The CO responded to the knock on the door immediately and Mandy entered dressed in khaki short-sleeved uniform shirt and matching skirt, and holding a folder. She was about to speak when she noticed him. He made to get up but Jimmy Mac waved her on. “It’s okay, Ninety-Nine. He’s back in the Fleet soon. He might as well hear what you have.” Slammer knew Mandy loved that call sign, Agent 99.
Slammer had listened to Mandy brief the Ready Room once a month for the past two years. As the Gladiators were a training squadron, the lectures were pretty vanilla compared to the detailed intelligence briefing Fleet squadrons received on a regular basis. It appeared that the information hidden in her blue folder might be of more interest than the usual fare.
He watched her hand Jimmy Mac a sheet of paper. “Sir, one of Brunei’s government aircraft disappeared over the South China Sea recently.”
Jimmy Mac dropped his readers onto his nose and scrutinized the message. He screwed his forehead, working to glean the significance of the news. After a moment of churn he relented. “Okay, I give. Fill me in, Ninety-Nine.”
“The Sultan’s brother was in Manila with delegates from Vietnam, China, and the Philippines discussing the Spratly Island territorial claims,” Mandy said. Slammer was now on high alert and he could tell Jimmy Mac was, as well.
“No distress transmissions, no signs of wreckage. A search is underway, but we don’t expect they’ll find anything.” She paused, clearly waiting to see if the CO was in the mood to guess.
“Why not?” Jimmy Mac waved his hand impatiently.
Mandy handed him a transcript. “Sir, this was picked up by one of our EP-3s on patrol in the South China Sea. It was intercepted a couple of minutes after the plane disappeared from radar.”
Slammer sat on the edge of his seat, watching Jimmy Mac’s eyes flit across the text. The CO asked, “Did they triangulate the location? Was it near the flight path?”
Mandy nodded. “Yes, sir. We believe he was injured and blew his cover.”
Slammer turned back to Jimmy Mac and his CO filled in the gaps. “Meaning not a random act of violence, not terrorism, certainly not the accident it was made to resemble. It was a deliberate covert act by a foreign government designed to affect the situation in the South China Sea.” Jimmy Mac turned back to Mandy. “You going to make me guess who it was?”
Mandy passed one more sheet across the desk. “It was translated from Mandarin,” she said as Jimmy Mac retrieved the document. “Tie this in with the explosion at the Vietnamese oil exploration post and it makes us spooks think the Chinese are about to ratchet up the game to the next level in the Spratlys. The Pentagon is working overtime on this one.”
Slammer watched the Skipper sigh again as he leaned back, returning the readers to the top of his head. “Thanks, Mandy. Carry on.”
“Sir, this would be a perfect time for me to bug out,” he said, hoping to capitalize on the momentum. “I could join a new squadron just as they’re starting work-ups.”
Jimmy Mac waved his hands, silencing him. They sat quietly for a moment as a knot of students strolled past the open office door gabbing enthusiastically. As their carefree voices trailed away, he watched Jimmy Mac nod in assent.
“I think that’d be a great idea, Slammer. I really do.” Jimmy Mac adjusted the readers on the bridge of his nose then opened one of the many folders littering his desk. “Unfortunately, I’ve got a responsibility to prepare these kids for the Fleet. And for now, you’re a key part of that. Get ’em done, get ’em out the door, and I’ll live up to our agreement. Dismissed.”
He climbed to his feet, unable to assail Jimmy Mac’s logic, but with a growing certainty he was going to miss something big. And that he wanted to be far away from Quick before he said any more stupid shit.
Chapter 13
28 February
Virginia Beach, Virginia
Slammer cracked the blinds in the briefing room letting in the first few rays of the late February morning light.
Today’s hop would be a huge step forward in the evolution of his students. Multi-plane dogfights were as fun as they were demanding. He reviewed the group. Today he would be dragging Dingle around in his back seat, as usual. Quick and Chewie would crew together and Dusty Rhodes would have to fly with someone other than JT. Eagle sat next to Dusty, carefully scribbling the administrative notes from the white board onto his kneeboard card with the meticulousness of someone working on a merit badge. He was a good man, Eagle. Eagle Scout.
