Senior Lieutenant Abrin had lost contact with his base and the rest of his flight, but his radar seemed to be working perfectly. He watched on the screen as the Americans performed the highly unusual maneuver of splitting up and one of them turned back. Then he saw the other plane make a pass at something and then disappear from the screen.
That was enough. He quickly turned his plane in that direction to see what had happened.
Patrol Two broke out of the clouds almost in the water. Frantically the rider signaled the beast to climb for everything he was worth. The dragon extended its huge wings fully and beat the air desperately to keep from smashing into the sea. Spray drenched dragon and rider alike, but somehow they avoided the ocean.
The dragon beat its wings strongly to climb away from the water and suddenly roared in pain.
Fortuna! Patrol Two thought. Somewhere in the last minute’s violent maneuvering the dragon had injured himself. The rider touched the communications crystal worn on a neck thong, but the bit of stone remained cold and dead.
Gilligan reached for the yellow-and-black handle next to his right leg. I hope to Christ this still works, he thought as he pulled the ejection lever.
The ejection seat was designed as a fail safe, electronics or no. The canopy blew off and Gilligan was blasted into the air scant feet above the water.
There was a whirling rush and then Gilligan was kicked free of the ejection seat. Suddenly he was dangling under his parachute, floating down in a clammy fog to the water he knew had to be below him.
Below and off to one side he saw a tiny splash as his ejection seat hurtled into the Bering Sea. Then the fog closed in around him and all he could see was cottony grayness.
Gilligan cursed luridly. In the personal effects compartment of his ejection seat was his map case and in that map case were several letters he had intended to mail-including the alimony check to his ex-wife which was already a week overdue.
Sandi’s lawyer is going to kill me! he thought as he floated soundlessly through the fog for an unknown destination.
Patrol Two was in no better shape. The dragon was favoring its right wing in a way the rider knew meant the beast would not be able to bear them up much longer.
Pox rot this place! Patrol Two swore silently and then concentrated on trying to remember the way to the nearest land. It was a terrible place to set down, but from the way the dragon’s chest muscles tightened with each wing beat Patrol Two realized they would be doing well to make it at all.
Lieutenant Smith hadn’t seen Major Gilligan go in, nor had he heard the distress cry from the F-15s transponder. But the major was supposed to make a quick pass and come back to join him. As the minutes ticked by, the lieutenant became increasingly worried. Something had to have happened to his commander.
Smith hadn’t gotten a good look at whatever it was, but he knew his video camera had it all down. That part of the mission was over. Now all they had to do was get back safely. He concentrated on guiding his plane back on what he was pretty sure was a reciprocal heading while he kept running through the channels on his radios. Mick would be along, he was sure. And if he wasn’t then that video tape was doubly important
Suddenly Smith’s radar and radios were working again. Quickly he shifted to his assigned frequency, keyed his mike and began reporting what had happened.
Lieutenant Smith wasn’t at all sure what he had seen down there, but he was reasonably sure the Soviets didn’t have anything to do with it.
Patrol Two stayed in the open to make searching for land easier, but the rider also kept close to the clouds to hide quickly if need be. Off on the far horizon, the rider saw a thin line that seemed to be land. The dragon saw it too and surged forward, its wing beats picking up strength as it flew.
Patrol Two was just starting to relax when another of the roaring gray monsters burst out of the clouds above and in front of them less than half a bowshot off.
Instantly, the rider rolled the dragon right and ducked into the clouds. As the misty gray swallowed them up, Patrol Two had a quick glimpse of the thing rolling into a turn to follow them.
So stiff, Patrol Two thought. Its wings don’t move even in a turn and the rest of the body stays rigid as well. Whatever the things were, they weren’t dragons.
Senior Lieutenant Abrin spent the next ten minutes dodging in and out of the clouds looking for the thing again. Although his plane did not have a video imaging system like the F-15s and it had all happened so quickly he hadn’t had time to turn on his gun cameras, he had gotten a good look at the object before it disappeared.
Lieutenant Abrin had no doubts about what he had just seen. His most prized possessions were a Japanese VCR and a bunch of bootlegged American movies. The more he thought about it the more obvious it was to him what was going on.
"Comrades. Do we have any information on Spielberg making a movie in this area?"
Twenty-five: MAROONED
Warm! Mick Gilligan thought as he spluttered his way to the surface. The water’s warm.
By rights it ought to be nearly freezing. But it was nearly as tepid as the Caribbean.
Nothing but surprises, he thought as he pulled his seat pack to the surface with the cord attached to his leg. At least this one is pleasant. He unsnapped the cover on the top half and inflated his raft.
Wait a minute! There are sharks in the Caribbean. He redoubled his struggles to get into the raft.
It wasn’t easy. An Air Force survival raft is about the size of a child’s wading pool and it is designed to be stable once the pilot is in it, not to be easy to get into. Gilligan was encumbered by his arctic survival suit, his G-suit and his flight suit. He wanted to hurry for fear of sharks, but he didn’t want to splash too much for fear of attracting them. If there had been anyone to watch, it might have been fairly amusing. But there wasn’t and Gilligan himself wasn’t at all amused.
Once he had flopped into the raft he tried to orient himself. The one thing that hadn’t changed was the fog. It was dense and thick everywhere. The air was a good deal colder than the water, so that wasn’t astonishing, but it didn’t explain why the water was so warm.
He pulled the seat pack into the raft and set it on his lap while he undid the catches on the bottom. Inside was a standard Air Force survival kit, including food, medical supplies and a lot of other necessities. Right now he was most interested in the radio and the emergency transponder.
The radio was about the size of a pack of cigarettes. Eagerly Gilligan extended the antenna and trailed the ground wire over the side into the water. Then he tried the radio. Only a hiss and crackle of static came out of the speaker.
Grimacing, Gilligan carefully clipped the radio to the breast pocket of his flight suit. Next he pulled out the transponder and examined it.
The transponder was bigger than the survival radio, but it did more. When it received a signal indicating an aircraft was in the area it transmitted a powerful homing signal. Just now it was silent as the grave.
Gilligan punched the self-test button on the receiver and watched the LED indicator light up. Then he studied the other indicator for a few minutes and his expression got grimmer and grimmer.
Every military aircraft and almost all airliners and business aircraft carry beacons which would trigger his transponder. Gilligan knew for a fact that an AWACS and several other aircraft should have been within range. If even one plane was above the horizon, the device should have been screaming its little electronic heart out. Yet the self-test said it was working.