Flash Point

7

“You got him, Wink?” Woods asked over the ICS.

“Yeah. I got him. He’s trying to come in out of the weeds.”

“There aren’t any weeds in the ocean, Wink.”

“No kidding. Come starboard hard to 005. Set four hundred fifty knots. He’s still descending. I show him at one hundred fifty feet doing four hundred fifty knots.”

Woods slammed the stick of the F-14 to the right and banked the Tomcat steeply, lowering the nose and starting a descent to complete the intercept. “He can’t be at one hundred fifty feet, Wink.”

“Why?” Wink replied as he worked the thumb wheel of the radar control handle between his legs.

“Because there’s a regulation against going below five hundred feet, Wink.”

“I forgot. Come port to 355. He’s made a hard right turn.”

The flat gray paint on the F-14 made it hard to see. That was the idea. Woods squinted as he looked down through the thick windscreen at the green diamond projected on the Heads Up Display. It showed where the bogey was; but Boomer was still too small a dot to see, even through the diamond that outlined his position. Just blue-gray water and blue-gray sky. “How far?”

“Twelve miles.”

“You think he’s got us yet?”

“If he does, he sure isn’t acting like it. He’s not coming up to get us. He’s just playing bogey.”

“How do you want to do this?”

“We’re going to break port in about two miles.”

“Roger.”

“Course 357 for ten miles, angels 0, slight left to right drift. He’s ten right, twenty low, closure nine hundred knots.”

“No tally.”

“Port hard,” Wink said, his voice cool. He watched the radar track on Boomer until it was sufficiently out to the right, then called, “Starboard hard,” as Woods wrapped it around in a hard right descending turn.

“Tally,” Woods said as he saw Boomer dead ahead at three miles with a shadow below him on the water.

They rolled in behind Boomer doing four hundred fifty knots at two hundred feet. “Fox two, set up another one, Tiger,” Wink transmitted.

“That’s all we have time for, 207,” Tiger replied. “Your signal is RTB, check in with Strike.” Return to Base.

“Thanks for your help. Switching button one,” Wink answered.

“My pleasure,” Tiger responded, a twenty-one-year-old OS-3, an enlisted man whose job it was to control intercepts from the carrier.

Woods checked his fuel and liked what he saw. He jammed the throttles into afterburner to catch up with Boomer quickly. He passed through five hundred knots and came out of afterburner as he approached his wingman’s F-14. Sliding out to the left, he signaled for Vialli to join on him. Boomer touched his forehead and pointed to Woods, transferring the lead to him. Woods pulled up quickly and climbed away from the ocean, the G forces causing him to grunt automatically. Wink gave Sedge a drinking signal. Sedge signaled 5,100 pounds left.

“Strike, Victory 207 checking in, flight of two, 258 at 15, angels 5, low state 5.1.”

“Roger, 207. Report ship in sight.”

“Wilco.”

He scanned the horizon where the Tactical Aid to Navigation needle — the TACAN — was pointing but couldn’t pick out the carrier from the haze and grayness. Quickly, Wink and Woods ran through their descent checklist as they passed through ten thousand feet on their way to five.

Again Wink looked ahead through the quarter panel of the windscreen where the TACAN needle was pointing and this time he saw the Washington, their home away from home.

“Strike, Victory 207, see you.”

“Roger, 207. Cleared overhead. Switch button four.”

“207, switching,” Wink said. He tuned his powerful digital radio to the Air Boss’s frequency. It was silent, as it was supposed to be for a day VFR recovery. Woods lowered his tailhook as he and Boomer entered the overhead circle at two thousand feet hawking the deck, waiting for the next launch to begin. The other planes in the air were orbiting at higher altitudes, each separated by a thousand feet. When the recovery began, they would all spiral down and land in order, thirty to forty-five seconds apart.

Woods brought his flight up the starboard side of the carrier again and watched the launch in progress. Planes taxied toward the bow cats, but the waist cats were about to launch their last planes. “What do you think?” he asked Wink.

“Next time around,” Wink said. “And Boomer’s tailhook isn’t down.”

“What?” Woods stole a look. “What the hell is he doing?”

“Beats me. I’ve been giving Sedge the signal and he just stares at me.”

Woods took his eye off the flight deck below and stole another glance at Boomer. “What’s he doing way out there? We look like a couple of damned helos flying formation in two friggin’ area codes.” He quickly keyed the mike for the front radio. “Tighten it up. Hook down.”

Boomer quickly closed the distance and dropped his hook, now ready to land aboard the carrier.

They began their gradual port turn and descended from two thousand feet to eight hundred. As they came into the break Woods signaled for wings aft. On the signal, he and Boomer swept the wings back on their F-14s simultaneously to 68 degrees and steadied out on the ship’s heading. Woods and Wink checked the deck one last time. The deck was nearly clear and only two planes were left on the bow cats. “Let’s do it,” Woods said.

