“Roll a little more! He’s right under us,” JT’s voice prodded.
She pushed the stick further to the left and scanned the airspace beneath her frantically, seeing nothing but ocean blue. But then, across the circle she spotted a Shrike arcing along the horizon below and in the opposite direction, about a mile away. “Got it!” she yelled. She pulled hard again, reefing her nose down and around to bear against the Shrike as quickly as possible. She clicked her weapons selector to AMRAAM as her radar scanned at the top of its range. Once more, under the strain of high G, her peripheral vision began to gray out. The longer and harder she pulled, the more the gray obscured her vision until she was looking through what felt like a soda straw, able to see nothing but the Shrike in an otherwise completely blank field of vision. She was about 90 degrees out in a hard descending turn. Close now. The gray brought a static with it which messed with her hearing. She could hear JT yelling something, probably encouragement. Five more seconds and she could take the shot and ease the G.
The Shrike pilot looked over his shoulder and spotted the developing situation. Both Rhinos were converging on him simultaneously. He’d seen this before. In the interest of safety he would quit. Give up and start over. They were both so close to getting a shot on him they were each staring through their HUDs at him alone, fixated and unaware of the other plane doing the same. He snapped his wings level and transmitted, “Knock it off! Simo run. Abort, abort.”
He saw Skids roll his wings level immediately, but the other Rhino continued the hard G pull, swooping down from above, completely unaware of the jet just below.
Dusty saw the Shrike level his wings through the small tunnel of vision remaining. She eased her G to match his wings and at that moment her radar locked the Shrike. She thumbed her radio switch, blanking out all radio inputs into her headset while she triumphantly transmitted her shot, “Fox-3!” She kept her thumb pressing the mic switch for the whole two seconds of simulated missile time-of-flight before calling the kill. “Kill the lead Shrike.”
As she released the mic switch, her ears were blasted with simultaneous calls over the radio and the intercom. JT was screaming, “…right below us! Pull! Pull!”
And the Shrike was yelling, “Simo run! Abort, abort!”
She reefed back on the stick as hard as she could.
The Shrike pilot couldn’t believe anything solid could transform so quickly. One moment there were two planes flying a thousand feet behind him, the next there was a single massive ball of fire.
“Knock it off!” he transmitted frantically. “Jesus! Banger, Banger, this is Shrike. We’ve got a midair. The Lions…both Lions hit.”
The fireball subsided quickly, leaving a cloud of dirty gray debris flitting earthward like leaves blown from a tree. One of the Rhinos spiraled down from the point of impact, missing huge chunks of wing and vertical stabilizer. And two chutes! Two parachutes bloomed full and floated in gentle contrast to the wreckage tumbling violently toward the ocean below.
“Two chutes! Send SAR to my location. I’ve got two chutes.”
Slammer was sitting in the Ready Room planning the night’s mission when the call came over the ship’s PA system.
“LSOs to the platform. Emergency aircraft at ten miles. This is not a drill.”
He grabbed his white float-coat and dashed through the door as the message was repeated. Where the side passageway converged with the main avenue to the stern he merged in with two other LSOs sprinting and hurdling the knee knockers on their way aft. The foot traffic in the crowded passageway pressed themselves against the bulkheads, making a hole for the three LSOs. Together they exited the hatch under the platform and scrambled up a ladder, eyes to the sky as the technician readied their equipment. He picked up a handset and scanned the horizon behind the ship as he keyed the mic. “Boss, Paddles ready. What do we know?”
From the tower in the island overlooking the landing area, the Air Boss answered over the radio, “Paddles, you have a Lion Rhino. No comm. There’s a Shrike escort reporting severe damage to the starboard wing and vertical stab. The arresting gear is rigged for Rhino. Seems like they are slowed to twenty knots above normal approach. We can handle that speed no problem. Gear down, hook down, stabilized on centerline, the deck is yours.”
Shit. No comm meant no sugar calls. And he didn’t know exactly how bad the damage was. Single engine? Would the Rhino be able to wave-off if the approach got out of safe parameters? Were the pilot or the WSO injured?
