Black Star

CHAPTER 8 — CHAMELEON

“Runner One-one on station,” Maxwell called.

His flight of fighters — four Super Hornets — had reached their CAP stations, orbiting at twenty thousand feet, one hundred miles from the coast of China. The second division was high, thirty-three thousand feet, twenty miles behind him. A hundred miles to the southeast, the Reagan Strike Group was cruising the southern Taiwan Strait.

“Alpha Whiskey copies, Runner One-one,” answered a voice in his headset.

Maxwell nodded. CAG Boyce, the Air Warfare Commander whose call sign was Alpha Whiskey, was now ensconced in the climate-controlled, red-lighted space of CIC–Combat Information Center — directing the action from his situational display.

To the east, Maxwell could make out the dark land mass of Asia. The sky was the color of slate, empty and yet filled with danger. Is it out there? Will it take the bait?

Boyce’s voice broke the silence. “Runner One-one, Alpha-Whiskey. Be advised Ironclaw is airborne.”

“Runner One-one.” The game was on, thought Maxwell. Here comes the bait.

“Ironclaw” was the usual call sign for an EA-6B Prowler. Today it meant something else. The Chameleon UAV — unmanned air vehicle — had just catapulted from the Reagan, cloaked in its electronic disguise.

On station also was an E-2C Hawkeye — the Navy’s turbo-prop version of the Air Force AWACS with its own saucer-shaped radar dome mounted above the fuselage. The controllers in the Hawkeye were standing by to vector Maxwell’s fighters toward any threat — and warn him of incoming bogeys.

Those that they could see.

With that thought, Maxwell gazed down at his radar display. Turning southward in his orbit, he picked up the returns of his high division, fanned out in combat spread. Led by Commander Rico Flores, skipper of the VFA-34 Blue Blasters, they were responsible for high altitude threats. Maxwell’s division would deal with any low intruders.

The space on the screen between his flight and the mainland was empty. So far the PLA was showing no curiosity about the American presence.

The pseudo-Prowler would fly a profile just like the one a real EA-6B might take, climbing to altitude, then descending on a track parallel to the coast. Then it would turn abruptly inbound, as if it intended to penetrate Chinese airspace. As if it were hostile.

“Ironclaw checks level, standing by for signal.”

“Alpha Whiskey copies. Ironclaw, your signal is Oscar.”

“Ironclaw, roger signal Oscar.” As Maxwell listened to the exchange, he had to grin. It was bogus radio dialogue for the benefit of Chinese eavesdroppers. “Signal Oscar” was a fictional execute command. Though the transmissions were on a secure channel, it wasn’t too secure. With only slightly sophisticated monitoring equipment, a skilled interpreter could intercept the communication. He would conclude that a Prowler was embarked on a mission toward China.

Maxwell forced himself to relax. For the moment, there was nothing he could do except sit back and watch the show. He and his fighters would maintain their CAP station until the Chameleon UAV had flown its first leg, paralleling the coastline. When it reversed course and turned inland, Maxwell’s fighters would close in behind it. flying cover.

Would the deception work?

Maxwell could only guess how the Chameleon’s electronic masking worked. Ship-based UAVs were something new, and the ability to emulate other aircraft was even newer. If the Chameleon’s disguise was successful, Chinese air defense commanders would see what appeared to be an EA-6B Prowler entering their air space. The Prowler — the real Prowler — was a derivative of the ancient A-6 Intruder attack aircraft. Crewed by a pilot and three ECMOs — Electronic Counter-measures Officers — the twin-jet Prowler was the strike group’s prime vehicle for radar and sensor jamming, targeting, and gathering of electronic intelligence.

Prowlers were the advance units of a deep air strike. Observing such a threat, the Chinese would have to react.

Or so Maxwell hoped.

“Ironclaw is checking in as fragged,” said a voice on the radio.

“Sea Lord copies,” replied the controller in the Hawkeye. “Picture clear.”

More bogus dialogue. The controller was informing Ironclaw that no threat was showing on the display. Maxwell wondered if anyone was listening.

Boyce’s voice came over the frequency. “Runner One-one, Alpha Whiskey. Ironclaw is on first base. Five minutes to second.”

“Runner One-one, roger.” Boyce was informing him that the decoy had completed its outbound leg and was flying back toward the Hornets’ CAP station. Five more minutes. When the decoy was directly beneath the Hornets, it would turn again and point its nose toward China.