They flew past the carrier, Woods watching closely over his shoulder. At just the right moment, he kissed off Boomer, threw the stick to the left, and banked sharply into the break. The F-14 lay on its side in its nearly delta shape as they pulled around to head in the opposite direction from the carrier, downwind in the landing pattern. Woods put the wings in auto and they moved forward quickly to their 20-degree position, as full forward as they could go. Woods and Wink went through the landing checklist automatically as they leveled out, checking the gear, flaps, wings, and hook. When they passed the ramp of the carrier one mile to their left Woods began his controlled turn and rate of descent. They went hot mike.

Woods was one of the smoothest pilots in the Air Wing around the boat. He routinely had the highest or second-highest landing grades in the squadron. Even though he was good at it, he never took landing aboard the ship for granted. He had seen too many guys plant it on the ramp or unable to get aboard at all.

He rolled into the groove, kept the ball centered on the landing lens, and touched down hard. The tailhook grabbed the two wire and pulled it down the carrier deck as the engines screamed against it at full power until the Tomcat was completely stopped. Boomer landed next but floated over the four wires and boltered, his hook sparking as it tried to grab something on the steel deck. The F-14 flew off the angled deck and climbed into the landing pattern. Boomer looked at the airplanes in the break and those turning downwind, and tried to pick a time to turn downwind and fit into the landing pattern.

“What the hell is he doing?” Woods asked, frustrated.

“I don’t think he’s ever boltered in the daytime before.”

“Pisses me off,” Woods said as he shut down the engines and Wink opened the canopy.

They returned to their ready room and filled out the paperwork. Ten minutes later Boomer and Sedge walked in. Chief Lucas, the maintenance chief, came out of Maintenance Control into the ready room. “Two up jets?” he asked hopefully.

All four nodded.

“We’ve got to turn them around for the next event. Any gripes at all, sir?”

Woods replied first. “Trim button sticks, but it’s not a big problem.”

“What about 211?” Lucas inquired.

“ECS is really loud,” Vialli replied. “When it changes the temperature it wants to get there now. Sounds like a hurricane.”

“We can take care of that,” Lucas said confidently. “What about the backseat?”

“No problems,” Sedge said.

“Great,” Lucas said and hurried out.

Vialli crossed over to Woods, and sat down next to him. He leaned toward him, and said in a low voice, “I need to talk to you.”

Woods glanced up from the paperwork on his fold-over desk. “About how you’re going numb on me out there?”

“No, something else.”

Woods studied his face. “When?”

“Now… if you can.”

Woods looked at his watch. “The wardroom will be shutting down. Let’s go to chow. We’ll just wait out the rest until we have time.” Vialli’s face showed concern. “Unless it can’t wait. We can just go to the stateroom…”

“No, lunch is fine,” Vialli said. “I’m kind of hungry anyway. They’re having sliders — we can stuff a couple of those and then talk.”

Woods handed the yellow sheet to Wink, who took it to Maintenance Control. “You want to go eat?” Woods asked him as he was walking away.

“Sure,” Wink said. The four of them walked the three hundred yards from Ready Room Eight to the forward wardroom. Greasy hamburgers lay quietly in the steel pans over heated water. They each made double cheeseburgers and put them on their plates. As they went for drinks, Woods moaned when he saw the cow was disconnected and there were boxes of funny-shaped cartons in front of it. “Not German milk again,” he groaned.

No one answered him. Woods hailed one of the messmen and asked him directly, “All we’ve got is German milk?”

“Afraid so, sir.”

“When did we run out of real milk?”

“Yesterday.”

“What’s the matter with German milk?” Vialli asked.

Woods shook his head. “It tastes like goat’s milk.”

Vialli laughed. “How the hell do you know what goat’s milk tastes like?”

“I’m guessing,” Woods said sarcastically.

Wink sat next to him and said, “We go to sea for weeks on end and you expect someone to bring you milk out of an American cow — pasteurized and homogenized — and whine about it when you have to drink German milk someone probably paid through the nose to get trucked down to Italy just for you?”

Woods looked at Wink. “You don’t have to make me sound like an ax murderer. I just like regular old milk. That’s all. And eggs, and butter, and all the things people back home take for granted. Here we eat powdered eggs, no butter, no real milk, and get paid less than bus drivers, and we’re supposed to be really grateful. I keep forgetting,” he said, finally biting into his hamburger.

After the other officers had eaten and wandered off, Woods sat with his hands around his coffee cup and studied Vialli across the table. “So what gives?”

“I need to ask you something as a friend,” Vialli began tentatively. Woods waited. “I know you’re my section leader, and senior to me and everything. But I feel like you’re my brother. You’re the best friend I’ve got. Can I say that?”

“Sure. But before you go too far, what’s eating you? You just about bought it on the strafing run the other day. And today you were flying formation like you were afraid of it. Your hook wasn’t even down. What gives?”

“I don’t know. I guess I’d rather be somewhere else.”

“Who wouldn’t. But if you want to get out of the Navy, you’ve got to wait—”

“No, it’s not like that.”

“What?”

“It’s something else.” Vialli swallowed. Now that he was actually going to say it, his courage was evaporating. “Always before, in New York, in college, I was always the tough guy. Always doggin’ everybody, making life hard. But here, I don’t know. It’s different. I don’t have to prove anything except in the air.” He grinned at Woods. “Don’t worry. I’m not gonna ask you for money.”

