“You didn’t lose me,” Furness replied. “You won’t lose me unless you’re stupid enough to let me go.”
He smiled, then held her face in his hands. “No chance of that,” he told her, punctuating his promise with another kiss.
They went over to inspect the capsule. “The missiles blew out the right flotation bag,” Furness said, “but we stayed afloat pretty well even though we were low in the water. Everything worked — radios, survival kit, flares.” She held up a helmet bag and added, “Two bottles of Chivas Regal — that’s all I could scrounge off the Turkish Navy. For your survival specialists and airframe maintenance crews.”
“I’ve got them too busy to drink it right now,” Mace said, “but they’ll appreciate the thought. Never hurts to suck up to the survival-gear gods. Where’s Mark? Is he okay?”
“He’s fine,” Furness replied. “He aggravated his back injury in the ejection, and the medics found blood in his stool, so he’s being taken to Incirlik for tests. He did real good out there — he’s turned into a real crewdog after all.”
“That’s good,” Mace said. He held her tightly, then said, “I’m damned sorry about Norton and Aldridge.”
“They didn’t find them?”
Mace shook his head. “The Russians recovered them and what’s left of the plane. They said they’ll release the bodies after the fighting stops. Sorry, Rebecca. Norton was a real fighter. She could have wimped out like Ted Little, but she didn’t.” He hesitated again, then said, “You and Mark did good, Rebecca. The whole squadron did good. Two destroyers, a frigate, and a guided missile cruiser — you and Fogelman got two out of the four. The Ukrainians got the Russian AWACS and the Novorossiysk aircraft carrier.”
“I remember the excited looks of the crews when they got back from a successful mission over Iraq during the war,” Rebecca said. “Funny — I don’t feel like that at all. I mean, I’m glad we flew the mission, and that we hit back, but I don’t feel like anything was accomplished.”
“You heard about Golcuk and Istanbul International?” he asked, referring to the low-yield nuclear attack by the Russians.
“Yes,” Rebecca replied. “It’s incredible. Were there very many casualties?”
“About two thousand so far,” Mace said. “The radiation hasn’t run its course yet — they may get several thousand more.”
“My God. What are we going to do here?”
“I think we’re going to find out,” Mace said. “Colonel Lafferty wants to see us immediately. Mass briefing in about fifteen minutes.”
The squadron meeting was being held in a briefing room in one of the underground hangar complexes. As Mace and Furness headed for the briefing, Mace suddenly stopped, went down another corridor, stopped at a door marked INFIRMARY, and said, “We’d better stop in here first.”
“Who got hurt? I thought everyone made it back okay?” In a room by herself, they found First Lieutenant Lynn Ogden, wearing a paper gown, lying on a bed on top of the sheets, curled up into a fetal position and sobbing uncontrollably. “Lynn?”
When Ogden saw Furness, she gave a loud cry, then reached for her with trembling hands. Furness held her tightly. “What’s the matter, Lynn? Are you hurt? Where’s Clark? Are you guys okay?” Lynn did not reply, only cried harder. After holding each other for a moment, Lynn suddenly seemed to just melt away from Rebecca, and Daren had to help guide her limp body back onto the table. “Lynn, what’s the matter with you? What happened? I thought you made it back okay. Lynn, stop it, you’re scaring me.”
“She’s can’t hear you, Rebecca,” Mace said. “She’s been like that ever since the raid. She and Vest hit a frigate with two HARMS and sent the sucker right down to the bottom — no survivors. She was morose after hitting the ship, but when she found out she sunk it, she went schizo. They’ll take her to Incirlik for evaluation — probably airevac her out to Germany if it’s safe to fly. Her family is flying out to Germany.”
“She’s not sick? No injuries? Did they take skull X-rays or anything?”
“I’ve seen this before, Rebecca,” Mace said as a nurse guided them out of the room — they could still hear her sobbing even after leaving the room. “Call it shell shock, or posttraumatic-shock syndrome, or battle fatigue — she’s so traumatized by the mission that she can’t control her emotions. She’s aware of everything and everyone around her, but they can’t make her stop.”
“Shouldn’t they sedate her or something?”
“They did. That’s her after the sedative wore off.”
As they exited the infirmary, they ran directly into Colonel Pavlo Tychina, the wing commander of the Ukrainian Air Force contingent. “Ah … Major Rebecca Furness. I am very glad to see you.” He shook both their hands and gave her a hug, pressing his gauze-covered cheek to hers instead of kissing. He still wore the white sterile-gauze mask everywhere — he refused to be seen without it. “I have heard of your fellow crewmember, Lieutenant Ogden. I am most sorry. I hope she will be fine.”
“Dyakoyo. Thank you,” Rebecca said, using one of the few bits of Ukrainian she had learned after the short time spent with the Ukrainian aircrews. Despite his horrible visage, she had found Tychina to be a very likable man, animated yet very by-the-book with his men, formal with the Turks, and polite, almost effusive, with the Americans. He was always working and always the commander, although he seemed at least ten years too young for the job. Of course, with the mask on, it was hard to tell if Tychina was thirty or sixty. His nickname “Voskresensky,” “Phoenix” in English, was well known throughout the joint air forces, and his heroic story was also well known, as was his sad story about his fiancée’s death from neutron radiation. “I think she’ll be all right.”
“Of course,” Tychina said solemnly. “Your crew very brave. You are brave … and pretty.” They walked together until reaching the main briefing room.
As was their custom, the Turkish aircrews were standing in the back of the room and along the walls. They all looked on with undisguised disgust as Furness entered the briefing room. A Turkish F-16 pilot curled his arms up along his chest, put his fist up to his mouth as if he were sucking his thumb, and whimpered like a dog. The Ukrainians reacted just the opposite — they got to their feet, applauding and cheering, and they slapped her on the back and the butt as if she were a man as she made her way to the front of the conference room and greeted Lafferty, Hembree, and the other American crewmembers. “Welcome back, Rebecca,” Lafferty said, putting his arm around her. “Sorry you lost your plane, but you did a terrific job.”
“Thank you, sir. Lieutenant Fogelman sends his regards.”
“He called from Incirlik,” Hembree says. “He’s ready to come back already. The docs don’t know yet.”
“He did really well out there last night, sir,” Furness told Lafferty. “I’ll fly with him anytime. I’m sorry about Paula and Curt, sir. Lynn too.”
“Me too. Their loss is hard on everyone here. Losses always hit small units the hardest. We just need to pull together.”
“So what’s going on?” Mace asked.
“We’re getting a briefing by some NATO and Central Command brass,” Lafferty said. “They should be here any minute. You know about the Russian attacks in Turkey, right, Rebecca?” She nodded. “I think the White House is finally going to get into gear. I don’t know what role we can play, but something’s happening.”
As if on cue, the room was called to attention, and three officers entered, followed by several Turkish staff members. The American officers snapped to attention …