“Sounds like last-minute invasion briefings to me,” Thorne grinned maliciously. “Why else would they pull such a concentration of top brass together, so close to the front? We need to get some confirmation on this from other sources… if this is legit, we could potentially decapitate the entire OKW in one stroke, and take out friggin’ Reuters and his little bumboys into the bargain!”
“We may be able to find some corroborating evidence in the coded stuff we’ve got, now we know what we’re looking for,” Eileen offered hopefully, handing back Thorne’s reports and beginning to rifle through the papers before her with renewed vigour. “If it is something that big, there must be other reports of it somewhere.” She paused for a moment to consult a large map lying on the table to her left. “Coast is only about fifty kilometres away from the target at its closest point too… only about four minutes flying time, which means they’ll have bugger-all warning of your approach.”
“Not enough to raise an alarm, even if that’d make a difference, which it won’t. September the Eighth…” he thought out loud. “Good time of the month for a night mission: moon’ll be almost bloody full by then… make it a lot easier to get in and out unscathed.”
“Remember what Hal said about ‘Larry’,” Eileen cautioned as a thought suddenly occurred to her. “You have to carry it externally, and that means you’ll be visible on radar! You’ll still have the Flankers to deal with after the attack, and you won’t be able to outrun them…!”
“The carriage and the bomb itself won’t be stealthy, but they’ll be small all the same, and bloody hard to spot on radar if I stay low,” Thorne countered, conceding the point but unwilling to surrender. If I get out of there fast enough, I’ve got a good chance of staying out of their way. We’ve got two AMRAAMs left and a brace of Sidewinders… I’ll have two of each in my internal bays just in case.” He thought more about the details of the mission as he leaned across the table and they checked the map together.
“I can head south west of the British Isles and tank up from the Extender over Ireland — that should keep me well out of their radar range. The Lightning’s combat radius is about 800 klicks on internal fuel,” He continued, picking out points on the map. “If I head south-west and stay under a hundred metres after I’ve cleared the blast area, I’ll come out somewhere around here… near La Rochelle or Bordeaux. I can meet up with the Extender again over the Bay of Biscay, and tank up again for a long detour home, again via the west coast of Ireland. Even with extra tanks, it’s unlikely the Flankers would dare to venture that far west and out of their own radar coverage.”
“You make it sound too simple,” Eileen said softly.
“I know it’s bloody dangerous, but I’d rather hit ‘em this close to the coast than try to fight my way to Berlin and back. With the extra fuel tanks I’d need for that, I’d stand out on radar like dog’s balls, and they’d have plenty of time to find me then.” Something else occurred to him. “We need to recall Kowalski and the rest of the Yanks too: we’ll need to be ready to hightail it in short order, if they decide to get nasty and retaliate rather than stop and think!”
“Does it have to be you?” Eileen asked, concern showing clearly in her eyes.
“Would you prefer I send Jack… or Alec…?” Thorne asked gently, sensing her fear, and also harbouring concerns for his own safety. “There’d be no point trying to send it across on a normal heavy bomber… their radar-equipped night-fighters have been blowing Bomber Command out of the sky before they can even get across the Channel, and those two are the only other men experienced enough to replace me in the Lightning on a ground attack mission.”
“I know,” she conceded finally, laying her hand on his. “I just don’t want anything to happen to you… to any of us… losing Nick was bad enough…”
“This is the best opportunity we’ll get,” Thorne stated with certainty, trying to be bright and positive, and leaning over to nudge against her shoulder with his own. “I’ll be okay, I promise… straight in and straight out again, then back again for tea, okay?”
“Okay,” she nodded, trying to be hopeful as she forced a thin smile and squeezed his hand softly. “How’re you feeling these days, anyway?”
“Haven’t had any drinks, if that’s what you mean,” he answered honestly, with no anger or offence in his tone.
“I didn’t just mean that, although that’s good to hear… that you haven’t needed it.”
“Oh I’ve needed it all right,” he admitted, then shrugged. “I’ve been coping, I guess… but it’s hard to think straight a lot of the time. I know I shouldn’t whinge… every one of us here is dealing with the same shit…”
“No we’re not, Max… not the way you are… and no matter how hard things get for us, we have a fall-back: you…” Eileen pointed out quickly. “You’re only military experience prior to this mission was as a squadron leader in a country that never experienced total war… not in our time, anyway. You’re an excellent commander… you just need time to adapt.”
“I don’t think Reuters will call a ‘time-out’ just ‘cause I can’t cut it,” Thorne grinned ruefully, making a ‘T’ out of his hands in illustration. He paused and took a breath, then added: “Eileen, if I can’t hack it…”
“Don’t even think about finishing that sentence!” She snapped in return, cutting him off sharply as she saw where he was going. “I don’t want the bloody job for a start, and I don’t have a hope of filling your shoes…” she grinned “…I’m only a size seven! Max, you’re an overgrown bairn a lot o’ the time, and you always know exactly what to say to get completely under my skin…” She didn’t need to add that most of the time, she loved every minute of it “…but I also know that the rest of us, officers and men, would go — and have gone — to the end of the bloody Earth for you, and with you. You’re a commander and you’re one of us, and somehow you manage to walk that line on every level despite the ‘Bloody Colonial’ act… or maybe because of it. Now you’re back on track again, you’ll work it out — I’ll make sure of that.”
“I never imagined front line command could be this difficult… despite telling myself as much so many times…”
“It’s not just that… we lost every support link we had in coming back here. They can brief you all you like but it’s not the same, and you’ve had to cope with your first combat command, and losing the hierarchy above you, and had to cope with culture shock and the loss of our world just like the rest of us.” She smiled kindly and ruffled his hair. “Give yourself some credit! These issues aren’t because you’re not up to it — they’ve arisen because what you’ve had to cope with is hard! Considering what you also went through losing Anna, no one’s going to begrudge ye a few chinks in your ‘armour’.”