Maxwell tried to visualize the effects it would have on the mainland. Telephones would ring. Missile sites would be activated. Questions would fly like missiles through the ether. Why was a Prowler invading our space? Were the Americans in the war?

Fighters would be scrambled.

Maxwell punched a five minute count-down into his elapsed timer. It was vital that he fly the CAP orbit precisely so that his Hornets were on a northwesterly course when Ironclaw passed under them.

He glimpsed it, two thousand feet below. It looked nothing like a Prowler, which had a bulbous nose, spacious cockpit, and wide, swept wings. The Chameleon was a stubby-winged craft with a long nose unmarred by a crew enclosure. Its only protuberance was a pair of ECM pods attached to its under fuselage. The decoy had a V tail and, despite its ungainly appearance, was moving at a respectable 350 knots.

“Runner One-one tallies Ironclaw,” Maxwell called, reporting that had a visual on the decoy.

“Alpha Whiskey, roger. You’re cleared to second base.”

The go ahead. He rolled out of his turn above and behind the Chameleon. Right on schedule, the pilotless aircraft banked to the right and slid its nose toward the looming coastline of Asia.

Fifty miles to the coastline. The game was on.

The Chinese had always insisted that their territorial boundary extended further offshore than the twelve mile limit recognized by the United States. Over the years the disagreement over sovereign air space had caused some classic incidents, including a collision between a Navy EP-3 surveillance plane and a reckless Chinese F-8 pilot.

That was then, Maxwell reflected. A time of relative peace. This was now. China was at war.

Forty miles.

“Ironclaw, you have multiple contacts near point alpha, one-hundred miles from you, ”

“Ironclaw, roger. ” No surprise. Maxwell saw the same thing on his situation display. Over the mainland, near their bases. None was yet a threat.

Fifty miles. Only three minutes from the territorial boundary. If the Chinese were going to do something—

“Ironclaw, this is Sea Lord. Single group twenty miles southeast Alpha, hot on you.”

“Ironclaw.”

Maxwell saw them too. High and fast, and feet wet. “Hot” meant that their noses — and weapons — were pointed this way. Judging by their profile, they were Flankers — Russian-built SU-27s.

Damn! That wasn’t part of the game plan. He wasn’t here to get into a furball with conventional Chinese fighters. Especially Flankers, which were fifth-generation, sophisticated interceptors.

Apparently Boyce had reached the same conclusion. “Ironclaw, Alpha Whiskey. Hotdog, hotdog. Scram east.”

“Ironclaw, roger, hotdog.”

“Hotdog” was the alert that they were approaching the international boundary. Maxwell saw the decoy turn to the east, on a course roughly perpendicular to the incoming bandits. He swung his flight of Hornets into position a few miles behind the decoy.

It was an old tactic. By turning perpendicular to the threat radars — beaming, it was called — you minimized the amount of Doppler shift the Flanker pilots could see, possibly denying them a radar lock. Sometimes it worked, especially if the fighters you were up against didn’t have GCI or AWACS. Maxwell knew that multiple radars on the mainland were tracking them. In fact, he was counting on it. Either way, it displayed a non-threatening posture to the Flanker pilots.

Forty miles to the merge. The Flankers were inside factor bandit range — the distance at which Maxwell had to regard them as a threat. He was paralleling the coastline. Did the Flankers have orders to attack American aircraft in international air space? If so, it meant China had just extended their war to include the United States.

“Ironclaw, lean right twenty degrees,” Maxwell ordered. He was buying time. The slight offset would extend the Flankers’ time to intercept. These were not the trophies that he wanted.

The Flankers were nose hot on the decoy. Maxwell tensed, wondering if the Flankers had committed. Would they attack the decoy or the Hornets? With their speed advantage — they were moving at about 1.8 Mach — the Flankers would be in missile range within—

“Sea Lord shows all red fighters turning cold. They’re bugging out.”

So they were. On his datalink situation display, Maxwell saw the two blips moving back toward the mainland.

Why? They hadn’t come close enough to the Chameleon to get a visual ID. Were the two Flankers waiting for reinforcements before engaging four Hornets?

A new uneasiness passed over Maxwell. Something was happening. He didn’t believe in extra-sensory perception, but in twenty years of flying he had learned to trust his gut feelings. His gut was sending a persistent signal. Something was happening. What?

