. Beijing has now ordered me to return to the South China Sea.

I cannot bear this shame….

The victory I had hoped to win here has eluded me. Oh, I have at least done one thing in establishing a strong outpost at Davao, but how long can one Knight stand in the center of the board alone? This fleet was the Queen, the two carriers my Rooks, the bombers my Bishops, and now the enemy plays for checkmate.

“Are the Americans still heading south?” he growled.

“Yes sir.”

“And the Siberians?”

“They appear to be on a heading to join the Americans.”

“Very well, the fleet will assume standard cruising order three, and come to two-four-two degrees southwest. Increase to 25 knots.”

“Yes sir. We also have a message from Zamboanga.”

“Send it to the terminal my ready room.”

The Admiral strode away, his brow wet with sweat, eyes narrowed, cheeks flushed. He plopped his heavy frame down into the chair by his desk, and activated his messaging terminal. Zamboanga reported they had just come under heavy cruise missile attack, and all planes based there, 10 precious J-20’s, were destroyed. Admiral Cook had turned south for the Makassar Strait, but he threw salt over his shoulder to sting the wounds he had already inflicted. The vital airfield at Zamboanga was wrecked…

The big Chinese Admiral put his fists to his forehead, and let out a roar that could be heard all the way out on the main bridge of Taifeng. More than one head was turned, but not one officer said a word….

“Mister Kane, will you look at the goddamn Siberians? We threw 60 MMT’s, 96 GBU-53’s, 24 LRASMs and another two dozen HAWC’s at these guys and didn’t lay a finger on them. That Siberian cruiser runs out twelve of those hot new missiles they have, and gets eight hits, sinking five ships, including a carrier and a Type 055 class cruiser.”

“That’s one hot missile sir. You can’t go after the damn thing while its inbound. It flies over 100,000 feet high, then dives to sea level like a rabid banshee. It’s one hell of a speed demon.”

“And it gets hits. It thinks on its feet. I don’t believe the Siberians targeted those frigates. Those missiles recalculated and redirected to those ships. That’s one slick missile.”

“I wonder if SM-6 could catch the damn thing,” said Kane.

“Speaking of that, how many of those stallions do we still have in the barn?”

“Zero, sir. But we still have 48 SM-2 Block-III. That will give us some reach out to 90 miles, and we’ve got the fighters, sir.”

“What’s on deck?

“A dozen Panthers rigged for air to air, and then we have the six Super Toms on BARCAP.”

“Good enough. What about the TacToms?”

“Fifty left on the destroyers, sir, and we still have 90 MMT’s. Are we going to hammer Davao?”

“No, we’ll leave that to the Washington. The Chinese fleet is headed our way, so we move to a neutral corner and get ready to tangle with them again in the morning. Air wing rearming on schedule?”

“Yes sir. Everything is rolling over, except for Avengers Flight-2. They switched to Slammers.”

“Better with the GBU-53,” said Cook. “They were able to get right in there, and I’ll bet they pulled a lot of SAM’s. Otherwise, I don’t think those hot Siberian missiles would have run up the score like that.”

“Do you want me to send down an order to switch back, sir?”

“No, proceed with the Slammers. We’ll look at the situation at 06:00. In the meantime, I think a good bunk and a warm blanket would do you some good. The Captain will be up to take his bridge watch in about ten minutes. Get some rest.”

“Thank you, sir.”

Enterprise was now maneuvering, steering 190 degrees south, back into the Makassar Strait. The waters ahead would be friendly, so both of the two Virginia Class subs had been detached to continue operations in the Celebes Sea. Just in case the Chinese snuck in another diesel boat, the Siberian submarine, Kazan, would be operating close at hand.

Admiral Cook had been understandably curious about the Siberian ships. Going to fleet intelligence data yielded nothing on any of them. Either the information was being suppressed, or it just wasn’t there. How does a nation with no significant maritime presence, or even major ship building facilities, manage to produce a ship like that big battlecruiser out there? Making a discrete inquiry to PACOM received a terse reply—CLASSIFIED – NO INQUIRIES PERMITTED. The question would not be answered, not even to an Admiral, and beyond that, the inquiry itself was deemed off limits.

Very well, he thought. The Siberians are here, that much is certain, and they are certainly pulling their weight. Better let sleeping dogs lie. I can see what the fleet learned about them later, but for now, its war time security, and no one rocks the boat.

They were about 325 miles from the Chinese fleet now, and scooting south at flank speed, 35 knots. That speed in the carrier strike groups has been one of their best fighting assets over the long decades of service. They could run like the wind, and very little on or under the sea could catch them when they did.

