Top Gun

by T. E. Cruise

  “Hey, it worked, right?” Greene shrugged. The Sun-Wolf’s performance specs were also locked into the simulator’s memory banks. If a pilot tried an unrealistic maneuver, the simulator flashed its equivalent of “Tilt,” and the game was over.

  “Just remember that the computer learns from experience,” the technician warned. “Next time you try that stunt, your bogies might have an unpleasant surprise waiting for you.”

  “I never worry about next time,” Greene said, forcing a smile. “That’s why I always win this time.”

  He turned away before the technician could reply, thinking that he’d argued this fundamental difference in philosophy before with the boys who baby-sat the computer: fighter jocks took risks; desk jocks went by the book.

  Greene guessed that Buzz had picked up on the sudden level of tension in the room. “Hey, the bottom line is that Robbie did a beautiful piece of work this morning,” Buzz began, playing the peacemaker role just like always. “I’m looking forward to the playback on the big screen at this week’s training debrief.”

  “I’m not,” Green said, smiling ruefully. “I made a couple of real bonehead mistakes. I expect I’ll get my ass chewed ragged during the playback.” He paused. “Buzz, you scheduled to fly the simulator today?”

  “Negative,” Buzz replied. “Tomorrow.”

  “Then you want to grab some lunch?”

  “Sure,” Buzz said. “But I’ve got some signing off to do on your simulation….”

  “That’s okay. I’ll stow my gear and stop by my quarters to get cleaned up. I’ll meet you at the burger place near the commissary in about half an hour.”

  Greene left the Flight Simulations Center, which was part of Wright-Patterson’s research and development complex, taking the shuttle bus over to bachelor officer quarters, where he showered and changed into a fresh uniform. He was on his way out as they were delivering the mail. That was when Greene got the letter from his uncle Steve.

  (Two)

  It was the lunch rush, and the Burger Barn was crowded when Greene arrived. The restaurant was done up like a barn, with rough-hewn paneling and cutesy descriptions of the food on the menu, but for all that it was one of the better lunch spots in the on-base shopping mall. There were no tables available, and Buzz hadn’t yet arrived, so Greene sat at the counter while he waited, with a mug of coffee and his uncle’s letter in front of him. He’d already read the damn thing, but he couldn’t help reading it again. The letter was handwritten on plain white paper, as if Steve Gold, an Air Force colonel presently assigned to Los Angeles Air Force Station, understood the enormity of his betrayal and didn’t want to use official stationery.

  The Burger Barn was noisy with the clattering of silverware and the loud drone of diners’ conversation, but the racket seemed to recede as Greene read:

  6/11/73

  Dear Robbie,

  I guess I’ve been putting off writing to tell you this, but now that the time is getting close when the official announcement is going to be made, I figured I better get on the stick and lay it on you before you heard about it from someone else. I’ve finally decided to make good on that threat I’ve been making down through the years to leave the Air Force. Next month, I’ll be joining in with your stepfather to help run GAT.

  I know that you might take this as a shock. Hell, it still comes as a shock to me….

  Flying fighters has been my life. I never even went to college or finished high school. Just ran off back in ’41 and lied about my age in order to join up with Chennault’s Flying Tigers. It’s been the “Wild Blue Yonder” for me ever since, and while I can’t say that I’ve never looked back, I do think that the Air Force has given me a good life.

  But Robbie, my Air Force career had to come to a close, sooner or later. I guess now is as good a time as any.

  I know what you’re thinking, nephew: “But Steve, you’ve worn Air Force blue for so long you’re not going to recognize yourself out of uniform….”

  Am I right? Thought so. You see, Robbie, I know what you’re thinking, because it’s what I’ve been thinking. I don’t mind telling you that for the first time in a long time I’m scared. (Not even going to War College freaked me out this much!) I know it’s not going to be easy giving up my identity and starting something new at my age, but like I said already, it had to be done sooner or later, and it wasn’t going to get any easier the longer I waited.

  About my new job at GAT: I’ll be handling the marketing and sales ends of things, with an emphasis on selling military airplanes. In case you were wondering, I won’t be taking orders from Don. Your stepfather and I are going to be equal partners.

