“Huh, I’ll be damned,” Jake said to himself quietly, just as astounded as the rest of the crew.
Emily was alone in her cubicle, scanning the world’s incoming data from their collection runs. Using her Windows 10 software, she read and read, until she found her needle in a haystack. She turned and smiled, curious at what an aircrew had just written up from their flight. Emily looked at her watch, and saw the latest update was only minutes old, filed while airborne.
“Bollocks,” Emily exclaimed. “This has got to be them. This must be Black Scorpion.” She smiled.
She also took off the printer the cell phone data, which included the names of the cell phones’ owners and all their apps. One app of interest was the aircraft engine and avionics performance figures, which she was familiar with from Devil Dragon. The Chinese had invented a smartphone app that communicated with the jet, downloading data from the aircraft to the phone. This allowed the maintenance crews on the ground to analyze the performance upon landing, providing technical data for adjustments on the high-performing engines and avionics. It was also a treasure trove of information to DIA.
Emily took her pile of papers from the computer and walked down to the conference room, where her team was in full stride in briefing Mr. Burns. She passed a group of four uniformed military guys standing in the hallway, and they couldn’t help but stare at the petite blonde in a short skirt and Steve Madden — brand leather heels. It was very non — politically correct to stare like they did, but nevertheless, they did it quietly. “Hello, boys. Good morning,” she greeted them, looking befuddled carrying, in addition to her coffee, a stack of white printouts that looked like they were going to fly across the office.
“Hey Emily…” they responded, ogling. They also got a whiff of her Jo Malone perfume, the woodsy and sea salt version, which the men loved. Emily knocked on the door quietly with two knocks and walked in on the briefing wearing a slight smirk. She kind of liked that she still had the power to get glances.
“And, based upon everything we have talked about so far, from the satellite stuff to the recorded sounds to parked aircraft, more probable than not, the Chinese have another jet,” Mark told the room, finishing up the brief.
“I haven’t heard you brief if there were flights in the area,” Calvin said, predictably.
Mark nodded over to Emily.
Emily lit up with a beautiful smile. “Cheerio. This is what we have so far. First, not sure if Mark or Robert told you, but we now know the aircraft is named Black Scorpion, which we think is their H-20 designation. We were getting raw data from some of those cell phones and, until very recently, only knew the aircraft name from their phones. Now that the algorithms and software have had some time to go through the phones and apps, we have the engine and avionics data.”
“Black Scorpion, eh? Are the readings from this aircraft similar to Devil Dragon? What else did it say?” Calvin asked, with a mind full of additional questions. His wheels were turning now that there was a hill of evidence building.
Emily walked over to the front of the conference room. “First off, our two People’s Liberation Army Air Force pilots are named Dai Jian and Chung Kang. Unknown backgrounds at the moment, but the owners of the phones not only have this encrypted engine app, but aviation navigation software for mission planning. Wu Lee had the same thing on his phone, so it’s a match.”
Ford was amazed at the similarities already, and he had only been here for a few hours. It was unfolding as it did before, and the more he sat there, the more he was eager to be involved. His mind was racing, wondering if he was going to get another go, another stealth bomber flight. The only pilot to steal two bombers from China! he thought. There is no way Calvin Burns will let this go… this aircraft couldn’t possibly remain in Chinese hands.
Robert immediately typed the two pilot’s names into Google and found their profiles on a social-networking site. “Well, so much for keeping a low profile. They are both on LinkedIn. Guys have pretty generic profiles on there, but… looks like they graduated from Stanford University together. School of Engineering… then… returned to China to work engineering jobs.”
“We freaking educated these two pilots?” Calvin said, taking off his reading glasses and sliding them across the brown conference room table. “Really?” as he shook his head and placed his face into his hands. “This is just like how we strung up aircraft at the damn Wright-Patt Museum for the whole world to see… only to have the technology used against us. Goddamn it. When are we going to learn?”
Calvin was referring to the Wright-Patterson Air Force Base in Dayton, Ohio, where the US Air Force had on display many of their historical aircraft. Calvin’s anger was because, through the years, General Chen used Ohio State University students with camera phones to take pictures of our U-2, F-117, B-2, and SR-71, which were all on open static display in the museum. The Smithsonian Institution Air and Space Museum at the Dulles Airport had a similar display. Both of these made Calvin furious because he felt we were giving our technology to the Chinese on a silver platter. It bothered him a tremendous amount.
Emily gave a nervous smile now and knew that his sensitivity was only temporary. “So, we should probably talk about the details of the items that just arrived. A bird off Korea.”
Robert and Mark both leaned in to hear what Emily was going to say, while Ford looked at Robert and Mark. Ford thought their mannerisms were funny and considered their body language. It reminded him of a family dog that was ready to get a biscuit.
“Calm down, you two,” Ford said, seeing an opportunity to bust their chops.
Emily continued. “The crew was first picking up some new and usual things, which just didn’t add up.”
“Hey, that matches Devil Dragon. She had the same profile,” Ford said.
“It does? Huh. Same ops. I must have forgotten that. OK, please continue, Emily,” Calvin commented.
Emily nodded in agreement. “A separate collection asset detected an anomaly on a routine night flight of an Su-35, a single ship in the same area. This info verified the cell phones I just briefed you on, and the author mentions that the actual cell phones were ‘flying in formation’ with, or alongside, this Su-35 over a bombing range. Range between invisible aircraft and Su-35 were from four to seven miles away from each other. No radar hits to any aircraft in the area except the 35.”
Ford crunched his face up in amazement. “Invisible aircraft over a bombing range? Not just flight test? What… were they doing… over a bombing range?”
“Yes, Ford, I’m glad you asked. Underneath this ‘phantom jet,’ as the crew called it, carrying these two cell phones and transmitting all sorts of data, were ground explosions. But no weapons were detected as firing. No bombs were detected as being dropped. The traditional ‘boop’ sound was not heard on any frequencies by our asset.”
As the only pilot in the room, Ford took on the role of subject-matter expert for this aspect of the aircraft. He was an airborne weapons expert, was skilled in both fighter and bomber aircraft, and previously did a joint tour with the navy as an F/A-18 Hornet pilot. To him, this was most unusual, because it meant the first few phases of flight test were complete. It meant the jet was stable and safe, and now you could fight with it.
Ford’s expression changed to serious. “Can I see those printouts, Emily?” Ford asked with his hand out. Emily passed them to Mark, who peeked at them, then handed them to Ford. He read them line by line, taking a close look at the app data feed from the Black Scorpion to the phone.