In the next instant he knew.

B.J. Johnson’s voice crackled on the radio. “Missile in the air! Runner One-one, six o’clock low, hot on the Ironclaw.”

A jolt of adrenaline surged through him. His RWR was silent. “One’s naked.” Meaning he wasn’t targeted by radar.

“Two’s naked.” No warning either.

Maxwell saw it. A tiny plume, ahead and below, between him and the Chameleon. Against the dull blue of the sea, it looked like a distant ember.

It’s targeting the decoy.

With morbid fascination, Maxwell watched the plume close the distance to the Chameleon.

Where did it come from? His eyes scanned the piece of sky where the plume had been when he first saw it. Then he scanned further back to where it must have been when B.J. called it.

He did a rough calculation. If it was an AA-11 Archer, which moved at something better than Mach two, it would cover about — he scratched for an answer, then came up with it—1,500 feet every second. More or less.

His eyes went to the empty sky over his left shoulder. If the Archer was launched five seconds ago, it would have come from—

There. A glimmer, low, nearly abeam his port wing.

It was between him and B.J. Johnson’s Hornet. He kept his eyes glued to spot in the sky, unwilling to blink. Yes, for sure, there was something.

“Runner One-one is padlocked.” Informing his wingmen his eyes were locked onto something. What?

As he watched, it faded from his vision.

Maxwell was still staring at the spot when, in his peripheral vision, he sensed an orange burst beyond the nose of his Hornet.

The missile had impacted the decoy.

“Runner One-two,” came B.J. ’s voice, “Ironclaw has taken a hit!”

Maxwell swung his gaze to where the decoy had been. It was gone. In its place was a roiling debris cloud, passing under the nose of Maxwell’s Hornet. Well, he thought, that was a hostile act if he ever saw one.

He hauled the Hornet’s nose toward the empty space where he had last seen the glimmer. “Alpha Whiskey, Ironclaw is down. Runner One-one is engaged, neutral.”

“Runner one-two, no joy, visual.” B.J. didn’t see the bandit, but she had visual contact with her flight leader.

“Runner One-two, cross-turn, I’m low, engaged.” There was no time for explanations. He was having a hard enough time keeping sight of this bandit.

In the left break, he picked it up again. The glimmer. Coming toward him.

There was no shape to it, no definition. Only an ephemeral grayness, fading in and out of Maxwell’s vision.

Again it vanished. Maxwell kept the Hornet’s nose aimed at the spot where he had last seen the object.

The voice of B.J. Johnson came over his earphones. “Runner One-two’s cross turning high, visual, no joy, no joy. Where’s the bandit?”

Good question, he thought. “Runner One-one, tally one, on my nose. Two, stay high and cover me. Three and Four, strip and bug east. Check six for spitters.” He was ordering B.J. to stay and support him while the second element bugged out of the fight. You can’t fight what you can’t see.

Maxwell mashed down the weapons selector for AIM-9M. He turned to move the seeker circle over the place where he expected the stealth jet to be. To his surprise, he was getting an intermittent growl in his headset. He uncaged the seeker and it whistled a shreeeeee indicating a lock on the heat source.

Was the Sidewinder’s heat-seeking head really tracking the invisible bandit?

Yes, definitely. He could see the gray shape again inside the HUD-displayed seeker circle. It was closing, head-on. The range was close for a head-on. It might be his only shot.

He squeezed the trigger.

Whoom! The two hundred pound Sidewinder leaped from the left wing tip rail.

“Fox Two,” Maxwell called, signaling the launch of a Sidewinder. With his eyes he followed the faint gray corkscrew trail of the missile. It would lead him to the bandit.

“Runner One, you’re targeted!” called B.J. Johnson. “Missile in the air, on your nose.”

Shit! The bandit had just taken his own shot. Now he was defensive. He could only hope his Sidewinder found its target.

He broke hard to the left, grunting against the G-force. The missile had to be another heat seeker. He was still getting no radar warning. He jabbed the flares dispenser, sending out a trail of incendiary decoys. Although he was belly-up to the missile coming at him he knew roughly where it had to be.

Maxwell tightened his rolling pull, continuing through inverted. Digging out the back side of the maximum-G barrel roll, the G force smashed him into the seat. The G-suit squeezed his legs and abdomen like a hydraulic vice, keeping the blood in his head and not pooling in his lower extremities.