From the present course of the Chinese fleet, they were trying to close the range with him now, but he would not permit that to happen. He had moved into the Celebes Sea, put in his first naval strike, then blasted the airfield at Zamboanga. Now he would keep the enemy at arm’s length, and strike them again at dawn.

And there wasn’t a goddamned thing they could do about it.

He smiled.

At 04:00, all enemy contacts went dark on the tracking screens. Admiral Wu had composed himself, and was now leaning over the radar operator, and checking his watch. There had been no sign of the Enterprise for the last 30 minutes, and at 04:30 he ordered one of the three J-31’s on forward CAP to move out and conduct a long range radar search.

As it happened, the scout moved up right in the middle of a US CAP replacement cycle, and was able to advance to a position about 150 miles from the Enterprise unnoticed, and therefore unchallenged. The J-31 quickly picked up a pair of surface contacts, heading south at 30 knots, but there was nothing else for several minutes until another Skunk was detected about 65 nautical miles further on.

The Admiral realized what he was seeing. That farthest contact had to be part of the carrier escort, and the two first contacts were most likely the Siberians. His eyes narrowed at that, seeing them as nice isolated targets, too far from the Americans to gain their support if attacked. That farthest on contact was now almost 350 miles away, and at 35 knots, so he knew he would never get any closer to the carrier now.

So I will strike the Siberians, he decided. They are only 285 miles away—inside the radius of our YJ-18’s. It is high time they suffered for all they have done to hurt our cause in this damn war. He would throw down the gauntlet with 34 missiles, and test the defenses of those ships.

At that point, his scout was finally detected by the enemy. A flight of three F-35’s, Watcher-3, had seen them on radar, and so had the Siberians. Kursk put two missiles in the air, the 9M96D with its 65 mile range good enough to reach the fighter, which prompted it to immediately turn and accelerate to military speed, 900 knots.

Watcher-3 reported the fleeing enemy contact, and was given clearance to pursue. A whisker faster than the J-31 at military speed supercruise, the F-35’s accelerated to 920 knots. They were carrying AAMRAM’s, with a 75 mile range, but the J-31 was a slippery target, and they would have to get closer than that to have any chance of locking on. That pursuit took Watcher-3 out into the no man’s land in the center of the Celebes Sea, and they flashed their radars to see if they could get a lock. It was at that point that their 200 mile range radars picked up Vampires, low on the sea.

“Nemo-1, Watcher-3. We have Vampires, low and slow. Over.”

“Roger, Watcher. Lock and Engage all hostile targets. Cleared Hot.”

That scout had triggered a defensive response that might not have been in place if Wu Jinlong had not been so curious that morning. As soon as the Forward CAP patrol engaged, the ship’s Captain, now on the bridge while Admiral Cook got some much needed rest, sent the Air Boss an order to launch the ready CAP fighters, two flights of two planes each, designated Linebacker 1 and 2.

Aboard Kirov, Kalinichev was standing in for Rodenko when the contacts came in. Karpov and Fedorov were both getting rest, so he was the Senior Watch officer on the bridge when the Vampires were seen. He followed procedure and sounded Air Alert One. Then, seconds later, all the contacts vanished. Kalinichev saw three American fighters overfly his position, returning to the Enterprise while others passed the ship a little to the southeast, outward bound. Then the Vampires reappeared, about 100 miles out, and he saw the American fighters engage. They unleashed all their arrows, and then turned for the carrier.

That still left 13 contacts inbound. The missiles disappeared again, lost on radar, then suddenly reappeared, this time just 20 miles out. With a standing order of weapons free, Kalinichev ordered Gromenko at the CIC to engage, and the Gargoyles leapt off the forward deck.

Karpov, sleeping in the ready room, was now out through the hatch as the missiles roared away. He immediately took stock of the situation, giving Kalinichev a reassuring pat on the shoulder.

“Well done,” he said, watching the Gargoyles engage on the radar screen. They were getting out to the Vampires just before they were close enough to enter their high speed terminal run, and they got every last one. That dropped his missile count to 29, but he had 90 medium range missiles behind those, so he was not concerned. You always put your best foot forward in combat, using the weapon most likely to get you a kill.

It was still too early for the morning strike, which had been postponed to 08:00 to give the ordnance crews more time to ready the planes. So Enterprise would recover the seven fighters it had sent out to engage those Vampires, and then posted its dawn watch, this time just one ready fighter and Hawkeye #3.

Karpov noted that the Chinese fleet had now changed course, and they were heading 325 degrees northwest. One look at the map told him they were going to Zamboanga, forsaking their effort to close with the Americans. There they would likely cover the base, or utilize the small port to refuel thirsty ships.

