Flight Of The Old Dog

THE WHITE HOUSE SITUATION ROOM

silent ordered.

"Give it to me right now," the President asked. "Yes, sir," General Curtis said enthusiastically The President and the JCS Chairman were alone with the President's aide Jeff Hampton and several Marine guards and military Communications technicians in the White House Situation Room. Curtis looked as spit-shined and polished as alwa, even in these early-morning hours and in spite of the short notice. The President, in sharp contrast, had pulled on a football warm-up suit after receiving the notification and ran down to the Situation Room.

Curtis walked rapidly to the rear of the chamber.

Here, Curtis thought, was a President who wanted acti Quite a switch from the political animal he'd always krim He went over to a large projection chart on the rear wall depicted the State of Alaska and most of Asia. The Kavaz laser complex was highlighted with a large triangles target symbol. Several circles were drawn: large circles around radar sites clustered all along the Russian coastline and near cities, small circles representing defensive surface-to-air-misile sites.

A very large circle was centered over the north Pac midway between Hawaii and the Aleutians-the kill zone the Soviet's new orbiting steerable mirror. The circle enc passed the entire north Pacific, the State of Alaska, all of arctic and even large parts of Canada.

One black-lined route was depicted-the attack route of B-113

Excaliburs, which were still orbiting over the Chu Sea six hundred miles west of Alaska. "The alert was c, 293

because of an unknown aircraft that disappeared from Soviet radar here a hundred and fifty miles south of the Kommandorskiye Islands. It was under radar control from Kommandorskiye Center.

The President looked at him. "Elliott?General Elliott's plane?"

"We know its call sign," Curtis asked. "Lantern. Lantern Four-Five Fox-" "I believe so, sir. It seems he made it.

"Son of a bitch," the President said, not knowing whether he should be elated or worried-he was happy that the Old Dog had done what the B-1s had failed to do, but now it too had been discovered. "What about the Lantern part?"

"Lantern was yesterday's Zulu call sign of SAC's Sixth Strategic Wing at Elmendorf Air Force Base in Anchorage," Curtis asked. "The Sixth has several KC-135 and KC-10 tankers, Plus RC-135 reconnaissance planes."

"So it wasn't Elliott?"

"Well, sir," Curtis said, hesitating, his Kansas draw] leaking through, "we called the Sixth. They had no Lantern Four-Five Fox at all that day They had a fighter drag earliersome tankers escorting F-15s-that flew fairly close to So let airspace on its way to Kadena, but no four-five call sign. Rv lit 9 now, we're checking out some possibilities. Kommandorskiye Center apparently had no flight plan on file for Lantern Four Five Fox. Kommandorskiye was told by Lantern that they would have Kadena Global Command Control relay their flight plan. That's standard procedure for military flight plans.

Meanwhile Kommandorskiye assigned Lantern an identification code and allowed it to continue southward, A few minutes later Kommandorskiye kicked Lantern Out of its airspace because of a malfunctioning identification signal. It was given a heading well clear of Soviet airspace. A half-hour after that Kommandorskiye calls Lantern and says they are seventy miles inside Soviet airspace.

"Inside their airspace?How did that happen?"

"We're not sure but I'm operating under the assumption that Lantern Four-Five is Elliott and his crew. I haven't figured out how he got the fuel-he didn't have nearly enough to fly all the way across the north Pacific Ocean. I should receive some word soon "Then our game is on-for real," the President said. He "Your plan seems to have worked, looked up at Curtis.

General "Yes, sir. When that Russian Air Defense emergency was called, those B-1s were tying up three quarters of the Soviet fighters in the area. The intelligence ship Lawrence didn't report any fighter activity further south. If it is Elliott, and I'm betting it is, he's got quite a head start."immediately. If the Russians find Elliott over the Kamchatka peninsula they'll shoot down the Excaliburs for sure."

"Yes, sir. And if I know those bomber crews they'll put the pedal to the metal getting back here."

"So that shrewd old bastard made it. "The President shook his head, still finding it difficult to believe what had happened.

He turned to Hampton. "Eight A.M Jeff. I want the National Security Advisors, JCS, House Speaker, minority and majority leaders of both houses of Congress and Armed Services Committee chairman of both houses. Request a secure videophone connection with the prime ministers of the NATO countries and the attendance of all available NATO ambassadors. Those who can't meet in the Oval Office will confer via secure videophone.

The President nodded his head decisively "That's when I will inform them of the strike against the laser complex at Kavaznya. "He turned to Curtis. "General, I want you airborne, right away, to direct Elliott's sortie and withdrawal."

Curtis nodded.saluted his Commander-in-Chief, turned and exited the White House Situation Room. As he did so his step was firmer, his eyes brighter than at any time in the past few months "Fox. The same as Elliott's… The President absorbed that, then: "General, recall the B-1s As the Old Dog streaked across the skies of the Kamchatka peninsula in eastern Russia, one of its electronic eyes looked straight ahead and kept the crew of six from crashing into the rugged mountains of the Kamchatka, while other eyes scanned the skies for electromagnetic signals aimed at it, looking for enemies who were looking for them.

It was Dave Luger who controlled the first "eye"-a beam of radar energy that swept in a forty-five degree cone on either side of the Old Dog's sleek nose. If there was an obstacle along the beam's path it would reflect the radar energy directly back to be displayed on Luger's scope.

