sakura empires unfinished monster

3rd Battle Of Coral Sea

Tone: "well we already know hiei is beached at guadalcanal with no sight of her what do you want to do hakuryuu" all eyes turned to her waiting for her orders. Taking stock of the situation and their capabilities she stared at the map planning what to do. "if hiei is still there we can't leave her. Yukikaze you'll detach and locate her ship, see if you can find her on the island. Tone, Kagero and Ryujo you'll be with me we will finish refuelling and proceed south send extra float planes to keep an eye on eagle unions task force, we'll be engaging the enemy from two directions to confuse them one going north and cutting south to their location and the other group going south and changing course to north in a pincer we'll be using both waves on this so we have to make it count we need them focused on us so yukikaze can safely reach hiei. Any questions" the room was silent everyone knew their orders and none were opposed. "good. Dismissed" upon hearing that the others left to prepare. From her bridge she was managing the arming process of her planes AP 500 kg bombs were being added to the bomb bays, torpedo bombers were having their torpdoes fitted and fighters were having their ammo refilled or refueled ready for when the order to launch was given.

While this took place in the hangar the morning CAP was coming in for landing touching down on both carriers decks for refuelling. Prioritising this the reppu and zero fighters would soon be launching off the decks again. Within the next 15 minutes contact was reestablished and the task force was on the move again yukikaze detached at the slot and headed for guadalcanal, "it's time to put that training to use" just before she was about to begin sending up planes for an air strike a lone contact came up on radar, using her fighter she would discover a catalyna flying boat "danmit we've been spotted an air strike is surely to come we'll need to launch now" checking her maps she was thankful to know her planes had the range to launch and recover. Directing her fighter it would dive on the flying boat it's cannons tearing into the plane and bringing it down before returning on station. "ryujo we're having a change of plans we've been detected by a American scout give me a run down of what you have" taken aback by this new information it took her a moment to answer. Ryujo: "I have 22 zeros 6 are currently being used for CAP, 10 Vals and 16 Kates hakuryuu"

Taking stock of what she herself has  48 Reppu fighters, 29 Suisei dive bombers and 23 Jill torpedo bombers with 4 spares of each type. "alright keep your 6 zeros up and I'll keep 14 of mine up we'll have 50 for escort. We'll send everything at them as this isn't a small task force. I'll send 24 reppus, 29 suisei's and 23 Jill's you'll send 10 Vals and 16 Kates with 16 zeros. That gives us 78 planes to strike the enemy and 40 fighters for escort but I'll have 10 fighters left to bolster the CAP" thinking for a bit ryujo smiled "got it let's do this" turning her attention to her flight deck planes were being lined fighters at the back, dive bombers after that and up front the torpedo bombers. After inital checks were carried out the warplanes would rumble down the flight deck taking off one after another, a similar story was taking place with ryujo as her warplanes were also lifting off the deck and gaining altitude. Within 30 minutes all 118 planes were airborne and began flying towards the eagle union carrier fleet. As predicted both Lexington and Saratoga were also launching their combined air strike of TBD devastator torpedo bombers, SBD dauntless dive bombers and F4F wildcats.

On the eagle union side both Lexington and Saratoga were carrying 35 SBD Dauntless dive bombers, 18 TBD Devistator torpedo bombers and 25 F4F Wildcats for a combined plane count of 156 planes between them. Launched at hakuryuu and ryujo was 70 Dauntless dive bombers, 36 Devastator torpdoe bombers and 20 F4F wildcats the remaining 30 remained as CAP or in the hangars. Their CAP being 14 at the moment. While both sides waited the two sides got into a tight formation however for hakuryuu and ryujo all they could rely on was tone and Kagero with tone on the right, Kagero on the left, ryujo at the front and hakuryuu in the middle figuring she'd be their main target. This was leaving them more exposed compared to the sister carriers.