“Morning everyone. Hope you’re all spry and chipper at this hour.” Chewie and Dingle groaned like twins into their coffee. On the other hand, Quick and Dusty sat as far from each other as possible in the small room, each regarding him with an irritatingly blank expression. Alright, he shrugged internally, just another Monday. It had been a month since his talk with Quick at the Club and they had resumed their normal state of affairs, frosty but cordial. His relationship with Dusty…well, he didn’t really have a relationship with Dusty.
“Two versus one air combat maneuvering today. Two of us, one of them; excellent mission. We’ll have a single bandit from VFC-12 meet us in the area; I’ve already briefed him up. I’ll take off with Dusty on my wing. Quick, you launch fifteen minutes after us. When Dusty’s complete I’ll send her home and you can jump in.” He paused to allow time for note-taking and spent the next forty-five minutes on the details of the event.
An hour later Dusty was fully geared up and at her jet. She climbed the ladder and leaned in, placing her flight bag in the cockpit then sweeping the switches to make sure they were in the proper position. She walked around the Rhino scanning for anything her plane captain might have missed—an access panel left open, hydraulic fluid leaking, cuts in the tires, loose screws, anything. Her heart skipped a beat every time she thought about the upcoming flight. She longed for JT’s stabilizing influence, but he was the Duty Officer today, stuck behind the big desk in the Ready Room. She passed Eagle circling in the opposite direction doing his own preflight, barely acknowledging him as they crossed. She reminded herself of what JT told her after the nearly disastrous El Centro flight. You gotta relax and have faith in the plan. He had come over last night, creeping in after sunset like a thief. She’d been irked when he’d told her he wasn’t able to switch his duty to fly with her. She’d started depending on having him in her back seat for the first mission in each new phase. His presence in the plane calmed her down, gave her perspective. He’d tried reassuring her last night that today’s mission was not about shooting or not getting shot. It was about being a good wingman and executing the tactics. Baby steps. They’d gone over all that stuff and as usual, she nailed it. She was like a computer. She programmed herself. She knew it cold.
As she reached the nose of the big fighter she paused, patting the radar cone affectionately, the way you’d pat a horse’s neck. Horses she knew. A horse she could bend to her will. She muttered under her breath, “Come on, baby. Help me out today, okay?”
Nothing in Slammer’s brief had been news to Quick. The event was on the flight schedule posted yesterday afternoon and she’d spent the evening studying with Pig and Moto for this mission. She was ready. She just had to wait for Slammer to convey the details so they could be off, into the airborne classroom to execute. There was only so much she could do to prepare on the ground. As far as she was concerned, once she got in the sky it would all fall into place. She had done her best to appear attentive while Slammer worked through the rest of the brief, but her mind kept drifting back to the satisfying sound of a cue ball cracking a knuckle.
Now she walked alongside Chewie from the hangar as Dusty and Slammer taxied from the flight line. She noticed Chewie’s smile was as big as hers as they ambled out to do a job they loved. Could this be the same guy who just a few weeks ago had joked about banging all the new girls. She shoved that memory aside, it was time to get to work. A few minutes later she scrambled to the top of the ladder and tossed her kneeboard onto the glare shield, lifting
her head at the roar of Rhinos screaming at takeoff power. She watched the two jets lift off—Slammer’s first, already airborne by the time it was passing by her, skimming just above the runway already faster than her Corvette could ever go, and seconds later, Dusty chasing to join up with her lead.
Ten minutes later Slammer was nearing their holding point over the Atlantic, roughly 60 miles east of Virginia Beach. The sun, which had been peeking over the treetops as they took off, rapidly yanked itself higher, far more quickly for them than it did for the earthbound, as the jets climbed to meet the morning. It now hung brightly in the clear blue about 20 degrees above the distinct line splitting sea and sky to the east. He took a deep, satisfied breath and looked around, spotting freighters and Navy warships trailing wakes as they funneled toward the mouth of the Chesapeake Bay, nearly at their destination. He keyed the intercom mimicking Dingle’s Texas drawl. “How’re we lookin’ Dingle?”