Enterprise was down through the narrow bottleneck of the Makassar Strait by sunrise, and into the bottle. Once through that northern gap where the US subs had dueled with Chinese boats earlier, the strait widened considerably for the next 300 miles until it gave way to the Java Sea. The morning seemed strangely quiet, but that was soon about to change.

Fighter deployments on the Chinese side started to thicken up just after sunrise. Six J-20’s rose from Davao, headed west to Zamboanga, and Taifeng sent up a flight of six J-31’s for morning CAP. They would be joined by six more from Davao, survivors from the carrier Zhendong. These planes would form the outer shield against an air strike expected that morning. Admiral Wu Jinlong knew his enemy by now, and could count the hours it took to rearm their planes well enough. The Chinese field at Miri on the west coast of Borneo also sent up a couple J-20’s. They would have a good angle to make a run at the US carrier and fix its position on radar.

On the US side, SAG Guam met TF South from Australia, and the two groups now formed one cohesive task force, designated Bougainville. There the US Navy Captain Jack Dorne would command a Marine Amphibious Group, with the LHD’s attached, Arlington, Portland and Green Bay. That was a force capable of making a landing anywhere on Mindanao to deal with the Chinese encroachment at Davao.

So while both sides prepared to launch air strikes, the threat Wu Jinlong would have to face would not come from the sky, but from beneath the sea. Two US boats, Franklin and Chancellorsville, were quietly stalking the enemy fleet, and they were getting close. Franklin was 20 miles off the port side of the enemy formation, and Chancellorsville 30 mile off the starboard side, both moving on intercept vectors like a pair of predatory sea demons.

Chapter 8

You never knew just where an enemy submarine might be lurking. They could be closing on your flanks, as the two US boats were now, but they might also be stalking you from behind, hiding in the noise of your wake, or just silently waiting dead ahead, the proverbial silent hole in the sea—with torpedoes. And of all weapons designed and deployed in this war to kill ships, torpedoes were the most deadly and consistent killers. Of those that had been fired, over 90% had found a steel hull, killing ships at an alarming rate.

The Chinese had lost 25 ships to torpedoes, and they in turn had sunk six Royal Navy and Singapore Navy ships with their own subs. The only SSM that got close to achieving anything like that was the Chinese YJ-18, which had savaged the Royal Navy and Singapore fleets with 17 kills. Third in line were Kirov’s Zircons, which had sunk 14 ships, including three carriers, and with far fewer missiles than the YJ-18. That said torpedoes were still the king of the seas, with the highest kill percentage and the more ships sunk than any other weapon.

The two US subs were going to try to extend that reign as they closed on the enemy ships. They would sprint to the ten mile mark, then drift and shoot.

The last of the F-35’s carrying HAWC’s was spotted and ready at 08:15, and a full squadron of 12 planes would take off to join a dozen Avengers already circling overhead. The forward escort of four F-35’s had already seen and engaged an enemy fighter that had been getting nosey. It took a number of attempts, and an evasive run to avoid four PL-15’s, but they got the lone J-20 that had been snooping on the fleet.

As they formed up and started north, the pilots could see that a group of Avengers were already cleared hot and firing their LRASM’s. The missile had a 500 mile range, so it was take off, fire, and land for those six planes, and it sent 24 missiles after the enemy carrier.

No report had been made by radar of any incoming Vampires, and no flights of enemy planes had been detected, but Admiral Wu had his own inner radar, and his hackles were raised, knowing danger was at hand. He could sense it, feel it, something close, something far.

He was very correct.

The US air strike was already underway, with some missiles already fired, and the two US subs were bracketing the Chinese fleet on two sides. Flight V Virginia Class boat Franklin would be the first to fire, sending three torpedoes at the heart of the fleet, which had been cruising at 326 degrees northwest. This sent them into an evasive turn away from the sub, and to a new heading of about 45 degrees northeast—directly into the path of the Chancellorsville. She was still some 17 miles off, coming at 30 knots, and her Captain was keeping his cool. He waited until the enemy had churned to within nine miles, then slowed to five knots and fired a spread of four torpedoes.

The effect these sudden attacks had on the formation was jarring. FFG Weifang bravely broke formation, accelerated to its top speed, and charged at the suspected location of the first sub, willing to sacrifice the ship and crew just to put pressure on the attacking enemy submarine if it could. It threw an ASROC YU-7 out, which plopped into the water eight miles ahead, but found no targets.

Two helicopters took off from destroyers and fluttered away at low altitude after Franklin, thudding out to the position where the torpedoes had been detected. But that contact was already twelve minutes old, and in that time the sub had been maneuvering away from its firing point at 20 knots, and was at least four miles away. That wasn’t good enough for what the Chinese helos were carrying. The single YU-7 torpedo on a Chinese X-9C helo had a two mile standard range, and a kinematic range of just 4 miles. It had to be damn near spot on when launched to have any chance of getting a hit.

