Winds of Change (Empires Lost Book 2)

by Charles S. Jackson

  The buildings were quite different to those he’d known but the landscape remained unchanged. Some thirty-odd kilometres to the south-west lay the Spring Mountains range and La Madre Mountain, places he’d hiked through many times on his days off when they’d been part of the Red Rock Canyon National Conservation Area. They were no more than a dark, jagged, featureless silhouette now, rising above the fading landscape of the Nevadan desert; the setting sun now a blazing red orb hanging low on the horizon in a yellow sky behind thin streaks of cloud that glowed deep red and fiery orange in the last remnants of its dying rays.

  With over two years now living in a predominantly piston-engined environment, Jack felt as if he’d almost forgotten the wonderfully exhilarating and powerful sound of a ‘modern’ jet engine. The last few weeks of his assignment there at the place he still thought of as ‘Nellis’ had brought it all back to him however. Ostensibly he was still a member if Hindsight, operating as a member of the unit’s ‘Air Development’ section (of which Alec Trumbull was also a part), but the reality was that his day-to-day duties were that of (Acting) CO and Lead Instructor of the United States’ 1st Joint Services Fighter Weapons Training Group, often abbreviated simply down to JSFWTG-1 in standard US Military ‘jargonese’.

  The primary ‘mission statement’ (that was a new term that Davies himself had originated, much to own chagrin) of the JSFWTG was to teach advanced fighter and strike tactics to selected pilots and flight officers with the intention of sending them back to their own units so they could pass on their newly-learned expertise to their fellow fliers. Originally intended purely as an Army Air Force unit, a government desperate to increase its combat readiness across the board had instead decreed that the installation would be a Joint Services unit that would draw on experience from all three services fielding air power – the Army Air Corps, US Navy and Marines – and similarly pass that garnered experience back to aircrews from all three arms.

  The concept – seemingly first imagined by bureaucrats in Washington – had initially been difficult to ‘sell’ to the Joint Chiefs, although they were ultimately in no position to refuse or ignore an executive order from the office of the President himself. As it turned out however, some members of the general staff did warm to the idea once reports came back from their commanders ‘in the field’ regarding the generally improved abilities and states of readiness being displayed by units to which graduates from this new training unit had returned.

  The Navy had held out the longest, citing – with some basis in logic – that a training centre established in the middle of the Nevadan desert was not exactly a fair representation of the environment most of their pilots were likely to encounter, should the indeed find themselves in combat sometime in the near future. Concessions were made to accommodate, with the promise of two more specialised training units (JSFWTG-2 and JSFWTG-3) to be set up at Marine Corps Air Station Yuma, Arizona and at Naval Air Station Miramar respectively.

  Where JSFWTG-1 would concentrate on air combat and superiority tactics, Group Two (Yuma) would be a dedicated training facility for tactical and ground attack and Group Three (Miramar) would act as an advanced training unit specialising in carrier and anti-shipping operations. Although all three installations would fall under the same ‘Joint Services’ umbrella and crews from all three services might be assigned to cycle through them all as part of a ‘cross-training’ regimen, the reality was that the USAAC, USN and USMC had now all been provided with an individual facility that catered to each one’s specific needs. That simple yet inspired decision had gone a long way toward finally smoothing over any remaining unrest the Navy or Marines still felt regarding ‘sharing’ their training with either the Army Air Force or each other.

  With less than perhaps ninety minutes of daylight left it was still a quite warm 26 degrees centigrade – 82° Fahrenheit in the scale still used in North America – and odds were, based on the experience of the last few weeks, that there was little likelihood it would drop much more than a few degrees throughout the rest of the night. Runway 03L/21R was already lit up in preparation for nightfall with brightly-burning yellow flares set at spaced intervals along each side of both runways.

  Jack Davies had been a fighter pilot for half of his thirty-eight years of age. Topping out at around 190 centimetres tall (almost 6’ 3” in the old imperial measurement), he was broad-shouldered and carried with him a physique kept lithe and muscled by regular exercise - predominantly hiking and cycling or some amateur boxing at times when outdoor activities weren’t readily available. A short-cut head of straw-blond hair topped a broad, country face that generally played second fiddle to an equally broad mouth filled with almost impossibly-large teeth.

