World War: Battleship Arms Dealers

"Report damage!" Beckett shouted, but only a grating static came through the communicator—the shelling had likely damaged the internal communication lines.

He rushed out of the bridge and onto the open command platform. The sight before him chilled him to the bone—the Black Prince was engulfed in flames amidships, its foredeck a scene of utter devastation, and several gun emplacements destroyed. Even more terrifying, in the beams of the searchlights, he saw the silhouettes of more German warships—not just light cruisers, but larger, darker shadows.

The shadow of a battleship.

At least four German dreadnoughts were slowly approaching from the southeast. They also turned on their searchlights, with more beams of light locked onto the "Black Prince".

It was a desperate sight—a lone British armored cruiser surrounded by the searchlights of eight or ten German warships, like an actor on a stage, illuminated by countless spotlights, with nowhere to escape.

"My God..." Beckett murmured.

He knew that the fate of the "Black Prince" was sealed.

But he still ordered: "All cannons that can still fire, fire freely! Aim at the nearest enemy ship! Torpedoes, prepare—fire if the opportunity arises!"

This was a desperate counterattack, a cornered beast's last stand. But at the very least, he wanted the Germans to pay the price.

The remaining guns of the "Black Prince" began to return fire. Shells flew toward the nearest German light cruiser, a few hitting and causing a small fire. But this return fire was negligible compared to the fire she was enduring.

The German battleship's main guns opened fire.

Those were real heavy artillery pieces. 305mm and even 350mm shells landed around the "Black Prince," sending up water columns higher than the bridge. Once the direct hits began, the outcome was only a matter of time.

The first large-caliber shell struck the main gun turret amidships. The turret's armor was ripped open, and the ammunition inside detonated. The violent explosion blew the entire turret off its surface, sending flames soaring into the sky.

The second bomb hit the aft deck, detonating the depth charge storage area. The chain reaction of explosions severely damaged the stern and caused the steering gear to malfunction.

The third one, the fourth one, the fifth one...

The "Black Prince" resembled an iron can struck by countless hammer blows; its hull twisted, broke, and burned. Explosions continued unabated, and flames engulfed the entire warship.

Beckett was thrown to the ground by the shockwave of the explosion. He struggled to his feet and saw that the bridge was half destroyed, and most of the officers were either dead or wounded. The navigator lay in a pool of blood, and the communications officer was trapped under collapsed steel beams, barely breathing.

He crawled to the microphone—miraculously, the microphone was still working.

"Abandon ship...!" he said with his last breath. "Repeat, abandon ship. God help you."

Then he turned to look at the German warships that were drawing ever closer in the searchlight beams. Their gunfire had ceased—there was no point in wasting ammunition on a ship about to sink.

Beckett straightened his uniform and wiped the blood from his face. He walked to the edge of the bridge and looked down at the chaotic deck. Sailors were lowering lifeboats and jumping into the sea. Some succeeded, some were engulfed in flames, and some fell into the burning oil.

He could have chosen to jump into the sea, or he could have chosen to survive. But he didn't.

As captain and commander of the ship, he chose to perish with the "Black Prince".

He walked back to the bridge and sat in the battered, warped command chair. He closed his eyes, awaiting the final moment.

Seawater rushed into the bridge. Cold, dark, and then eternal silence.

The British armored cruiser HMS Black Prince sank in the middle of the North Sea at 1:20 a.m. Of the 857 crew members, only 34 were later rescued by German ships; the rest perished, including Captain Thomas Beckett.

A few nautical miles away, the main German fleet—the very fleet led by Scheer—continued sailing southeast without stopping or celebrating, simply passing silently through the scene of the recent massacre in the darkness.

For Scheer, the Black Prince was merely an unexpected prey, a chance encounter. He didn't even record it in detail in his logbook—sinking a stray British cruiser on such a chaotic night, during such a desperate escape, was insignificant.

But that's war: on the macro strategic chessboard, the capture of one piece is insignificant; but on the micro level of individual fate, it means the end of 857 lives and the shattering of 857 families.

At 1:45 a.m., the British destroyer HMS Shark was slowly cruising in the darkness of the North Sea.

She was one of three reconnaissance squads dispatched by Jellicoe, responsible for the southeast direction. Accompanying her were two destroyers—"Shark" and "Shark"—and the light cruiser HMS Dublin. But an hour earlier, in the dense fog, they lost visual contact with HMS Dublin and could only maintain communication through faint light signals.

On the bridge of the USS Shark, Major Richard Archer carefully observed the sea with night-vision binoculars. This new equipment was touted as being able to see ships five nautical miles away in the dark, but in reality... it was only slightly better than the naked eye.

"Any discoveries?" he asked the lookout beside him.

"No, sir. Only the waves and the occasional... wait."

The lookout paused abruptly, adjusting the focus of his binoculars: "Two o'clock, something. Not a ship, looks like... floating objects? Lots of floating objects."

Archer raised his binoculars. There were indeed some dark shadows drifting on the sea. They didn't look like wreckage—wreckage usually has sharp edges, while these shadows looked more rounded.

"Get closer," he ordered. "Slow down to eight knots and remain alert."

The Shark slowly steered towards the floating objects. As it drew closer, Archer finally saw what they were—

Life raft.

Dozens, perhaps hundreds, of life rafts were scattered across a vast expanse of sea. Each raft was crammed with people, shivering in the cold sea breeze. Some were still alive, waving; others were motionless, perhaps unconscious, or perhaps dead.

"They are survivors," Archer judged. "They escaped from the sunken ship. Judging from the style of the life rafts... they are British-made."

He felt a pang of heartache. These were his compatriots, Royal Navy sailors, struggling to survive in the icy waters.

"Prepare for rescue," he said. "Launch the small boats and save as many as you can. But remain vigilant—German submarines may use survivors as bait."

The order was relayed. The USS Shark began to slow down and launched two small boats. Sailors rowed the small boats, weaving between the life rafts, rescuing the survivors one by one onto the destroyer.

Soon, the deck was crowded with rescued people. Most of them were seriously injured, some with burns, some with frostbite, and some hit by shrapnel. Medics and paramedics moved through the crowd, providing emergency treatment.

Archer approached a survivor who appeared to be less seriously injured. He was a young sailor, about twenty years old, wrapped in a blanket, shivering as he held a cup of hot tea in his hands.