“Yes sir,” O’Hare replied. Rodriguez couldn’t help noting the pilot was biting her lip now…
“Jeez, you scared me man,” Perri said, turning to see 15-year-old Dave Iworrigan looking at him with wide eyes from under a mop of unwashed black hair, his little fat cheeks red with either cold, or excitement. “What are you doing up here?”
The other boy looked embarrassed, and shrugged, “I hang out up here a lot,” he said, pointing into the storeroom out back where there was an old sofa and a table. “For the peace and quiet, you know?” Perri knew. Dave came from a big family, who were legendary in Gambell for their all-out brawls. Dave’s brothers were as peaceful as lambs toward strangers, but brutal toward each other. As the youngest, Dave had apparently decided flight was a better survival strategy than fight. He looked out the broken windows of the gas station again. “Sound of the choppers woke me up. I saw you run for it, then total your ATV and dive into the bay.”
Perri looked past him into the dark storeroom, “You got a sleeping bag back there?”
“Not there, someone would find it,” the boy said. “I’ve got it stashed.”
“I’m freezing here Dave,” Perri said impatiently.
Dave looked at him as though deciding whether to let Perri in on his secret, and then sighed, “OK, follow me.”
They went outside to a hatch in the dirt. It had an old padlock on it and Dave pulled out a key and undid the lock, putting it in his pocket.
“Welcome to my crib,” he smiled, pulling up the hatch.
Perri saw a ladder going down a narrow shaft and a weak light below, and looked at Dave doubtfully.
It smelled and it was dark.
“Go on, it’s bigger at the bottom,” he said.
It wasn’t like he had much choice. He’d die of hypothermia if he didn’t get warm, and soon. He went down the ladder, his eyes adjusting to the weak light, and at the bottom found himself inside what must have been an old gasoline tank. It was about the size of a small fishing hut, and Dave had moved in a mattress, some small boxes for furniture and storage, a folding chair and some bedding. Perri sniffed; it stunk of teenage boy, but not the gasoline smell Perri expected. The light was coming from a construction light hooked up to a car battery, sitting beside some solar cells and a cable which Dave obviously used to keep it charged. A 20-gallon plastic bladder of water sat beside them.
“I figure it’s like twenty years since there was gasoline in here,” Dave said. “Don’t worry. I dropped a burning rag in here just in case there was fumes or something, but it didn’t even get a flash. It’s just a bit rusty is all.”
Perri walked over and grabbed the sleeping bag on top of the mattress.
“Oh man, you’ll get it wet,” Dave said, but he helped Perri unzip it, took his wet sealskin blanket and wrapped the bag around him. He sat Perri down in the chair.
“What else you got in the boxes there?” Perri asked when he finally stopped shaking.
“Got a gas stove, some packet soups, instant oats, that kind of thing,” the other boy said. “I was about to make some breakfast when those choppers rolled in.”
“Got your phone?”
“Yeah, but…”
“Got a gun?” Perri asked.
“Of course I’ve got a gun,” Dave answered, pointing at a long fish packing case, like it was the dumbest question in the world.
“Ammo?”
“Yeah. Couple boxes I guess.”
“What caliber?”
“Got some .300 for this rifle, some 30 oh six for my other rifle. Why?”
Perri pulled the sleeping bag tighter around himself, and then heard the unmistakable sound of a sonic boom, coming from the direction of the village. He pointed up toward the rolling thunder. “Because I think we’re at war, is why.”
“Air to air missile launch!” Bunny said as her Fantom swung around to start its second approach and was immediately picked up on radar by the approaching Mig-41 flight. “Jamming active. Countermeasures deploying.” She was talking to herself as much as to the people in the room with her. She turned her helmet to look at data on a virtual screen on her right, then back to the heads-up display for the Fantom. “K-77s. Four. We’re dead.”
She pointed up at the missile tracks, spearing in from the Russian fighter icons, spread in a fan with Bunny’s Fantom at its point. “Question is only whether we can uplink the recon data before they splash us.”
The K-77M was a new short-range phased-array, all-aspect missile that used both infrared, optical and radar guidance to home on its target. Rodriguez knew the best way, maybe the only way to survive a volley of K-77Ms at this range was to kill the fighters shooting them before they could even fire. And it was too late for that.
With nothing to lose, O’Hare pushed the Fantom higher to get the best possible imagery. They all watched the video feed intently as the town sped toward them, seeing choppers lifting off, men scurrying about and light transport vehicles lined up along the side of the runway like the Russians were holding a Gaz Tigr-M truck fire-sale.
Hammering through Mach 1.6 the Fantom flew over the top of the town just as the tracks of the incoming K-77M missiles on the tactical screen crossed its flight path. The video feed went dead. “NCTAMS to ANR, we are out of the fight,” Bunny told her NORAD controller. “Tell me you got that feed!”
“NCTAMS-A4, I confirm recon data package received. You are clear to return to base with your remaining birds. Nice job NCTAMS, ANR out.”
Rodriguez started as Bunny punched the desk next to her joystick, “ANR, those bloody Russians just shot down two of my Fantoms. I have mapped a Verba missile crew in at least one position on that isthmus and the electronic signature is telling me it is networked, not just some random guy with a missile launcher on his shoulder. My two remaining birds are carrying both Cudas and long range anti-surface ordnance. I am in a position to engage both Russian air and ground defenses. In accordance with standard rules of engagement I request permission to engage hostile enemy air defense assets!”
There was a tense moment of silence. Halifax stepped forward and put his hand on Bunny’s shoulder, just as the radio crackled to life again. “Negative NCTAMS, you are not to engage. You will return to base and await further tasking.”
O’Hare pushed her keyboard away from her. “Roger ANR, NCTAMS out.” Then she lifted Halifax’s hand off her shoulder without taking her eyes from the vision and data from her remaining drones, “Permission to indulge in profanity Sir?” she asked.
“Patience O’Hare,” Halifax said. “Russians keep this up, payback will come.”
“Not soon enough Sir,” Bunny replied. The only good news was that the Mig flight had been drawn to the recon drone, allowing the other two drones to escape without detection. Even as she checked on the status of her returning Fantoms and keyed in the dogleg return journey, Bunny was rewinding the vision her machines took over both Savoonga and Gambell and getting her AI to quantify the visual and signals intelligence it had gathered.
For the first time in an hour, she pushed back from her desk, pulled off her helmet, blew her spiky fringe from her eyes and took a long pull on the warm soda that had been sitting at her elbow since the catapult had fired her first drone through the chute.
She looked at the data from her overflights as it flowed across multiple screens. “So tell me, sirs and ma’ams,” she asked, staring up at the numbers. “If you were reacting to an unexpected maritime emergency in foreign waters, even one involving a nuclear sub, is it likely you would be able to pull together at least 23 Mi-26 choppers, an A-50 airborne control aircraft, a squadron or two of front-line Su-57s and Mig-41s armed with the nastiest air to air missiles in the Russian arsenal, plus at least two battalions of special forces troops supported by fully networked Verba ground to air missile systems?” She spun her chair around and looked at them both, “Because personally, I don’t think it’s very likely at all. I think it’s more likely Russia has just invaded your US of A.”