  Dressed in the desert camouflage pattern of the US Military’s newly-issued M41 fatigues, the low-visibility-style faded and blackened insignia of his rank – a bald eagle holding an olive branch and cluster of arrows in its talons – were displayed on small, sewn-on patches above the brim of his patrol cap and on either side of the jacket’s Mandarin collar. His Ray-Ban Aviator sunglasses weren’t standard issue but it was also true that many pilots had taken to wearing them anyway.

  The availability of the Ray-Bans had caught Davies by surprise at first. He’d no idea that the original Aviator model had come onto the market during the late 1930s and had been pleasantly surprised by that fact upon arrival with Hindsight. He’d seen Top Gun as a young boy, of course; the movie poster had hung on his bedroom wall and it had been the beginning of the inspiration for his desire to become a fighter pilot. He also remembered – as a child – thinking how totally and utterly cool Cruise, Kilmer and the others had all looked in their tinted Ray-Bans. He’d not been the only one who’d thought so, it seemed, as sales of that very same Aviator model had jumped forty percent in the year following the film’s release.

  Goddamn Navy pukes…! He grinned silently, revelling in his own harmless prejudices and accepting that his adult mind was now skewed toward an Air Force bias. He’d never get to fly the Tomcat – the F-14 had been an exclusively USN aircraft after all – but he’d flown just about every aircraft the USAF carried in its inventory at once stage or another during his long career, and that had included one or two so advanced the Tomcat might’ve been considered an antique by comparison.

  Technically-speaking, so could the squadron of jets now carrying out ‘touch-and-go’ landing manoeuvres in the failing desert sunlight, although they were beyond even ‘state-of-the-art’ by 1940s standards. This was a model he’d flown several times, both in Realtime and now again in this era, and although it would never rival an F-22 or even an F-15 Eagle in terms of pure, unadulterated, adrenalin-pumping speed, it was nevertheless an agile and immensely capable aircraft that was an absolute joy to fly.

  The design had been brought into existence as the CAC Model 16 (or just CA-16 for short), however the Australian Commonwealth Aircraft Corporation could only dream of the kind of manufacturing capability possessed by American aviation companies and the aircraft flying past him right at that moment had instead been licence-built by Fairchild Aircraft and Republic Aviation.

  The A-5A was huge by 1940s standards and was in fact now the largest single-seat aircraft flying – a title previously held by the Luftwaffe’s large but nevertheless far smaller S-2 Löwe. The pilot sat well forward in a high-mounted cockpit perched directly behind its blunt, rounded nose, in a position that provided exceptional all-round (and – more importantly – downward) vision, something that was essential in a good attack aircraft.

  Fitted with a tricycle undercarriage that was revolutionary by 1940s standards, the aircraft was a low-wing design with a similarly low-mounted tail sporting tall twin-rudders. Just ahead of the tail, its two powerful turbofan engines were mounted in pods above either side of the rear fuselage. The original design, taken from plans that few knew had originated in a different reality some thirty years in the future, also intended the placement of the engines to aid masking their infra-red signa
tures against heat-seeking surface-to-air missiles. Although missiles were not a threat in this era – not yet, anyway – this gave the added benefit of improved operations in ‘hot-and-high’ environments by keeping the intakes high above the ground, lessening the likelihood of foreign object damage through the accidental ingestion of debris.

  Another pair of the huge jets howled past, their main landing gear barley touching the tarmac with puffs of bluish smoke and the soft chirp of abused rubber, before their engines again went to deafening full throttle and they powered away, clawing skyward once more with full flaps and split-ailerons deployed. As they climbed away, Davies could see most of the mounting points for one of the aircraft’s under-wing and single under-fuselage stores stations, capable of carrying a combined payload almost twice the offensive might – albeit at far shorter ranges – of the Boeing B-17F Flying Fortress.