The Z-9 reached the point where they thought to find the American sub, then hovered to deploy their dipping sonar. They had gone slightly beyond the contact point, and got lucky. There was an almost immediate contact, and the excited pilots pulled up to get moving on that target. At that moment, something streaked in from the south west, jogged left, and bored right in on the helo, blasting it from the sky.

The US Escort-2 had been dueling with the J-31’s, found a hole in their defense, and unleashed several AIM-260 missiles at the helos. The Z-18 off the Moon God was the first to be knocked down, and now, just as that Z-9 was ready to pounce on Franklin, another missile saved the hour.

Chaos swept through the fleet like a storm. Seven ships behind Taifeng had been scattered in all directions by the torpedo attack, then the first of the LRASM’s started to come in at the front of the herd, all bearing down on the carrier. The big ship had been screened, and maneuvered successfully to get out of harm’s way, but the lances Franklin had fired were now locking on to alternate targets and still chasing them down, all while that spread of four torpedoes fired by Chancellorsville was sweeping in from the east.

SAM’s started leaping off the decks to get after the LRASM’s, and deck mounted lasers were flashing like lightning from the newer Type 055 destroyers. In the midst of this, one of the torpedoes fired by Franklin found the Vietnamese destroyer Haiphong and sent up a wall of white water and black smoke when it exploded. The ship was so badly hit that it was dead in the water a minute later, with fire and flooding amidships, and a broken back. The second torpedo circled and struck the wrecked ship again, sending what was left of it on a steep ride to the sea floor, over 16,000 feet below.

The third of Franklin’s fish then turned, detected the fuming wake of another ship, and surged towards DDG Saigon, just as a torpedo off the Chancellorsville found the frigate Yulin. A second struck DDG Yueshen, the Moon God. A third hit DDG Xining, a Type 052D Class ship. The American subs were simply devouring the confused and scattered southern end of the enemy formation. For good measure, Franklin put two more torpedoes in the water to get after the bold frigate Weifang that was tormenting it, wanting to shake that terrier off its tail.

In reprisal, the frigate fired its last two ASROC YU-7’s, and now it was up to the torpedoes. The ASROC’s plopped into the sea just 750 meters from the American sub, and began to look for their quarry, even while the two Mark 48’s locked on to the frigate and started their terminal run to the target. The ship would not survive, but the submarine would race away at 32 knots, quickly getting outside the shore ranged YU-7’s. Franklin slipped away, avoiding the threat until the enemy torpedoes lost energy and sunk into the depths below.

Wu Jinlong fled northwest, every ship ordered to make its best speed. Yet when he looked over his shoulder, he could see the smoke and fire of five stricken comrades burning on the sea, each and every one devoured by the terrible effectiveness of the torpedoes that were fired at them.

Yet the torment wasn’t over. Admiral Cook had also ordered another volley of MMT Tomahawks timed to follow up his air delivered ordnance, and now those missiles started tracking in. Type 052D Class destroyer Yinchuan was the first to detect them, and started firing its remaining HQ-9’s. As that battle began, Admiral Wu took some heart out on the weather deck, when he looked up high in the sky and saw the contrails of two formations of aircraft. The Flying Leopards were coming….

They rose in two groups of ten planes each, the JH-7B Fighters known as the Flying Leopards at Davao. Each plane carried a pair of YJ-12 cruise missiles, with fast turbojet engines that would push them at 1600 knots for 215 miles. That was bringing 40 missiles to the attack, and now Wu Jinlong knew he had to augment this with any cruise missiles that still had the range. He ordered all his gods and warriors with the YJ-100 to fire half their remaining inventory, which would send another 48 missiles southwest after the Americans. It was a desperate counterattack, but there was nothing else to be done. Orders were sent to a pair of J-20’s orbiting over Borneo to dash on the American carrier and paint it with radar.

The Leopards strained to make the range, getting right up to the last minutes of available fuel before they released. They got their missiles in the air, and then started the long trip back to Davao, over 300 miles away. That sent the alarms ringing in the Enterprise Strike Group, and the crews stood ready to unleash their SAM’s.

The fast YJ-12’s were going to outrun the YJ-100s and get to their assigned targets first, only to face a streaming cloud of ESSM’s. The Sea Sparrows were out like predatory fish, lancing into the oncoming school of Vampires and cutting it to pieces in that feeding frenzy. Some got very close—laser close, and the CG-21 Class cruiser Atlanta flashed its energy weapons to get two fast leakers before they could find a hull to savage.

