Chapter 1
"Home"
1st January 1936-28th January 1936
47th Infantry Brigade
The 1st January 1936 was a day of much turmoil, Armies, navies and airwings where all called back to the home island, the orders had been dispatched the night before, and preperations began from dawn, Major General Sanada who had just recieved his promotion after the successful disbanding of his motorised infantry Brigade, the 47th Infantry Brigade, which was part of the Taiwan Garrison, however, now that he had recieved his promotion and ready to move up and take command of an entire division of his, rather than being a measly brigade commander as he had been used to in the past years, he was gonna be heading out with the remainder of the division that he had once served in as a brigadier General.
According to the orders the 15th Kaigun Commanded by Honda was to pick up the garrison in Taiwan, so Sanada fortunate to already be at the port in Taiwan, decided to just hang back and wait for the garrison in Northern Taiwan to arrive.
Sanada was at the time living in a "hotel" at the docks, every morning he would storm to the windows in hope of seeing the 15th Kaigun docking, so he can get back to Japan and assume command, i say every morning, it was in fact only one, Commander Honda arrived in Taiwan on the 2nd January in the evening. Sanada was excited about coming home to Japan, he had not been in Japan for a year, however he did not think he would be staying in Japan for a long time even though they were going home... but to his dismay, it would've appeared to be a delay to his return home, the Garrison guarding the northern bit of Taiwan was only half way back to the port area, so setting sail for japan was delayed...
.... Back in Japan, on the 31st of December a young sailor, had finally gotten his promotion to Commander, after only three years of service, however he was not very thrilled with his first task given by his superiors, in a link with the Japanese reorganizing the entirety of Japans armed forces, the Garrisons in the pacific isles had to be brought home to Japan, he was therefor given the 16th Kaigun, Despite his dislike of his newly appointed task, he began plotting his course, to pick up the Japanese soldiers that needed to get home, not alone for he had his friend Archie helping him
they figured it best to do it in to runs, since they only had so much room on the ships assigned to them, of such it was decided to follow the red plan followed by the green plan
whilst the orders given seemed to be terribly dull, sailing on the sea is never dull, they set assail at dawn on the 1st of January, headed for Iwo Jima, arriving 32 hours after setting sail getting everyone aboard the ships proved little challenge, and the fleet was ready to set sail again only an hour after docking, now headed for Saipan.....
..... after a few days, of waiting at the "hotel" Sanada was relieved to hear news that the garrison force had finally arrived, and everyone was to board the ships so there could be set sail at soonest possible time, Sanada already packed all of his belongings into his baggage, and ran towards the boats, by The Emperor he did not want to take any chances, despite the messenger had told him that it would at least an hour before the ships would set sail, and there would be plenty of warning, he would simply not risk it, he wanted to get home to Japan as quickly as possible
as Sanada got him self set up comfortably on the ship, the messengers word proved to be true, an hour after they began preparing for setting sail for Japan.. he had asked one of the minor officers on deck, how long they reckoned the trip would take, 2 days time they estimated it to be if the weather be good... he nodded whilst maintaining his fortitude, as the petty officers went about their way, Sanada quickly grabbed the railing and started puking down the side, much to a young sailors dismay... you see the young sailor had been hanging down the side of the hull all noon repainting the name of the ship, and having people become seasick above you probably wasn't anticipated by him, or anyone for that matter.
Alas, Sanada looking down the railings after having been a bit seasick, realized there was a young sailor down there, and quickly scurried off before the sailor would get whim of who did it. As Sanada got away from the poor now smelly sailor, he began feeling abit seasick again, but determined not to get the entirety of the ships crew against him he argued with him self against doing it over the railing, and tried to maintain his fortitude, as he was standing there, clearly struggling, one of the petty officers from earlier came up behind him padding him on the shoulder, asking if he was feeling abit seasick, with abit of a grin on his face, Sanada felt ashamed at this, the petty officer then took out some pills from his pocket telling Sanada to take one that it would help with the seasickness, and avoid a repeat of what happened to the sailor earlier.. Sanada thanked the petty officer, and took the pill and hoped that they would be home soon.....
in the morning at the 6th the ship horns sounded, to awaken the passengers on the ship, they had finally docked, Sanada however, ever vigilant had all of his stuff ready and ran like a man possesed to get off the blasted boat, and back home to mainland Japan. when he finally got off the boat, he saw an old friend greeting them welcome, it was a Brigade officer in the Korean Garrison divisions, they had both undergone officer training together back in the day, and Sanada was thrilled to see him
and ever so happy to be back in Japan, it was not long after that the rest of the soldiers came on land, who could blame them for not wanting to on such a monstrosity he thought to him self, with no bias due to his seasickness at all
Sanada then asked his friend from officer school, if there was any good hotels in the area that wasn't already crowded with officers, the brigade officer pointed him towards an establishment not far from the docks, Sanada took his words and immideatly headed for the establishment, on the way he was beginning to worry about the amount of Koreans in this Japanese city, and thought it odd that there wasn't any Japanese civilians in the streets or anywhere, however, confusing as it was it all made sense when he arrived at the establishment his friend has pointed him towards.. he was not in Japan... he was in Pusan, he stood outside the establishment one bit crying another bit laughing at him self and a bigger bit feeling ashamed how stupid he had been mistaking Korea for Japan, he swore to him self that he would not tell anyone of this little misunderstanding, to save his own pride....
....Mutsuki was half way done with his job of bringing the garrisons in the Pacific home to Japan, and everything was going smooth, as you would expect in peacetime and with no real danger present, it was merely a business of a calm taxi service across the pacific....
....Sanada had gone back to the ship later on the day to ask how long til setting sail for Japan, the petty officer that had been so kind to give him seasickness pills told him, it was gonna be a while, that they had to wait for more troops to arrive to Pusan so that the 15th Kaigun did not have to sail more times than needed, to preserve fuel, but he promised Sanada to send word as soon as they knew.
---
ten days later
---
Sanada was already onboard the boat, and the petty officer had been so kind as to give him a seasickness pill preemptively, meant that there would, hopefully, be no trouble on this trip, as it also turned out to be true.
8 o clock in the morning the following day the 15th Kaigun docked at Kanazawa, and finally Sanada was in Japan... he was Home.....
..... out in the Pacific however, Mutsuki was still at large.. it would be an entire 10 days further before he would've picked up the last remnant of the Garrison forces in the Pacific... after which Mutsuki was only too obligded to set full speed h ome
by god, he wanted to come home to Japan to be part of the "rejiggeling" that was imminent as he left japan on this task..
on the 23:00 on the 28th he finally got home to Japan arriving in Osaku, almost a month after setting out on getting everyone home. now the rejiggeling can begin, for the navy....
