Brown, Dale - Patrick McLanahan 09

by Warrior Class (v1. 1)

  Duane looked at Annie with a touch of concern—then that ever-present, cocky, Cheshire-cat smile crossed his face. “I’m with you. Heels,” he said. “I will always be with you.” Annie felt her face flush with embarrassment, and she thanked the stars he couldn't see her pleased smile behind her oxygen mask. “Let’s go and show those Madcap Magician pukes the way home.”

  “I heard that,” Briggs interjected.

  “Then let’s do it. Dev,” she said.

  “I’m right here with you, Heels,” Deverill said, with a smile, as he fastened his oxygen mask in place and lowered his clear visor. “Show me some of your bad-ass pilot moves.”

  Annie was happy to comply. She swept the wings full aft, rolled inverted, and dove for the ground, losing fourteen thousand feet in the blink of an eye. When they rolled wings-level, they were only five miles in trail from the MV-22 and closing quickly. Meanwhile. Deverill had punched up the laser radar and had the MV-22 Pave Hammer aircraft locked on with ease. All the Vampire crew had to do was lower their electronic helmet visors, and they saw a virtual three-dimensional image of the MV-22 and showed its location when they looked in its direction. with tiny arrows showing which way to look for the target. Annie flew the rejoin as if she could see the aircraft through the clouds and darkness.

  “Stand by. Hammer,” Annie Dewey said. “We’re moving in.”

  “Rog.” Briggs replied. He had changed seats with Fratierie and was now in the copilot’s seat, scanning the sky out the right-side cockpit windows with his suit’s sensors. “Come on down.”

  “Stand by on towed arrays and countermeasures, Dev.” He swallowed hard, watching the laser radar display intently. Inside three miles. Annie announced, “Okay, Dev, let’s dirty her up.”

  “Go for it,” her mission commander said. ‘Towed decoy retracted, transmitters and countermeasures in standby. Ready.” Their threat warning receivers still showed antiaircraft artillery sites and search radars in the vicinity, but none aimed in their direction. “I gotta tell you. Heels, I feel naked up here.”

  “Me, too,” Annie admitted.

  “Nah. That’s only me undressing you with my eyes.”

  “Har har,” Annie shot back—but he sounded truthful about that, and it made her smile again.

  Annie slowed the plane to two hundred and fifty knots, swept the wings full forward, lowered flaps and slats to the approach setting. One hundred and sixty knots. It was still too fast, so Annie lowered the flaps to the next notch. The Vampire automatically settled into its before-landing nose-high attitude, ft was a little weird flying with the deck angled up so sharply, flying next to another aircraft that was flying straight and level.

  The LADAR showed the MV-22 in startling detail—including the shut-down engine, which showed blue-cold in their sensors, and the antiaircraft artillery damage it sustained. “Holy crap,” she exclaimed. “They got blasted all to hell. They got the right engine shut down, but the prop’s not feathered. The right side got all shot up.”

  “Visibility looks like it’s less than a half-mile up here,” Deverill said. “If we got any chance of doing this, we gotta get within visual range.” Just then, the threat warning receiver emitted a slow DEEDLE... DEEDLE.. . DEEDLE tone. “Soviet-made triple-A, probably a ZSU-23A, ten o’clock, range about ten miles. We’re flying right into its lethal range. You gotta get him turned around in the next two minutes or we’ll both be Swiss cheese.”

  “Oh, hell,” Annie murmured. She dipped the nose and quickly scooted under the MV-22 to put herself between it and the triple-A site, and to put Deverill on the same side as the MV-22 so he could try to communicate with them while she flew the plane. She pulled off another notch of power and eased the big EB-1C flying battleship closer to the stricken turboprop. She had to fly formation cross-cockpit, looking through Dev’s windows, but with the orange and yellow virtual 3-D image hovering in front of her eyes, it was as if she could look right through Dev’s body and through the clouds and darkness and watch the big MV-22 transport move closer and closer.

  “Where’d you guys go?” Briggs asked.

  “I moved over to your left side, Hammer,” Annie said. “We’ve got a triple-A site ahead. John, you’re going to have to get a good visual on us real quick.”

  “Copy. Heels,” Weston replied. Unlike the others, he couldn't see a thing outside the windows except darkness, interrupted occasionally by flashes of antiaircraft artillery fire.

