Which was roughly Cowboy’s judgment as well.
Possibly.
The submarine had been purchased in New Zealand, supposedly by a Japanese businessman who intended on sailing it to Japan. That was a little unusual, given the length of the journey and the fact that he could have easily had another delivered direct from the States. More unusual was the fact that the submarine did not appear to be registered or docked anywhere in Shikoku province, where the businessman allegedly was from.
But the real reason for Danny’s interest was a routine satellite observation photo from a few weeks back that showed the submarine near an island in the area of the Sembuni Reefs offshore of East Malaysia.
The only way to know for certain if the submarine was using the island was to go there. And sooner rather than later. But the Whiplash team was still twelve hours from reaching Malaysia.
That wasn’t a problem, as far as Captain Thomas was concerned.
“We have plenty of people for an assault,” he told Danny after watching Cowboy and Turk tentatively ID’ing the sub. “Let’s get out there.”
“How soon can you be ready?” Danny asked.
“We’re Marines. We’re always ready.” He grinned. “We can take off in an hour. Less if you need us to.”
Danny turned to Turk and Cowboy. “Can you guys fly cover?”
“If they let me near a plane,” said Turk.
“They will,” said Cowboy.
“I’ll talk to Colonel Greenstreet,” said Danny. “Are you guys sure you’re not tired?”
Turk shrugged. Cowboy shook his head. “Like the captain said, I’m a Marine. I don’t get tired.”
“You’re going to fly over that island in broad daylight?” asked Colonel Greenstreet. “If they have antiair there, you’re going to draw all sorts of fire.”
“The satellite images don’t show anything like that,” said Danny. “Even though they’re a couple of days old, I think it’s unlikely they moved anything in.”
“The photos also don’t show your aircraft. Or even that sub,” added Greenstreet.
“True.”
“It’s not the F-35s I’m worried about,” said Greenstreet. “It’s the Ospreys. They’re sitting ducks. You can put an RPG into the side and they’ll go down. What you have to do,” he added, “is have the F-35s take a couple of runs and try and suck out any defenses. Then you have the Ospreys come from this end, where at least they might have a chance if someone tries shooting at them.”
“Agreed,” said Danny.
The island was small — maybe ten acres, half of it covered with trees and thick brush. Shaped like an irregular opal, it had a necklace that sprawled from one side — a jagged reef that poked over the waves at several different points and extended for about a half mile.
The working theory was that the sub recovered the aircraft and returned it there for launching. A small rocket engine was attached to the rear of the aircraft, which was then launched from a small gantry like a guided missile. That meant the base could be small and easily hidden in the jungle. Whiplash analysts put the probability of the base being there at only seventy-five percent.
How exactly they came up with the percentage hadn’t been revealed.
“So you land here and here,” said Greenstreet, pointing at the sides of the island opposite the treed area. “You may need support fire on that tree line.”
“That’s exactly what we think,” said Captain Thomas, the ground commander. “So you have to be ready to bomb the area.”
“And there’s a possibility they may launch when they see us coming,” said Danny. “You have to be ready for that as well.”
“Obviously.”
“How many aircraft can you give us?” asked Danny.
“I have two pilots, myself and Cowboy. Lieutenant Van Garetn, that is,” added Greenstreet, using Cowboy’s real name.
“I think we oughta fly Turk out there, too,” said Cowboy. “He knows how these things fight.”
Danny glanced at Turk, who was standing quietly against the wall on the opposite end of the room. He was staring blankly at the projection of the island. He seemed more like his old self; less angry, a little easier-going. There was always going to be a hard edge to him now, and an even harder core. Danny knew that seeing people who were close to you get killed changed your brain chemistry forever. But maybe Turk was coming out of the worst part of the dark place Iran had left him in.
“We could fly three planes,” said Greenstreet. The vaguest note of reluctance mixed into his clipped, professional aviator tone. “We can kit one of them up for air-to-air, and mix the others. If Captain Mako is up for it.”
“I’m good,” said Turk.
Thomas wrapped up with an impromptu, “Let’s get going and kick butt the Marine Corps way.”
Danny smiled, but it was Turk who had the last word:
“And if that doesn’t work, we’ll give them a touch of Whiplash.”
13
“We’re getting really good data flow from the Marine F-35s,” said the techie supervising the data collection, Hy Wen. “We’re good to go whenever they are.”
Breanna nodded. The Cube’s situation room — a complex of data stations arranged theater-style in front of a massive wall screen on the very bottom level of the Cube — was packed to overflowing. Exactly ninety-eight analysts and technicians had been brought in for the project, both to gather and analyze data on the UAVs and to support Danny, Whiplash, and the Marines. It was the most people they’d ever had in the Cube at one time.
The only problem was feeding them. Literally. Greasy Hands Parsons — Breanna’s special assistant and majordomo — was currently trying to solve that problem with a cook over at the CIA kitchens. Hopefully, he would solve it soon — Breanna was starving.
She tried to get her mind off food by walking around the workstations. She found Ray Rubeo halfway down, arms folded, hunched over an analyst from the Air Force. The analyst was a cryptographer, tasked with trying to break any encryptions in real time.
“Just like the old days, huh, Ray?”
He frowned.
Breanna sometimes suspected he didn’t like people.
Other times she was sure of it.
14
Turk had gone much longer stretches without sleeping, but the stress of combat, and flying an aircraft he wasn’t thoroughly used to, was starting to wear him down. The sides of his head felt numb, his eyes were scratchy, and his throat was sore. On top of which, his arms and upper back kept cramping.
Couple more hours, he told himself. Then we sleep.
Turk knew from experience that once things got hot — when the Marines went in, or if the UAVs appeared — everything that was bothering him would disappear. The problem was the long intervals of boredom a fighter pilot inevitably had to endure. The briefs, the preflight, the prep, the long flight to target, the ride home — these were all the very thick bread that sandwiched the few minutes of excitement he lived for.
Very thick bread, especially with Greenstreet cutting the slices.
“All right, Basher flight. We’re zero five from the target. Basher Two, you are my wing. Basher Three, you are top cover. Acknowledge.”
“Basher Two acknowledges,” said Cowboy.
“Three,” said Turk tersely.
“Sounding a little tired up there, Three,” offered Cowboy.
“Negative,” said Turk. He was at 22,000 feet, a good 10,000 over the other aircraft. He’d picked that altitude because it was a few thousand feet over the starting point for the Flighthawks’ favorite long-range attack routine against ground attack aircraft. Of course, there were literally dozens of different routines the computer guiding the UAV interceptor might use. And in Turk’s opinion, the Marine F-35s should worry more about MANPADs — shoulder launched ground-to-air missiles — than UAVs.