“Paddles copies.” He tightened his grip on the Pickle Switch. “Shrike, you up?”
“Shrike’s up, Paddles. We’re at four miles. Lion’s canopy is pretty badly shattered on the back side. Looks like the WSO is out cold. Can’t tell you more than that. Pilot is working hard to keep the plane stable. Looks like one-hundred fifty-five knots for approach speed is the best she’s going to get. Any slower and it starts rolling to the right. Right engine is trailing some smoke, and farts sparks every couple minutes. Other than that, gear down, hook down, stable.”
“Copy all. Thanks. How’s your gas?”
“Shrike’s at five point five.”
“Paddles copies.” He turned to the other two LSOs. “No time to rig the barricade for the Rhino. Even if we did, the Shrike would run out of fuel before we stowed it again. Should we bring her aboard, or have them eject alongside the ship?”
One vocalized what Slammer himself was thinking. “The WSO’s slumped over. If they punch out with him out of position like that, he’s going to break his neck.”
He nodded, not saying what they were all thinking—that it wouldn’t matter if he was already dead. “Okay, you guys back me up on lineup. That plane’s gonna want to drift right, especially in close. Any sign it’s heading for the island or the people on the deck, wave it off quick.” They nodded and he glanced over to the deck on the right side of the landing area. Hundreds of people were gathered to watch the landing. Fire fighters stood at the ready perched on their truck, their silvery helmets pulled down into position, gloved hands poised on hose handles. At least twenty planes were parked on that side in the shadow of the island superstructure.
He turned back to the planes on approach behind the ship. They were at two miles now. The approach controller kept a steady rhythm on the tower frequency. “On glide-slope. On centerline.” He took a deep breath and focused on them. A minute later the controller handed the planes off to the LSOs. “Approaching three quarters of a mile. On and on, call the ball.”
The Shrike broke away to the left, leaving the Rhino to fly the rest of the way on its own.
“You’re looking good Rhino,” he called over the radio. “On and on.” Maybe they could hear him even if they couldn’t transmit. He continued in as soothing a voice as he could muster, “Don’t climb now. Keep it coming. Steady. Now power back on.” He kept up the patter for the next fifteen seconds until the plane crossed the threshold. “Okay, you’ve got it now. Stay on centerline.”
The hook settled just before the 1-wire as the jet hit the deck with a thunderous smash. The right landing gear collapsed immediately, dragging the wreckage toward the planes and people. But the hook held steady, slowing the plane to a stop as it slid toward the right side, stopping just short of impact with the parked jets. The engine howled like a wounded beast as the Rhino lay on one side, shedding bits of itself into the hot exhaust.
Finally the pilot shut the engine down, leaving only the sound of the blowing wind and the blood banging in Slammer’s ears. Crap, that was close. The three LSOs joined the crowd sprinting toward the badly damaged jet.
He reached the stricken Rhino as the firefighters were carefully removing Tiny from the back seat and strapping him to a spine-board. He looked at Skids, who was standing on his own ejection seat through the remains of his shattered canopy anxiously watching his limp WSO being carried off. The pilot appeared shaken but otherwise unhurt.
“You okay?” Slammer asked.
Skids met his gaze and nodde
d. “Anything?”
He shook his head. “Haven’t heard. What are the chances?”
Skids shrugged. “I thought I saw a chute. Maybe two. But I was fighting to keep this thing flying.” The firefighters helped Skids pick his way from the cockpit to the deck where he was whisked away by a small throng for a full medical and debriefing.
The emergency crews quickly cleared and cleaned the landing area. By the time he watched the Shrike land safely and shut down, the sound of approaching helicopter rotors hammering the air was clear to everyone on deck.
He stood at the edge of the crowd that formed a large circle for the helo to land in. Sensing someone at his side, he glanced down to see Quick looking back up at him, eyes wide. He couldn’t think of anything helpful to say.