  Duane fished through his pubs bag stuffed into the cubby beside his seat and produced a three-cell flashlight. “My Kmart special,” he quipped. “I hope I remembered to change the damn batteries.” They worked the first time, and he shone the thin beam out the cockpit window.

  Normally the beam was bright enough to inspect the deepest. darkest, tallest wheel wells of the EB- 1C bomber even during the darkest preflight, but now it barely seemed to reach out to the Vampire’s wingtips. “Looks like we got some ice forming on the wings,” Deverill said. “About a half-inch right now.” He looked over to be sure the bleed air anti-ice system was activated. Normally they wouldn’t fly in conditions like this for very long—the B-1 bomber was very susceptible to ice accumulation and had terrible flight conditions with even a small load.

  “Any sign of the MV-22?”

  “Nope,” Deverill said. He could “see” it through the electronic visor, but if he couldn’t see it visually, the MV-22 crew couldn't see them. “I’ve got you at half a mile, Heels.”

  “I'm not stopping, Dev.”

  “You don't hear me arguing, do you? Keep it coming.”

  “Terminator, this is Genesis,” Samson’s ethereal voice emerged from thin air. “Genesis to Terminator. Status check.”

  “We're at one-half mile, General,” Deverill reported. “No contact.”

  “We have you and the MV-22 on JTIDS,” Samson re, minded them. JTIDS, or Joint Tactical Information Distribution System, allowed many different users to share information with each other. When the Vampire’s laser radar locked on to the MV-22 transport, its position was instantly relayed via JTIDS to all authorized users, including General Samson. He could clearly see that they had moved closer than one-half mile. “If you don’t have a visual, cancel the rejoin and move back up to patrol altitude.”

  “General, you saw the Zeus-23-4 site up ahead,” Deverill said. “The MV’s headed right for it. We’ve got a chance to get him turned around—we’re going for it.’’

  “All the more reason to get the hell out of there/’ Samson said. “Climb out, nail that Zeus site, and try a rejoin again when the visibility improves. Do it.”

  “We’re only going to get one shot at this, sir,” Annie said hesitantly.

  “I copy that, Annie, but l can't risk both of you,” Samson said. “Abort and climb out. That’s an order.”

  Annie swore under her breath, then suddenly cobbed the throttles to full afterburner. As soon as she reached two hundred knots, she started raising flaps and slats and swept the wings to the climb setting. “Dev, nail that Zeus-23!” she shouted.

  “Crap, we're losing our ticket home,” Weston swore. The roar of the EB-l’s afterburners rattled the cockpit windows, and the long tongue of flame from the four afterburners lit up the cockpit as if they overflew a searchlight. They could see nothing else except the four bright shafts of fire; then, seconds later, darkness again. They could smell the jet fuel and feel the heat of that very close encounter. “We’re deaf, dumb, and blind up here,” Weston said, hoping that stating the obvious could help them plan a way out. If they couldn’t rejoin, Weston, his crew, his passenger, and his aircraft would probably never make it home.

  “I got it. Heels,” Deverill said. With the plane no longer in automatic takeoff-and-land mode, he was able to program the attack computer again. He selected another Longhorn missile, slaved its autopilot to the coordinates of the antiaircraft artillery site, and programmed a launch. Deverill watched as the radar-enhanced infrared image of the tanklike mobile antiaircraft gu
n unit got bigger and bigger on his large multifunction display. From only five miles away, the kill came fast. The Longhorn’s millimeter-wave radar locked on to the center of mass of the ZSU-23/4 and killed it in seconds.

  But they weren't out of the woods yet. “Another triple-A just popped up,” Duane said. “Eleven o’clock, ten miles. Must be part of the same regiment. We should ... wait, another popup threat. SA-6, twelve o’clock, twelve miles. They must’ve seen their buddy go up in smoke, and now they’re hunting for us. We’re bracketed. I think we just highlighted the MV-22. They can’t see us, but they can see him."

  “Great. We just signed his death warrant,” Annie said. She cut the afterburners and started an orbit around the MV-22. “The only chance we got is to get him to do a one-eighty, and then tag all those antiaircraft sites.”