The other eyes-the sensors and antennas of the electronic countermeasures sYstem-were mostly computer-controlled. A computer would instantly analyze a signal, identify it, determine its danger level and jam it if necessary. Luger's "eye" was different. He constantly had to adjust the radar presentation, search the scope for tiny peaks or ridge lines, be able instantly to evaluate the terrain around them and determine a safe altitude….

Luger suppressed a yawn and directed the stream of cool air from a vent right into his face. He had been leaning forward, intently studying the scope, for the past thirty minutes. The parachute he wore felt like a boot resting on each of his kidneys, but he was afraid to take his eyes off the scope to readjust it. He knew the pilots upstairs were blind-all they could see were some jagged peaks in the gray starlit horizon, which just made them all the more nervous.

Without the terrain-avoidance computer, it was his radar against the mountains. When the scope was clear he would direct a shallow descent until terrain appeared, then climb again until it disappeared. It was like terrain-avoidance in the G- and H-model B-52s-except there was no TV screen for the pilots to watch, no terrain-avoidance trace that gave the pilots an exact picture of the disasters waiting for them. He was their eyes now.

At the moment Luger was watching one particular reflection on his SITUATION scope. It had a range of thirty miles, but for some reason he hadn't seen this large ridge line until it was much closer. Quickly he pressed the interphone button under his left boot.

"High terrain, thirteen miles, twelve o'clock."

Elliott and Ormack both sat up, and Ormack instinctively pushed on the throttles, preparing to pull the Old Dog's nose skyward. "Thirteen miles," he asked. "How come you didn't see it before?"

"Climb first, ask questions later, Colonel.

Ormack gritted his teeth and pulled back on the yoke as soon as he noted a definite increase in airspeed, added five hundred feet to the Old Dog's altitude and leveled off.

"Clear of terrain for thirty miles," Luger reported. Ormack reengaged the low-altitude autopilot and Elliott checked the switch positions.

"I repeat, why the hell didn't you see that terrain earlier, Ormack asked. "The most critical phase of this mission so far and you're asleep down there-" "That's bullshit, Colonel," McLanahan said.

"There's a dozen reasons reasons why terrain won't show until it's closer in, snow, trees, fog.

It sure as hell isn't because anyone's sleeping down here. Maybe you ought to come down here for a while, Colonel, and you keep this hunk of metal out of the dirt-" "Enough. "Elliott told them. He had been quiet ever since aded the S.A-2 missile but was furious now. He glared across at Ormack. "This is no goddamn time for squabbling."cockpit, he said, "John, what the hell is it?Those guys down there sure as hell aren't sleeping and you know it."

"Ah ormack rubbed his eyes, stared straight ahead "I'm sorry, I guess into the inky blackness all around them.

He took a deep breath and tried to rub the kink I'm just beat of his left shoulder. "I guess I've been on the edge ever out since-" lanced over at Elliott. The general was slumped forward He g in his seat, his hands looped over the control yoke, his head awkwardly dangling to one side.

s right "General. "He reached across and shook Elliott shoulder. No response. "Angelina looked forward around "Pereira. Get up here.

her seat and saw Elliott's limp body. She began to unfasten the buckles around her chest and crotch.

"What happened?"

"The general. He's out cold, Pat. "Ormack disengaged the low-level autopilot and started a slow climb, leveling off at five thousand feet, reengaged the autopilot, unfastened his straps and leaned across to help Elliott.fasten his Not until he was far enough over to Elliott to un chest straps did he smell it-the thick, cloying stench of dried blood. The overpowering scent forced his eyes down to Elliott's right leg. The general's fatigue pants from the knee down oozed a crusty red film. His boots stuck to the floor when Ormack tried to move the leg.

The general's face made pale look healthy.me, began to breathe again Ormack shouted the general's name when he saw Elliott's eyes flutter open. Eyes that looked at the instrument panel and somehow found the radar altimeter indicator "We're… we're too high, John "Never mind that, General. "Angelina crawled forward with some web straps cut from her walk around oxygen bottle harness. "Lie back," she said, and turned to Ormack. "We're going to have to tie a tourniquet around that leg. "Ormack nodded. "General, lie still. We're going to lift your leg up so we can tie this around your knee."

"Won't hurt a bit, Angelina," Elliott said, smiling weakly at his gunnery specialist. "I haven't felt anything in this damn leg for three hours."

Ormack and Pereira carefully pulled Elliott's leg up and across the throttle quadrant. Angelina then wrapped the web strap around Elliott's leg beneath the knee and pulled it tight as she could. When she had finished Elliott's leg looked less than half its normal diameter.

"I should have been more realistic about the leg-" "Don't apologize," Angelina asked. "Sometimes the pain 4, just takes over, no matter how hard you try to fight it."

"You sound like you're speaking from experience."

I'm no spring chicken either, General. I know there's some things you can't do a damn thing about."he two looked at each other a moment, then Elliott struggled back into his seat. By the time he refastened his harness buckle, he was near total exhaustion.

Abruptly Ormack ordered Angelina back to her seat as he took a firm grip on the yoke and pushed the Old Dog down once again.

"On the double. We're under attack."

Angelina half-crawled, half-ran back down the narrow aisle to her seat and began strapping herself in. Wendy was studying her video threat display. Every few moments she glanced at the countermeasures receiver set, waiting for the computer positively to identify the new signals and plot their direction from the Megafortress.

As Angelina plugged in her headset she heard Wendy report: "Golf-band search only."

"Position?"

"No clock position yet."

"High terrain, ten miles," from Luger. "Slight climb to clear it."

"Take fifteen degrees right," McLanahan directed, leaning over in his seat and studying Luger's tiny.five-inch display "Looks clear in that direction at this altitude We can't afford to do any more climbs."

