The image switched again to another wide-angle shot. Six more gray spears erupted from the deck. He felt this launch through the soles of his feet, as a small earthquake. He had no real idea what was going on, and the men and women around him gave little indication. There seemed to be a slightly increased level of activity at the dense banks of computer stations, but . . .

Murray felt a tap on his arm. One of Halabi’s young men, an ensign, directed his attention to the giant video wall that dominated the darkened battle room.

“That’s a full-spectrum Nemesis battlespace display, sir,” the man said quietly. “You’ve got radar, drone coverage, and over there, in the corner, a feed from the camera in the nose of the missiles.”

To Murray, the monochrome image also seemed very unstable.

He cast his eyes around the Combat Center.

Every screen was attended by an operator. All of them seemed to be talking at once and somewhat to Murray’s surprise, the captain stood in the center of this ferment, calmly providing instructions without a hint of panic. She seemed almost graceful.

“Weapons bring the hammerheads around to one-oh-four.”

“One-oh-four, ma’am.”

Murray stared into a large screen carrying a black-and-white movie radioed back from the camera in the nose of the lead missile.

“Weapons, I want simultaneous hits on those destroyers. Quickly now. We don’t want any intel leakage, if possible.”

A young black woman near Murray click-clacked at the plastic keys of her computing machine with a speed and confidence that astonished the admiral. Surely one false keystroke would doom the mission.

Halabi appeared in front of him.

“All done.”

“But they’re—”

“Watch the screen, Admiral.”

Murray saw then that the center’s main screen had split into a confusing grid of tiled windows. Some carried jumpy, black-and-white footage of the Japanese ships. In the space of a few seconds the outline of each target swelled to fill the screen. Then all the displays turned black.

“What’s wrong?” asked Murray. “Where did the pictures go? Were all the rockets shot down?”

“No, Sir Leslie. Think, what would happen to the camera when the missile struck armor plating.”

“Oh,” he said. “I see.”

HIJMS AKATSUKI, 2348 HOURS, 20 JUNE 1942

Commander Osamu Takasuka surveyed the heaving ocean from his eyrie’s nest. It was only mildly turbulent tonight, with the bows knifing through meter-and-a-half waves. Still, each plunge of the ship threw plumes of water high into the air.