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Cuttlefish -> RE: In Drydock (4/27/2007 3:05:14 AM)
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July 6, 1942
Location: Kobe
Course: None
Attached to: Disbanded in port
Mission: None
System Damage: 7
Float Damage: 0
Fires: 0
Fuel: 475
Orders: Repair the ship and get back in the war.
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Aboard the Hibiki:
Riku is tired as he comes off duty. Over the last couple of months he has slowly become the indispensable right hand man of the ship’s quartermaster. He has tackled the job with energy, and has shown a real flair for organization and stowage. Riku enjoys the work more than he thought he would, and the fact that it gives him a free hand in loading and stowing crates of his own aboard the ship is a nice bonus.
The young sailor has kept his word to Taiki and has made no effort to contact the lovely Nanami Shun. He is no less love struck, however, and in his off hours he cannot help thinking about her. His friends are in fact worried about him, for he has completely stopped visiting the local geishas.
Instead of wrangling a pass off ship and carousing, in fact, this evening he is trying his hand at love poetry. He has little skill with the classic forms such as the tanka or haiku, but this does not stop him from trying. He works for a while in a fever of creativity, crouched in a corner of the bunkroom where he slings his hammock.
When he stops and reads what he has written, however, he is filled with chagrin. His feeble efforts are an insult to the beauty that is Nanami. In disgust he wads up the sheet of paper on which he has been working. He goes for a stroll up on deck and while up there pitches the offending ball of paper into the harbor. Then he returns to the bunkroom and crawls into his hammock for some much needed sleep.
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Chief Petty Officer Shun walks along the deck of the Hibiki. His sharp eyes miss absolutely nothing. Even sailors who are doing their jobs energetically and well twitch a little nervously as he walks past. For those who are not, a single baleful look is usually sufficient to produce the desired results.
The Chief spots a wadded up piece of paper wedged in one of the scuppers. Offended by the litter, he reaches down and picks it up. He can see a few hand written characters upon it, and out of curiosity he uncrumples it and reads. As he does so he slowly becomes absolutely still. His color deepens until his face is suffused with red. The paper is crushed once again in his powerful hands.
Finally he takes a deep breath. He recalls an Okinawan saying: “Once is happenstance, twice is coincidence, three times is enemy action.”* This is enemy action. He has no idea who has written this drivel, no idea who has dared to think about his daughter, but he intends to find out. Oh yes, he intends to find out.
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*Okay, unlike the other sayings included in this AAR this is not an authentic Japanese or Okinawan proverb. These words will not, in fact, be written for another 17 years, when they will appear in a book written by a man who is currently an officer in an enemy navy. But I wanted to use the phrase.
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