He smiled behind his mask as Dingle’s voice filled his ears. “Lookin’ fine back here sir. Good radar. Good weapons. Read’to go.” It was a good morning for flying, and Dingle was turning into a half decent WSO. Peeking to his left he spotted Dusty, right where she was supposed to be, at his 8 o’clock a couple of plane lengths away in Loose Cruise position. He looked down at the map display; time to get started. He pumped the stick back and forth gently, bobbing his Rhino’s nose up and down.
Dusty noticed it immediately and added power to creep in closer. Eagle’s voice barked over the intercom, “That means he wants you in close. Scoot up a bit.”
“Yes sir.” She kept the irritation from her voice and added additional power. As the extra gas took effect she saw Slammer hold his left arm at a 90 degree angle, fist pointed at the sky.
“That means he wants you to cross under to the other side.”
She responded in monotone through clenched teeth. “Got it.”
You didn’t have to be a mind reader to interpret the irritation in her voice. Eagle keyed the intercom again. “Okay, Dusty. I’ll shut up. Show me what you’ve got.”
She rolled her eyes and added a bit more power, increasing her rate of closure with Slammer’s jet yet again. She saw him very deliberately lean his head in her direction twice, the signal for a left turn, and his plane banked gently in her direction. She swore under her breath. With his plane in a bank, her closure was now excessive, but not by a lot. She just needed to duck down a bit and scrub off some of the extra speed, keep it under control. Basic stuff. But as she was skidding toward Slammer’s plane, like a dog on linoleum, the combined effects of the turn and dropping down exposed her to the full force of the morning sun blasting her square in her face. Reflexively she jerked her head away for a moment, but there was no choice but to turn back and face it immediately. Even with her visor down she pinched her eyes into narrow slits against the glare. She could barely make out the silhouette of Slammer’s Rhino as she slid toward it at 20 knots. She was about to pull power and pop her speed brakes when she remembered Eagle in the back seat. She could feel him just waiting to pounce on such a sloppy over-correction. Her eyes burned, welling with tears, rebelling against the abuse of the harsh light. She was stuck, one hand on the throttle, the other on the stick, eyes watering over and still she was closing in on Slammer’s jet faster than she wanted. She squeezed her eyes tightly and shook her head trying to clear them.
“Watch it,” Eagle cautioned from the back. The oncoming Rhino was still just a fuzzy silhouette washed out by the glare. She pulled up slightly, trying to block a part of the sun with Slammer’s wingtip. Any second now they would be through enough of this turn to move the sun out of her line of sight. She blinked a few more times and squinted tightly.
“Fuck! Push over! Push!” The terror in Eagle’s voice bypassed all circuitry in her brain. She shoved the stick as hard as she could, throwing her up against the shoulder straps and bouncing her helmet against the canopy. A moment later the deafening roar of Slammer’s exhaust filled their cockpit. She watched, mesmerized, time compression making it feel like slow-motion, as her face passed just inches below his tail. She could have reached through her canopy and touched his burner cans. Then the action slammed into fast forward as her plane pitched violently nose down from the combined effect of her full-forward stick and the tail section entering the wash from Slammer’s exhaust. The plane somersaulted through the vertical with Dusty pinned against her straps as centrifugal force tried its damnedest to shove her through the glass.
“Recover! Recover!” Eagle screamed the command over and over until finally, with the very tips of her fingers, she was able to pull back on the stick. Their bodies snapped from one extreme to the opposite, negative Gs pushing them out of their seats changing in a blink to 5 hard Gs slamming them onto their asses. She took in a deep, shaky lungful of air as the plane resumed normal flight. “You got it?” Eagle breathed.
“Yes. Yes, I do.” She looked through her canopy, straight up at Slammer’s plane flying three thousand feet directly above her. There was no reaction from him, no transmission. Apparently he was completely oblivious to what just transpired, to just how close they were to… Her hands began to tremble slightly.
Eagle’s voice spluttered from the back seat, “What the hell? You almost killed us!”
