Cent. Calendar 23/02/1640, outside the port of Astaran (Point Jeanne), 6:52
It was a cold winter morning in the northeastern fishing town of Astaran. Around two months into the war with Parpaldia, their army landed in the kingdom and took the town for themselves; weeks later, it was now the busiest port on the northeastern coast with dozens of Parpaldian transport ships unloading men, supplies, cannons, and war animals to shore up their presence. As all this hustle and bustle was going on, the Parpaldian occupiers were lenient enough to allow the town’s native population to continue with their daily lives. For most of the residents, this meant being able to continue with their livelihood as fishermen.
The horizon to the east was dyed a somber orange as the sun was about to burst forth from its slumber. However, the morning fog that had set in was still pretty thick, so the powerful glow of the rising sun was somewhat stymied. At the town’s fishing port, a lone fishing boat was setting out and clearing the breakwater. At the helm was its captain, who maintained overwatch and had his hand over the wheel.
It was already 6:52 in the morning, an arguably very late time for the fishermen who were going for the morning catch, so no other fishing boat was leaving the port. However, the port was by no means empty—on the other side of the port where the Parpaldians had built a makeshift unloading facility, a couple of transports were docked and were in the process of unloading their cargo. Outside the harbor, however, were dozens more of these transport ships, anchored some distance from one another and waiting for their turn to unload their cargo. These hulking vessels, some more than thrice the fishing boat’s size, loomed in the fog as the boat made its way out into the sea.
“Hmmm...”
The captain glared at the Parpaldian vessels. They were massive but unprotected. Unfortunately for their side, the Royal Altaran Navy had been dealt a massive blow roughly a month ago, and there was now virtually no challenging the Parpaldians at sea. But...
“Seems about the same...”
The captain muttered to himself as he squatted down onto the floorboards, dislodged a loose plank on the corner, and procured a dark metallic brick from underneath. It was about the size of the plank—roughly a whole arm’s length—and was mostly inconspicuous apart from one of the faces on its long side, which was filled with raised squares in a grid pattern.
The captain pushed some of the squares in sequence as if they were buttons before hovering his finger over a circular button near the top of the brick. It was labeled with two scripts corresponding to the common Asheran script and the local Altaran script but they said the same thing: “Press to Talk.”
“Alright...”
Just as he was about to press it, however, something caught his attention.
“Wait! That ship...”
As his boat was entering the open ocean, he spotted a lone transport ship anchored at the tail end of the ‘line’ of vessels waiting to enter the port. It wasn’t exactly alone—there appeared to be a warship further behind it—but the key fact about it was that it wasn’t there yesterday evening, the last time the captain had set sail when he was trying to go for the night catch.
“Damn!”
He quickly set aside the brick and produced a map from the same place he got the brick. It was a map of Astaran and the local area but it differed from the usual maps due to its elaborate grid system that corresponded to accurate coordinates. Skilled in navigation due to his extensive time as a sailor, he found his position and the position of the new ship in no time. He promptly took note of the coordinates and re-entered the sequence on the brick before pressing down and holding the press-to-talk button.
“Anglerfish, 244.”
The captain uttered into the brick before letting go of the press-to-talk button. Less than a minute later, a voice came from the brick.
“Swordfish, 154.”
Hearing this, the captain sighed in relief. It was almost as if he had been hoping for such a reply. Pressing the button again, he started talking.
“Prior positions unchanged, but be advised of ONE pufferfish at coordinates... and ONE sunfish at...”
The cryptic conversation between the captain and the mysterious voice continued as the fishing boat disappeared into the fog.
Onboard the Army transport ship Mouette, 7:06
Knock knock
“Come in.”
Captain Guiscard permitted the person knocking on his quarters’ door to come in. The damp wooden door swung open, revealing a figure dressed in a white uniform carrying with him a tray. The neutral expression on the young man’s face betrayed the almost heavenly sight of the items on the tray. It didn’t take long for the visual stimulation to be joined by his olfactory senses as the starchy smell of buttered bread and the aromatic fragrance of hot coffee wafted into the room.
Guiscard almost reflexively moaned in delight at the smell, but his uneasy throat got the better of him and he let out a cough instead.
“May I perhaps offer hot tea instead, captain?”
The concerned cook took notice and tried to be understanding, offering to change his captain’s breakfast drink for something more accommodating to a cough.
“No need.”
The captain refused his offer, dismissing him with a wave of his hand. With that, the cook promptly placed the tray down on one of the corner tables before making himself scarce.
