In seconds both the chutes went into the water. As Jake went over he spotted the angel coming up the wake.
“Boy, talk about luck! It’s a wonder he didn’t blow up,” Jake told Flap.
He was turning across the bow when the air boss came on the frequency. You always knew the boss’s voice, a God-like booming from on high. “Texaco, your signal, charley. We’re going to hot spin you.”
Jake checked his fuel quantity. Nine thousand pounds left. He opened the main dump and dropped the hook, gear and flaps.
As advertised, the ball was moving up and down on the optical landing system, which was gyroscopically stabilized in roll and pitch, but not in heave, the up and down motion of the ship.
He managed to get aboard without difficulty and was taxied in against the island to refuel. He kept the engines running.
In moments the helicopter settled onto the deck abeam the island. Corpsmen with stretchers rushed out. The stretchers weren’t needed. The two Phantom crewmen walked across the deck under their own power, wet as drenched rats, grinning broadly and flashing everyone in sight a thumbs-up.
Jake and Flap were still fueling five minutes later when two Soviet Bear bombers, huge, silver, four-engine turboprops, came up the wake at five hundred feet. The bombers were about a thousand feet apart, and each had an F-4 tucked in alongside like a pilot fish.
The flight deck crew froze and watched the parade go by.
“We could have done a better job up there today,” Jake told Flap. “We should have had the second radio tuned into Strike. Then we would have known what Two Oh Seven’s problem was without asking. And we should have asked about that wingman. Phantoms always go around in pairs, like snakes.”
“Those tailpipes in our windscreen,” Flap said, sighing. “Man, that was a leemer.”
Jake knew what a leemer was — a shot of cold urine to the heart. “We gotta get with the program,” he told the BN.
“I guess so,” Flap said as he tucked Malcolm X into his G-suit pocket and zipped it shut.
The air wing commander was Commander Charles “Chuck” Kail, a fighter pilot. He was known universally as CAG, an acronym that rhymed with rag and stood for Commander Air Group. This acronym had been in use in the U.S. Navy since it acquired its first carrier.
CAG Kail made careful notes this evening as he listened to the air intelligence officer brief the threat envelopes that could be expected around a Soviet task force. Lieutenant Colonel Hal-dane, his operations officer Major Bartow, and Jake Grafton were the A-6 representatives at this planning session. Jake sat listening and looking at the projected graphics with a sense of relief — the AI’s presentation sounded remarkably like his homemade presentation for Colonel Haldane several weeks ago. An attacking force could expect to see a lot of missiles and stupendous quantities of flak, according to the AI.
“They aren’t gonna shoot all those missiles at the first American planes they see,” CAG said softly. He always spoke softly so you had to listen hard to catch his words. “It wouldn’t surprise me to find out that half those missile launchers are out of service for lack of maintenance. Be that as it may, these numbers should dispel any notions anybody might have that smacking the Russians is going be easy. These people aren’t rice farmers — they are a first-class blue-water Navy. Putting them under with conventional, free-fall bombs is going to be really tough. We’re going to lose a lot of people and airplanes getting it done.”
“We’ll probably never have to,” someone said, and three or four heads bobbed in agreement.
“That’s right,” Kall said, almost whispering. “But if the order comes, we’re going to be ready. We’re going to have a plan and we’re going to have practiced our plan. We’re not going to try to invent the wheel after war is declared.”
There were no more comments about the probability of war with the Soviet Union.
“We’ll plan Alpha strikes,” CAG said. “When we get to the Sea of Japan we’ll schedule some and see how much training we need to make that option viable. At night and in bad weather, however, the A-6s are going to have to go it alone. I’d like to have the A-6 crews run night attacks against our own destroyers to develop a profile that gives them the best chance of hitting the target and surviving. Colonel Haldane and his people can work out a place to start and we’ll go from there.”
“Aye aye, sir,” Haldane said.
12
One morning when jake came into the ready room the duty officer, First Lieutenant Doug Harrison, motioned to him. “Sir, the skipper wants to see you in his stateroom.”
“Sir! What is this, the Marines?”
“Well, we try.”
Jake sighed. “You know what it’s about?”
“No, sir.”
“For heaven’s sake, my name is Jake.”
“Yes, sir.”
“You try too hard. Let your hair grow out to an inch. Take a day off from polishing your shoes. Do twenty-nine pushups instead of thirty. You can overdo this military stuff, Doug.”
The skipper’s stateroom was on the third deck, the one below the ready room deck. Entry to the skipper’s subdivision was gained by lowering yourself through a watertight hatch, then going down a ladder.
Jake knocked. The old man opened the door. “Come in and find a seat.”
The pilot did so. Colonel Haldane picked up a sheaf of paper and waggled it, then tossed it back on his desk. “Your letter of resignation. I have to put an endorsement on it. What do you want me to say?”
Jake was perplexed. “Whatever you usually say, sir.”
“Technically your letter is a request to transfer from the regular Navy to the Naval Reserve and a request to be ordered to inactive status. So I have to comment about whether or not you would be a good candidate for a reserve commission. Why are you getting out?”
“Colonel, in my letter I said—”
“I read it. ‘To pursue a civilian career.’ Terrific. Why do you want out?”
“The war’s over, sir. I went to AOCS because it was that or get drafted. I got a regular Navy commission in 1971 because it was offered and my skipper recommended me, but I’ve never had the desire to be a professional career officer. To be frank, I don’t think I’d be a very good one. I like the flying, but I don’t think I’m cut out for the rest of it. I’ll be the first guy to volunteer to come back to fight if we have another war. I just don’t want to be a peacetime sailor.”
“You want to fly for the airlines?”
“I don’t know, sir. Haven’t applied to any. I might, though.”
“Pretty boring, if you ask me. Take off from point A and fly to point B. Land. Taxi to the gate. Spend the night in a motel. The next day fly back to A. You have to be a good pilot, I know, but after a while, I think a man with your training and experience would go quietly nuts doing something like that. You’d be a glorified bus driver.”
“You’re probably right, sir.”
“So what are you going to do?”
“I don’t know, Skipper.”
“Hells bells, man, why resign if you don’t have something to go to? Now if you had your heart set on going to grad school or into your dad’s business or starting a whorehouse in Mexi-cali, I’d say bon voyage—you’ve done your bit. That doesn’t appear to be the case, though. I’ll send this in, but you can change your mind at any time up to your release date. Think it over.”
“Yessir.”
“Oh, by the way, the skipper of the Snake-eyes had some nice words for the way you tanked Two Oh Seven and dropped him off on the downwind. A quick, expeditious rendezvous, he said, a professional job.”