“He’s pretty beat up, but he’s awake and doing okay,” she replied. “I tried to find Ted, but they say he was released.”
“They let him go home for a couple of days. I guess he got creamed harder than they thought. Some mucky-muck movie guy from New York City came and picked him up in a limo.”
“Stand by for a real shocker,” Furness said. “Fogman wants his pubs. Anyone know where they stashed his books?”
“Fogman wants his tech orders?” Frank Kelly asked in astonishment. “For what — to prop up a nurse’s ass before he screws her?”
“He says he wants to study,” Furness replied, giving Kelly a disapproving glare, “and he even asked for a briefer to get him up to speed.”
“That knock on the head must’ve shaken some cobwebs loose.” Kelly chuckled.
“Hey, the guy’s on the case. Give him a break,” Tobias interjected. Rebecca realized a fellow navigator was actually defending Mark Fogelman. The war, the DEFCON change, and the nuclear-alert generation was pulling this unit together very quickly.
Properly admonished by his WSO, Kelly showed Furness where Fogelman’s pubs bag was. It was in the squadron commander’s office, marked with pieces of yellow tape to signify that they had been inspected by the accident investigation board and were cleared to be returned. A check to be sure that each crewmember’s required onboard publications were up to date was routine in investigations such as this — although they did pubs checks often, Furness would be surprised if Fogelman’s regs were completely up to date. After retrieving the bag, Furness went out to check her scheduled show time to start generating her alert line.
Rebecca had been assigned one of the last alert lines in the follow-on Charlie force, sortie 39. Because Ted Little was on convalescent leave from his minor injuries during the near-collision with the F-16 fighters, Furness was scheduled as the weapons officer, not as a pilot, and paired up with Paula Norton. The sortie was scheduled to come up at ten A.M. the next morning, but a note pinned to the bulletin board advised all crews to be ready to report in two hours early and to show one hour earlier than posted because Maintenance was getting the bombers ready faster as the generation progressed.
Staying at the alert facility was going to be impossible. Every crewmember assigned to Plattsburgh Air Force Base was there, either generating a sortie or already on alert, and they were already three to a room and breaking out the cots to put crews in the hallways. They had packed up her bags and moved her out of her room in the facility anyway — Rebecca noticed the yellow inspection stickers on all her bags, which meant that members of the accident investigation board had checked all her belongings, looking for any evidence of misconduct or inappropriate behavior that might have a bearing on the accident — prescription or controlled drugs, alcohol, a “Dear John” letter, anything.
There was a small bed-and-breakfast hotel downtown near the lake where Rebecca liked to put guests when they came to town to visit, so she checked in herself for the night, then walked the ten blocks or so over to Afterburners, the Plattsburgh aircrews’ customary hangout downtown, for a sandwich.
The place was absolutely deserted.
“Hey, Brandon,” Rebecca greeted the bar’s owner, a huge, bearlike ex-biker type with a full beard and who wore sunglasses twenty-four hours a day. “Can you find me a good table?”
“Hey, pilot, about time someone showed,” Brandon replied, escorting her to the bar and placing a menu in her hand. Rebecca waved off the glass of wine, and the barkeep put a Perrier on ice in front of her instead. Brandon only referred to his patrons as “pilots,” “navs,” “chiefs” for the maintenance guys, “brass” for the commanders, or “legs” for the nonflyers: “You’re the first crewdog I’ve had in here all night. Had to put up with a bunch of legs whining about the Russians and all the noise you’re making out on the airpatch.”
Rebecca looked around the empty bar and asked, “Well, they’re not here anymore, so what’d you tell them?”
“I asked them which sound would they rather hear,” Brandon replied, “the sound of freedom or the sound of Russian bombers screamin’ overhead? I think they got the message — go complain someplace else.”
“Thanks for sticking up for us,” Furness said. She handed the menu back to him. “Burger and fries tonight.”
“Uh oh, sounds like the old man got on your nerves.”
“How in hell do you know that?”
“You only order the gut-bomb and skids when you’re upset at the pencil-pusher,” Brandon replied. “Why don’t you let me take care of the geek for you, honey? The boys need some excitement.” He was referring to his Hell’s Angels buddies that Brandon occasionally rode with — they rarely came to the bar, but when they did they seemed to empty a room real fast. Fortunately they got along well with the military, especially the flyers.
“I can handle him, Brandon,” Rebecca replied, “but thanks. I don’t have many friends who offer to commit mayhem for me.”
“Anytime, pilot.” The big barkeep shuffled off to fire up the grill and deep fryer, leaving Rebecca alone with the big-screen TV in the corner.
The news was switching back and forth from international to national news, and all of it centered on the outbreak of war in Europe. Moldova, Romania, and the Ukraine had been pounded by waves of Russian bombers. Russian President Velichko was shown in the Politburo pounding his fist on the podium, but she couldn’t hear what the voice-over was saying he was ranting about. Thankfully, the use of low-yield nuclear-tipped missiles was not repeated, although the follow-on conventional bombing raids were fierce and probably claimed more lives than the nuclear attacks. For now the attacks were over, but the casualty estimates were astounding — nearly ten thousand dead after the first series of attacks alone. The Ukrainian capital of Kiev had been bombarded and the government had fled, their destination unknown. The Romanian government was dispersed into air raid shelters, even though the capital, Bucharest, was not under attack. Moldova was in the hands of the Russian rebels after the capital of Kishinev was bombarded and the Moldovan and Romanian troops in the western part of the country were pounded by waves of tactical and heavy bombers. Russian military aircraft were patrolling the skies all over the region, enjoying absolute control of the skies.
Now, Russian air bases near the Black Sea, such as Rostov-na-Donu and Krasnodar, were seeing large numbers of smaller jet bombers such as the Sukhoi-24 and -25 and Mikoyan-Gurevich-27 arriving there from interior bases, well within unrefueled striking range of the Ukraine, Moldova, and Romania. The Russian Air Force was encountering little or no resistance. They were taking a breather from the blitzkrieg attack and were now accomplishing a steady generation of tactical forces, preparing for an invasion. Once fully mobilized, she thought, Russia could probably squash Moldova, the Ukraine, and Romania like insects.
Jesus, she thought, if it weren’t right there on the television, she would have sworn the whole thing was like something out of a Dale Brown novel. Maybe — she sighed — that’s where Russia got the idea.
The network news cut away to the local stations. The Burlington TV station aired a teaser about “confusion over the war in Europe” causing an F-111G bomber crash at Plattsburgh Air Force Base. Rebecca noted that there was no mention of the plane being a reconnaissance jet, choosing instead to highlight its bomber role in light of the war in Europe, and she felt sick at the thought of the accident being broadcast to thousands of homes all over the area. Her neighbors, her family, her uncle in Washington would all hear about it soon. Bad enough going through the ordeal without having the whole world know about it.