Carrier - Joint Operation Book 16

by Keith Douglass

  TFCC

  1443 local (GMT-IO)

  Just then, the phone mounted on the table leg, out of sight just to the right of Batman's chair, buzzed. He picked it up, said, "Admiral," and then listened. A look of consternation crossed his face. "I see. Very well, I'll be there immediately."

  Batman placed the phone back in its hanger, then turned back to the assembled joint staff. "We have another problem. The stern of the second ship just let down in back. There's a well deck inside, according to the helo pilot." He gazed around the assembled crowd, making sure they understood what he was saying. "They're disgorging small boats. Each one looks to be carrying around a hundred and twenty men. And they're heading for the coast."

  Batman turned to Bam-Bam. "Break off one of the S-3's to get as close in as she can and take a look at what's going on. The Simpsons are riding pretty low in the water-there's a chance they've misinterpreted what they've seen." But as he listened to his TAO give the orders, Batman had a sinking feeling that he was not going to like the report coming from his S-3 any better.

  Viking 709

  1445 local (GMT-IO)

  Commander "Rabies" Grill put the S-3B Viking into a gentle turn to the right. The airspace immediately above the Chinese aircraft carrier was abuzz with MiGs, but they seemed to take no notice of his surveillance patrol at this distance. The ship was maybe eight miles away, her structure clearly visible, especially through binocu-

  lars. His copilot kept up a careful scan, noting the activity on the deck, the configuration of the ship, and the direction and size of its wake.

  "What's that mother doing?" Rabies muttered. He hummed a few bars of "Love Me Tender," then said again, "What is that mother doing?"

  Without dropping his binoculars, the copilot replied, "Not much. But if you start singing again, I swear I'll pitch these binoculars right through the windscreen." Rabies chuckled quietly. His love of country music was well known among all the S-3B Viking aircrews. In a moment of undeniable malice, the VS-29 operations officer had assigned only those individuals with perfect pitch to Rabies's aircrew. A betting pool had already been started among the rest of the squadron, wagering on which of the other three occupants of the aircraft would be the first to crawl sniveling on his knees to the operations officer. Himself, Rabies had ten bucks on the copilot.

  "Can you get around the stern of her again?" the copilot said. He leaned forward slightly in his seat, oblivious to the ejection seat straps holding him in place. "Because I think I see--hell!"

  "What is it?" Rabies goosed the S-3B up to top speed of four hundred and twenty knots, and everything in the cockpit started rattling.

  The copilot yelped, dropped his glasses momentarily, and shot an angry look at Rabies. "She was designed for this speed twenty years ago. Don't press your luck, asshole."

  Rabies refrained from rejoinder.

  "Sir, you're going to be out of range of the sono-buoys," the AW in the backseat complained. "I'm already starting to lose contact-damn."

  "Well, it's not like you were holding contact on any- thing, was it?" Rabies replied, a practical note in his voice. "That diesel's gone sinker, and you're not going to see her until it gets dark."

  "You never know," the AW muttered darkly. "If she takes a shot at die carrier and we're not on station-'

  "Our primary mission is to keep an eye on that bastard conceived-in-hell aircraft carrier," Rabies replied. "And if my beloved copilot wants a closer look at her ass, then that's where we're going."

  "Holy shit. I'm not believing this," the copilot said, stark horror in his voice. "Not the carrier, but the ship next to it. It's a fucking amphibian transport."

  "What?" demanded Rabies.

  "The stern just levered down into a ramp, and sea-water's flooding the back of it. You know what that means, don't you."

  Rabies nodded glumly. He did indeed. It meant the ship was equipped with a well deck, which meant that she had a covey of nasty little target boats inside of her capable of transporting men and equipment to shore. Easy targets for the most part-the max speed, unless they were hovercraft, was usually well under twenty knots. Not even with a harpoon-he'd get in close and take them with guns.

  "Any boats coming out?" Rabies asked.

  "Negative. It'll take them a while to flood the well deck if they're anything like our transports," the copilot replied.

  Rabies picked up the mike. "Homeplate, this is Dragon Zero Seven," he said. An answer came back from Jefferson immediately.

