The battle
June 22nd, 3329, South Celestial Sea, 1430 Hours
The battlefield was just recognized, it was the ocean of the Celestial Sea just seventy miles south east of Baltimare. My ship's light gray hull, and gun's golden orange shined in Celestia's sun as waves lightly hit the decks as we went up and down in the waves. I was in the Bridge, and about eighteen kilometers to starboard in the distance was black smoke coming out of coal powered warships. My battle group was made up of three escort light battleships, and eight armored cruisers armed with seven inch cannons. They too were light gray, and golden orange. My ship however, was the first and biggest battleship. It was the pride of our navy, this ship had to be protected at all costs. It could, however survive with it's own protection of the advanced armor, and number of secondary cannons. It mounted four turrets, with three fifteen inch cannons each. Nothing could overpower my ship.
I was the flag ship, with the escorts in a triangle like formation off the ship's stern about eight hundred meters out. Our armored cruisers were about a kilometer off to port in a line formation.
I ordered cruising speed to fifteen knots from thirteen knots. We were approaching sixteen kilometers from each other, the ship's firing range was fifteen point two kilometers. I ordered crew to their battle stations, and respective positions. I issued orders to bare main battery turrets "A" and "B" to sixty degrees starboard.
The enemy was still advancing at an estimated ten knots, it wasn't fast but we turned to port to bare all guns on target. They were fifteen point five kilometers away now, I was starting to sweat at the anticipation of hearing our cannons fire and hear shells whistling in the air. Well we wouldn't hear it, but they certainly will. They were in range, although only to my guns. The others were still kilometers away from being able to start raining hell. I gave the order to start firing "A", "B", "C", and "D's" cannons one gun at a time as to not waste shells.
There were magnificent "Booms" as the cannons fired, it would take roughly twenty, thirty seconds give or take for the shells to make contact. I held out a pair of binoculars, and waited for water to erupt beside the enemy ships.
It wasn't long before water erupted hundred to fifty meters off the enemy warship's starboard, and port. They were closing at fourteen point six kilometers as they increased speed. I readjusted the firing arc of the cannons to account for the shortened distance, and reports from the range finders. Soon enough they were reloaded with new armor piercing rounds, and we fired similarly as before, one cannon at a time.
With more "Booms" of the guns, I waited once more for contact. Soon enough, one by one shells rained down. The first nearly hit the bow, missing by an estimated ten meters to it's port. Others missing by about fifty meters starboard, to port of the enemy ship.
At this point the enemy was breaking fourteen kilometers, and I could make out the design better. It was a gray, it had large turrets to it's sides, and had a larger turret mounted at the bow. It was less technologically advanced from the looks of it, it's cannons appeared shorter in length compared to our ships. I could only assume they'd make good mortars, deck punching guns one could call them. The side turrets mounted smaller, but longer cannons I estimated either six inch, or eight inch secondary battery's. It was still hard to make out anyone on board, but they were Griffons since we were already at war with them. It wouldn't make much sense otherwise. I could also tell it lacked range finders, which made them fools for attacking one of our ships at all. Over all it seemed to be an Ironclad design, instead of dreadnought or battleship like us. I could however make out smaller ships behind, they seemed to be armored cruisers. Can't say what else until they get closer.
Our cannons roared once again, as the enemy was about thirteen point five kilometers away. After waiting, one by one shells landed. One struck the belt causing a large amount of sparks to be created followed by the shell striking the water about five meters away. I could see a large dark grey marking where the shell struck, surely their ears must be ringing by now. Another shell nearly hit the bow again, and others were near misses. It also tilted slightly to starboard when the first shell ricochet off the port side belt. It returned back to it's normal rocking in the waves soon after.
I started to grin after the main guns were getting much closer to target. Soon though, their bow turret started to train on my ship's position. It was foalish to believe they could do much, especially with how few they had. It was, however, clear we were in range of their cannons. They started turning to starboard, and it's escort or sister ship followed about five hundred meters to it's aft starboard. The cruisers behind were still following until they were in appropriate positions to make a move.
