A Monster in the Sky is a short story by Steven Mohan, Jr. It is a re-telling of the Battle of Tsushima in the universe of Leviathans.
Plot[]
The Battle of Tsushima was turning into a disaster for the Russian Baltic Fleet. Desperate, Admiral Zinovy Rozhestvensky sent a message to Polkovnik Mikhail Kozlov aboard the leviathan Prince Baratinsky, requesting assistance.
Admiral Tōgō Heihachirō had already crossed the Russian "T" twice, and was preparing for a more direct attack, when the Russian leviathans appeared over the horizon. The Russian skyships formed a line a hundred feet in the air between the Japanese fleet and the Baltic Fleet, but Togo ignored them until after their first broadside. Then, he ordered the Mikasa, his flagship, to engage the leviathans while the rest of the fleet continued to engage the Baltic Fleet.
The Mikasa's guns had difficulty targeting the aerial vessels, while the Russian guns were not heavy enough to penetrate the Krupp armor on the battleship. Finally, one of the Berkuts was hit by Japanese fire, and destroyed. Kozlov ordered the leviathans to break formation and attack the Japanese fleet's main body, instead, with the goal of slowing them down and buying time for the Baltic Fleet to escape.
Gaining altitude, the Baratinsky fired down onto a Japanese destroyer, bypassing her armor and hitting the vitals. New orders went out to climb and use plunging fire against the more thinly armored topsides of the ships.
Seeing that the Baltic Fleet had been able to escape, Togo turned his attention to destroying leviathans. The Mikasa found the range on the Aleksandr Nevsky and damaged her, and the Fuji finished her off. Kozlov took the Prince Baratinsky to point-blank range of the Mikasa, a cruiser dueling a battleship. While the leviathan was badly damaged, the cruiser was able to pierce the battleship's vitals.
The battle was over, and the age of the leviathan had begun.
Characters Appearing or Mentioned[]
Japanese Characters[]
Russian Characters[]
- Poruchik (Lieutenant) Golubev
- Mikhail Kozlov
- Zinovy Rozhestvensky
- Ardan Tomav
Leviathans Appearing[]
All are Russian. Two Nevsky-class cruisers and 22 Berkut-class destroyers referred to as gunships.
Maritime Vessels Appearing[]
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- Baltic Fleet
- Knyaz Suvorov (flagship, only named ship in that fleet)
- Retvizan (mentioned, past)
Historical Notes[]
The Russo-Japanese War, and the Battle of Tsushima, both came nearly a decade later in the OTL. In the historical version, the Japanese fleet was victorious, and Theodore Roosevelt mediated the Treaty of Portsmouth.