The helo flew in from the port side, hovered for a moment, and then collapsed onto the deck as if from exhaustion. A team of corpsmen rushed forward as the door slid open. They gingerly removed a stretcher on which a flight-suited body laid inert. Once free of the bird, they sped away toward the elevator below as a second group, only a pair of corpsmen this time, replaced them at the open door. While the rotors continued to beat overhead, the two corpsmen carefully retrieved a coal black body bag. It bent awkwardly between them as they wrestled it from the innards of the helicopter as gracefully as they could. Slammer felt Quick stiffen at his side and his stomach dropped. He took a step forward to chase after the receding corpsmen but as the helo added power to lift off, the rotor blast pushed at him and held him back.
He looked at Quick again. She was following the helicopter, her face pale and her eyes shiny. Their eyes met and she shook her head in dismay, then turned and disappeared into the dispersing crowd and maze of jets.
Chapter 4
03 August
USS Bush (CVN-77)
Quick, like all the others, stood at parade rest, her feet shoulder-width apart, her hands clasped together at the small of her back. She was still in some form of shock. Her mind couldn’t quite grasp, couldn’t quite accept what had happened. It was so final. So absolute. So dead.
The flight deck was preternaturally calm as the carrier drifted with the wind. The planes, which were normally parked overnight in the landing area, were crammed to the bow or stern leaving a large open space now filled with rows and rows of officers and sailors in their Service Dress Whites. They stood in ranks composed of their squadrons and work spaces, organized and uniform, sharply dressed with all of their medals and ribbons adorning their chests. Thousands of them.
At the front was a dais flanked by a color guard of four flag bearers standing stiffly, one hand on their flag pole and the other behind their backs. Opposite the color guard on the other side of the dais was a formation of seven Marines outfitted in their dress blues, each carrying a rifle resting formally on his right shoulder. Beyond them was a bugler, also at parade rest, his hands folded under the brass of the bugle that he cradled like an infant.
She watched the chaplain walk slowly to the microphone. Her first thought was that his hat looked so out of place up here on the flight deck, a place where hats were normally forbidden because they would get sucked into a jet intake. But then she realized they were all wearing hats. Of course.
The chaplain gave an invocation that she heard but didn’t hear. Ragged bits stuck occasionally, something about a plan and a better place. Then her CO, Clam, walked to the dais and spoke briefly. Again her brain wandered, refusing to allow the words to penetrate her haze. All she held on to were “service” and “brothers and sisters of the Fighting Blacklions.”
Clam stepped back and took his place next to the chaplain, both facing the honor guard who snapped crisply to attention as one. The thousands of attendees matched them, all standing at attention now. She heard the leader of the color guard bark out commands and the Marines raised their rifles to their shoulders, pointing them starboard toward the sea. They fired together three times, pausing for a breath between each, and her muscles jerked reflexively with each volley.
She didn’t think she could absorb any more sadness until the mournful strains of Taps spread across the deck. The most melancholy twenty-four notes she had ever heard, each a barb tugging at her soul. Her eyes stung and she blinked a dozen times, trying to keep the tears from taking over. She was afraid if she felt one trickle across a cheek she would heave with deep, uncontrolled sobs. She clamped the lid down tightly on the welling heartache, but as the last soft strains of the bugle drifted away with the breeze, a flight of four Hornets approached from the bow toward the stern in echelon formation a couple hundred feet off the water. As they reached amidships the second plane pulled straight up, lighting its afterburners and rocketing into the clear blue sky.
She felt the hot tears now, rolling freely down her face in torrents as she watched the remnants of the Missing Man formation fly away with a solemnly conspicuous hole in the middle. She felt it, she felt the hole. A violently rent jagged tear with a million implications.
As the noise of the jets faded the crowd broke formation, shuffling about aimlessly. The ceremony was completed, but it felt wrong to rush away and so she stood by herself in the middle, more by herself than ever before, as squadron mates drifted around her chatting in low voices. She quickly wiped away her tears and looking up she saw Slammer standing, facing her from a few feet away. He was studying her, taking inventory, always evaluating. His face was taut as if he didn’t at all like what he saw. She turned and walked away, falling in with the slow procession making its way below decks. She couldn’t wait to get out of those damn whites and sit by herself. But there were some unpleasant things to attend to before she could escape into solitude.