Once the door was closed, Guiscard stood up and went to inspect the tray. It was only seven in the morning and he had just woken up, but the beckoning smell of melted butter and beautifully roasted beans were like opium in their allure and ecstasy. He took in his right hand a silver fork and his left a silver knife from the tray. He plunged the cold metal stakes of the fork into the plump-looking bread prepared on a porcelain plate. The slender stakes easily sunk into the body of the bread and glistening drops of buttery oil oozed from the holes the fork pressed into. It was an appetizing sight to watch, even in the terrible lighting conditions offered by a weak, flickering magic bulb.
Unable to contain his panging hunger, he promptly sliced roughly an eighth off the bread, dipped it into balsamic vinegar seasoned with shredded garlic, and put it in his mouth. Immediately, the explosion of flavors cast away the languidness and fatigue from his body as his mouth winced at the sourness of the balsamic vinegar. His mouth was watering at the seams and he wanted more. In no time, he finished the bread, much to his disappointment, but the coffee was more than enough of a rewarding end that it washed his troubles away.
“Ahhh...”
He sat back in his cold, wooden chair with the cup of coffee in hand. He took one more sip before deciding to get to work.
On his desk were two piles of documents: one was a mound of small papers with brief and succinct sentences containing sighting reports and maneuvers, all of which were correspondence with the Ignace, a Navy broadside ironclad escorting them; the other was a pile of more formal-looking correspondence with complete addresses and titles—correspondence with the Army Maritime Transport Establishment back in Esthirant. He placed his cup of coffee on top of the former pile as a paperweight and turned his attention to the other pile, particularly a specific letter on the very top.
He looked at it more closely. He hadn’t seen it before, which meant they had just received it the night before while he was asleep. It wasn’t that long; it was mostly about the weather and the situation at relevant ports in Altaras and back home, but what caught his attention was a very short footnote.
Guiscard turned to his right, where a map of the Altaras Strait and the northern part of the island of Altaras was pinned onto the wall. His eyes wandered to Hajjisler, a major Altaran city just south of the ‘base’ of the peninsula Le Brias was situated on. Home to a population of 300,000 and two infantry regiments of the Royal Altaran Army, it was a tough target and thus ignored by the Parpaldian Army, which focused on a fast, northern blitz to Le Brias. Nevertheless, the military maintains overwatch over activity there, including its port, which is detached from the main city further inland. Hajjisler’s port had a naval base, but the major capital ships homeported there were all sunk at Menda Point, so the Parpaldian Navy deemed it to be a ‘low-level threat.’
Even with the naval base there still intact, nothing had happened up to this point, so Guiscard and the other captains weren’t exactly restless commanding the Army’s transport ships back and forth between Parpaldia and Altaras. However, this single footnote in the letter from Maritime Transport shook him awake. He had never received notice about activity in Hajjisler before, but the way it was seemingly haphazardly added to the letter makes him want to believe it’s minor and thus not a cause for concern. After all, the Navy seems to think they’re not a threat, and with how they’ve acted as if the Altaran seaboard was their backyard, he has all the reasons to believe them. However, with the withdrawal of most of the 1st Armee Corquexima (1st Fleet) from their diversionary attack on Le Brias and returning to Esthirant to recuperate and resupply, their supply lines were vulnerable.
Enjoying this book? Seek out the original to ensure the author gets credit.
And yet...
“Hmm...”
What worried him was that Point Jeanne, their designation for Astaran, the site of the Army’s eastern beachhead and the major port for logistics on the eastern side of the peninsula, was only up the coast from Hajjisler’s port. If there really was a cause for concern from the “unusual activity” in Hajjisler, his ship and the dozens of other transports at Point Jeanne were in danger.
As he pondered for possible courses of action, the lighting in his quarters suddenly went from dim white to bright yellow. A colored magic bulb near the ceiling had turned on; not long after, a piercing buzzing sound rang out. It was a signal that his crew was calling for him to come to the bridge and typically only used for situations where they immediately needed his judgment.
“Here we go...”
Donning his captain’s cap, he quickly made for the bridge.
- - -
Arriving on the bridge toward the Mouette’s stern, Captain Guiscard found his bridge officers waiting for him.
“Captain!”
The officers simultaneously saluted their captain, to which their captain responded with a prompt salute.
“Why was I summoned?”
“Correspondence from the Ignace.”
One of the officers handed him a small piece of paper, which read, “Be advised: smoke trail from unidentified source spotted at 098, distance uncertain. Strongly recommend engines on and all crew on station.”
Guiscard’s eyes widened as big as the full moon. The hairs on his neck stood straight on their ends. The footnote from Maritime Transport flashed before his eyes.
“Turn the engines on and prepare to cut anchor! Get all crew on station, now!”
“Roger, engines are already hot and ready to move! Notifying all crew!”
The officers promptly rang bells, signaling the crew to man their stations. Most of the crew were already awake, but the shift had only turned an hour ago so the crew working the last shift were still in bed. Down in the crews’ quarters, officers were ringing bells and banging on the doors.