Ormack turned the control yoke in a ten degree-bank turn to the right.

Luger asked. "We can "Clear of terrain for twenty miles," les.

turn back to track at this altitude in five mi "Tork?"

"Signal strength increasing slightly but not as fast as I thought.

Rough guess would be the MiG-25s or -31s out of Ossora, Airfield.

Probably converging on our tail at high altitude.

"The 3 Is are their — it'll be the Foxbat-Es," Angelina said.

front-line fighters. They'll send the 25s with external tanks out r position and let the us out-then report you to find us-or draw Foxhounds have us-" "Wendy," McLanahan broke in, "can you tell if they find us?"

"I should be able to see a change in their-" She stopped ignals rapidly abruptly, staring at the large video screen. The s e signals just went to began to change — "Missile alert. One of the tracking mode — " u said-" "But I thought yo ndy asked. "They can't be locked "They're too faraway," We on. Their signal isn't strong enough. "Confused by the sudden threat signals and the responding increase in thrust as Ormack pushed up the power, Wendy hurriedly rechecked her receivers and indicators. All self-tested normal.

SILE LAUNCH indicator blinked on her panel. At the same time a repeater warning light blinked on the front instrument panel in the cockpit.

ced. "Clear for evasive "Missile launch," Ormack announ maneuvers?"

"Clear left and right, ten miles," Luger called out.

"C'mon, Tork, get with it," Ormack asked. "Which way""

1; "It can't be, they're… they're bluffing, wait…

"Pereira. "Ormack was over the edge. "Find those damn fighters."

Before Wendy could answer, Angelina had turned ADIATE.Since there was her tail Scorpion tracking radar to R no azimuth information from Wendy's receiver Angelina began a complete rear-hemisphere sweep behind the Megafortress.

"I don't understand A red MIS "Nothin Angelina reported after several sweeps. "№ 9 in targets for thirty miles."

"They're bluffing," Wendy repeated, sounding surer of herself now. She reached across the defensive compartment and grabbed Angelina's denim jacket. Angelina was still searching her rectangular scope for the fighters.

"They wanted us to turn on our radars," Wendy asked. "They couldn't find us down here so they're faking a lock-on. Stop."

"Angelina, shut down," McLanahan said."if you haven't AN seen them by now, shut down. "Angelina put her radar to STANDBY "Damn Wendy whispered as she studied the video threat receiver. "Back to search radar… signal strength increasing-" An inverted "V" airplane symbol appeared at the bottom of Wendy's countermeasure receiver scope.

"Fighter at six o clock!" A second "V" appeared. "Second fighter, both at six o'clock.

With Ormack having already throttled to military power, the the roar of the eight turbofan engines was deafening sound was amplified as it vibrated off the mountains barely three hundred feet beneath them.

"He's still at extreme detection range," Wendy reported.

"He can't shoot at us down here."

"Scorpions are ready, Angelina said.

"How far until the computer can start driving the auto Pilot?" Ormack asked.

"Still a hundred miles," McLanahan told him.

"We might not make it that long-":"VHF transmissions," Wendy called out.

"Shut them down," Ormack told her. "They'll report our position. "But Wendy was already adjusting her jammers, matching the frequency marker of the jammers with the wavy oscilloscope-like radio transmissions.

" Narrow-scan tracking signals," she asked. "Sweeping around us…

his computer can't find us so it looks like he's searching manually "High terrain, twelve o'clock, seven miles," Luger reported.

"Pretty deep canyon on all sides," McLanahan added quickly. "Better climb over this one. Slow climb."

Ormack slowly pulled back on the yoke and began a gentle two hundred foot-per-minute climb.

"Clearing terrain on either side," Luger asked. "Five degrees left."

Ormack nudged the Old Dog to the left. "Looks like 1I be clear of terrain for thirty miles after this last ridge.

we Level off. This is a good altitude, ridge crossing in ten seconds "Signal strength decreasing," Wendy asked. "He's still trying manual track but he's falling behind."

"Coming up on the ridge "Looks like the fighter behind us lost us "Cresting the ridge now In the dim cockpit Ormack could just make out the sno wcovered ridge line they had just crossed, the mountains harply to a white-covered valley below. "Hey," dropping off s he said, "it looks pretty flat out-" A thunderous explosion echoed just outside Elliott's canopy.

Ormack caught a glimpse of two dark streaks against the hazy stars.

The shock wave hit the Old Dog's nose like a giant invisible hand.

"We nearly had a midair with two of them," Ormack said, and pushed the Old Dog's nose down to the snow-covered plain below, watching the radar altimeter and canopy windows. He leveled the aircraft at two hundred feet. "Terrain-following autopilot reengaged, slaved to the radar altimeter. Set to two hundred feet.

"Clear of terrain for thirty miles," Luger reported.

"The two fighters are turning," Wendy asked. "Infrared tracker has one of them… going high… stabilizing-" A large red MLD light blinked rapidly on Ormack's threat repeater lights.

"Missile launch detection, infrared missile launch," Wendy broke in.

"Break right…"

Ormack lurched the Old Dog into a furious dodge to the right, steered the huge bomber past the maximum thirty degrees of bank. The autopilot, slaved to the now failed radar altimeter, immediately commanded a two-G max climb. That climb command, with the Old Dog now in a forty degree bank to the right, increased the G load on the bomber and tightened the turn.