A few moments later I ordered the guns to re position for the enemies new positions, and movements which picked up to fifteen knots. As much as I wanted to make them regret a broadside position to us, I kept up the pot shots instead of full broadsides. No, that was going to wait until we can really give them hell in fast succession. I wasn't going to get greedy, yet.
The guns fired one by one, and I waited once more. One hit the super structure at the aft section, resulting in an explosion as fire erupted out of the rear super structure. Another two were close, and the other went over.
Moments later, I saw smoke and fire billow out of it's main battery cannons and soon heard the shock wave. About thirty seconds later, I heard a loud whistling, and the shells missed around fifty meters to my port, and starboard. It didn't make me very nervous, but eventually once secondaries started opening on both sides, I wasn't about to wait for my head to be taken by a stray shell.
I suddenly heard explosions from behind us, our escorts were opening up on the enemy. They mainly targeted the second ironclad, and mostly missed first salvos.
I then opened the second part of my battle plan for the armored cruisers to go in front of my ship's bow, and open fire on the enemy. They'd be exposed, yes, but the point was to get as many cannons on their positions as possible. Let our cruisers dwindle down the battleships to a burning corpse, while the battleships deal with the cruisers. Point is to take out their supportive fire units, while the front line units get focused by our cruisers.
They were twelve point four kilometers away, when our cannons fired again. One by one they came down, an Armor piercing shell struck and detonated inside of it's bow most port side secondary turret. It exploded into a fiery mess of metal, and the ship began listing a tad to port. Another penetrated the bow, causing sparks to fly, and a hole about twenty feet from the tip. Others nearly missed, and I looked towards the second battleship. It had been hit from the looks of it, but it wasn't anything terrible.
I could make out the cruisers clearly now. They were a salty ocean blue, with a dark green at the waterline, it's structure was also gray. It mounted a duel eight inch turret on it's bow, with three other eight inch guns covered by a gun shield from what I could make out on the port side. It had three smoke stacks, and had no range finders like their battleships.
I checked on our armored cruiser's positions, and they were about five minutes from completing the maneuver.
There were more explosions as the enemy continued getting hammered by our ships, and as they fired back. The first contact enemy shells made with us, was the second enemy battleship successfully hitting the starboard side escort, the shells dug into the deck as they detonated. It caused a large fire, damaged it's starboard secondaries and engines.
The enemy lead ship was now on fire at three locations, the turret explosion caused the fire to spread into the enemy's bridge, and the bow was hit by an armor piercing shell which detonated near the deck.
They were closing slowly, and were now about eleven point six kilometers away.
I decided to open fire with an entire broadside, since they were broadside to us. They were also closing slowly, which meant shells should make contact with ease. After the booming of all the main guns firing, and fifteen or so seconds of waiting they struck a serious blow to the battleship. Shells ripped into the belt, mid ship, and turrets causing a massive explosion of fire. After the water's eruption into the air ended, I could only see a listing battleship with fire on the entire super structure. Moments later, it erupted into a fireball breaking the ship in half, it only took about twenty minutes for the broken halves to slip below the water.
I doubt they were expecting us to blow up their lead ship so quickly, as the other enemy ships started to turn tail and run. I wasn't about to let them get away so easily, they were slow ships. I gave the order to follow them, and I turned my bow to their aft sections. Once reloaded, I re positioned the guns to fire on the second battleship. I ordered the other ships to open fire on the enemy cruisers as soon as possible. I was dealing with this one alone.
The closest enemy ship was eleven point five kilometers away now, and our guns boomed. Two struck the battleship's rear turret, failing to penetrate, however it was disabled for the time being. The other's were near misses off it's aft, and port side.
I soon gave the order to go combat maneuvering speeds, top speed being twenty knots. We quickly got closer, by the time my ship's guns were reloaded we were eleven kilometers away. I gave the order to fire, and another two penetrated the super structure causing a decently sized fire, another shell glanced it's mid ship and ricochet off into the distance.
I was confident the destruction of the enemy fleet would happen before "1800" today. So I took a risk, and decided to get closer before opening fire again. It wasn't a huge risk, but for others I assume it would be unnerving.