“General stations! General stations!”
Half-asleep crewmen hurriedly jumped out of their beds, donned their uniforms, and rushed out of their quarters. The sound of ringing bells, shouting men, and thundering footsteps could also be heard in the soldiers’ quarters. Filled to the brim with a battalion’s worth of soldiers—reinforcements for the Parpaldian Imperial Army’s offensives into Le Brias—the transport Mouette was also carrying half a dozen artillery pieces, two companies’ worth of horses, three land dragons (sedated for the journey), and crates of weapons, ammunition, and various foodstuffs and supplies.
“What the hell...?”
Parpaldian Army soldiers jolted awake by the sudden commotion had started wandering into the corridors and onto the deck. It was a slow, cold, and sleepy morning, and they were only waiting to be received by the port, so they were puzzled by the crew frantically running about.
Meanwhile, back on the bridge, Captain Guiscard was standing on the portside rails and facing the 098 direction, which was roughly to the southeast. The Mouette’s bow was pointed south and the Ignace was anchored some distance away to the northeast, covering their rear.
“Dammit! Where’s the smoke?!”
Guiscard frantically searched for the smoke trail the Ignace was referring to. However, the morning fog essentially obscured their sight. Their lookouts weren’t high enough to see past the fog, so the only way they could know where to spot the smoke trail was from cues from the Ignace.
“Can’t see shit! Has the Ignace figured out their distance yet!”
Guiscard barked at his communications officer, who hurriedly operated the ship’s manacomm. After some time, he got a reply from the ironclad.
“They lost visual of the smoke trail! Distance yet uncertain!”
“For the love of—”
He started to freak out, but he bit his lip to try and maintain some semblance of cool.
He desperately continued to search for the smoke trail, but the thick blanket of fog stood in his way. Sweat poured from all over his body as the faint hum of the ship’s Mirishial-built magic engines whirred in the background. How he wished he could call on the wyvern corps, but he didn’t have the authority to request their help; the Ignace should have the authority, but for some reason—perhaps the wyvern corps was too preoccupied with prior missions or they were taking their sweet, sweet, sweet time to respond—the skies were devoid of the all-dominating cries of their wyverns.
Then, while sweeping the general southeast direction, the fog slightly parted.
“There!”
One of the officers who was also watching the direction screamed out. On the still blurry horizon, they could make out a smoke trail. Below it was the dark silhouette of a small boat barely bigger than their largest launch and its bow was coincidentally directly pointed toward them. It flew no visible flag, and it didn’t resemble any vessel they’d seen before, so neither Guiscard nor his officers could identify what it was. However, the Ignace seemed to know what it was, for the manacomm was ablaze.
Their communications officer was white from fear and was panicking.
“F-F-From the Ignace!!! Torpedo boat at 098 at distance 0.5 tacour (~1.3km) and undertaking hostile maneuvers! They’re ordering us to undertake immediate evasive maneuvers!”
Guiscard’s face was white with horror, but he nonetheless responded with the right urgency.
“Cut the anchor!!! Engines to full power!!!”
“Engines to full power, aye!!!”
The helmsman repeated his orders as he threw his body into pushing the engine power controls to their maximum while crewmen severed the anchor. Immediately, the magic engines started to whir louder and louder as the ship underneath their feet began to wobble and move. Behind them, the Ignace was already moving, turning hard to port to point its starboard broadside toward the direction of the incoming torpedo boat. Its broadside gunports were hurriedly opened and gun crews moved to get them into position, loaded and primed.
However, all of this action felt frustratingly slow with the torpedo boat already heading toward the Mouette at combat speed.
Guiscard glared at the incoming torpedo boat. Relics of the Western powers’ pre-Great War arsenals, torpedo boats were sold rather liberally to the powers in the East—Riem, Parpaldia, and Altaras. He was no expert on how they were used, but the reigning principle of navies in the East was the dominance of big fleets of capital ships; torpedo boats may have been seen as a radical way to break the capital ship fleets, but the primarily continental focus of Parpaldia likely doomed further efforts on radical naval concepts like the torpedo. Nevertheless, Parpaldia does possess dozens of such boats and there are well-known strategies to counter them (courtesy of Mu and Mirishial), but they are so obscure that even captains such as Guiscard only had a rough idea of what they looked like.
Thirty seconds had passed since the engines were brought to max power, yet the ship was only beginning to crawl from where it was anchored. Guiscard gripped the rails hard as if to beg the ship to move faster.
Then, he saw the torpedo boat launch two objects from its bow, which splashed into the ocean. As soon as the splashes had cleared, the torpedo boat turned its bow away from them, revealing its long side profile.