  “I’m on it,” Duane said. His fingers flew over the attack computer controls, trackball, and touchscreens, designating targets and programming the missiles for launch. As they completed their orbit, the attack computers opened the middle bomb bay doors and spit a Longhorn missile into space. “Stand by for multiple missile launches.”

  But their luck began to run out. The Longhorn missiles did have one major flaw: their big rocket engines, which ignited seconds after release, highlighted the launch aircraft like a bright neon sign. The other antiaircraft sites wised up and started moving to another firing location. Every time they launched another Longhorn missile, several ripples of 23-millimcter cannon fire streamed in their direction, and Annie was forced to dodge and jink away.

  It was a valiant effort, but it didn’t work. The AGM-89 Longhorn missile was able to lock onto a target once in flight, but without guidance corrections from the bombardier, its hit percentage decreased markedly. Deverill simply could not juggle six Longhorn missiles in the air at one time. After one orbit, there was still a ZSU-23/4 unit operational. “All missiles expended.” Deverill said breathlessly. “Triple-A still active, eleven o’clock, range indefinite. Sorry, Annie.”

  “I’m not going to let that MV-22 get shot down,” Annie said.

  ‘Terminator, this is Genesis,” Samson tried. “We show all air-to-ground weapons expended. You’re done for the night. Return to the refueling anchor.”

  “Deactivate voice link,” Annie ordered to the satellite voice server.

  “He can override,” Deverill reminded her. “You can’t shut off the general.”

  “Just give me a heading and altitude on Hammer,” Annie said. “I'll give it one more shot.”

  “You’re going to ignore Samson? He’ll eat you for breakfast.”

  “Do I gotta do it myself, Dev? Give me a damned vector to the MV-22.” Deverill shook his head, gave Annie a heading, altitude, airspeed, and range to the MV-22 Pave Hammer, then fell silent.

  If it was possible, the weather had gotten worse—now, along with the structural ice, darkness, and poor visibility, they encountered strong, choppy turbulence. A few' times, the turbulence was so bad they thought they had been hit by antiaircraft fire. In addition, the MV-22 was in a slight turn. At first it was in a good direction—northwest, away from the advancing Russian army—but the turn kept on coming, and now they were headed back the way they came, toward the oncoming forces.

  Again, Annie began her rejoin on the MV-22. She lowered flaps right to the landing position to slow down and stabilize faster. But it was obvious after only a few moments that it was not going to be any easier—the pounding caused by the turbulence w'as getting worse by the minute. “Damn it, I can’t do it,” Annie said. “The turbulence is too strong. I'm getting a cramp in my hand.”

  “You’ve come this far, Annie. Keep it coming. Relax your grip on the stick.”

  “I can’t do this, Dev—”

  “Heels, just shut up and move it in,” Deverill said. “Nice and easy, but keep it coming. We’ve got about ninety seconds before we get within lethal range of that Zeus-23.”

  Annie nudged the EB-1 closer, closer... “Three thousand feet... twenty-five hundred ... good closure, two thousand ... fifteen hundred ..But suddenly the MV-22 hit some turbulence and yawed hard left. Annie yanked the control stick left, avoiding a collision by just a few dozen yards. Annie had no choice but to bank away hard, back out to three-quarters of a mile.

  “Why are they turning left?” Annie exclaimed, her voice strained and hoarse. “Don't they realize they’re about to get their butts shot off?”

  “Never mind, Annie,” Deverill coached. “Ease it back over. You can do it, Four thousand feet... c’mon, Annie, time’s a-wastin’, get it over there ... whoa, whoa. a little too fast, two thousand . . . good correction, fifteen hundred . .. one thousand . .. good, five hundred feet... slide ’er over a hair more. He scanned the sky with the flashlight, aiming it where the electronic image said the cockpit was. “Trash Man’s probably got all his attention on his gauges, trying to keep himself upright. C’mon, you guys, look up, look up!”

  “Crap, crap, crap, ” Weston swore to himself. The primary electronic artificial horizon had gone out when the triple-A guns got them, and now the backup gyroscopic artificial horizon was starting to look wobbly. He glanced over at the pneumatic pressure gauge and saw it was two dots below the green arc—the backup gyro instruments would probably go out very soon. When that happened, he’d have to rely on the electric turn and bank indicator, the pitot-static altimeter and vertical velocity indicator, and the backup “whiskey” compass—instrument flying at its most basic.

