“Get that bastard off the cat!” the Air Boss screamed. The Hornet five decks below him waggled its control surfaces forlornly as the pilot cycled the stick again. One aileron refused to move. “We don’t have time to troubleshoot on the cat. Move, people, move!”
The Hornet backed down from the catapult, pivoted, and then taxied aft of the island. Green-shirted avionics technicians swarmed over it as it rolled to a stop, popping panels off of it to find the cause of the stuck aileron. Another Hornet rolled smartly up to the catapult. Within moments, it was airborne. The JBDs, or jet blast deflectors, dropped down, and the next waiting fighter rolled forward.
“Goddamn Hornet,” the Air Boss snarled. The Mini Boss carefully stifled his agreement. It was the first time he’d ever heard the Air Boss admit that the Hornet was anything other than the most superb fighter ever built. “What was our time on the alert fifteens?”
“Five minutes. Not too shabby,” the Mini Boss replied.
“Not too hot, either, with a strike inbound. I sure hope to hell Tombstone knows what he’s doing.” The Air Boss glanced at the relative wind indicator, watching it quiver. “Tell the OOD I want another five knots of wind. We need another three Vikings airborne. If the admiral’s right, we’re going to have some submarines making themselves conspicuous right quick. Hunter 701 has contact on one of them, but those slimy little bastards could have a couple more in the area.”
The Mini Boss toggled the bitch box and relayed the message to the Officer of the Deck. With enemy fighters inbound and the threat of submarine-launched missiles, there were a hell of a lot of things he’d like more than Vikings. The Aegis snugged in closer for instance, or more aircraft in the pattern. And maybe, just maybe, a little luck wouldn’t hurt.
“Rabies! Get us the hell out of here!” the TACCO said urgently.
“One more shot,” Rabies snapped.
“If we’re going to get back, we have to leave now,” his copilot argued.
“If we leave now, we may not have anywhere to go back to! You think that sub’s just here for the fun of it? Don’t you know what overwhelming force is all about? Those fighters are there for a reason, to distract us while this bastard takes his next shot!”
“MAD, MAD, MAD,” the TACCO sang out suddenly. “That’s it, Rabies! Attack criteria.”
The torpedo was off the wing an instant later. Rabies fought the sudden change in weight, as the strong winds caught the now asymmetrically loaded Viking. He quickly retrimmed the sturdy jet, reestablished level flight, and circled to watch the results.
The top of the sail was already visible, a darker shape and peculiarly stable against the churning water. Half of the sail had already slid back, exposing the starkly gleaming launcher. A missile was already on the rails. Rabies squinted. No sign of the torpedo or its telltale wake.
“She’s active-acquired!” the AW shouted. “Homing-homing-YES!”
Three short cheers echoed on the ICS, drowned out immediately by the coldly professional recitation of the AW.
“Explosion-secondaries. Wait one-flow tones. Okay, that’s it. She’s breaking up.”
Adrenaline surged through the pilot, making him almost giddy. For the moment, he forgot about the eighty men below him, struggling against a torrent of invading seawater, dying quickly in an explosion if lucky, drowning slowly if they were not. Later, he knew, it would hit him, but for the moment the sheer joy of the kill sang in his blood.
CHAPTER 26
“Tallyho,” Bird Dog heard Batman call out, confirming contact on the enemy aircraft. “Low and fast, probably counting on coming right out of the sun low on the horizon.”
“You got them yet, Gator?” Bird Dog asked.
“Not yet. But I’ll take those JAST avionics on our lead anytime, if he’s seeing them from this range!”
“Batman’s supposed to be as sharp as his bird. Not often we get to fly wing on a full captain. Let’s just see if he’s still got it, after pushing a desk in the Pentagon!”
The loose, orderly formation of Tomcats scattered. Bird Dog broke right, following Batman to intercept the northernmost cell of enemy fighters. The JAST bird was armed with four Sidewinders and two Sparrows, the weapons load tailored to the lead’s preference for close-in kills. Five hundred feet above and behind his lead, Bird Dog’s Tomcat carried the heavier and longer-range Phoenixes, as well as an array of shorter-range missiles.
“Bogey to the north, Bird Dog,” Gator said. “No, wait! I lost him! This little bastard pops in and out on my screen like a-hey, wait a minute! You think this has anything to do with those ghosts we’ve been seeing?”
“Do I give a shit? Get me a goddamn target! You can’t hold that one, pick another!”
“Getting contacts from the JAST bird now,” Gator muttered as the targeting pip appeared on his HUD. “Damned tough to hold, though.”
“Take a shot, Bird Dog,” Batman ordered over the circuit.
“Fox one!” Bird Dog thumbed the switch and felt the aircraft jolt up as the massive missile shot off the rails. Even if it missed, it lightened the Tomcat, extending his time on station by decreasing his fuel consumption. He held the Tomcat straight on in level flight, feeding targeting information to the missile.
“Closure rate, one thousand knots,” his RIO said. Already, Gator had ceased to exist as a separate presence, becoming instead a part of Bird Dog and his aircraft, a voice feeding him information.
Aside from situations allowing the use of long-range missiles such as the Phoenix, aerial combat was a battle for position and altitude. Aircraft danced through the air, darting around each other and maneuvering for position. Above and behind — the ultimate goal for position on an enemy.
Bird Dog nosed the F14 up, sacrificing a little airspeed for altitude. With the enemy strike force approaching, he had little time to spare. Altitude was something you could never have too much of.
“Missile inbound,” the officer in the backseat howled. “Phoenix!”
“I’ve got it,” Mein Low swore. He cut the aircraft into a sharp turn, heading nose-on to the missile to reduce their radar cross section. The F10’s avionics examined the radar signal and radiated countermeasures intended to defeat detection and targeting.
Mein Low scanned the sky, knowing the missile was too far away to see but trying anyway. Over his tactical circuit, he could hear aircraft in the strike calling out targets, dividing up the launching American fighters between themselves.
No matter. He was flight leader, and the first aircraft they saw would be his — As well as the first kill.
The long-range Phoenix missiles were not the ones that worried him most. They required guidance from the AWG-9 Tomcat radar for most of their flight, switching to individual guidance only as they neared their targets. Intelligence had told him that they often suffered fusing problems, failing to ignite, and that none had ever been used successfully in engagements. It was not enough to make him overconfident, though. Even a Phoenix that failed to detonate could do a massive amount of damage if it struck his aircraft.
The weakness in the system was the AWG-9 radar, and the need for the Tomcat to maintain a radar lock on him.
“Chaff,” he ordered, and felt the gentle thumps of the canisters of highly reflective metal strips being ejected from the aircraft. With any luck, that would confuse the radar picture, and perhaps mislead the Tomcat into keeping the missile locked on the chaff rather than his aircraft.