Simultaneously with the "break" call, Wendy popped two high-intensity flares from the Megafortress' left ejectors. The flares were shot a hundred yards from the bomber and burned hotter and moved slower than the Old Dog. They lowered themselves slowly to the snow-packed ground with tiny streamers as the Megafortress turned hard in the opposite direction.

The fury of the turn shook up Elliott, but he had the presence of mind to watch the altimeters before reaching for the ejection trigger in each armrest. He was scanning the engine instruments, making sure the roar echoing in his confused head was coming from all eight turbofans.

Out of the front cockpit window he spotted two fiery streaks of light flashing past the windscreen and exploding in the valley below.

"Engine instruments okay, John," Elliott reported to Ormack who looked in amazement at the man, barely able to support his head upright, scanning the eight rows of instruments crowded on the forward panel.

"Fighters passing overhead," Wendy said, her report confirmed by the roar of turbojets in full afterburner skimming over the jet-black bomber. "But coming around for another pass."

"Like hell," McLanahan said, pressed the RADIATE button on his attack radar and slaved the azimuth-elevation controls to Wendy's threat receiver. The attack-radar's antenna immediately swung to the azimuth of the fighter and began a heightt:1nding scan of the sky The radar reflection of the attacking fighter only a few miles away showed clear as a mountain on McLanahan's radar, He typed "TRACK I" on his keyboard and a small circle cursor centered itself on the return. The LED azimuth and elevation readouts flickered as the antennas raced to keep up with the retreating fighter.

"Locked on, Angelina," McLanahan asked. "Take over."

Angelina was ready. With Pilot consent already given, she pressed the COMMIT button on the forward Scorpion missile pylons. In one twenty-fifth of a second the fire-control computer selected a missile on the right pylon, gave it the initial elevation, azimuth and distance computations from the attack radar and ejected the air-to-air missile from the pylon down into the Old Dog's slipstream.

The advanced Medium-Range Air-to-Air Missile's gyros stabilized the ten-foot-long missile in the slipstream as if it were a sprinter feeling for a footing in the starting blocks. In the next three hundredths of a second static ports on the missile's body sensed the slipstream around it and armed the Scorpion's one-hundred-pound high explosive warhead. The same sensor set the Scorpion's large thirty-G rear fin to the proper angle, took one last look-around self-test, and fired its solid propellant motor.

Elliott and Ormack saw a blinding flash of light race a few hundred yards ahead of the Old Dog, then suddenly change direction up and over their heads. An instant later a huge fire with a red benaltlireeruupptsetdaijrsusctrbeewhicnodmEpllairottmtesnstidoef wthiend(olwd, Dilolugminating the yellow glare.

"A hit," Elliott said, shielding his eyes from the glare.

"I've got the second low-altitude fighter," Angelina said, confirming the fire-control computer's radar lock on the target.

She held the safety levers of the Stinger airmine rockets down and fired twice.

"Second fighter decelerating," Angelina reported. "Sitting stable off our left rear quarter… slowing… we got him. I think we FODed him out."

"What?" Wendy asked.

"FODed him out. He sucked in an engineful of scrap metal. "Upstairs Wendy signaled a gloved okay to Angelina as the gunnery expert watched the range gate of the fighter rapidly increase as it fell behind.

Wendy noted that her infrared tailwarning seeker had locked itself onto the disabled fighter, but she ignored the indication-Angelina had already tagged that one.

The Soviet pilot aboard the Mikoyan-Gureyvich E-2heM "Foxbat-E" interceptor was preparing to abandon his aircraft.

He was watching two hydraulic system failure-warning lights and two engine overspeed-warning lights, aware that although the flash of light was far behind him he had flown through a cloud of something… he could almost hear the flak rattling around in his engine's turbines, tearing through the hydraulic lines, ripping the compressor blades apart. The intruder, whatever it was, was invisible through the glare of the warning lights on his canopy.

But he did notice one more set of lights-the lock-on indication of two of his K-13A Atoll missiles tracking the intruder. Seconds before power drained from his interceptor, the pilot selected every last one of his remainin missiles, and with his other hand on his ejection ring, pres e sed the missile launch trigger.

Ormack was checking his switches and asking General Elliott cross-cockpit how he was feeling. McLanahan had just put his attack radar to STANDBY and was leaning over to help Luger with terrain calls.

Angelina had completed a quick scan of the rear hemisphere of the Old Dog before putting her radar to STANDBY Wendy was readjusting a twisted parachu strap, trying to unwind a bit from her first real fighter engagement.

But the supercooled eye of the infrared seeker mounted on top of the short curved V-tail of the Old Dog wasn't relaxing. It was tracking the dimming heat signature of the fighter far behind them when it noticed the sudden increase in the heatsignature of the target as two heat-seeking missiles streaked toward the Old Dog's eight Pratt and Whitney TF33 turbofan engines. The increase quickly surpassed the delta-pK thermal threshold programmed into it months earlier by Wendy herself, and an MLD indicator flashed at both Tork's and Ormack's position. Simultaneously with the warning light, the decoy system ejected one bundle of chaff and one phosphorous flare from both left and right ejectors.

The automatic response to the infrared missile attack would have been successful-had anyone noticed the MLD warning indicators and initiated evasive action. The warning tone sounded in everyone's headsets at the same time the light illuminated, but both Ormack and Tork had to be watching for the target on the threat display and expecting the attack to escape the heat-seeking missiles, By the time Wendy noticed the blinking red Missile Launch Detection light, the Atoll missiles had accelerated to nearly Mach 2 and had closed the short distance between them in the blink of an eye.

