Nuke Zone

10

“It’s working–there’s no doubt about it.” The Naval Aviation captain first rank looked pleased.

“But the Americans? We believe they’re headed toward our facilities for an examination of their catapult.” Yuri spread his hands to indicate his lack of comprehension. “How does that show that we have been successful?”

The captain’s smile broadened. “You have not heard the news, obviously. The foolish Turks have done exactly as we anticipated. They have activated the minefield in the Strait.”

The captain’s voice turned grim. “Unfortunately, the first casualty was our submarine.”

“Then the Americans-” Yuri started.

“Are trapped in the Strait. An excellent tactical position–unless you are an American.” The captain chuckled lightly. “It certainly makes our targeting and anti-air-defense problems much simpler, does it not?”

Yuri nodded, letting a smile settle on his face. It would not do to appear anything other than completely enthusiastic at this point. It was clear that there were circles within circles, aspects of this plan that he had never been briefed on.

But since when had they bothered to brief him on anything of relevance?

Even the details of this weapon hung on his wings were classified. A ridiculous state of affairs, not to even know what weapon you were firing.

“Moreover, I believe a window of opportunity is now opening,” the captain continued, evidently satisfied with Yuri’s expression of understanding. “We have many sources of information–two nations cannot be this close together without developing certain sources.”

“Sources?” Yuri immediately wished he could call the question back.

An officer was told what he needed to know–he did not question. It was all too easy to see how his one-word query could be taken as a sign of political unreliability, particularly in these unstable times.

Evidently, however, the captain was in a garrulous mood. “The entire Turkish command structure,” he confided, “is riddled with spies. Our spies. We know exactly what they’re going to do moments after they decide themselves.”

A self-satisfied look spread across his face. “Many of these sources I helped develop myself.”

“Impressive.” Yuri breathed a sigh of relief. A brief expression of admiration always went well with the captain.

“And we now know that they are planning to avenge their honor–that is how they put it.”

The captain laughed. “As if they had any. And they certainly won’t after today.”

“They never did,” Yuri commented idly.

“They will be launching an air attack on the aircraft carrier. An air attack–imagine it. It will be devastating to both sides. The aircraft carrier already has many of its fighters airborne, and it can rely on the weapons aboard the Aegis cruiser Shiloh. If the Turks have any sense, they’ll hold until the aircraft are running low on fuel, then launch.”

Yuri could see the picture now, unfolding in all of its complexity.

By shooting a tactical nuclear weapon at the Americans while pretending to be a Turkish aircraft, he had provoked the aggressive stand of the Americans. At the same time, Turkey was outraged that the Americans believed she had provoked the attack. To avenge Turkey’s honor–he nodded his head, now understanding. Yes, that would have been a cultural certainty. And based on his experience with the Turkish air force, he would bet that they would have considered the question of fuel.

“So you will prepare to launch in one hour,” the captain continued.

“While they are preoccupied with Turkey, we will launch a massive preemptive strike, along the same mission plan as before. We can circle with ease over Turkey–after all, all of their interceptors will be otherwise occupied at that time, will they not?”

“Truly brilliant,” Yuri said numbly. The weapons load–what would he be launching with?

Another nuclear weapon?

It bothered him, even though the tactical first use of tactical nuclear weapons was well established in their military thought. It had always been viewed as a normal part of any battle for the Soviet Union–and now Ukraine–to take an aggressive posture against any force by introducing overwhelming force at the earliest possibility. Tactical nuclear weapons had always been part of that plan.

But why wouldn’t they tell him?

If it were truly in accordance with military doctrine, and truly a part of the Ukraine’s national military strategy, then why weren’t officers allowed to know that?

Why were they launched blindly, carrying weapons about which they’d been inadequately briefed?

And what were the possibilities of collateral damage?

In particular, to his own aircraft. Had he not immediately dived low and put airspace between himself and the first launch, there was a good chance that the EMP would have wiped out the avionics on his aircraft as well. He shuddered at the thought of being downed by his own weapon.

Yuri stood, carefully concealing the confusion whirling in his brain.

“It will be an honor, of course,” he said, saluting sharply. “I will go prepare for briefing immediately.”

“Where the hell is the carrier?” Bird Dog fumed. “Dammit, she’s-“

“She’s a little busy right now,” Gator pointed out mildly. “You think there’s a possibility of mines ahead, you wanna be real careful where you take your only airport. Makes sense to me.”

