Weapons of choice

Hidaka looked up from the computer screen and returned Brasch's greeting in his own faltering German. "Guten Morgen," was about all he could muster. Brasch's English was also better than Hidaka's, but there were occasions when they used it to confer, nonetheless. Neither man really trusted Steckel. When he was within earshot, they spoke in the enemy's tongue, of which he had no knowledge.

"And what do you have for us today, Commander Hidaka?"

The Japanese, he found, tended toward a scattergun approach, skipping from one fantastic discovery to the next as they swarmed over the ship. Brasch, on the other hand, spent most of his time patiently arguing in favor of a more systematic method: choose a category of investigation-such as the offensive missile system-draw up a template to guide the research, and move methodically through each stage of the study.

He had also prevailed upon them to exploit the Indonesians, Lieutenant Moertopo and his men. Yamamoto had been detaining them in heavily guarded luxury on the island. But the admiral was disinclined to let them anywhere near their controls again-especially since the vessel now lay at the very heart of Japan's naval power. Word was that Yamamoto lay awake at night, fearful lest half his fleet might be disintegrated beneath a brace of doomsday rockets. Even the cavalier Hidaka had to agree with that.

Still Brasch had argued, finally appealing directly to the admiral himself.

"Those men are cowed," he insisted. "They are as pliable as sheep. They feel abandoned by the Americans, and remain unbalanced by their presence here."

"So you would have unbalanced men sit in the midst of my fleet, controlling weapons of a power we can hardly imagine?" asked Yamamoto.

"Yes," asserted Brasch, "if you would have me come to understand those weapons. We could stumble along for years trying to figure out how even the simplest devices work. Or we could just ask them. If they cooperate, we reward them. If not, we force them."

Yamamoto finally relented when Brasch explained that the sensors on the Sutanto gave him reason to suspect they could not keep the Indonesian vessels a secret for much longer. Moertopo had already explained that the other ships in this Kolhammer's task force were larger and even more capable. Their devices would surely sniff out the truth before long.

"And then, Admiral Yamamoto, you can expect to lose a great many ships just outside your window, to their doomsday rockets."

Yamamoto had surrendered to the argument.

For his part, Brasch alternated between sincere fascination at the wonder of the ships and the blank flatness that had come upon him in Russia. In his most lucid moments he understood that he was sick, afflicted by a paralysis of both mind and soul. Depending on his mood, he might be reduced to tears by a letter from his wife and son, or so unmoved that he couldn't be bothered opening the envelope.

He occasionally wondered why the army had sent him here. A mix of reasons, he presumed. His Japanese was fluent, thanks to many childhood years spent traveling the Orient with his parents. Father was a diplomat, just like Steckel. Or maybe not so much like Steckel. His father's career had eventually stalled under the Nazis.

And Brasch's engineering skills, as even Hidaka acknowledged, were exceptional. But he knew there was more to it. They had tried to make him a hero after Belgorod. His insanity in standing atop the pile of Russian dead, to calmly empty his pistol into a Soviet horde, was an exact fit with the fuhrer's "stand fast" principle. He had even met Gobbels when they brought him home to show off this fine example of Aryan manhood.

Unfortunately his shattered nerves hadn't equipped him for the public role of superman, and after two instances of ill temper and a breakdown in a radio recording studio, his schedule of appearances had been canceled.

A small article in the Volkischer Beobachter announced that he had been dispatched overseas on an important mission for the fuhrer, but that was before the mystery ships had even arrived. The bizarre communiques from Tokyo had simply provided an excuse to be rid of him for even longer. He suspected the high command thought this whole adventure was an absurdity dreamed up by the Japanese to explain the abortive end to their Midway invasion.

The reality had reduced him to helpless laughter more than once, further convincing Herr Steckel of his mental frailty.

He rarely worried about the report he would have to make, and soon. He knew Steckel already had been sending inflammatory messages. For Brasch, who had walked in the land of the dead for so long, the Sutanto presented an intriguing puzzle that diverted him from the unbearable burden of living.

HIJMS YAMAMOTO, HASHIRAJIMA ANCHORAGE, 0824 HOURS, 6 JUNE 1942