Still, his vision was tunneling down. He tightened his leg muscles, fighting to stay conscious against eight times the force of gravity. Sweat poured from under his helmet, stinging his eyes.

He rolled wings level, still pulling the jet to its computer-limited G load. The missile should be in terminal guidance. He had to see it. It should be—

There. Up and to the left. Passing aft of his wing line.

He relaxed his pull on the stick and gasped in relief. The missile had gone stupid. He was still alive.

He swung his attention back to the forward quarter. Where was the bandit? He had to be out there—

He was. Dead ahead and close. So close, he thought for a moment they would collide.

As the shimmering apparition flashed past on his left, Maxwell got his first good glimpse of the aircraft. He saw it clearly for less than a second, but it was enough. In that instant he felt as though he were peering through a window to his past. He was back in a place five years ago, in the high desert of Nevada. It was all there, as in a dream.

The diamond shape. No vertical tail.

The Black Star.

Or a damned good knock off. And it was trying to kill him.

“Runner One-two is still visual no joy,” called B.J. Johnson from directly overhead. “You got a tally on the bandit?”

“Affirmative. He just passed down my left side. I’m engaged, left hand turn.” He hauled the Hornet’s nose across the Black Star’s tail, peering back over his shoulder to keep it in sight. It was gone. He kept his turn in, but relaxed his pull. He squinted, scanning the horizon for the telltale shimmer.

“Runner One-two, scan in front of me for that shimmer. I think we’re in a single circle flow.”

“Two’s looking.”

Where the hell is it? He felt like he was in a knife fight in a blackened room. The other guy could see him, but he was blind.

Maxwell felt a stab of fear. It’s out there somewhere. It would fire another—

“Runner One, I see something. The shimmer is at your ten to eleven o’clock, maybe a mile, closing.

Okay, he knew where the bandit was, but he still didn’t have a visual. The Black Star had made a level turn in a single circle flow. Turning inside of him.

“Skipper, he’s pulling lead on you. Two’s rolling in with guns.”

Maxwell cursed and yanked on the stick. It had been a mistake, relaxing his turn after the head-on pass. He gave the bastard some turning room.

He glimpsed the grayish silhouette. Coming at him again. As he stared, the shimmering image faded from view.

A flash caught his eye. Cannon! Behind the strobing muzzle flash shimmered the amorphous shape of the Black Star.

“Tracers, tracers! Guns defense!” B.J. was screaming in the radio.

Instinctively, Maxwell rolled out and pulled the nose of the Hornet up and away from the Black Star. Out of the enemy’s turning plane. He hunched down in the cockpit, waiting for the cannon shells to shred his jet. It was a high deflection shot. At such an acute angle, the guy couldn’t possibly hit him.

Thunk. Thunk. It felt like a giant hammer walloping the airframe of the Hornet.

The Chinese pilot, whoever he was, was no amateur. He was getting hits from a nearly ninety-degree angle. Maxwell turned harder, again grunting against the force of the Gs. The tracer arcs were falling behind him. The deflection angle and the Gs were too great for the Chinese pilot to keep tracking him.

The winking strobe of the cannon extinguished. The Black Star was again invisible.

Maxwell’s Hornet was rocketing upwards. He rolled right to see B.J. ’s jet diving down towards the Black Star, cannon fire blazing from the nose.

B.J. ’s voice crackled over the radio. “Runner One-two’s lost sight.”

That was it. Time to get of Dodge. Turn tail and run. It was an inglorious way to end a fight, but Maxwell knew they had no option. If they stayed, the Black Star would kill him and, probably, his wingman.

Their only hope was in the superior acceleration of the Hornet. Still in afterburner, he pointed the jet’s nose toward the empty hole in space where he had last glimpsed the Black Star. With its two F-414 engines at full thrust, the Hornet was approaching supersonic speed.

“Roger. Bug out, bug out. One’s visual. Come hard left to a one-thirty heading. I’m high at your ten o’clock.”

“Two’s visual.”

“Runner One-two maintain that heading. One’s shackling for position.”

Maxwell pulled his jet across the top of his wingman in a hard S-turn for spacing. He rolled out into a tight combat spread position.

With their noses down, in full afterburner, they accelerated through mach one, in the opposite direction the Black Star had been headed. It would be tough for the Chinese pilot to reverse his turn in time to catch them and get a missile off.