“Me too, I suppose,” Bird Dog admitted. “But dammit, we’re going to be getting low on fuel before long.”

The Tomcat, along with twenty other fighters off the carrier, was loitering just inside the Black Sea. Shiloh and Jefferson were supposed to be through the Strait by now, their reliefs launching from the ready deck.

At least that was the plan before the whole situation went to shit.

“Besides, we’ve got a tanker airborne,” Gator continued. “The Hornets are already sucking down,” Bird Dog said grimly. “Thirsty little bastards, they are.”

“I heard that,” the sharp voice over the tactical circuit snapped. “We ain’t thirsty, we just got a high metabolism. Accounts for all that muscle, you know.”

Gator laughed. “Muscle, huh? The only muscle you’ve got is from doing push-ups on the flight deck.”

“That’s Thor,” Bird Dog said, disgusted. “Goddamn Marines ought not to be flying–they ought to be down in the mud, like they’re supposed to be. Do you know what the Army calls the Marines? Pop-up targets.”

“Funny guy. There’ll be enough mud up here, if it comes to that,” Thor pointed out. “Besides, against one of those little MiG bastards, you want a Hornet. Not a Tomcat.”

Bird Dog yanked the Tomcat back into a steep climb, effectively reducing his speed over ground to zero. The jet rocketed up, its high power-to-weight ratio sending it screaming past the lighter Hornet.

“Muscle, huh–can you do this?”

“Bird Dog, cut it out.” Gator’s voice was sharp. “Gas ain’t something we wanna be wasting up here. Get back down to most economical loiter speed.”

Reluctantly, Bird Dog leveled off into stable flight. The Hornet, which had given chase, was still five thousand feet below him. “If he wants a muscle car, he ought to be in a Tomcat. Not that lightweight piece of shit.”

“You got a thing about wingmen?” another voice snapped over the circuit. “Because if you do, you’d better tell me now.”

“Oh, shit,” Bird Dog groaned. “I forgot about the kid.”

“Didn’t forget–just decided not to think about it, right?” Gator said out loud, his voice barely audible in the cockpit.

“Whatever.” Bird Dog flipped one lazy hand toward the backseat. “Don’t know why I have to be baby-sitting him. Damned nugget’s just on the boat a week.”

“Because this is a training mission. At least that’s what it was briefed as. That’s the only reason you’re flying, you know. And me too.”

Gator’s voice was infinitely patient. Over the last several cruises, he’d been a prime baby-sitter himself, keeping his feisty young lieutenant pilot in check from the backseat.

Baby-sitting–if anybody knew anything about that, it was Gator.

“Still, I don’t see why we have to do it,” Bird Dog continued, blithely oblivious to Gator’s sarcasm. “After all, you and I are the most experienced combat pilots around.”

“For now.”

Skeeter’s slow Southern drawl was grim. “That crap about baby-sitting–from what I hear, you need one yourself. Sir.”

“He’s got you, Bird Dog,” Gator said, laughing. “Any pilot who’d go off and leave his wingman needs one.”

“Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah,” Bird Dog muttered. He glanced down at the fuel gauge again. His stupid little stunt had cost him more than he wanted to admit. “Let’s go see if we can hit the tanker, how about it?”

“On your wing,” Skeeter chimed in. “We could use some too.”

“Skeeter, the only thing I want to hear from you from here on out are two things: the word ‘two,’ acknowledging my directions, or the phrase ‘Lead, you’re on fire.’ You got that?”

“Two.”

The other Tomcat moved in closer, glued itself into the appropriate position on Bird Dog’s wing, and cycled through the gentle turn toward the carrier with him.

Gator flipped over to the ICS. When he was certain that no one else could hear him, he said, “Bird Dog, sometimes you are such an asshole.”

Yuri walked out of the hangar and paused for a moment to survey the aircraft arrayed up and down the flight line. A slight breeze blew in off the Black Sea, warm and humid in the temperate early fall. The dull roar of aircraft engines turning over, winding up into a high-pitched feral scream, filled the air, accompanied by the sharp staccato of aircraft maintenance workers and technicians. Aviation fuel mixed with salt air, forming the peculiar tang he always associated with this base.

His MiG was parked at the end of the line, away from the rest of the aircraft. A junior technician stood a lackadaisical guard watch over it.