That defense held, and as the YJ-100’s finally came on the scene, sea skimmers at 500 knots, Karpov gave orders for Kirov and Kursk to support the defense. They were running out of Gargoyles, but still had plenty of Growlers. The weight of those missiles, combined with the American ESSM’s was more than enough to smash the last of the YJ-100’s. By 10:30 Local, the smoke was finally clearing. Once again, while the cruise missiles had fired in their hundreds, none had scored a hit, while a total of nine torpedoes, including two more fired by Franklin, had hit six ships, sinking three and leaving the other three creeping along as the damage control teams fought to control the flooding and seal all leaks.

Yet the undersea attack was never without risks, especially when so close to a large number of enemy ships. While Franklin slipped away, Chancellorsville was detected and targeted by two ASROC YU-7s fired by the cruiser Zanshi, the Warrior. Those, with the aid of two helicopters, were able to get hits on the American sub, and end its war.

The battle had been intense, confusing, and costly for both sides. Escorts and strike planes both took hits, and of the 36 F-35’s Admiral Cook took to sea, there were now 27 remaining, with a lot of empty chairs in the briefing rooms. All twelve Avengers were safe after two strike missions, and the six SuperToms were now up on BARCAP in case anything else came their way. Submarines Shenandoah and Chancellorsville were gone, but the enemy had suffered much greater harm, at least in overall tonnage and ships lost.

Admiral Wu would return to the South China Sea, missing six ships already sunk, including carrier Zhendong and the Rain God, Yushen, with three more badly damaged. His mission was a complete failure. He had been unable to destroy any of the American bases, while Beiying in the Philippines, was badly damaged, and with heavy plane losses. His grand campaign was now a broken arrow….

The 36 bombers at Clark AFB were trapped, as the runways and access points were so beaten up that they could not take off. The base commander, under orders to get those bombers back to China, fretted the hours away, knowing American bombers might strike them again at any hour. Two B-1’s were taking off at noon to do exactly that, and stir the embers there with more JASSM-ER’s. If necessary, the B2’s were rearming with that missile, using up almost all the remaining inventory on that ordnance at Anderson. A pair of B-52’s also sat ready with them if needed.

Aboard the Enterprise, Admiral Cook looked at his watch and figured it would be 16:00 before he was ready to contemplate another strike, so he turned and began moving back up towards the bottleneck of the Makassar Strait. From all reports, the Chinese fleet was still strung out on a long formation, and running for Zamboanga at the end of the Elephant’s Trunk of Mindanao. They would look to refuel hungry ships, and then his best guess was that they would return to the South China Sea.

A little after 13:00, Local, the two B1’s were in position to release on Clark AFB again. A few of the crewmen had spent time there, and as the missiles started to drop away and ignite their engines, one blew a kiss at a departing missile and spoke wistfully of a favorite restaurant and bar. “Now don’t overshoot your goddamned target and hit my Lomi House. I slogged down a lot of good food and beer there in my time.”

The missiles went in, eventually engaged by a defending HQ-9 battery, which got eight kills. But the rest delivered another pounding to Clark, this time the fires and shrapnel slashing at those big bombers all over the field. When it was over, only 21 of the 36 that had been based there remained, and the Air Force Generals were screaming bloody murder.

Captain Shill on the USS Washington was also about to deliver the same treatment to the airfield at Davao. His destroyers were laden with Tomahawks, and he would send out 72 to cover all the main targets at that field, including open parking and tarmac space. While the Tomahawk had proved to be a very inept ship killer, this was a mission it was built for, precision ground strike operations. It would be a 300 mile journey to the target, with the missiles traveling 500 knots, so they would get there within the hour.

The first Vampires were spotted over the eastern highlands at 14:44, which prompted an immediate scramble order for all twelve J-20’s based there, and one KJ-200 AEW Plane. The 20 flying Leopards were all laid up in the hangars and parking spots, surrounded by ordnance crews that now raced to get to shelters as the air raid sirens blared all across the field. Two SAM batteries switched on radars and begin processing the contacts to get firing solutions. A minute later they started sending missiles at the leading Vampires.

One battery sawed off the tip of the spear, buying the fighters just enough time to get airborne, which allowed them to fire their PL-12’s at the main body of the Tomahawks to get many kills. The KJ-200 thrummed skyward just as the first leaker got through and struck one of the tarmacs. Of the 72 missiles fired, only ten would get through that combined SAM and air defense to strike the base, but even those ten killed eight Leopards on the ground, and smashed the control tower and cargo terminal. The runway itself was also damaged to a point that the emergency crews had to radio the J-20s and tell them they could not land. They had no choice but to turn away and head northwest to Puerto Princesa AFB on Cebu, so the strike had effectively driven off all the remaining fighter defense at Davao.

