"Do you mean to take this ship into battle?" asked Hidaka with growing excitement.

"Perhaps Lieutenant Moertopo and his men do deserve an opportunity to prove their loyalties," Yamamoto mused.

"But what if they are found wanting?" Hidaka asked.

"We shall not let them fail us." Then he noticed the expression on the German's face. "You disagree, Major?"

Brasch was lost in deep thought. He responded slowly to Yamamoto's query.

"Oh, no. You are right of course. I was simply wondering whether it was such a good idea, to risk such a valuable resource. And one that cannot be replaced."

Yamamoto considered the question a fair one.

"The Sutanto is a card to be played," he said. "But there is something to what you say. The value of this ship goes beyond the guns and rockets she carries. The information in her archives is potentially more valuable."

Hidaka leaned forward eagerly. "And not just that, sir, but a thousand little pieces of equipment we wouldn't need on a basic mission. We should strip her down to the bones, leaving only what we require to make our point."

He dragged out the flexipad that he now carried with him everywhere and held it up.

"There are nearly a hundred and fifty of these on the Sutanto," he said. "Just one would be of untold value to our scientists and engineers. As Major Brasch has pointed out, we cannot hope to build one. But they are such powerful machines in their own right that they can help us develop-what did you call it, Major, precursive technologies."

"Precursor," Brasch said in a monotone.

"Yes. Moertopo tells me the number calculator in these machines can perform a trillion mathematical operations in the blink of an eye. Then there are the even larger computers, and the signaling devices, and the automatic rifles, and-"

Yamamoto held up his hands.

"I take your point, Commander. And on that point I have some good news for a change."

The other two men reacted in their own ways-Hidaka sitting up ramrod straight, while Brasch reclined in his lounge seat and raised an eyebrow.

"I have been keeping something from you. We have found another ship," said Yamamoto. "The Sutano's sister ship in fact."

"But where?" gasped Hidaka.

Yamamoto smiled. The small lines at the corner of his eyes crinkled with honest delight. "On top of a mountain in New Guinea," he said, shaking his head at the outlandish notion.

"My God," breathed Brasch.

"Indeed, Major. Her stern is buried in the mountainside. I'm told she looks like she's sinking right into the earth. There is unfortunately no chance of digging her out. The metal has somehow fused with the rock. As did many of the crew. However, a unit of the Kempeitai is stripping her down."

"Were there survivors?" asked Brasch.

"Initially." Yamamoto nodded. "Oh, it's not what you think, Major," he hastened to add. "The conditions up there were quite inhospitable. Most of the crew died from exposure while still comatose. I understand we have saved five or six men. They are on their way here now."

Hidaka was fairly bounding from his seat.

"This is excellent news," he said. "We have doubled our gains!"

The grand admiral of the Combined Fleet sighed.

"But we will soon lose the advantage of surprise," he said. "Australian militia scurry about that country like ants. They will soon get word back to MacArthur or Nimitz. And then, my friends, the game will be on in earnest.

"So, Hidaka, by all means, strip the Sutanto. You can start now if you wish. But I want an operational recommendation within two days. If we are to bring off a Kessen Kantai, we must strike before Nimitz."

Both men left the office to return to their research. Hidaka, with action in the offing, could hardly contain his natural restlessness. Brasch found it irritating, but said nothing.

After they left, Yamamoto had a pot of tea brought in. He felt the loneliness of command more than ever in these strange days. There would come a juncture very soon where he would have to confide in the members of the general staff and the cabinet. For now, though, they were as paralyzed by shock as anyone. They trusted the commander in chief of the Combined Fleet to fashion their immediate response to the sensational events of the past two weeks. But would they agree to his grand strategy? Would the Germans? He had no idea.

And what was worse, he had almost no confidence in the decisions he was making. He picked up the research report that had been prepared by Brasch and Hidaka. There, on the very first page, they had produced a comprehensive list of faults with both the Pearl Harbor and Midway operations. He detected the hand of Brasch in that. Hidaka would not have been so bold. But he understood that the German was testing the limits of their autonomy.

And much of the criticism he agreed with emphatically. He had raised all the same objections to war with America. He had foreseen with remarkable prescience the inevitable consequences of waking a giant. But he had not foreseen the result of Midway. He had been so confident of his choices in that matter.

His hands shook as he read the summary of what would have happened, had Kakuta not turned tail and run for home. The breaking of their naval codes meant Nimitz had known exactly what was heading his way. The repair of the Yorktown, which they had thought sunk or at least damaged beyond salvage, had added a crucial platform to the American order of battle.

The incredible sacrifice of wave after wave of American pilots-all of them knowingly flying to their deaths-touched him in a way he had not thought possible. They had died with great spirit, just to give their dive-bombers a shot at Nagumo's carriers. In five minutes three of those carriers had been destroyed, and the war lost. The fourth soon followed. All because of a stupidly complex and wasteful plan for which he bore sole responsibility.

Yamamoto had to lean against his desk as waves of dizziness and nausea swept over him. He, and he alone, had brought unutterable shame upon the emperor and devastation on the homeland. He did not need to reread the brief account of the atomic blasts that would have devastated Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Nor did he need to examine the photographs again. The images would stay with him for the rest of his life.

He wondered bleakly how long that might now be.

Would his new grand strategic design change anything? Or were they all trapped in a cycle of predestination. Was Japan doomed to lose this war and face subservience to a Communist China in the next century?

Yamamoto put down his tea. Such things could not be known until they had come to pass. Resolution took hold of him, driving out his doubts and fears. His choice was clear. He must do everything he could to safeguard the emperor and the Home Islands. If he should fail, such were the fortunes of war.

A convoy of twenty-seven trucks arrived in the early evening to carry away the equipment that had been stripped from the Sutanto. At least three of the vehicles were filled with an eclectic assortment of twenty-first-century artifacts that had little or nothing to do with the ship's military role. All of the printed matter was boxed up and carried away along with video game consoles, televisions, DVD players, camcorders, coffeemakers, waffle irons, rice cookers, digital watches, most of the ship's pharmaceutical supplies, and 125 personal flexipads along with thousands of data sticks containing games, books, movies, music, and pornography. The seemingly endless list of exotic devices threatened to make Yamamoto's head swim.

"Don't be so glum, Lieutenant," he said to Moertopo. "You're not being robbed. Far from it, you're probably being saved. That ship will be the Americans' first target when they discover we have it. You must realize that yourself."