  Well, I guess that’s all I can tell you for now, except for the fact that your mom and your grandmother are all enthusiastic about what I’m doing. I can only hope that you are, as well….

  If this letter kind of sounded like I was trying to convince you of something, it’s because I was. And trying to convince myself, too, I guess. But hell, you probably guessed that much, right?…

  The truth is I’m scared, and already lonely and homesick for the only life I’ve ever known, and I ain’t even left it yet! Of course, there’s an upside for you, old buddy: In just a couple more weeks, you’ll be the senior fighter jock in the Gold clan. How about that?

  Seriously, Robbie, there’s an upside for me, as well. Nervous as I am about all this, it’s what I want to do. The Air Force doesn’t have many challenges left for an old bird like me. It’s time for me to make my own challenges. Helping to run GAT is going to be a big one.

  I hope you wish me luck.

  Steve

  “Sorry I’m late.”

  Greene glanced up to see Buzz Blaisdale standing behind him. “No, problem, man….”

  Buzz was studying him. “You okay? You look pale. You’re not suffering from simulator sickness, are you?”

  Greene smiled, shaking his head. “Just some bad news from home….” Greene realized that his friend was waiting for him to elaborate, but he just didn’t feel like getting into it right now.

  “There’s some tables opened up,” Buzz said, breaking the awkward silence.

  “I guess I’m not that hungry, after all,” Greene said. “I’ll have another cup of coffee while you eat.”

  Buzz was frowning in concern. “Look, I had a late breakfast, so I’m cool.” He paused. “You want to go work out?”

  Greene nodded, sliding off the stool and putting down a buck on the counter to take care of his coffee and a tip. He folded up his uncle’s letter and stuffed it into his pocket.

  “Gym or dojo?” Greene asked. Eighteen months ago both Greene and Buzz had gotten into the martial arts in a big way: karate, aikido, nunchakus, bo sticks, the whole nine yards. Both of them were now karate brown belts, and had a bet going concerning who was going to make black belt first.

  “Dojo,” Buzz said, winking. “That way if you continue to refuse to tell me what’s wrong back home, I can beat it out of you.”

  (Three)

  The dojo, or karate training hall, was part of the health club on base. It was a long, wide, brightly lit place with polished wooden floors and mirrored walls. There was an area carpeted with padded mats for judo and aikido practice, racks of plastic and rubber training weapons, and racks of body armor to protect against injury during sparring. There was a karate class just ending when Greene and Buzz left the locker room, so they had the dojo to themselves. Both men were barefoot, and both were wearing the floppy white karate suit called a gi.

  “Hard to believe a guy like your uncle could leave the Air Force,” Buzz commented as he and Greene faced the mirror and began their stretching exercises.

  Greene just grunted in reply, intent upon his leg lifts and turns. On the way over to the dojo. Buzz had managed to badger him into revealing the contents of Steve’s letter. Now he was sorry he’d let Buzz grill him. He wanted to put his turncoat uncle out of his mind.

  “Wasn’t your uncle the guy who wrote the book
on the Fishbed?” Buzz asked.

  “Literally,” Greene replied. “He was the guy the Air Force sent to check out that Arab MiG-21 the Israelis managed to get their hands on back in the 1960s. It was my uncle’s actual evaluation sheets that we studied back at fighter pilot’s school. Most likely, the computer guys used my uncle’s evaluations to program the flight simulator.”

  They were silent as they warmed up by doing a hundred karate punches and an equal number of snap kicks, watching their form in the mirrors. Greene studied his reflection as he brooded about the news from home: he was just a little under five ten and weighed one sixty-five, all of it muscle, thanks to his frequent workouts. He had green eyes under a shock of black hair. Back in ’Nam he’d worn his mustache with the ends waxed and twirled, but upon coming home he’d trimmed away the handlebars.

  They next practiced their kata, the series of prearranged movements that formed the bedrock for their karate training, watching and correcting each other’s form. They then faced each other to do some basic combination thrusting, kicking, and blocking techniques.

  “There’s just one thing I don’t understand,” Buzz suddenly piped up. “Why did you call the fact that your uncle is leaving the Air Force bad news?”