“Just say it. Don’t get misty-eyed on me or something.”

“You’re a Lieutenant, a second-tour Lieutenant, and I’m just a first cruise JG.”

“So?”

“So that means you’re probably a lifer and figure the Navy’s your career. I haven’t come to that point yet, and figure flying around in a 747 would be a pretty good job.”

Woods was puzzled. “What are you trying to say?”

“Before I tell you, I need your promise you won’t tell anybody about this.”

Woods was starting to feel uncomfortable. He had responsibilities in the squadron that went beyond friendship. “Okay,” he said after a long pause.

“It’s Irit.”

Woods smiled suddenly. “So you’re in love. Why don’t you want anyone to know?”

“It’s not that. Well, I guess part of it is… I was in love in college once.” He struggled to express himself. “You ever fall in love a lot faster than you even knew you could?”

“Just once.”

“How did you know?”

“The usual. Every hour I lived when she wasn’t there was like it was wasted.”

“Exactly,” Vialli agreed. “That’s exactly how I feel.”

“This is all about Irit?”

“Yeah. It is. It’s the strongest thing I’ve ever felt. It’s almost scary.”

“Does she feel the same way?”

“I think so.” He hesitated. “You see her hand?”

Woods nodded.

“She only has her thumb and one finger on her right hand. She’s really good at hiding it.”

“Does it bug you?”

“Yeah. And I can’t believe it does. I always thought I was bigger than that. I was horrified.”

“You’ll get over it.” Woods started to push his chair away from the table and get up, but Vialli put up his hand to stop him.

“I’ve got to see her.”

“We’ll be there in a few weeks,” Woods said supportively.

“I can’t wait that long.”

“What’s a few weeks?”

“I can’t explain it.”

“What do you have in mind?”

“I want to take some leave and go there.”

“Where?”

“Israel. Nahariya.”

“Nahariya? Isn’t that way north?”

“I’m not sure—”

“Just wait, Boomer. We’ll be there in a few weeks.”

“I can’t.”

He knew Vialli was impulsive, but he also usually had good judgment. “You know better than to decide things like this just ’cause you’re hot—”

“It’s not like that.”

Woods had his doubts. “What are you thinking about doing exactly?”

“When we pull into Naples I’m going to take leave.”

“And?”

“Fly to Tel Aviv. Commercial. She’s going to pick me up. I’ve already made the reservations.”

Woods sat back. “Skipper will never approve a leave request for Israel.”

“The leave request won’t say Israel.”

Woods immediately understood. “It’ll say Naples? You’re going to put a false destination on it?”

Vialli looked into Woods’s eyes. “You don’t have to put it that way, but yeah.”

“I can’t do that.”

“I’m not asking you to. The Skipper will approve it. I’ll tell him I need some time off. I’ll be back long before we sail.”

“What if we sail early?”

“I’ll take the COD and catch the ship when I can. Same as if I woke up one morning on leave in Naples and saw the big gray ship had left without me.”

“She know about this?”

“I talked to her on the phone the last day we were in Venice.”

“She said it was all right?”

“It was her idea.”

Woods shook his head. “I don’t like it, Boomer. Why’d you tell me all this?”

“You’re my friend. If you see me doing something really stupid you’ll tell me.”

“Okay. I see you doing something really stupid. I don’t even know if we’re allowed to visit Israel on our own. I don’t know if it’s on the list—”

“It’s not. I asked Pritch.”

“Don’t do it,” Woods said.

“Why?”

“It’s illegal. It’s not the safest place in the world. You’re going to lose your wings if you get caught.”

“I’ll be back before you know it.”

“I’m telling you not to go.”

Vialli was taken aback. “Telling me meaning what? An order? You gonna order me not to go?”

Woods had hoped it wouldn’t come to this. “That’s exactly what I’m doing. I’m ordering you not to go.”

“Oh please. It’s my skin.”

“It’s mine too, now. If something happens they’ll be all over me for not stopping you.”

“You can say you didn’t know about it.”

“Just lie?”

“Sure. They won’t know the difference.”

“I sure will. I’m telling you, don’t go.”

“I hear you, and I’m going anyway.”

“I can’t let you—”

“You’re really something,” Vialli said, the veins in his neck straining. “You follow the rules when it suits you. But when you want to have a little fun, like thumping my ass in the middle of the night from a cloudbank, that’s fine! Right? You’re fine with breaking a few rules when it’s you, and you think it’s clever, or funny, or shows how adventurous you are. And I’m just supposed to look the other way, not report you for a flight violation, like I should have. But when it’s someone else who wants to bend one, and not one that’s gonna get us killed, just one to go visit a girlfriend, then you get all high and mighty.” He was angry. “That’s bullshit, Trey!”

Woods was stung. “It’s completely different.”

Vialli got up. “Maybe. But I’m going. If you want to tell the CO and get my ass in trouble, feel free. And if you do, I swear to God I’ll write you up for a flight violation for thumping me. Just try me.”

Before Woods could stop him, Vialli was on his feet, turning his back on his roommate and walking out of the wardroom.