Even so, the automatic system had its saving effect. The flares, shot two hundred yards away from the bomber's belly, caught the Atoll missiles' attention, providing a momentary distraction. But at less than a mile away the missiles could not ignore the huge globes of heat emanating from the Old Dog's turbofan engines.

One missile locked momentarily onto the right flare, then back onto the right engines. The sudden swing of the I.R seeker head from one hot target to another-a sign that the seeker had picked up a decoy-triggered a proximity detonation signal to the sixty-pound warheads-the missile exploded less than twenty yards from the Old Dog's V-tail vertical stabilizer, blowing off the top nine feet of the Old Dog's right stabilator tail and leaving a short jagged stub of metal where the stabilator used to be.

The other missile took a sideways glance at the decoy flare and swung a few precious feet to the left toward the flare, but it wasn't enough to divert it. Driven by the solid propellant engine just approaching full thrust, it plunged into the exhaust port of the number one engine and detonated. That explosion immediately turned the number one engine into a blob of molten metal and New what remained of the already damaged left wingtip into a shower of fire.

and pulled by one lost engine, skidded violently to the left The Old Dog, pushed by an exploding missile on one side Ormack was able to keep the bomber a fe knots above the stall only because all eight engines were already at maximum thrust. Stomping on the right rudder, he turned the control wheel full to the right. The lights flickered in the crew compartment and the interphone began to squeal.

"We're hit," Ormack reported, and pushed the right rudder hard all the way to the floor. The Old Dog slowly, slowly began to straighten its sideways slide. As it did, Ormack scanned the caution lights and engine instruments, but it was Elliott who noticed the engine instruments while Ormack fought for aircraft control.

"Fire on number one," he called out. Ormack glanced quickly at number one's engine instruments to confirm the call, then pulled the number one throttle CLOSED.Elliott, his hand on the fire-shutoff switch, pulled the T-handle when be saw Ormack's hand reaching for it. He then began reciting the emergency checklist: "Starter switch off."

Ormack checked the switch. "Off."

"Electrical panel."

"Checking," Ormack said, scanning the a-c and d-c electrical panel on his right instrument panel. "Crew, we've shut down number one engine.

Shut off all unnecessary equipment or we'll lose another generator."

He checked the generator panel and confirmed total loss number-one generator.

"All other generators are on high load but they're okay so far."

"Bleed selector switch, normal left hand inboard," Elliott continued, now reading from the emergency checklist displayed On the cockpit computer monitor.

"Normal.

Elliott painfully hauled himself forward out of his seat and strained to look out the cockpit window.

" Fire light has gone out," Ormack confirmed, then began a check of the fuel panel.

"I think we have a leak in the number one wing tank, but it doesn't look too serious. "He reached down to a large knob on the center aisle control stand and cranked in full right-rudder trim. "General, check the rudder hydraulics. We might have a problem with the rudder now."

Elliott checked the warning lights on his left instrument panel. "All the lights are out."

"Well, we got rudder problems, too," Ormack asked. "I'm retarding engines seven and eight to help keep straight.

Number two engine has to stay in military, " Ormack started a slow climb to four thousand feet and carefully engaged the low-level autopilot. He waited a few moments to be sure that the autopilot could hold the Megafor tress straight and level. "All right, we've got control of the aircraft. Pereira, McLanahan, check for fighters before we get too involved in damage assessment.

Angelina and Patrick went to RADIATE on their radars and took careful but fast full hemisphere sweeps of the sky. With both radars operating, they could scan almost three thousand cubic miles of airspace in a few seconds.

"Clear," McLanahan reported.

"No pursuit," Angelina said.

"Scope's clear," from Wendy "A few extremely low Powered search signals The Power fluctuation put some of my jammers into STANDBY but they should reset in a few minutes."

"Clear Of terrain for thirty miles," Luger said.

"All right. "Ormack relaxed his grip on the control yoke.

"We're level at four thousand feet. "We've lost number one engine and its enerator. We can't visually confirm it but I 9 think we lost the rest of the left wingtip. There's a slight leak in the number one wing tank supplying the number two engine but I don't think it's fatal.

Something's also gone haywire with the rudder, it's hard to keep her straight I feel a pretty good shudder in the airmine turret-controls," Angelina asked. "Need to check out the cannon steering. "She activated the Stinger airmine rocket cannon controls and began self-test of her system.

"The navigation system went to STANDBY for a few seconds from dumping.

We're reloading the mission data now from the game cartridge."

In a few moments Angelina was back on the interphone "Colonel Ormack, I think we lost the whole damn tail. My infrared scanner is dead.

Everything's faulted. We won't have any more automatic I.R detection from the tail anymore."

"Well," Luger said, "can't the threat-receiver-" "The threat-receiver only detects fighters when they use their radar," Angelina told him.

"If they get a visual infrared lock-on they can launch missiles at us all day and we can't see them. They can drive in as close as they want and get a point-blank kill."

"The Scorpions," Ormack asked. "What about them?"

"I'm getting a flickering low-pressure warning light on the rotary launcher," Angelina said, checking a set of gauges on her right control panel. "Still in the green, but that last attac.

might have done some missile damage."

"High terrain, thirty miles," Luger reported.

"Any way around it?" Ormack asked.

"Solid rijge line. No other way."

Ormack cursed and nudged the Old Dog skyward. They were almost back at their preestablished five thousand for safe-clearance altitude before Luger finally reported clear terrain.

