Somewhere in the Spratly Archipelago, 10 September 1905
The blazing sun glared from the heavens, and Officer Höhnel felt he could drown in his uniform.
Please let this be over soon.
It was planned to be a short affair, with the objective of boosting morale and relaying current events to the public back home. “
See the brave men of the SMS Kaiserin Elisabeth
! The lone Austrian ship fighting in Paradise! The flag of the Habsburgs flies high over the Spratlys!” [1] But then there was the delay in the assembling of the contingents, and then something came wrong about the weather and the clouds, and after
that came the problems with the cameramen and their devices. One hour later, and just about every sailor and cadet on the beach were sweating in their shoes.
But just as Höhnel finally had it with the delay, an announcement came from the crew. The flag-raising ceremony would proceed.
With orders blunted by the heat of the day, the cadets and officers marched to their final positions, forming a line of honour on the soft sand. A makeshift flagpole was erected earlier in the day, and teams of cameramen and cellulographers now angled their machines to it. Once that was done, Höhnel gave the starting orders.
A team of cadets marched past, bearing the Austro-Hungarian banner. Another smattering of orders, and the flag was tied to the ropes and hoisted onto the shaft. Another command, and the strains of the
Kaiserhymne filled the air, mixing awkwardly with that of the breaking waves.
With his arms in salute, Höhnel stared at the symbol of his homeland, backdropped against the azure sky.
They’d probably think I’m lucky, not being in the trenches. Even with the broken communications, the Telegraph Office at Singapore received a few snippets of the goings-on in Europe, and they were anything but joyous.
Ten to one they would all wish to be in our place, fighting for the empire off the coast of the Philippines. Oh how much has changed.
Still, he wondered if the theatres in Vienna – if they could even
get the footage to Vienna – would mention how Sarawak and the Royal Navy did most of the heavy fighting, or how the Spratlys would be probably divided between them and the government in Manila.
Not a single inch of land for the emperor. Not even an atoll or two as a consolation prize.
As his eyes surveyed the scene before him, of the pristine beach and the rustling palms and the turquoise-clear sea breaking gently upon the shore, he wondered if he could change that.
A paradise on World’s End… that would be something for imperial morale. Even if the humidity is suffocating.
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Regia Marina dockyards, Sandakan, Italian Sabah, 13 September 2018
“Hand me the part.”
Cicalese grunted as he inserted the final bits of machinery to where they belonged, his arms strained from the amount of work done over… who knows how long?
Finally, he closed the hatch. Over a thousand hours had he and his men worked on the vessel, repairing the inner working through the days and weeks even as the rest of Sandakan emptied away. Once, the dockyards around the harbour were crowded full with passengers and seamen crowding around the ships; Transport vessels, patrolling ironclads, and cargo hulks that were crammed to the full with the wealth of Italian Borneo. Now, the only sounds apart from his work crew were of those catering to the warships, and even they were slipping away as the colony spiralled to oblivion.
Wouldn’t blame them. With the way the Rajah’s coming, we could all kiss our asses goodbye.
Despite the hours on the docks, Cicalese wasn’t blind to the news coming in from the west, of the colonial high command conscripting undesirable peoples against Sarawak and the fistfights this caused amongst the officers in the Residency. Cicalese was no saint himself – the things he had done back home was the main reason why he hopped off to Asia – but even he was perplexed when it came that the local pirates and headhunters were conscripted into a new fighting force.
And now we’ve pissed off our neighbour for doing so. Can’t blame them either. Burning villages would make anyone mad.
But orders were orders.
And that made the repair of the
Rana all the more critical. It was an experimental torpedo boat that was capable of diving and speeding near the waterline, giving enemy ships the shock of their lives.
[2] But it was, perhaps,
too experimental.
Broke down through the main voyage, and broke down again when arrived. In fact, I don’t think you’ve done much work this past month, do you?
“Break!” The voice of the head mechanic seemed to echo in the confined space, but the thought of a meal quickly overrode Cicalese’s annoyance. He slipped from the hold, landed on his two feet, and quickly made his way through the dock with the other workers, though not before turning back to glimpse at the repaired craft.
But one shot. Just one. And you’ll be remembered forever.
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Upper Sugut basin, Italian Sabah, 24 September 1905
“Bring the food!”
The order was met with sharp replies of
“Ya, Tuan Muda!” as a group of Kadazan warriors hauled sacks of rice to the beleaguered villagers at the forest clearing. The burnt-out dwellings couldn’t be seen from their distance, but the smell of charred wood hung heavy in the air, wafting deep down everyone’s noses.
Despite being the Rajah Muda of Sarawak – the declared heir to the throne - Clarke Brooke was more comfortable at the helm of a war
Prahu than in delegating village matters. But his father did not raise himself or his brother to be commanding brats, and the skill of governance was instilled within Clarke since he could even remember. And besides, with what the
Askari’s are doing, he was glad that food aid was flowing under his watch while his father dealt with another belligerent force further down south.
Still a leader, even at seventy-six.
“Is there a leader of the village? Where is the chieftain?” he asked, and so he was brought along with his guards to an elderly man whom spoke of a white-faced figure that came to the longhouse, sometime ago. The pale man courted the warriors and elders, invoking the right of tribal honour,
warrior’s honour, to fight under the banner of a foreign (albeit colourful) flag. While a few village warriors were interested, he and his elders were wary, and after an hours-long discussion, answered back: Only if traditional laws are accepted in full, only if their youngsters are not sent to the logging fields, and only if they would stop pestering missionaries upon missionaries upon them.
In truth, the longhouse has long been wary of the new peoples whom lived at the alien city called ‘Sandakan’. The foreign taxes, foreign laws, foreign religions, and foreign labour obligations imposed by them was the reason why the villagers migrated to the foothills of the Sugut River. That was why he cautiously accepted the offer of the Sarawakian emissaries that came a week before.
But no one expected the unthinkable to happen; of the groups of hard-faced men who called themselves
Askari, of the requisitioning of rice, of the looting and plunder, of the longhouse being set alight. It was a true blessing that the Brooke forces were close by, for who knows what could become of them all?
“There were several of our sons whom fought with the
Askaris, but we haven’t heard from them since the last few hours.” The chieftain finished.
That’s odd. “We never saw any other force besides ourselves.” Clarke said. “Could you tell us where they went – ”
“
Tuan Muda!! We found something! Something you need to see!!” A courier ran into the huddled group, breathless.
Puzzled, the heir and the chieftain walked a ways off into the thick undergrowth before stopping before an unnatural mound of fallen leaves and twigs. “There were foot trails to and from this area, and we thought they were made by the
Askari’s until…” the courier’s voice died as he went around the back.
It was only then that a new smell assaulted Clarke Brooke’s nose.
The smell of blood.
Oh God.
The back of the mound was littered with corpses. Muscles and limbs broken and bleeding, torsos and thighs lacerated with stab wounds and punctured with bullet holes. All of them, arranged in a hideous line around a pool of blood and gore.
But the worst of all were the heads.
There were no heads.
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Notes:
1) This is based on the real
Kaiserin Elizabeth which was stationed in China during the outbreak of the First World War. In this timeline, she was able to slip past French Indochina to join the Anglo-Sarawak fleet.
2) There is no equivalent to a ship like this IOTL, but the closest relative would be the
Grillo-class “jumping boats” which were designed to be akin to motorboat-tanks with torpedoes. With the
Regia Marina being more funded ITTL, such experimental designs would have been pioneered earlier during the 1900’s, though as shown above, their mileage may considerably vary.