Quick had scrubbed her face till it was stinging and pink and changed into her flight suit. Now she stood staring at herself in the mirror over the sink in her room. There were dark circles in the corners of her eyes. Her mouth was a tight line across her pale face. Her blond hair was drawn back into a severe bun, pulling away any softness from her features. She looked about the same way she felt, she thought. Like a big bag of useless shit.
Reluctantly she left the refuge of her own quarters and made her way to Dusty’s room, where someone had thoughtfully left a couple of empty boxes. The bed was still made, taut and formal like a drum skin. She opened the desk and gathered a few of Dusty’s personal items, then placed them into one of the boxes. There wasn’t much really, just a few trinkets and some jewelry. A man’s watch that looked old, but not expensive. Some loose change and a gold chain necklace with a horseshoe charm. And a couple of paperback novels. As she lifted one of the books, a photo slipped from the pages onto the desk. She picked it up and saw a little girl with intense eyes astride a horse. A ten-year-old Dusty sitting happily on a saddle while a woman stood next to her, smiling broadly, her hand resting on Dusty’s leg. Mother and daughter. She couldn’t remember Dusty ever talking about her family. Or ever smiling so freely. She tucked the photo in a pocket of her flight suit and continued packing all of Alexandra “Dusty” Rhodes’ possessions for transport.
An hour later and many levels lower in the bowels of the ship, Quick opened a door marked with a Red Cross. As she entered, Clam and Slammer stepped out from behind a drab green curtain partitioning a bed from the main space. She stopped, uncomfortable.
Clam’s face betrayed nothing. “It’s okay. We’re done. You can go in.” Then he and Slammer left, Slammer barely nodding as he passed.
She knocked on the metal bulkhead outside of the curtain and heard a weak voice tell her to come in. She ducked inside, letting the curtain fall closed behind her.
“You up for a visitor?”
Dusty looked up from the bed, small and pale. “Yeah, sure,” she said. Her face was badly bruised and one eye was swollen shut. The other was a spooky bright crimson where the white should have been.
Quick must have been staring because Dusty moved a hand to her open eye. “It’s from the ejection. Burst all the blood vessels in my eyes. I can barely se
e right now.” Dusty let the hand fall next to the other, which was in a cast up to her shoulder. Dusty glanced down. “Arm broken in three places.” Then she leaned forward and rapped on her leg through the thin hospital blanket. “And my left leg in two. Always overachieving,” she said with a humorless shrug. “The good news is I’m so doped up right now I can’t feel any pain.”
Quick pulled up a chair and Dusty narrowed her open eye. “Go ahead. You must be dying to say ‘I told you so’.”
“No.” She shook her head, unable to muster more. She fumbled in her pocket and pulled out the photo, handing it over.
Dusty thumbed the corner, flicking it a few times while she studied the image. “I don’t even know who these people are anymore,” she said softly.
Then, catching herself, she placed the photo on the bedside stand face down and returned her right hand to her left. Her fingers fidgeted and worried with something tucked into the palm of the cast. “Well, you don’t have to worry about me anymore.”
“So…”
“Yes. It’s over. They’re getting me off in Singapore. I’m done.”
Quick shifted nervously in her chair, like a child who knows she must tell a secret but doesn’t want to. “Me too,” she said, barely a whisper. “I’m done too. I’ve been faking it this whole time. I’m just a pilot I guess, not a fighter pilot. Just a chicken shit fake getting in the way.”
Dusty’s hand shot out and grabbed hers, squeezing till it nearly hurt. “I killed him.” Dusty turned her face away as her body shook with silent sobs. “I never had anyone stand by me. Ever. Ever. And I killed him.” She slowly pulled out a red bandana tucked between her palm and the cast and used it to blot the tears leaking down her face.
Quick stood. “I need to pack.” If Dusty’s experience had nailed one thing home, it was that she didn’t want to be responsible for doing this to someone else. You needed to be great to do this job. And she was not.
Lions of the Sky Page 24