  Even so, he nevertheless knew that the real offensive might of the aircraft sprang from the muzzle of the huge cannon projecting slightly from beneath its blunt, rounded nose – a weapon that occupied most of the forward third of an aircraft that had been purpose-built around it. Like every pilot in the same service in which he’d begun his long career, he was also well aware of the power of the gun he’d known of as the ‘Avenger’: a weapon that had earned a reputation for lethality of almost mythic proportions among friend and foe alike.

  The one other positive thing that could be said about the deafening howl each jet produced as it thundered past was that it went some way toward neutralising the substantial rumble and clatter of the wheeled, portable O’Keefe & Merritt generator standing perhaps a dozen meters or so behind him. It was in turn being used to provide power for several large and powerful Kleig lights set up a similar distance to his left. A number of uniformed officers and ORs (‘other ranks’) were clustered about those lights, which were positioned slightly apart and all aimed directly at the section of runway through which the jets were carrying out their manoeuvres.

  The group were all part of the 18th Army Air Force Base Unit – also known as the First Motion Picture Unit – and as their less official title might suggest, they’d come to the Fighter Weapons School to make an Air Force propaganda/recruiting movie. Davies turned momentarily to glance in their direction, forced to squint because of the glare from the nearest of the Kleigs, and shook his head in a movement that was equal parts disapproval and disbelief, as was the thin smile that accompanied it.

  The displeasure he felt was mostly with regard to how much more difficult the glare from those lights was undoubtedly making things for his pilots as they went through the most crucial and dangerous part of the entire manoeuvre, actually touching their wheels momentarily against the asphalt before climbing away again. Had it been his choice, he’d have certainly demanded they whole crew pack up and come back at a far more suitable time.

  Orders were orders however, and even a colonel had to sit up and take note when General Spaatz, CO of the 4th Air Force (of which the JSFWTG was a part), made it crystal clear that every possible courtesy was to be extended to the film-making unit as they went about their duties. Enlistment in all arms of the US military was rising due to the current world climate but it wasn’t rising fast enough in the eyes of the Joint Chiefs of Staff or the President, and anything that could be done to increase those numbers was to be accorded the highest possible priority.

  That being said, Davies also had the safety and well-being of his men to consider. He raised his left arm and glanced at the Chase-Durer watch strapped to his wrist, quickly deciding that two hours of filming (or thereabouts) was more than enough for one day. Reaching down to the web belt at his waist, he unclipped the mike for a radio identical to Max Thorne’s and raised it to his lips.

  “Tower control, this is ‘Maverick’… time to wind things up for the afternoon… over…” he didn’t even crack a smile now as he used the codename he’d picked out for himself, secure in the knowledge that only a handful of people in that era would recognise its origin and that even fewer would dare to rib him over it.

  “Tower control receiving you loud and clear, Maverick… orders acknowledged… over and out…”

  He replaced the mike at his belt and turned on his heels, beginning a slow walk back to his personal vehicle, parked as it was just a metre or two beyond the chugging generator. He’d taken just a few steps as he heard the soft ‘crump’ of a flare gun from the direction of the main tower, off to the north east. A single star of burning yellow sizzled high into the sky atop a tail of grey smoke. Instantly, the next A-5A on approach for its touch-and-go aborted the procedure while still a few hundred metres out and banked slowly away to the east, clearing the airspace over the runway until the entire squadron could form up and carry out an orderly landing in sequence.

  “Colonel…!” The call came from off to his right and he turned his head, still walking, and watched as a junior air force officer separated himself from the rest of the film crew and jogged across the space between them, dressed in the same desert pattern uniform as Davies but clutching his matching patrol cap in one hand. The man was lean and broad-shouldered, standing perhaps five centimetres shorter than Davies and perhaps six or seven years his junior. His features were strong and clean-cut, with sharp blue eyes and a wide smile that, the colonel had no doubt, quickly set him at ease with men and women alike.