  “Why do you think, man?” Greene responded angrily. “I grew up worshiping that guy, and here he is selling out!” He increased the pace and intensity of his thrusts; the smacks echoed in the dojo as Buzz managed to deflect Greene’s strenuous punches with circular blocks.

  “Hey, man, cool out,” Buzz complained, stumbling back.

  “Sorry…”

  “You want to spar, let’s put on some body armor.”

  “Yeah, right.”

  They walked over to the racks, where they selected and strapped on padding to protect their chests and groins, moved To the center of the dojo, bowed to each other, and then began their wary circling. Buzz went into a cat’s-foot stance, his knees bent, all of his weight on his rear leg so that he could kick out with his front foot. Greene refused to allow himself to be lured into anticipating a kicking attack. Instead, he watched Buzz’s eyes.

  Buzz skittered forward, feinting a kick and then attacking with a left thrust to Greene’s chest. Greene sidestepped to the right, deflecting Buzz’s punch, sweeping it away with with his left forearm. As Greene completed the block, he slid his forearm down Buzz’s outstretched arm, gripping Buzz’s wrist in order to haul Buzz toward him, simultaneously executing a side foot thrust to Buzz’s thigh. Buzz freed his wrist using an aikido technique, and pivoted away from Greene’s kick.

  The two men separated from each other. The entire exchange had lasted only a few seconds.

  “God, I love this.” Buzz smiled, breathing lightly. Both men were again circling each other, looking for a chink in the other’s defenses.

  Greene nodded. “This must be like what dogfighting was like in the old days: lots of aerobatics with machine guns blazing.

  “Yeah, that’s right,” Buzz muttered. “Your old man was an RAF World War Two fighter jock….”

  Greene hesitated. He didn’t like talking about his father. “He flew a Hawker Hurricane against the Germans over Africa,” he admitted reluctantly. “He was an ace—”

  Greene suddenly lashed out a front snap kick to Buzz’s protected belly. Buzz stepped away from the kick and then lunged forward, bending at the waist, making a grab for Greene’s outstretched leg. Greene managed to retract his leg just in time and then snapped out a back fist strike to Buzz’s padded shoulder.

  “Gotcha!” Greene gloated. “Score’s one to nothing!”

  Buzz stepped in fast, scoring with a foot strike to Greene’s upper thigh and then two solid punches to the chest that knocked the wind out of Greene despite his body armor. Greene tried to backpedal away, but he lost his balance and sat down hard on the wooden floor.

  Buzz was grinning down at him with his hands on his hips. “You keep making the same mistake, Robbie. You made it in the simulator, and just now. You get so carried away with your initial victory that you leave yourself open for a counterattack.”

  “Thanks, I’ll have to remember that, oh wise one,” Greene said dryly as Buzz gave him a hand getting to his feet.

  “Score’s three to one, my favor,” Buzz said as they again began to circle each other. “Now, then, you were telling me about your father… ?”

  “There’s nothing more, except that he died in the war,” Greene ended firmly. It just hurt too much to talk about the precious little he knew about his father.

  Blaize Greene had died in combat, purposely sacrificing his own life to save others, the day his son was born. What Robbie Greene knew about his father he’d learned from his mother, but when she’d remarried she’d stopped talking about her first husband. She’d even taken on the Harrison name, and had a son with her new husband, leaving Robbie Greene as the outsider in this new family and all alone to carry on the Greene name. For Robert Blaize Greene, so hungry for his mother’s recollections, it had all seemed a cruel betrayal, which had festered within him through the years. In retaliation, he’d turned away from his mother and that slimy bastard she’d married, giving his uncle Steve all his affection.

  But now Uncle Steve was also betraying Blaize Greene’s memory by making peace with Don Harrison; by becoming partners with his father’s usurper.

  Greene saw an opening and stepped in close, driving his elbow into Buzz’s ribs. He knew instantly that he’d hit Buzz too hard, even before his friend cried out, falling to his knees and clutching at his side.

  “Goddammit, Robbie…,” Buzz grumbled as Greene helped him to his feet.

  “I’m sorry, man.” Greene shook his head. “Look, that’s enough sparring. I’ll see you later. I’ll pay for the beers tonight to make it up to you. Right now I’m going to go work out on the heavy bag. I’m feeling a little too mean today. I’m not fit for human company.”