She took her hand off the stick, flexing it and shaking it, loosing the cramps from the death grip. “I lost sight when Slammer crossed me under into the sun. It wasn’t my fault.”
She could hear the static as Eagle keyed his mic, holding the button down while he searched for words. Finally his voice exploded in her head, “Wasn’t my fault? Bullshit! You’re the only pilot in this jet. We’re done for today.”
She felt a panic rise. “No, wait, I’ll…”
But Eagle’s abrupt radio transmission cut her off. “Slammer, Eagle. Dusty and I are going back.”
Slammer was mildly surprised. “Everything okay?” These things happened—planes occasionally developed problems or weapons systems would crap out.
But he received no response. He didn’t know if Eagle had already switched frequencies to Air Traffic Control to arrange for their transit home or if they were in further distress. That left him in an awkward position.
He whipped his head from side to side looking at the empty sky where he expected to see Dusty’s jet. “Dingle, you see anything?” Fear rose that they were experiencing a real emergency, a fire or engine failure cutting off their communication. Maybe they were hanging in their parachutes right now.
“I got nothing sir.”
He tried another transmission, “Eagle, Slammer. What’s your status? What’s your position?” He released the mic switch and waited. Again nothing.
“Slammer, Ambush.” Their bandit was checking in. “I’ve got them right underneath me, heading for base. No smoke, no sign of trouble.”
Slammer exhaled a sigh of relief.
“You want me to escort them back?”
Slammer was the flight lead, they were his responsibility. It was common practice to accompany a distressed aircraft back to base unless the crew let you know they were alright, that their condition was minor. But he hadn’t been able to talk to Eagle and he was already too far to chase down Dusty. Sending their bandit back with the Rhino was definitely the prudent thing to do. “That would be awesome. Thanks, Ambush. We’ll catch you next time.”
Just then Chewie’s unmistakable voice piped into his ears. “Slammer, Chewie. Checking in on station for the second half. Save a piece of Ambush for us, amigo.”
The scheduled mission had completely blown up. He’d lost his first wingman and now the bandit. But there was no reason to go home yet. Two good airplanes, a beautiful day. Let’s see what you got, Quick, he thought. “Roger that. Listen up. Change of plans. Dusty is RTB with the Ambush as escort. Just you and us out here. You guys up for some one v one BFM?”
Quick gulped behind her mask. One versus one Basic Fighter Maneuvers—dogfighting—against Slammer. Holy shit. This wasn’t c
rud. She paused with her thumb on the mic till Chewie prompted from the back seat, “Hey Quick. You still up there?”
“Yes, sir. What can I do for you?”
“You up for some BFM or would you rather head back for the lunch buffet at the Club? Pretty sure they got cream puffs on the menu today.”
She grinned as she keyed her radio, “Slammer, Quick. Sir, we are on station, ready for BFM.”
“Roger that. Slammer’s ready. Fight’s on.”
She repeated the affirmation, “Quick copies, fight’s on.”
Her radar locked onto him from fifteen miles away and she maneuvered for a merge. You bet, Slammer, she thought. Fight’s on. A minute later they flashed by each other at over a thousand miles an hour, just 500 feet apart. As Slammer’s jet whisked past her, she pulled into him in a 7.5G turn, crushing the breath from her diaphragm. She screamed into her mask. “Yaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!”
Back at base Dusty had parked her jet. She was a few yards behind Eagle, who had bolted for the hangar as soon as his foot hit the cement. She took a couple of awkward jogging steps, bouncing along in her bulky flight gear, to pull abeam him. He didn’t acknowledge her or even slow down. She fell half step behind, struggling to keep pace with his long strides.
“Hey Eagle, wait up.” She reached out and touched his shoulder. “What was that all about? We could’ve gotten that mission out.”
He stopped in his tracks, mouth hanging open. “Please tell me you’re kidding. We nearly crashed. Isn’t that enough for one day?” He shook his head and turned his back, storming off, leaving her to walk the last hundred yards alone. She jutted her jaw, lifted her head, and walked toward the hangar with her back ramrod straight. She moved briskly, but she didn’t rush. She didn’t chase after anyone.
Lions of the Sky Page 13
