Big Guns go Boom

Posted on Sun Mar 1st, 2020 @ 6:05pm by Lieutenant Commander Elizabeth Yamaguchi-Solusar

Mission: Mission 34: Between Two Fires
Location: Various Locations - USS Roanoke
Timeline: 1000Hrs - June 26th, 2391

Takov looked at his sibling Nuyari as they stood out the door of the holodeck. "I wonder what program Cyrin has that he wants us to see."

Teval walked up behind his two kids with Savo and Karryn following him, saying," Well, lets find out, you two don't need to be shy."

Takov opened up the holodeck door only to be immediately met with the smell of salt water and a metal deck, with metal railing sitting in between them and open ocean. Nuyari decided to be the adventurous one and walked in first. Karryn walked in after, and turned in a different direction. Looking around, she immediately noticed she was on a boat of some kind, though a very large one. She looked up to the front of the ship and immediately noticed several very large gun barrels pointing to the side. Teval meanwhile approached from behind, when a voice called out," Hey Teval, there you are, its about time you guys showed up."

Teval looked up and noticed Niva, Cyrin's sister on one of the upper decks. With his kids following him, Teval climbed the nearby stairs up to the upper decks where Cyrin and Niva where.

Nuyari was the first to ask, "So what is this thing."

Cyrin smiled, "oh its a bit of a hobby of mine, I have an interest in ancient naval vessels. This one design in particular is from earths history. its an old naval battleship."

Teval looked up, noticing the large smokestacks and masts, and then looked around, then said, "A ship from the age of Steam and Steel, huh, don't see this too often. Most starfleet officers I know of, when they choose an old naval vessel, its almost always from the age of sail."

Cyrin nodded," Yep, this ship design originates from a united states design study between earths first and second world wars. It was never actually built though. They called it the Tillman four-two, a design armed with fifteen 457 mm guns."

Karryn walked up the stairs commenting, "So who is the enemy today."

Cyrin smiled, saying. "The imperial Japanese Navy, and their Yamato class battleship."

Meanwhile outside the holodeck, Ensign Elizabeth Yamaguchi was standing before the holodeck display. "Mmmm... a World War Two battleship.." she muttered aloud. "not seen one of those in... too long." she tapped the display which requested permission for her to enter the program from the person running it.

Cyrin got notice of the permission request and simply granted it, he wasn't familiar with Elizabeth so he just let her in.

The doors opened and in walked Elizabeth Yamaguchi, before she could process where she was, she got a splash of ocean water in her face. "Uhh..." she gasped. "What the!" she looked around as she found that she was instantly lost. "Where am I?"

Cyrin meanwhile, gt into the moment and said, "Well guys into the conning tower, the enemy is on us, cover your ears."

The group moved into the armored conning tower, where Nuyari got a good look at the extremely thick steel covering it, while Niva closed the hatch. Niva then went over to the gun director table, an reported the enemy location and direction, she then set the azimuth and elevation for the guns.

Meanwhile outside, the turret near Elizabeth began beeping before it started rotating slowly, its barrels changing their bearings. "Whats going on?" she paused as she turned her head to watch the turret as she found it fascinating.

As soon as the turrets where on target, Niva hit the trigger and all 15 of the very large 18 inch guns fired in unison.

Elizabeth had about a tenth of a second before the guns launched off all of their ordinance all at once, the backwash from the blast caught her and sent her on her back flying down the deck for about twenty feet or so, the other issue was that she was looking at the gun as the detonation flash went off, this had the effect of a very large and very powerful flashbang.

Elizabeth gasped. "Shit!" she screamed at the top of her lungs. "I can't hear anything." and while it was true, nobody else could hear her as she spotted the first hatch she saw, she yanked it open and went in, before closing it behind her.

Elizabeth paused before she tripped over her own feet and went down, almost flat on her face, while she lay there she took a moment to wait for the effects to pass before she slowly picked herself up off of the deck. "Uuhhh... What was I thinking?" she asked herself aloud.

She turned her head before she opened the hatch and peered back outside as loud shrieking could suddenly be heard before great mountains of water appeared. "Holy shit, we're being shot at...!" Elizabeth slammed the door closed before turning and moving into the interior of the ship.

She crossed a mess hall like space and entered a kitchen which she cut through in seconds before exiting into a almost labyrinthe style network of corridors and passages. "Crap... where's the bridge..?" the tall woman asked herself. "Forward..." and with that she set off.

Eventually she heard voices, before she walked slowly into the Command and Control center. "Hello?" she inquired softly. "Anyone in here?"

The hull clanged as one of the enemy shells bounced off the ships belt armor, while Niva fired another volley. Watching the radar screen, 15 seconds later, the shells found their mark, "4 hits."