Compared to hakuryuu's force Lexington & Saratoga could rely on a steady ring of ships protecting them with Houston, pensacola, San Diego, San Juan & phoenix protecting their front, sides and flank while fletcher, Nicholas and Bache formed a triangle around them closest ready to fill the sky with AA. With the formations set and the air strikes launched both sides eyes were fixed to their radar and the sky's for the tell tail signs of the incoming air raid.

   ----Eagle Union Task Force 14----

Lexington was currently on her toes she was already expecting someone to come and find Hiei but she wasn't expecting to be notified that a unknown carrier would be present she immideatly tell from the recon that Tone, Ryujo and Kagero was present however the flat top she saw wasn't anyone she recognised she was smaller then shinano but she was bigger then any carrier she ever saw and she was well armed. She wasn't even aware of a new kansen however she knew in her heart herself and her sister had to deal with them and have faith in their friends.

13:48: a large flight of unidentified aircraft came up on the radar

Lexington: "this must be their strike" hitting the buzzer to her left general quarters rang out from the loud speakers of the ships all remaining aircraft for CAP was launched off the decks as quickly as possible. All guns trained to the sky the bellowing roar of a hundred warplanes broke the calm silence. High above the task force F4F wildcats, A6M Zeros and A7M Reppu fighters twisted and turned getting into a dogfight while some focused on the approaching dive bombers. Bellow 5 inch guns, quad 1.1 inch "Chicago Piano's" and 20mm orlekans were trained ready the carriers conducting evasive manovouers. Agonising moments passed as the Val and Suisei dive bombers dived down waiting for them to get into range. As the dive bombers eventually reached into range a murderous hail of flak fired from the task force cut loose.

Anti aircraft cruisers San Diego and San Juan were hammering out salvo after salvo from their 12 dual purpose main guns filling the air with black clouds, the Chicago piano's roared into life as they reached down occasionally a burning dive bomber could be seen falling from the sky the wildcats clear the sky of as many as they could as the 20mm orlekans opened up filling the sky with tracer fire and black clouds of smoke. Opening it's bomb bay 2 Suisei dive bombers from hakuryuu would drop their payload before pulling out of the dive 1 Val had also survived and dropped their bombs. Tense moments past 2 of the bombs were near misses but one bomb from a Val slammed into the deck breaking through 3 layers before erupting with a powerful explosion gouts of flames roared up from the flight deck of saratoga causing despair and anger in Lexington who intensified her AA knocking a Jill torpdoe bomber out of the sky and into the brimy waters bellow.

Despite the flak from all the escorts and the planes of the carriers 3 Jill torpdoe bombers and 4 kates would attack both carriers. Releasing their payloads both carriers manovouerd to avoid it Lexington managing to avoid them all but Saratoga would have 1 torpdoe nail her forward engines a great plume of water raising up and splashing her decks making her take on water. Around them torpdoe and dive bombers making their runs at 14:08 another Suisei dives on Saratoga the AA launched against it causing the plane to get struck making it burn prefusaly. Keeping it under control somewhat the plane would loop around slamming into the side of the saratoga and exploding violently from the bomb going off making her list over the next 20 minutes of the attack saratoga would end up being hit by 2 more bombs Lexington managing to avoid them all as most focused on her sister. With all their bombs and torpdoes expended the remaining planes would bug out but a few more would be downed by a combination of wildcats and AA from the ships.

With the attack over and the planes out of range things looked bad on Saratoga. 3 bombs had hit her 2 500kg armour piercing bombs and 1 smaller 60kg bomb, her port side had been struck by a torpedo letting in 250 tons of sea water giving her a 15° list and half of her engine power gone due to other compartments flooding not to mention the huge hole in her upper belt due to the kamikaze strike and bomb detonation, it took 15 minutes of frantic damage control before it was finally contained. Being drawn to a halt Fletcher provided aid with fire fighting and pumping out as many compartments as they could her deck was buckled and a mess with 2 massive holes in her deck as well as her forward elivator being knocked out.

(alright all this is the next chapter I hope you enjoyed it was quite the debate on the damage and how many planes were lost. stay tuned for the next chapter where we'll see how the air strike on hakuryuu and her task force does. Until next time)