  "Roger, Jefferson, got a visual on the second big bad boy. My copilot reports that it's an amphibious transport, The well deck's flooded-once they get it stabilized, I

  suspect we're going to see mama laying some eggs. What do you want me to do about it?"

  "Dragon Zero Seven, wait. Out."

  Rabies sighed. Typical of the new Navy. If he had his way, he knew what he'd do-make an approach on the boat immediately and start strafing those little bastards as soon as they got spit out the ass end. Waterborne turds, that's what they were-might as well kill'em at sea before they had a chance to make landfall.

  He glanced up at the airspace over the carrier and revised his plan. Might not be such a good idea to wander into the middle of that cluster fuck of fighters while he was armed with torpedoes and harpoons. He doubted if any of the nimble MiGs would stand still long enough for him to take them with guns. Still, he was willing to give it a try if Jefferson said so. He'd never had a chance to use the ejection seats in the Viking, and it might be interesting to-

  "Dragon Zero Seven, this is Homeplate. Weapons tight-I repeat, weapons tight. Maintain briefed distance and continue observations. We're sending you out some playmates."

  There were two sighs of relief from the backseat as it became clear that Rabies would not be allowed to enter the airspace around the Chinese aircraft carrier. Even the copilot looked relieved. Rabies's tendency to shoot first and ask questions later was well-known amongst the community.

  Rabies sighed and tapped impatiently on the throttle cluster. "Damn. And I was hoping to be an ace."

  TFCC

  1450 local (GMT-IO)

  Batman listened to the report from the translator with a grim expression on his face. "A full division crammed inside those amphibs? He was certain? And a submarine in the area, too?"

  The translator nodded. "He was certain, Admiral. Especially about the submarine. He's the equivalent of one of our sonar technicians, and he knows that they've anticipated having to deal with at least one U.S. submarine."

  Batman was silent for a moment, then said, "So why's he talking? Does he think we'll torture him?"

  "As I understand it, he's planning on asking for political asylum." The translator pursed his lips for a moment, deep in thought. "As there's something more that's motivating him, I'm certain. He kept mentioning a senior pilot by the name of Chan. Chan Li. Evidently this fellow thinks Chan is out to get him."

  "Okay by me," Batman answered. "I don't care why he's talking, as long as he's talking." He turned to Bam-Bam. "Get a message to Centurion. She's been holding contact intermittently on something, and if we give her an exact classification, it'll help her localize it."

  Lab Rat broke in with, "In these waters, ASW is going to be difficult, sir. Especially near the harbor. The water's not bad, but the ocean floor is littered with metal. It's going to be difficult for the airborne assets to depend on their MAD contacts."

  They all fell silent for a moment as history hit home. That the remnants of that gallant fleet on the seabed should make their problem now more difficult seemed cruelly ironic.

  "The floor's charted," Lab Rat added. "There's no area that's been mineswept more thoroughly. That'll help." He left unspoken the last thought-it would help, but it might not be enough.

  Flight Deck USS Jefferson 1500 local (GMT-IO)

  After two hours of humping tie-down chains, watching aircraft, and conducting FOD walk-downs, the four aviators had a new appreciation for the complexity and skill requi
red of the enlisted flight deck technicians. They'd all seen the other ratings in action time and time again, ever since their earliest days in flight training, but they'd never actually had to perform the work themselves. They quickly discovered how very little they actually knew about what goes on behind the scenes.

  Hot Rock was taking a break from hauling sonobuoys up from the ammunition locker to the flight deck when he ran into Lobo. He slipped behind the island with her and wiped the sweat off his face. "You always see those guys crashed out just inside the passageways with their headphones still on during flex deck operations. Man, I never realized how tired you got doing this stuff. How are you holding up?"

  "Fine," Lobo's voice was confident, but Hot Rock noticed how she winced as she settled down onto the non-skid next to him. "You're right, though. It is hard work. Just had a chief order me to get out to the LSO platform and take them some water and some paper cups. You want to go?" Just then the IMC went off overhead.

  "Launch the Alert Five Tomcats, the Alert Five Hornets, and all backup sections. Stand by for full flex deck operations. Green deck; green deck."