  He knew he was in serious trouble. It would take all his skills to keep the big plane upright now. Any distraction, any emergency, any attack now that diverted his attention away from Hying the aircraft, might send them into an unrecoverable death-spiral right into the ground. Weston tried to relax his grip on the controls, tried to loosen up.

  “Where are you guys?” Briggs asked, frantically searching out the cockpit windows. “My pilot’s getting pretty antsy, and so’s his gauges.”

  “At your nine o’clock, less than a half-mile,” Deverill replied. “Coming in fast.”

  At that instant, Weston saw it—it looked like a flashlight beam, as if shining through a thick fog. Weston’s eyes darted back and forth, from window to instruments. He then had to scramble to stop a steeper-than-anticipated left bank. Shit, that came out of nowhere! An instantaneous distraction was all it took to start a violent maneuver. Weston quickly realized he couldn't keep that up any longer—the plane was drifting farther and farther off course every time he looked out the window.

  Suddenly he saw it, flying just below and to their left. less than a football field’s distance away. How in the world they’d avoided a collision, Weston couldn’t figure. “Tally-ho! Tally- ho!” Weston crowed. “Got you in sight!”

  “There it is!” Deverill crowed. “You see it. Heels?”

  “Tally-ho!” Annie responded happily. Sure in hell, it'd worked. Her attitude changed instantly. Before she'd had visual contact, all she could think about was how to stay away from the MV-22. Now that she had visual contact, she wasn’t going to lose sight of him again, even if Deverill had to open the window so they could hold hands together. “I got you now, sucker.”

  Her flying instincts and skills kicked in immediately. Seconds earlier, five hundred feet apart in the soup was too close— now fifty feet didn’t seem unreasonable at all. She smoothly, expertly tucked herself right underneath the pilot's window— fortunately, the EB-l’s high angle of attack, with its nose sticking high above the horizon, helped Annie to get closer than she ever thought she could do.

  Just then, a shrill warbling DEEDLEDEEDLEDEEDLE! warning tone sounded, followed by a aaa threat light on the threat warning display. “Triple-A, ten o’clock, inside lethal range!” Deverill shouted. And then the shells came, bright yellow pops of light slicing upward through the darkness. Duane knew that for every flash of light he saw, there were ten others zipping around with it. The snake of shells swung hard in their direction. They were too close to turn in either
direction—there was no way out.

  Deverill shouted, “Vertical jinks!” But it was too late. Dewey and Deverill heard what sounded like a rapid, heavy drumming on the left wing, followed by a heavy vibration emanating from the left wing and tail. The master caution light and several yellow warning lights illuminated on both sides. “Fuel malfunction ... configuration warning ... flight control warning.” Deverill said. “Looks like they shot the hell out of our left wing and tail section—” At that moment, the first red light on the warning panel illuminated. “Oh, crap, number-one i hydraulic hot warning light.”

  “Annie, this is Dave,” a disembodied voice announced. It was Colonel David Luger, seated in the “virtual cockpit” of the EB-1C Vampire bomber back at Elliott Air Force Base, which allowed several crew members and support personnel to remotely monitor the aircraft during its mission. “Annie, I’m going to shut down your number-one primary and secondary hydraulic systems before they seize and put the entire system into isolate mode. Eve also sent a test signal to your left flap and slat actuators, spoiler group, and adaptive wing actuators, and there’s no response, so it looks like you lost all your leftside-wing flight controls. The rudder actuator seems okay, so you still have limited turn control via the rudder. Copy all?”

  “We copy,” Annie said. “We've got a pretty good vibration coming from the left side,”

  “Could be a shot-up wingtip, spoiler, flap, or malfunctioning adaptive wing actuators,” Luger said. “In any case, don’t touch the flap or wing sweep controls or you’ll put your hydraulic system into isolate mode and end up wrapping yourself up in a ball.”

  “Roger.”

  “Captain Dewey,” General Samson cut in, “I want you out of there right now. That’s an order. Return to the due regard point. We’ll coordinate a tanker rendezvous.”

  “I’m not leaving the MV-22 now that I’m in contact,” Annie said. “He’s on my wing, and he’s going to stay there. If you want me to leave, get another plane up here to lead this guy. Otherwise he won’t be able to keep himself upright.”