With Carrier Strike Group Washington now under 300 miles to the east, the US would soon dominate the skies over Mindanao. TF Bougainville, was now ordered to begin preparations for the landing of US Marines on the west coast of the Gulf of Davao southwest of the city. They were tasked to come ashore at Binagao Beach south of the big Davao Therma South Power station complex, and also north of that site at Merco Beach.

It was expected that landing would be unopposed, and then the Marines would move overland up Highway 1 to take on anything the Chinese had at Davao in the way of garrison troops. The first ground counterattack of the Pacific War would be underway within 48 hours.

Chapter 9

“I don’t know what it is, Dimitri, but something feels odd.”

Admiral Volsky eased off the examination table as Doctor Zolkin finished listening to his heart and lungs with a stethoscope.

“I know what you mean,” said Zolkin. “But it isn’t up here.” He pointed to his head. “It’s just a gut feeling. Tell me about these dreams you say you have.”

“Well,” said Volsky. “It starts with a great sea battle, but it is nothing like the things going on here now.”

“How so?”

“Here a battle at sea is a lonesome affair. You never really ever see the thing you are firing at, unless the occasional missile gets inside five miles. All you see are the SAM’s firing off the deck, the SSM’s. Soon the entire ship is shrouded in a white misty cloud from the smoke of all the rockets. The only way you can ever make any sense of what might be happening would be to hover over the radar station, and there you can watch the tracks of the missiles as they come and go. The computers tell you whether a missile failed or hit its target, and if it does, you know nothing of the terror it caused on that unfortunate ship. There is a wrenching explosion, smoke, fire, but you see nothing. You just sit there in that white fog….”

The Admiral inclined his head, as if he had hold of something in his mind. “Yes… fog….”

“And this is what you dream?”

“Quite the contrary. The battle I see in my dream is one where you can actually see the ship you are attacking, off on the horizon, a dark and threatening shape, a shadow. From time to time you see the flash and wink of light, and then comes the boom of great guns.”

“Guns? You mean naval guns? We never seem to use them on this ship. They just sit there.”

“Very true, but not in my dream. Kirov is there, to be sure, but then in one dream I find myself on some other ship, and not one I even command. It is very old, one of those big battleships from the great war. The sound of the guns firing is deafening, terrible, worse even than the roar of these missiles when they fire. You can hear the woosh and fall of those massive shells, and see them plop into the sea to send up big water geysers. No, it is nothing like modern naval combat, where the missile you send will almost certainly find and kill its target—unless another missile finds and kills that Vampire first. It is almost exhilarating. The fact that the enemy shells miss you actually heightens the tension. You see them walking closer to your ship on the sea, and realize that should one ever strike…. Well, at least there is no fog. You actually see the devil stalking you, and feel the wind from his fists of steel as he flings his madness at you. Yes… no fog.”

“Better to see your end, if it’s coming?” said Zolkin. “I would not like to be sitting there is a cloud, not knowing whether an enemy missile is about to break on through and smash into the ship. So I just stay here and hope nothing bad happens, and that I will not have a line of wounded men to tend to.”

“Well, that’s the thing, Dimitri. All you have to do is go to the radar screens, and you will know if an enemy missile is close or far. But this is not the case on those old dreadnoughts.”

“Leonid, you sound as though you have actually fought such battles. I know you have been in the navy a good long time, but not that long.”

Volsky smiled. Of course there was no way he could tell his friend all that he really knew, and all he had experienced. Because yes, he had seen those mighty old battleships, and he knew the doings of the war where they once fought on the seas first hand. Yes, he had been to the last great war, aboard Kazan, until Fedorov had urged them to try and return to the world where they belonged. Go forward, he said. Go home. They had the means, one of those magic control rods Kazan had been carrying, and Time had the will. So they dipped that rod, shifted, and here they were, but not in the world they once knew as home. Instead, they found themselves in this far flung future, the years that grew directly from the great war he had seen in the past.

Yet his friend here knew nothing of that, nothing at all. Fedorov and Karpov hijacked this ship in 2021. That was the future we came from. They tell me they stopped Kirov from regressing to the past, and instead became embroiled in a war like this one. They tell me I was on that ship—another Admiral Volsky, and perhaps the man I was before all of this ever happened. So there we were. The missiles started flying, and we fought, for our lives, for our country, for that future, or so Fedorov tells me. But we failed. Way leads on to way when first we practice the deadly art of war. There we were, thumping our chest with those live fire exercises, and yes, way leads on to way….