  Of course, Davies didn’t need to guess at the man’s talent for dealing with people: he was old enough to recall that well enough for himself. They’d spoken several times since the film crew’s arrival on base the week before, and although he thought he’d managed to keep it mostly hidden, Davies was nevertheless unable to completely overcome the sensation of disbelief that always came with those conversations. He was already well aware of what the man was likely to ask as he paused for a moment and waited for hum to catch up. It took all of the Texan pilot’s willpower to keep an incredulous smile off his face as he spoke.

  “What can I do for you, s- son?” He enquired with a slight falter, managing to cover up his instinctive desire to use the word ‘sir’ – something that certainly wouldn’t do when addressing a junior officer – and replacing it at the last moment with something a little more suitable.

  “Sir, the crew were hoping to get a few more reels of film before the end of the day – we’re on a tight shooting schedule and we need to have all our footage back in Culver City the day after tomorrow.”

  “Well, I appreciate that, lieutenant, but my boys have been working hard all afternoon too, and both they and their aircraft need some rest.”

  “I understand that, sir, but movies like this are also real important in helping out the recruiting drives.”

  “No argument from me on that score, but the fact remains that tired pilots are pilots who make mistakes, and we can’t afford that to happen with hundred-thousand-dollar aircraft.”

  “Of course, colonel, of course...” he paused for just a moment, just long enough flash a bright, winning smile that was almost certainly calculated for greatest effect “…but the general was very clear about wanting this movie ‘in the can’ as soon as possible…”

  Had the words been said without that smile and in a less open, honest tone of voice, Davies might well have taken the observation as a thinly-veiled threat. Had such a threat been uttered by anyone other than the young man before him right now – a young man he was trying very hard not to be in awe of – he might well have decided to make life very difficult in return.

  “You sure know how to make a sale, lieutenant… tell you what:…” he began after a moment’s consideration. “Tomorrow morning we’ve got a live-fire exercise scheduled over at Tonopah: if you’re ready to ship out at oh-six-hundred, I’ll make sure you and your crew get ringside seats for the ‘show’.” He’d not have believed it possible for the man to have smiled any wider, but he managed it all the same.

  “Well that’d be just swell, colonel…! It’d mean a lot for the movie to get some real ‘combat’ footag
e, and I’ll bet all the folks at home would love to see some of our newest fighter-bombers on display being flown by our ‘best and brightest’.”

  “It’d be my pleasure, lieutenant…” Davies gave an equally toothy grin in return “happy to do whatever I can to help out,” he continued honestly, allowing himself a little latitude for a change. “They’re still screening Kings Row at the movie theatre in Vegas by the way… I ducked in to catch the show last week… have to say, that was a damn fine performance.”

  “That’s kind of you to say so, sir, but everyone worked hard on that movie…” the lieutenant replied with a suitable level of humility, although the honest the pride in his eyes was nevertheless self-evident over a role he personally considered the height of his acting career so far. “Now I’ve been drafted, most folks’ll probably have forgotten all about me by the time I get to make another civilian movie.” He shrugged. “Got a more important job to do right now anyway,” he went on, shaking personal pride from his mind and replacing it with genuine patriotic purpose. “With Europe under the heel of Fascism and war with the Japs looking more likely every day, anything we can do to help make America’s stronger should be first and foremost.”

  “Preaching to the choir, lieutenant, preaching to the choir,” Davies nodded in agreement, clapping a friendly hand on the man’s shoulder. He grinned again, this time at a silent, quite cheeky thought of his own, then added: “Tell you what, though; you’ve sure got a way with words: if y’ ever get tired of acting, I reckon you’d have a fine career ahead of you in public office.”

  “You think so, sir? My wife says I’m already too ‘caught up’ in politics, being on the Board of the Screen Actors Guild and all, but I think it’s every man’s duty to take an active interest in what’s best for his country. This is a great nation for anyone who wants to work hard – a country where any kid can grow up to become President…” Davies could swear that for a moment – just a split second – he saw a flash of unrealised ambition and self-belief flare behind the younger man’s blue eyes. “…I could be President one day…!”