  CHAPTER 3

  (One)

  The International Air Transport Committee annualtrade show

  Sunshine Convention and Exhibition Center

  Los Angeles, California

  12 November, 1973

  Steven Gold knew that the 1ATC trade show was the number-one event in the industry. It was here that the aviation industry offered for sale to the American and foreign airlines everything to do with the commercial air-transport business: jetliner fuselages, engines, avionics, door-latch assemblies, seat-upholstery fabrics, in-flight catering equipment, personnel uniforms, and so on. The trade show had a carnival atmosphere. The vendors spent heavily on elaborate promotions and lures designed to attract the airline purchasing agents to their exhibits. As Gold wandered the maze of aisles formed by the hundreds of elaborate booths, he saw give-aways, sweepstakes, and hucksters dressed up as clowns, birds, and in World War I flying gear; and the largest concentration of platinum-blond “spokes models” in low-cut sequined gowns outside of Hollywood. The manufacturers’ sales and marketing departments began preparing for the IATC extravaganza months in advance. Everybody who was anybody in the commercial aviation business was here, but as Gold bleakly returned to GAT’s huge booth in a prime spot in the hall, he wondered if anybody in the history of the world had felt so out of place as he did just now.

  Gold glanced at Don Harrison, who was standing like the king of the mountain on a raised platform in GAT’s multilevel booth. Don was busy chatting with several airline vice presidents. Evidently, one of the prosperous-looking guys had told a joke: Don and the others were all laughing uproariously.

  Sons of bitches. Gold thought grimly. Nobody had said two words to him all morning, and the times he’d tried to intrude into ongoing conversations, things got strangely quiet. He felt like a wallflower, and felt doubly foolish about his sorry situation because Don had told him his presence at the trade show wasn’t necessary. It was Gold who had insisted upon coming. It was his way: when things weren’t going well. Gold liked to throw himself wholeheartedly into the fray.

  And
things definitely weren’t going well, Gold now brooded. He was loitering in front of the GAT booth, his shiny plastic exhibitor’s badge pinned to the lapel of his custom-tailored, three-piece blue flannel suit, standing around playing pocket pool with himself and rocking on his heels like a goddamned department-store floorwalker. It had been a tumultuous five months since he’d turned in his Air Force uniform for executive’s pinstripes, and he was having a tough time getting used to the civilian world. For instance, not even in your own office could you just order that things be done according to standard operating procedure. No way, pal. Even with your own staff, you had to “communicate,” “negotiate,” be “considerate,” and “compromise.” If you didn’t, the hippy-dippy bastards would up and quit on you, for chrissakes.

  Gold smiled grimly. He would have liked to see somebody on his staff try to quit him in the Air Force….

  He was comfortable dealing with the DOD military-aviation market because he was an old hand at finding his way through that particular jungle, but the civilian air-transport business was virgin territory. Don Harrison had told Gold he needn’t concern himself with that side of the business, but Gold was damned if he was going to be satisfied with half a loaf: Pop had mastered all aspects of the aviation business, so Herman Gold’s son was going to do the same, even if it killed him.

  And so here Gold was attending this trade show, feeling bored and out of place, wandering the hall until even the would-be starlets in their form-fitting glitter gowns had begun to pale.

  And there wasn’t one armament or combat avionics vendor in the whole fucking convention center.

  “Hello, amigo.”

  Steve turned. “Tim?” He smiled tenatively. “Tim Campbell?”

  “None other, amigo.” Campbell grinned.

  “Damn, it’s been a long time!” Gold exclaimed.

  Campbell was in his early seventies. He was short and stocky, but still looked as randy as an old billy goat. Campbell had a full head of gray, auburn-tinged hair that he wore in a Beatles cut, and modishly bushy sideburns. His clothes were 1960s-era, dandified English mod as well: his tan and green windowpane-plaid, double-breasted suit had wide lapels and a nipped-in waist; his tie was a riotous maroon and yellow paisley pattern; his snakeskin boots had zippers on the sides. Campbell may have dressed like a backwater used-car salesman, but he was one of the richest men in America.