Fedorov told me Russia was losing that war, in spite of all our efforts. Karpov fought with the same art and skill he has always shown, the same unwavering determination, but the Navy was just not strong enough to face and defeat the USN. And the land war that started so auspiciously for us in the Baltic States, and Ukraine, took a decided turn for the worse once the European Union, Britain, and the United States mobilized their latent strength.

Very strange… That was a war I should have fought—the war I trained and prepared for through all my years in the service. They tell me I did fight, defending Severomorsk and the approaches to the Barents Sea, and covering our troops in Norway, but it was not me. It was some other version of this old man, and when Karpov, Fedorov, and Tyrenkov got the notion that things were going up in smoke in that war—nuclear war being imminent—they simply stole away on this ship, leaving that old Volsky behind to his fate.

I suppose that wasn’t something they could remedy, as I was not aboard when they felt compelled to make good their escape. That said, it still stings a bit to think they left me there, but time has a way of righting all wrongs. Here I am! I came forward with Gromyko aboard Kazan, and we have had our nice little reunion. But this is not the future I once knew. No, it is the future of the war I saw with my own eyes, the war where dreadnoughts prowled the seas. Yet even as I think back on it, I am beset with these strange feelings. I fought there, yes, but in some deep place within me, I feel I died there as well. That is what I dream of now. Yes, I died in that war, as I died again in 2021…. Yet here I am, sitting with my old friend of so many years, in this and every Meridian of time where I have ever existed.

“It is very strange, Dimitri—more than strange. If you knew all the things I have really done, you would know I came to make friends with the impossible long ago. But this is what I dream… Once I was on a great battleship, in the last war, and the enemy shells found my ship I think—found me.”

Zolkin nodded. “Just a dream, Leonid. Do not fret about it.”

“You are probably right,” said Volsky. “Dimitri, do you ever have the odd feeling you have done something twice?”

“Twice? You mean feeling like I have lived through the same event more than once?”

“Exactly.”

“Well, to be quite honest, I have. I putter around in here when there’s no line at the hatch, and once I found something that puzzled me. It was an old bandage, still bloodied, but for the life of me, I could not remember ever using it, or dressing out a crewman with it. If that were the case, I would certainly have disposed of it properly.”

“A bandage? Just throw it away, Dimitri. Nothing to bother with.”

“You might think as much, but I couldn’t…. throw it away. I wouldn’t. It seemed important, though for the life of me I cannot say why. But it was important, something I kept for a reason. The strange thing is this. The instant I saw that bandage, I had the distinct feeling that I had found it once before, and had this very same reaction to it. You would think I would recall something like that, eh? Well, it seemed as if I did recall it, but then I could not remember why it would be important enough for me to keep it like that—locked up in the medicine cabinet and all. That was most unusual.”

“Something tells me we’ve both been at sea too long,” said Volsky. “Tell me, Dimitri. What do you make of all this?”

“It’s crazy,” said Zolkin. “One moment we are out there to conduct those live fire exercises for Naval Day, and then we suddenly find ourselves under attack by a hidden submarine and World War Three starts! Now look where we are, five years ahead and still stuck in that war. How could it be? How does a ship like this suddenly leap into the future? And here we find the whole war is turned on its head. Instead of fighting the Americans, they are all our friends. Instead of locking arms with the Chinese, Karpov is up there sinking their aircraft carriers. It’s madness! The men have accepted it, god bless their souls, but I could never quite swallow it. Movement in time? Even if I could accept that, why would we still be fighting this war now, in 2026?”

Volsky smiled.

“You are not the only one so confused and bewildered by what had happened to us.”

“True, Leonid, but I can’t for the life of me reason why the Americans would suddenly decide we are their friends.”

Volsky did not know how to respond, because he knew his friend had no idea Kirov had actually sailed with those grand old battleships of WWII either. So he tried to come up with some reason.

“We are five years ahead, and not any older. That at least is one good thing. But Dimitri, we don’t know what happened in those five years. The history books might write it somewhere in this world, but we have none of them aboard this ship. Perhaps Fedorov could explain it to you, as he has a nose for history. All I can imagine is that there must have been an armistice, and a peace made between Russia and the United States. It seems Russia isn’t even fighting in this war any longer—just us. We are the only ships still in the conflict, and now they are struggling to deal with China. That is all I can say about it.”

“I suppose that makes sense,” said Zolkin. “But for five years? Look how it almost came to a terrible end in 2021.”

“It seems this world avoided that.”

“But still they fight. The missiles still fly. The fog of war still envelops us every time that alarm sounds.”

“Yes,” said Volsky solemnly, “the fog….”

That was another deep memory he struggled to see and hold in his mind. The fog—but not from the missiles firing. No, this was something else, a deep, oppressive fog that enveloped them on every side. It was so thick that none of the helicopters could fly high enough to find clear skies. This is what he dreamed at times. Endless fog…. Men missing…. Brave Fedorov….