“They’re in the water!!!”
One of the officers screamed, prompting horrified looks from the crewmen working on the bridge. Before they could react, the deafening sound of cannon fire cackled from behind them in staccato.
Boom! Boom! Boom! Boom!
The Ignace had started firing a rolling broadside, producing a thick cloud of smoke on its starboard. The distance between the two Parpaldian ships and the torpedo boat was close enough that the shots the Ignace fired landed not long after, but the shots all missed the small and speedy torpedo boat.
Meanwhile, the two deadly torpedoes it launched were now headed straight for the Mouette’s long port broadside. The wakes they created were visible from the bridge and they were moving faster than the Mouette could turn.
“Captain! Your orders?!”
His terrified officers begged their captain for a plan of action. Guiscard wasn’t paralyzed by fear, but he knew it was too late to do evasive maneuvers. It was painfully clear from the point they spotted the torpedo boat and how close it was that the Mouette would be lost. With less than half a minute of a window to act, he decided to commit.
“We’re not surviving this strike! Abandon ship!”
Without any hint of resistance, his officers acknowledged his order. Quickly, they sounded the whistle, and crewmen started to run for the lifeboats. Just as officers started informing the soldiers and the other passengers of their situation, the ship was violently thrown back.
KABLAM!!!
Two gigantic columns of water jutted out of the ocean from the Mouette’s port side, dwarfing the transport. Men, horses, furniture—everything that wasn’t nailed down was thrown into the air before falling onto the walls or the floor. Guiscard himself was thrown back into the bridge, slamming his left arm hard into a metal fixture.
“Grrrrr!!!”
He winced as he felt immense pain in his arm. It must have been broken. But then the pain was soon joined by intense ringing in his ears, possibly from the explosions. Still disoriented, he could faintly hear the shouting of his men, the wailing of horses, the agonized cries of land dragons, and the creaking of metal. However, he started to feel the energy ebb away from every corner of his body and it got harder and harder to lift himself up from the floor. Before long, even the pain started to dissipate.
The last thing he felt was the cold embrace of water steadily swallowing his body from his legs to his head.
- - -
“Is it just me or did you also hear that?”
“What the hell’s going on?”
Engineers under Parpaldian logistics units working at the makeshift port in Astaran (Point Jeanne) were disturbed from their menial duties by commotion out at sea.
First, they heard the rolling popping of gunfire—probably a ship firing a broadside—which was not much cause for concern since they were in a combat zone, but still off-putting. But then a powerful, heart-thumping explosion rang out from where the gunfire came from. The sheer magnitude of the explosion was strong enough to rock the wooden jetties of Astaran’s fishing port. Altaran civilians and Parpaldian soldiers started to congregate at the town’s harbor front wondering what was happening.
“There! Look at that one!”
One of the engineers pointed to the transport ship furthest out, which had two massive columns of water right next to it and collapsing onto the ship. It was visible even with the fog, which was clearing up as the morning sun rose from the horizon. As the water cleared, they could make out the ship’s profile listing heavily to port.
“Fuck. We gotta call this in.”
While some of the engineers ran back to their control facility to report the incident, some stayed to watch. In those two minutes that the engineers ran back to the control facility, the transport completely rolled over to its side before disappearing beneath the waves.
- - -
At around 7:39 in the morning of the 23rd of Febrond, while awaiting its turn to dock and unload its cargo at Astaran (Point Jeanne), the Parpaldian Imperial Army transport ship Mouette came under attack from an unidentified torpedo boat—likely a torpedo boat of the Royal Altaran Navy. Two minutes after being struck by two torpedoes, the Mouette capsized and sunk. Of the 67 crew, 1,000 soldiers, 50 horses, and 3 land dragons onboard the Mouette, only 10 crew and 49 soldiers were recovered from the ocean by the nearby broadside ironclad Ignace.
News of the incident made its way back to the military command in Esthirant within the day. Before His Majesty Emperor Ludius could react, the Navy Chief of Staff already made leadership changes in the Navy Command and the War Department, promising the Emperor to “make the rest of the campaign flawless.” As part of its mandate, the Imperial Communications Office limited exposure of the incident in Parpaldian mass media.
The next day, on the 24th, the War Department issued a directive that prevented elements of the Army Maritime Transport fleet from sailing without the escort of a Navy squadron. The Navy and the Wyvern Corps were ordered to launch a retaliatory strike on Hajjisler Naval Base, as well as to commit some forces to reinforce maritime supply lines and actively seek out and destroy surviving elements of the Royal Altaran Navy.
The ramifications of these additional commitments to the Navy, Wyvern Corps, and Army Maritime Transport on the Army’s offensive into Le Brias will soon be made apparent...