Maxwell knew it was luck that the guy hadn’t killed him with the Archer. B.J.’s tally call had saved him. It was more luck that he hadn’t killed him with the cannon. He had a feeling he’d used up his luck.

He craned his neck, peering around. No sign of the Black Star. No missile in the air.

He went back inside, scanning the panel. He had taken at least two hits. What was the damage? No red lights, no warnings—

His fuel quantity. It was decreasing rapidly.

B.J. Johnson confirmed it. “Runner One-one, you’re streaming fuel.”

Maxwell shook his head. All in all, this was turning into a very shitty day. He was in a full afterburner dash to outrun an invisible enemy. And he would be out of gas in — he did a rough calculation — ten minutes. Maybe less.

“Stay with me, Runner One-two. We’ll do a battle damage check after we’ve put some distance behind us. Alpha Whiskey, Runner One-one and One two need the tanker, no delay.”

“We copy all that, Runner. Oilcan is on station Bravo Lima. He bears zero-nine-zero degrees, eighty miles. Can you make it?”

“I don’t know. I’ve got battle damage and a fuel leak.”

“Alpha Whiskey roger. We’re launching the SAR helo now.”

He would have to come out of afterburner before the thirsty engines sucked his tanks dry. He could only pray that the Black Star wasn’t still in hot pursuit.

It would be close. He knew Boyce wouldn’t order the tanker to come any closer. If the Black Star was still out there, it could pick them all off.

Five minutes elapsed. No longer in afterburner, Maxwell’s Hornet slowed back to subsonic speed.

The digital readout in the HUD indicated 410 knots.

While Maxwell flew a direct course for the tanker, B.J. Johnson flew a criss-cross pattern behind him. The second section, Gordon and Miller, rejoined their flight leader. They remained high, off his starboard wing.

No missile alerts. No more wispy gray telltale trails of an incoming heat seeker. The Black Star was gone, or he was setting them all up for a turkey shoot.

Maxwell’s fuel totalizer was reading five hundred pounds when he acquired a visual ID on the tanker. Less than three minutes of fuel. At this low quantity, the gauges were inaccurate. It could be off by more than three hundred pounds.

“Oilcan, Runner One-one is closing. Start a left turn and give me the drogue.”

“Oilcan is way ahead of you, Runner,” said the tanker pilot. “Drogue’s out, and here comes your turn.”

The tanker was a three-engine KC-10, an Air Force version of the civilian DC-10 transport. Fifty feet behind the big jet streamed the drogue, the three-foot basket at the end of a flexible hose.

Maxwell ignored the persistent low fuel warning while he flew an intercept curve toward the turning tanker. He knew the indication had to be zero. At best, he’d get one shot at the drogue.

He extended the Hornet’s in-flight refueling probe, affixed to the starboard fuselage. The gray mass of the big tanker swelled in his windshield.

Hurry, he told himself. No time for niceties like checking out the condition of the basket, like getting himself stabilized in position before easing the probe into the drogue. Hurry.

Fifty feet. Don’t overshoot. He fanned the Hornet’s speed brake.

He kept the jet moving, sliding into position behind the tanker. The drogue was dancing around in the slipstream of the turning tanker. The trick was not to chase the wiggling basket, but aim for the center of its movement. It was easy, when you had lots of gas for another try.

Twenty feet. Any second now the engines would gulp the last of the fuel. The whine of the turbines would go silent. The Hornet would be a glider.

Ten feet. The drogue was twitching around in the right quarter of his canopy. Hurry. If he missed—

The probe hit the rim of the basket, glanced off like a basketball on a hoop, then skittered into the opening.

Klunk. He felt the probe make solid mechanical contact with the refueling nozzle in the drogue. A ripple passed along the length of the hose as the probe shoved the drogue forward. Fuel began to flow down the hose, through the probe, into the Hornet’s empty tanks.

Maxwell felt the pent-up tension peel away from him. The tanker could deliver fuel faster than he was losing it. He’d make it back to the Reagan.

“Good shot,” said the tanker pilot. “No swimming for you today, Navy. The United States Air Force is taking you back to your boat. Tell you what. We’re gonna have you sing the Air Force song on the way.”

“No way,” said Maxwell.

“Okay, we’re flexible. You just hum the tune, and we’ll sing.”