"Goddamn," Ormack said, "over four thousand feet above the ground-" "But we may belly-flop that ridge line when we cross it, McLanahan reminded him. "We should be able to engage the auto terrain-following computer any second-" "Airborne interceptors at twelve o'clock," Wendy interupted. "At extreme detection range but closing rapidly. Multiple indications."

"And we're stuck up here," Ormack asked. "No other way around it.

Pereira, McLanahan, engage at long range. We' have to blast our way out of here. "No one offered any alternative. McLanahan reactivated.

"Can't see the nacelle, don't see any fire out there… seconds," Luger reported, "but the battery kept everythin Scorpion attack radar and tuned it immediately to fifty-mile range.

Slaved to Wendy Tork's threat receiver, the radar immediately pinpointed the aggressors ahead.

"Locked into one," McLanahan called out. Just as he designated the first target he heard the whoosh of a Scorpion missile leaving the left pylon.

"Locked onto a second One-" "Fighter at six o'clock high," from Angelina. Instantly she activated her own radar and locked onto the fighter. A moment later she gave a look of surprise and reached for the airmine triggers. "Range decreasing rapidly," she asked. "He's diving at us…

"Radar's gone down, " Wendy asked. "And we don't have an infrared scanner to pick up-" "It's an I.R attack," Angelina announced. "Pilot, break right.

Ormack threw the Old Dog into a hard — banking turn to the right. The bomber, already without several thousand pounds of thrust from the number one engine, rumbled in protest, hovering just above a stall.

Wendy punched out two flares from the left ejector while Angelina tried to locate the attacker on her radar.

"I got him, I got him on radar," she said, hit the green TRACK button, watched the circle cursor surround the fighter's radar reflection and squeezed the Stinger airmine rocket triggers.

But the attacking fighter had the advantage. Following a vector to the intruder from his low-patrol mates-both of whom he had lost contact with soon afterward-he had spotted the intruder on radar long enough to point his MiG-25s infrared search-and-track seeker at the penetrator.

Once the seeker had locked onto the target, he had no need for the lookdown radar and turned it off. His AA-7 missile immediately locked onto the two engines on the left inboard nacelle of the Old Dog, and he hit the launch button just as he noticed a short burst of flame from below him.

Angelina's right break had been perfectly timed. The AA-7 missile's I.R seeker lost the engines in the break and locked Onto the flares, but the change was too quick and the proximity and decoy-detection fuse exploded the missile.

Saved from destruction, the Old Dog was nonetheless naked… the missile's high-explosive detonation, together with the one-thousand-degree-Fahrenheit parachute-equipped ares and the low wide burst of an airmine rocket, perfectly fl lined the Old Dog against the snow-covered mountains.

out The MiG pilot attacking from above and behind the Megafortress had watched his missile streak toward the target. Then suddenly he saw a dark silhouette of incredible size. He blinked, not able to believe it as the outline of the massive aircraft materialized below him. A low-attitude warning horn sounded in his helmet, and he managed to pull out of his dive only a few hundred feet above the ground and force his fighter skyward.

Although the sleek nose confused him, there was no misidentifying the rest of the plane. An American B-52 bomber.

He had always thought that if he was called on to defend Kavaznya against attack, it would be against an F-15 or even the American Navy's F-18 or F-14.Never, never an Straining to keep the antediluvian bomber in view as he aging dinosaur like the B-52.

pulled on his control stick and crawled for altitude, he frantically keyed his microphone.

"Aspana. Danger. American B-52 bomber. Paftariti. American B-52 visually identified."

Another warning beep sounded in his helmet. He recognize the stall-warning buzzer, applied maximum afterburner and leveled off to wait for his airspeed to increase. He repeated his warning over the radio, including the bomber's direction and estimated speed.

Could the B-52 possibly have destroyed the other fighters?The MiG pilot had seen what he thought were gunblasts from the puny.50 caliber guns in the tail, but none of the pilots at Ossora would be stupid enough to fly that close to the intruder….

Angelina had to haul herself upright by the armrests of her ejection seat to regain her balance. The sudden turn and the abrupt roll-out had her head spinning and she fought to refocuse. She grasped the triggers and fired twice at the almost stationary fighter.

The last thing the MiG pilot saw was the glass around him seeming to melt like cellophane. His canopy disintegrated a twenty pounds of metal chips from both Stinger rockets sheared through the plastic-laminated canopy, shredding everything in its path. His fighter flew on for several minutes, its pilot sightless and bleeding, before crashing into the low mountains.

"Angelina!Twelve o'clock high!Another MiG coming in fast Bathed in the bright sunburst of the descending flares, the MiG-25 attacking from the nose had a solid visual contact on the intruder.

The Old Dog was approaching a high ridge line, very close to the ridge but well above the snow-covered valley behind, and the attacking MiG was well above the bomber, which was perfectly highlighted. The Russian pilot had to strain, but even after the flare plunged the sky back into darkness the bomber was still visible.

He refocused his eyes on the heads-up display for a few seconds, rapidly checking his instruments to see if he could establish a more reliable shot on the bomber below him. The infrared seeker had not locked on — that would have been difficult unless he was behind the B-52.His tracking radar was randomly locking onto hundreds of targets all over the scopecompletely jammed. Useless. A B-52, he knew, carried more jamming power than ten MiG-25s combined. He shut the radar off, banked hard to the left and began to dive at the bomber, fighting to keep it in sight as he approached the ridge.-..

"He's closing in fast," McLanahan called out. "Ten miles."

Angelina had to take a few precious seconds to select a Scorpion missile and align it with McLanahan's steerin signals, then launched the Mach three missile within six seconds of McLanahan's second warning. Still, in that time the MiG had halved the distance between them.