"Well, you guys are really enjoying this aren't you," Teval commented. He then noticed Elizabeth stumbling into the room. "Elizabeth, what are you up too."

"I was just passing by." she responded with a smile. "I was outside when someone launched off a full broadside.... wow that hurt." she responded. "Mind if I sit down...?" she inquired.

Teval nodded, noticing Elizabeth was covered in cat hair, and he recognised the cat as being Five's cat." Yeah your fine, what brings you here."

"I was passing by.." Elizabeth responded as she selected a seat near Teval. "Its seldom I ever get to see a real battleship... not one of those overdone barges of the damned that laughingly passes for the age of sail." she explained. "HMS Victory... Might as well call her HMS Widowmaker..."

Cyrin shook his head, "Yeah I have never figured out why so many starfleet officers can be fascinated with those things."

Elizabeth smiled. "I prefer cold steel over painted wood." she responded. "but... thats me." she turned to Teval. "I heard you had some cats you wanted to find a home for.... would you object if I asked for a couple?" she sounded almost hesitant. "I found out that Shadow likes me... and .... I now understand why my siblings love cats.."

Teval shrugged," Yeah, thanks to Shonax, we now have eight of them. four of them are six months old, the other three are about three months. Though they are all part maine coon, so they get big and fluffy."

"Cool." Elizabeth smiled. "Can I give two or three of them a new home?" she sounded eager. "Rachael never shuts up about them.... after last night, I can see the appeal."

Teval looked at his children whom where currently fascinated with the gunnery table, then looked back at elizabeth, "Well I'm sure that can be arranged."

"That sounds great.." she responded before she turned to regard the small Kurukuri. "Will they be alright with losing two or three of them?"

Looking over at Nuyari and Takov, whom where both busy pawing the gunners table," Teval mentioned. "Yeah it shouldn't be a problem, as long as I keep a few they will be fine.

Elizabeth smiled. "Thank you Teval." she responded. "So.. what ship are we on and who's the enemy?" the human woman turned her attention to the nearby displays. "I don't recognize the design... of ship we're on.."

Teval looked at Cyrin whom answered, "An old design proposal from a former country of earth. This is a ship from the US, the design proposal was called the maximum battleship. Our enemy is the japanese battleship yamato."

"Ahh... wasn't Yamato sunk during Earth's second great war?" she inquired.

Cyrin nodded," Yep, unfortunately by hordes of sky cancer."

"Sky cancer," Karryn asked puzzled.

"Carrier born aircraft. " Cyrin explained." The war saw aircraft carriers replace battleships as the main ships of earths navies during and after the war."

"Huh, Interesting, Yeah In akurian history that never happened," Karryn added. " Akurians never developed the concept of the aircraft carrier at all, at least not until long long after we became a space faring species."

Cyrin looked at Karryn curiously," Really why not, did the planet not have large oceans or something."

Karryon shook her head," no 50% of Ariveyo's surface is covered in water, in fact the panets landmasses are broken up into much smaller continents than on earth, so if anything Wet navies where even more important in Akurian history than in earth history. But what happened is that heavier than air flight came very late for us relative to humanity. Ariveyo lacks the large oil and fossil fuels that earth had that the humans used to developed the internal combustion engine. Akurians retained the use of the steam engine until we developed nuclear fission, which came a little more quickly for us as Ariveyo has a higher concentration of uranium than earth did. It want until we developed hydrogen powered vehicles did heavier than air flight become possible, and I believe by then, large wars simply stopped happening, and warships in general started to disappear, that is until we built their space based counterparts many centuries later."

Elizabeth listened as she took in what everyone was saying, she found the idea of skipping burning fossil fuels to be interesting. "I've never heard the term 'sky cancer' before." she admitted.

Cyrin barely realized what Elizabeth was saying as he listened to what Karryn was saying, then he asked," Wait, what do you mean by aicraft carriers not coming until the Akurians where a space faring species."

"Well," Karryn explained," well, we did develop aircraft carriers, but it was something that came over a millennia after becoming an interstellar power. We still use them today actually. but that they are are vessels about 200,000 metric tons in weight, and are capable of space flight, though they lack FTL. Technically they are airships more than spaceships, they only go into space when transiting from their own larger transport starship to a planets atmosphere. though if the planet has an ocean, that is where the aircraft carriers will be most of the time, and they have a bunch of drone aircraft on them. We use them mainly because drone aircraft aren't designed to travel in space at all, to keep their size and weight down. And the drones are used to assist combat airships in establishing air superiority, as well as for close air support."

Cyril looked at karryn saying, "What have i missed."

Elizabeth listened carefully as she found the subject fascinating. "Nice!"