  Hot Rock and Lobo scrambled to their feet and dashed toward the island. Hot Rock stopped just short of the hatch, and Lobo crashed into his back. "What the hell are you doing?" she asked angrily.

  "You forget-we're grounded." Lobo could hear the frustration in his voice. "They've got more than enough flight crews for all the aircraft-no way we're getting on the schedule, not even in a full Alpha strike."

  "Yeah, but-" Lobo's voice broke off when she could find no way to reason around the order grounding them. Their seniority and experience kept them on the flight schedule most of the time, but this wasn't most of the time. With more aircraft, they might have had a shot at it, but there were more than sufficient aircrews to man up every airframe on board the carrier.

  "So we stay up here," Lobo concluded glumly. "That sucks."

  "And out of the way," Hot Rock added. "That sounds like the LSO platform to me."

  Ten minutes later, after finding that there were a lot of shortcuts out to the LSO platform that they'd never learned, they stepped out onto the small platform on the port side of the ship just below the level of the flight deck. Both pilots immediately moved forward without thinking to stand next to the officer guiding the aircraft in.

  "Back off," a harsh voice said. "Jesus, what are they teaching you in boot camp these days? Don't you know enough to stay out of the way?" an LSO snapped at them.

  "What's-" Hot Rock began. A strong hand closed on his collar and jerked him back out of the way. "What the hell?"

  "Didn't you hear the lieutenant?" a chief petty officer asked. "Get your ass out of the way-now!"

  "What is it?" Lobo asked, as they both backed out of the way.

  "Pay attention-this isn't going to be pretty," the chief said, shouting to be heard over the noise of an approaching Tomcat. "Nugget inbound has lost his cool--he's boltered twice and the LSO is trying to talk him in. Getting low on fuel, too, but he's shaking so much right now he can't even take a pass at the tanker. This is going to be ugly."

  He pointed down at the cargo netting that dropped from the LSO platform to a spot that was affixed to the hull of the ship. "Anything goes wrong, you jump for that net. There's a hatch down there off to the side-you can make it back into the ship that way."

  Hot Rock and Lobo exchanged glances. If a Tomcat pilot was in trouble, then it had to be someone they knew. Neither of them recognized the LSO-it was from one of the other squadrons onboard-but both could now see the Tomcat inbound. The pilot was clearly having problems maintaining altitude and orientation to the deck. The Tomcat wandered around the sky like a wounded goose. Wavering back and forth off center line, sometimes too high, far off and too low.

  "Man, oh, man-I'm looking at a ramp strike waiting to happen," Lobo breathed. "Get some altitude, buddy, come on, come on. . ." Her voice trailed off as she realized the chief was staring at them curiously. Four feet in front of them, the LSO was repeating virtually the same words.

  They both stared at the incoming Tomcat, silently willing it across the flight deck. As the nose of the aircraft passed over the stern, they both breamed a sigh of relief. At least it wouldn't be a ramp strike, a head-on full speed impact into the stern of the ship. But just when they thought he would make it, snagging the four wire, the stern of the ship jutted abruptly up. It caught the Tomcat just forward of its main landing gear, snapping the struts like matchsticks. The tail-end of the aircraft slammed down, and the aircraft itself commenced a flat spin across the nonskid, headed directly toward them.

  "Down!" the chief shouted, and he yanked both of them down to the railing and over it and into the cargo net in one motion.

  They were staring in horrified fascination when the chief yanked them down. Behind them, they could hear other feet clanging on the metal deck plates, feel the hot breath of the burning Tomcat, now on fire, hurtling over their head and into the ocean.

  As they hit the cargo net, they hit on their backs and rolled over to see the lieutenant flying through mid-air toward them. Just as his forward section cleared the cargo net, the shattered remnant of a landing gear strut snagged his foot. It ripped the flesh open in a thin smear of blood and hung in the air a moment. The impact slammed him hard into the side of me ship, and he crumpled into an ominously still heap in the bottom of the net.

  The chief scrambled down after him. Before he even performed first aid, he stripped off the lieutenant's headset and clamped it over his own head. Then, simultaneously making his report to the Air Boss and checking the lieutenant to see if he was still breathing, he briefed the Air Boss.