“Well Dimitri, we won’t sort all of this out here. All I can say is how grateful I am that you are here, my old friend. You may be troubled with dreams as well, and odd memories like those I describe to you here. Who knows, maybe a man lives many lives, and has many chances. But at least one thing holds true—our friendship.”

“Yes, Leonid. I was so glad when you returned on that submarine. Nobody really tells me much of what is happening. Oh, I get hints and clues from what the men whisper among themselves. I knew you were out there somewhere, fighting, defending Severomorsk. Then this crazy ship came here, a thing I have struggled to understand and accept. You know, trying to explain it to the men was the only way I kept my sanity. What happened, Doctor? Where are we? How is it possible? These are the things they all lined up to ask me. So I had to put aside my own bewilderment, remain calm, be strong for them, and help them make sense of it. Here we are, I told them. It’s the same world, just a little farther on.”

Volsky nodded, but he knew it wasn’t the same world. No, this was the future Kirov and Kazan shaped long ago, in WWII, and not the world his friend had lived in. That world was gone, and he knew that some version of his very own self had perished with it. This was another world, and another life, but his head was now a jumble of too many odd memories, snippets of one world or another, one life or another. It seemed to him that he had been caught up in the exploits of this ship and crew for ages past, and that there would be no end to the story. It would just go on, and on, and on.

He smiled inwardly. That is life, he thought. That’s how it really is. The only place things get tidied up and all resolved to a fitting end is in the story books and movies. But that isn’t the way it is in real life. There we just move from one time to another, one life to another. We reach back in our mind and see ourselves in one chapter or another of our life, and the older we get, the more there is to sort through, the love, the losses, the friends and foes, successes and failures, and all the choices we made to bring us to the place where we now stand, remembering it all. Yet I am a man grown too old, or so it seems. I have more things in this head than I can hold at any one time, which is why I think so much of my story must remain asleep. If it all woke up and came out at once, it could overwhelm me. So let it sleep, Leonid, he told himself.

Yes, forget the battleships, and forget the fog. Just be here now where you are—on this proud ship, and with this fine crew. Just be here with your dear old friend, and be glad for it.

“Yes,” he said to Zolkin. “Just a little farther on. That was a good way to say it.”

“Yet the men could only wonder what had happened to their wives, their children, all their friends. No one can use ship’s Internet stations to find out. Wartime security, says Karpov, and I suppose he is correct. Who knows what happened, but I told them they were all still out there, still waiting for them. Some were not so sure…. Think of the sacrifice these men have made, Leonid. We take them out on one sea or another, ask them to fight, to stand up, remain loyal. And amazingly, they do!”

“The finest crew in the fleet,” said Volsky.

“Yes? Well, how many aircraft carriers does Karpov need to sink? Why don’t we just go home. The Americans seem to have things well in hand.”

“Do they? Perhaps, but we have made a big difference in this war. It is a sad thing that we must fight it, and yes, we might wish the world would finally learn the folly of war. Yet here we are. The missiles come for us, and we fight back. That said, I do understand what you are saying. The men must long for their loved ones, and wonder where they are. One day that will all be resolved… One day…”

But Volsky knew that day might never really come, and that if they ever did finally put in to a friendly port, it would be one more hard shock for the crew. They don’t know the whole of it, he thought. They think this is the same war that started in 2021, and that we have pulled some kind of Rip Van Winkle affair to sleep and then wake here five years on. If we ever do take them home, what would they find?

Then he came to the hard fact he had discovered, too curious one day, just as Fedorov had learned the difficult truth. This world was not the one Fedorov left in 2021. So he thought he would use his Admiral’s privilege to gain access to the Internet. The first thing he did was see if he could learn the history of this ship, but it wasn’t there. The Soviet Navy of this era had never built it.

That was a most unsettling discovery, and it prompted him to want to search for his own name to see what he could learn. His hands hovered over the keyboard, and then he thought twice about it, and just shut the session down.

Better not to know, he thought. Be here now. What I don’t know cannot hurt me. If we keep the men in the dark, then I will sit there with them—all in the same boat, quite literally. I already know far too much….

As he thought on that, he wondered if the crew also had these odd dreams at times, and if their sleeping past would awaken in their heads as they took their rest in the bunks. He would help them as best he could, he thought. And for now, while Kirov still cut the waves with her proud bow, he would sail with them, wherever they went.

Then words came to him, one of those far off memories from some distant, hidden place in his mind. It was his voice, speaking to this crew: On the sea the boldest steer but where their ports invite, but there are wanderers o’er Eternity, whose bark drives on and on, and anchor’d ne’re shall be….