The MiG's warning receivers immediately detected the missile launch and the pilot quickly switched hands on the stick, activated the forward deception jammers with his right hand, switched hands again and hit the chaff-dispenser on his control stick.

A B-52 launching an air-to-air missile' It was worse than he ever imagined. He could easily see the fiery plume behind the missile below him, pointed his fighter directly at the missile-showing the missile only his smallest radar profile.

The glare from the missile spoiled his night vision some, L the bomber was still in sight. The MiG saw a slight shift in the shape of the missile's plume-instead of a round dot, it was a bit more oblong. He smiled and relaxed his grip on the control stick. The American missile had locked onto one of the false targets his jammers had created.

Instantly he released another bundle of chaff and pulled right and up on his stick. The missile's egg-shaped ball of fire became a long, orange line it harmlessly passed underneath his MiG.

The pilot, who had his eyes squinted against the explosion he had feared as he watched the missile streak past, nc opened his eyes-the huge B-52 was centered in his gunsight Even so he felt he was a heartbeat too late-he should have been firing his cannon before the B-52 entered his sights. He shoved the stick down now to lead the target more, but t' snow-covered ridge line popped into view ahead of t' bomber. He had only an instant left. His finger closed on the trigger and held it until trees began to show on the edge of the ridge, then released the trigger and hauled back on the stic with all his strength…

"The missile missed," Ormack answered as he watched the the Scorpion disappear into the night.

"Break right," McLanahan told him, watching the rad target grow to horrifying size.

The split-second the Soviet pilot had wasted realizing he w, too late for a real kill had saved the Old Dog's life. Twenty millimeter shells plowed into the leadin edge of the Old Do 9 9 left wing where Elliott's cockpit windows had been an insta before. The shells ripped into the left Scorpion missile pylo destroying half of the remaining missiles.

The explosion would have ripped the wing apart, but one ricocheting she fired ajettison squib in the pylon and the entire burning pylon exploded into space. The pylon missed the remaining fragments of the Old Dog's V-tail and the Stinger airmine rock cannon.

The MiG's strafing track continued through the wing and fuselage, piercing the number-two main center wing and forward body-fuel tanks, but the shells created no deadly spar: and dissipated most of their heat in the fibersteel skin of the Megafortress.

Elliott could see sparks flying from the hardpoint where the Scorpion pylon used to be. "Angelina, the left missile pylon's hit.

McLanahan glanced up and checked the selective jettison board on his weapons-monitoring panel. "We lost the whole damned pylon," he called out, deselecting jettison power from the pylon circuitry.

Angelina immediately reached to her overhead circuit breaker panel and pulled a group of circuit breakers. "Pylon deactivated."

"That left wing must be getting awful light. "McLanahan tried for a bit of grim humor.

it was wasted on Wendy, who called out, "Fighter at six o'clock.

"Here he comes again."

"I see him," Angelina said as she steered the circle-cursor on the radar return and hit the TRACK button, then began aligning a weapons-bay Scorpion for launch.

The Soviet pilot saw the missile lock-on indication on his threat receiver and immediately activated his own electronic countermeasures.

Angelina depressed the TRACK button once again. The green light stayed on but the circle cursor kept on walking away from the return.

"He's jamming me," she said, "Switching to manual track. "She deselected radar-track, grabbed the steering handles and carefully tried to position the circle cursor on the fighter.

The Soviet pilot noted the persistent missile-alert signal even though his jammers were breaking the radar lock. He promptly began a series of random S-turns, rapidly closing the distance between them, trying to push his MiG-25 closer to the bomber's altitude.

The Old Dog cleared the ridge line by a scant forty feet, the wingtip vortices snapping fir trees like straw as it skimmed the ridge.

Rooster-tails of snow and dirt were blasted dozens of feet in the air.

Suddenly, a large green TERRAIN DATA PROCESS and TERRAIN DATA GOOD readout flashed across McLanahan's computer monitor. "Computer terrain-following is active," McLanahan asked. "Clear to engage."

Elliott and Ormack quickly engaged the terrain-followingpitch autopilot to the navigation computers. Now the computer, which already knew the elevation of all the terrain around them for thousands of square miles and had the accuracy of the satellite navigator for positioning, would put the Old Dog at the lowest possible altitude but climb her in anticipation of terrain ahead.

Through the MiG-25's windscreen the B-52 could be seen diving sharply toward the rocks below and disappearing. From radar, infrared, visual, everything. The pilot searched. No sign. The huge bomber had disappeared. Swearing into his mask, he throttled back and climbed to begin a search.

"I can't find him," Angelina asked. "I can't lock onto him. His jamming is too powerful. We can try a home-on jam launch but we don't have the missiles to waste."

"He's back there, waiting for us to pop up into him," Luger said, staring at the radar altimeter readout on his computer screen. "He's not going to drive into our laps. "He sucked in his breath as the readout dipped to thirty feet before climbing again to a hundred feet above the ground.

"We've got to suck him in," McLanahan asked. "Draw him in, then chop the power."

"He'll blow us out of the sky," Ormack asked. "We're staying down here."

"He's also vectoring in his buddies," McLanahan asked. "If he doesn't get us in the next five minutes he's gonna have lots of help."

"We've got a dozen missiles left," Ormack said.

"Great, but we can't take on all of them. "McLanahan shook his head.

Ormack was about to answer when Elliott put a hand on his wrist. "We have no choice, John."