  Hot Rock glanced out and could see two more Tomcats wheeling into position on final approach. He stepped forward, tapped the chief on the shoulder, then started to remove the headset. The chief clamped one beefy fist over Hot Rock's hand. "What the hell you doing, kid?" the chief snarled,

  "I'm Lieutenant Commander Stone," he said calmly. "And this is Lieutenant Commander Hanson. We're both F-14 pilots. Both LSO qualified. And I think you could use one of those about now."

  The chief stared at them for a moment, disbelieving, then sudden recognition dawned in his eyes. "I know who you are. Didn't recognize you in-Sir, what the hell are you-never mind." He ripped the headphones off, shoved them in Hot Rock's hands, and turned his attention back to the lieutenant. "Air Boss knows what's going on, and Medical is on the way. He said the forward part of the aircraft slid completely off and they're checking the catapult for damage right now. May be a couple of minutes until we can launch, but we've got two birds inbound." He pointed aft. "Think you can get them in?"

  "If there's no damage to the wires, yeah," Hot Rock said.

  "Keep in mind they're going to be a little shook up." He glanced at the two of them then said, "You know how it is. You see somebody buy it right in front of you getting on the deck, you're going to be kind of shaky coming in. Don't let on that you're a replacement LSO."

  "This part I know how to do, Chief." Hot Rock climbed back up the net and stationed himself on the undamaged portion of the LSO perch. Lobo joined him. She put her head up next to his, pulling the earpiece away from his ear slightly so she could listen in.

  "Tomcat Two-zero-one, call the ball," Hot Rock said, falling easily into the LSO pattern of coaching a bird onto the deck.

  "What the hell is going on down there, LSO?" a panicked pilot's voice asked. "Jesus, is he-

  "Tomcat Two-oh-one, call the ball," Hot Rock repeated, keeping his voice calm and professional. "Keep your mind in the game, mister. You've only got one thing to worry about right now, and that's putting that turkey down on the deck."

  "Yeah, but-"

  "Tomcat Two-oh-one, call the ball," Hot Rock repeated, letting the repetition cue the pilot's mind back into the familiar pattern of the landing sequence.

  "Roger, LSO, Two-oh-one ball." The pilot's voice already sounded calmer as he focused on the immediate problem at hand.
"Four thousand pounds on board."

  "Roger, Two-oh-one, say needles?" Hot Rock asked, asking the pilot to tell him how his glide slope indicator held the aircraft's position in relation to the ideal glide slope.

  "Roger, needles show high and to the right."

  *Two-oh-one, LSO, disregard needles, I hold you on course on speed. Keep it coming in, you're headed straight for the three wire."

  "We got a green deck?" the pilot asked, the anxiety surging in his voice again.

  "Roger, that's a green deck," Hot Rock said. "Green deck, green deck... looking good, Two-oh-one, a little power, a little power, that's it, watch your attitude, attitude, that's it, that's it..." Hot Rock settled easily into the familiar singsong patter of an LSO walking a Tomcat down the invisible slope that linked his last position on final approach to the number three wire on the deck. He could feel Lobo's hot breath on his neck as she listened, heard her subvocalizing the same patter he was putting out over the airwaves to the nervous pilot. "Looking good, looking good-got it!" he shouted as Tomcat Two- oh-one slammed down onto the deck in a controlled crash as it crossed the three wire. "Good trap, Two-oh-one."

  "What the hell is going on down there?" a new voice demanded on the circuit. "Chief said the LSO was out- Henry, what are you doing?"

  "Air Boss, it's Hot Rock and Lobo," the pilot answered, suddenly not at all certain that he was on solid ground. Sure, he knew what he was doing, but he supposed he should have asked the Air Boss's permission first before taking over the LSO duties without even informing him. Still, with a turkey in the air and a nervous pilot, the last thing the Air Boss or the Admiral would have wanted was to put the pilot back in the starboard marshal, particularly not when it looked like they were going to need every airframe they could get airborne within the next hour. "We happened to be out here, and when the LSO bought it, well. . ."

  There was silence for a moment on the circuit, then the Air Boss said, "I hold Two-oh-five inbound next. Be advised, we're still a green deck."