We were ten kilometers away now, and I gave the order to fire once again, and the guns boomed. Three shells hit, and detonated into the super structure causing a massive fire. I could eventually see the structure fall apart, practically melting from the flames.
Eventually the enemy understood they were never getting away alive, so instead of running they went into a broadside to us again at eight point seven kilometers away. We turned to port to meet their port side broadside, and our secondary batteries filled the air with shells. We had the advantage in the number of secondary cannons, but they had the higher caliber.
Once reloaded, our cannons fired a full broadside. I had faith they'd connect to the enemy battleship. After a short time, they penetrated the belt, mid ship, turrets, and the ship exploded into fire. Eventually erupting into a fireball like it's sister ship.
However, things turned for the worse for my ship when all the enemy cruisers focused on my ship. First hit received struck the super structure, and caused a small fire. Thankfully it was contained, and dealt with quickly. More hits soon followed, they would burn the deck, and damage the super structure further.
I decided to train the guns on the closest cruiser nine kilometers away. My ship's range finders weren't perfect, and was unlikely to hit first salvo. So I made sure the turrets had slightly different elevations for the guns to gamble a hit on the cruiser. It could at least do damage, and help pin point an exact position needed to accurately hit the ship.
One by one the cannons fired their armor piercing shells, and one by one they came down. One hit the deck just front of it's turret, and exploded, another hit the superstructure also exploding causing a fire. It's turret was left not moving, and scorched in black, probably killing it's crew. Other shells missed by a small margin.
The enemy cruisers were starting to follow their own path as they went bow on to our starboard side. I decided to counter this by having our cruisers execute a starboard turn with the fleet following. It would mean they closed in much faster, but it also meant our cruisers could fire upon them as well.
I moved into the conning tower below for safety. It gets a little unnerving when ships get close, and start hitting the ship repeatedly. It was a squarish room with vision slits, but it was protected by more than sixteen inches of armor, nothing was getting through.
It wasn't too long before they got to seven kilometers, which was getting rather close. It meant they were less likely to miss, and so more shells exploded on the ship's surface. At least it worked both ways, and at this point our shells would go through their ships like a hot knife in butter. It's only more pleasing to imagine all twelve cannons to hit the cruiser, followed by the ship exploding. Harder we hit, faster they sank.
The closest ship was looking like it had enough, and was about to sink. At this point it was on fire on all points, and it was listing to port. The ship's behind it were also taking their tolls in damage. Six I counted, it was a fair few amount of cruisers. Three were built different however, they were the same color, but their bow main batteries were protected by shields instead of a turret. Half of the ships were on fire, the others sustained minimal to no damage yet. They would be a bigger threat now, and our secondary cannons could finish off the burning cruisers.
Twenty minutes later, the enemy was seriously damaged. They were either heavily listing, on fire, or effectively disabled. It wasn't all fine, and dandy for us, not entirely. My ship, had taken allot of surface damage, and was on fire after receiving so many hits. One of my escorts was forced to leave the battle after an engine room explosion, but the rest were mainly untouched. The ship I commanded was no longer a golden orange that shined in the sun, it was charcoal black from the damage.
Ten minutes later, the ships were sunk, and did very little in return. It was more or less a slaughter once the enemy was disabled, they quickly sank into the water as burning heaps of metal and wood. I ordered our cruisers to pick up survivors, while my ship, and the remaining escorts went back Baltimare to report on the battle, and for repairs of course.
On the way back, I left the ship's insides, and went onto the deck. It was not a pleasant sight, the worst of it was seeing burned bodies, organs, and blood across the deck and walls. It was a sight that was burned into every sailor, captain, and admiral, something nopony forgot as long as they lived. It was a shock at that point, and I hurled into the sea releasing the contents of my stomach. Something you couldn't get used to, it was simply accepting the damage, and moving on, which was plenty hard enough. The official count of dead sailors on my ship was "182", many of which were slaughtered on the deck trying to put out fires.
Three hours later, we made it to port. It was going to be a hard night, and an even worse week. I was one of few that refused to drink, smoke, or destroy my body so I could cope with losing friends, family, or fellow sailors. It simply meant a night crying myself to sleep, but at least no hangovers in the morning. That was one of the few upsides.
The End