"If we can't find him, General," Ormack yelled over the roar of the turbofans, "if we lose him… if he shoots first "We've got to be the hunter, not the hunted," Elliott said.

The two pilots looked at each other. Then Elliott took the throttles from Ormack, placed a tight grip on the yoke and gave it a shake.

"I've got the aircraft."ormack looked at the exhausted general as a wave of turbulence rumbled through the bomber. "We're taking a big gamble, General.

"Now's the time for one, John."

Orinack nodded. "You've got the aircraft, General."

"Thanks, John. Stand by on airbrakes and gear."rmack reached across the throttle quadrant and put his hand on the gear lever.

"Wendy?Angelina?"

Angelina nodded at Wendy who reported, "Ready, General. "Landing and taxi light-switches off. Setting two thousand feet. "Elliott twisted the clearance plane knob from COLA to 2000, and the Old Dog's SST nose angled skyward.

powered The Soviet pilot was busy cursing himself and his low radar when the American B-52 suddenly appeared from here just off to the right of his MiG's nose. The radar range now gate immediately set, azimuth locked on and his last AA-3 radar missile aligned and reported ready for launch.

"He's right behind us," Angelina called out.

:"Missile alert," Wendy followed, and hit the right chaff ejector.

"Jink left."

Elliott put the Old Dog in a sharp turn to the left just as the MISSILE ALERT indication changed to a MISSILE LAUNCH.

"Missile launch, break left!" Wendy punched out eight bundles of chaff from the right ejector as Elliott threw the bomber from a twenty to a forty-five degree bank to the left.

The MiG pilot watched in frustration as another huge radar target appeared on his scope. The aiming reticle moved across to the bigger, brighter, unmoving blob just as he thumbed the LAUNCH button… and watched as his last missile disappeared into empty space.

Immediately he shoved the throttles of his twin Tunnansky engines to maximum afterburner and swerved to the left to get into cannon-firing position…

"Range decreasing rapidly," Angelina asked. "Still no automatic lock-on. I'm setting the detonation range for the airmines manually.

"Range decreasing," Wendy reported. "Stand by for a break to the right."

"If we have our gear and airbrakes hanging out," Ormack said, "and then break to evade a missile we'll stall for sure. We may not have enough altitude to recover.

Three miles and closing fast," Angelina said.

"if he was going to launch one, he'd do it now," Wendy asked. "Two miles. "She was staring hard at the threat video.

The bat-wing interceptor threat symbol hovered behind them, inching closer and closer. "Approaching one mile… now.

Hit it.

"Gear. Airbrakes six," Elliott ordered. Ormack dropped the landing-gear handle and flipped the airbrake lever full up. The Old Dog pitched down, throwing everyone hard against his shoulder straps.

Elliott brought the power back to eighty percent, then quickly back to full military thrust as the initial buffet to stall again rumbled through the bomber. He had lost a thousand feet before he was able to bring the Old Dog under control.

The Russian pilot wasn't caught unaware. He had just throttled back to cut his closure rate on the B-52 when he noticed the radar range gate rapidly decreasing.

He immediately disregarded the indication. He had no radar guided missiles to launch anyway, and the B-52's jamming probably had broken the range lock. Catching glimpses of the huge bomber's outline against the snowy backdrop, he kept his power in minimum afterburner and rested his finger against the cannon trigger: The range gate wound past one thousand meters-well inside firing range. He stepped on the right rudder to completely align himself, and took a deep breath.

He saw several bright flashes of flame from the rear of the bomber, instinctively rolled his fighter left to begin S-turning behind the B-52.The.50-caliber machine gun could never hit the bomber without reliable radar guidance, he thought, and his own twenty-millimeter shells had a greater range and reliability. He started a right roll and pressed the trigger.

The flashes of light suddenly grew into huge, pulsing shafts of color.

Immediately he threw his fighter into ninety degrees of bank to the right and pulled on the stick, breaking hard away. He caught a glimpse of his airspeed indicator-in his attempt to match speed with the intruder he had allowed his airspeed to decrease drastically..

He rolled until the stall-warning horn came on again, then rolled out.

His stick would not respond to his control. He was A inking fast, in the grip of a near-stall. His MiG-25 wasn't s made for low-altitude intercepts, it was designed for fast high altitude dog-fighting. It was with huge relief that he saw his airspeed increasing steadily. Ochin. In a moment, he thought, he'd finish this Amirikanskaya.

He looked out the left side of his canopy just in time to see a colorful line of fireworks explode less than fifty meters outside his canopy, the blossoms of light reminding him of starburst fireworks he had once seen-big and bright with thousands of tiny stars racing out from a red center.

A moment later those stars riddled the entire left side of his MiG-25.

The canopy became one giant mass of holes and jagged cuts, yet somehow stayed intact, but the left engine flamed out immediately, then seized as the engine oil drained from a hundred punctures in the engine cowling.

The radar signature of the MiG blossomed momentarily as the Soviet pilot ejected from his stricken fighter, but neither Wendy nor Angelina noticed. Angelina was congratulating her partner, who was busy watching her frequency video display. One transmitter band at the top of her display began to show low power, high-energy activity.

She watched it, studied it-and her sweat turned cold.

"Activity, Wendy?" Ormack asked amid the quiet jubilation of the Old Dog's crew.

"Search radar… twelve o'clock."

"Identification?"

Wendy answered, but the words were uttered too softly to be understood.

"Say again?"

"Kavaznya. "Wendy's voice was flat now, emotionless.

"Kavaznya. The laser. It's looking for us."