Yuri headed for his aircraft, walking slowly to survey the other craft parked along the line in order to later compare them with his own bird.

The MiG-31 was not a radical departure from previous airframes–lighter, packed with advanced avionics, with a peculiar jutting radar dome near the front. Her skin was smooth and bright, washed daily to prevent the salt air from corroding her. She was still new, so new that no maintenance dings and dents marred her finish. The patina laid down by the factory still glistened in the sun.

He exchanged a few words with the guard, then dismissed him. No one had attempted to approach the aircraft. Despite the alleged secrecy of the project, almost everyone on the flight line knew that there was something special about this bird. Even if the rumor mill had not been operating at full force, the presence of an armed guard alongside the bird would have sparked their curiosity.

He pulled out his laminated checklist and began the preflight. Tires, struts–he jiggled each fuselage panel to make sure it was securely latched. He paused at the weapons hung on the wing, checking the safety streamers plugged into the firing circuit. His plane captain accompanied him.

Plane captain. Spy, most likely. Ukrainian politics intruded on almost every aspect of a pilot’s life. No doubt the secret police got regular reports on his conduct around his aircraft. If his political reliability were ever called into question–no, he wouldn’t let that happen.

Still, even aware of the scrutiny of the man, Yuri paused to examine the weapon more closely. It looked like any normal anti-air missile, sleek, deadly, and far larger than a civilian would have thought. There were no special markings on it, no indications of its warhead.

But there was something odd about it–there had to be, based on the mission briefing he’d been given. He spent a few more seconds looking at it, always aware of the plane captain’s scrutiny. Finally, he finished his circuit around the aircraft, and approached the pull-down stairs inset into its left side.

“A good flight, Comrade,” the plane captain said. He followed Yuri up the ladder, leaned over into the cockpit, and helped him secure his ejection harness to the safety points. Finally, satisfied that everything was in order in the cockpit, the plane captain climbed back down. He walked under the aircraft, pulled the safety streamers out of the weapons lockout, and held them up for Yuri to see.

Yuri made a motion with his hand. The technician spread the streamers out so that he could count them.

Finally, satisfied that his weapons were ready for use, Yuri gave the technician another hand signal. The plane captain nodded, moved over in front of the aircraft, and began signaling him to turn on the engines.

The light-up sequence went smoothly, the plane captain in full control of the aircraft’s conduct while it was still on the ground. After all preflight checks, and a final sweep of the stick by Yuri to ensure full and complete movement of each control surface, the plane captain snapped up to attention and rendered a sharp salute.

Yuri returned it, then slowly eased off the brakes and turned the nimble jet toward the landing strip.

With his release by the plane captain, control of his aircraft shifted to the tower. Shortly after he was airborne, the ground-control-intercept officer would take control, giving him detailed instructions and vectors.

Yet even chafing under the continuous and all-pervasive surveillance, Yuri felt the familiar sensation of freedom slip over him. At least here, inside the aircraft, there was no one watching every expression on his face. No one to comment that he took too long over lunch, was late for a political-reliability meeting, or otherwise exhibited some small sign that could wreck his career. There was no one–just him and his aircraft, with the GCI officer a tolerable annoyance as merely a voice over the radio circuit.

After waiting for a flight of MiG-29’s to vacate the airstrip, Yuri commenced his roll-out. The MiG-31 took barely one third of the runway to come up to rotation speed. He felt the general shift in the aircraft’s center of gravity as it eased up off the concrete and grabbed air, gently buffeted by ground effect. Seconds later, he rotated and was free.

Mike Packmeyer loitered at the small cafe near the Naval base. It was almost deserted, as most of its customary clientele were still at work at the base. In the next thirty minutes, the first of the early lunch crowd would start filtering in. Until then, only two other tables were occupied, and those with pensioners.

The cell phone rested on the table in front of him, fresh from the recharger. It should be good for another twelve hours, if the advertisements were correct. Still, he counted on no more than six. After that, he’d swap battery packs.

With events proceeding at this pace, twelve hours looked like a long time away.

So just what was going on?

Once again, he entered the circular logic of motives and opportunities that defined international relationships in this part of the world. He was still no closer to an answer, but his gut conviction that everyone had the wrong read on this situation was growing.

That was the reason he was here. The lunch crowd was often noisy, and he’d eaten here often enough that his presence would go unremarked by the regular patrons. A few comments, someone slipping up and letting out a small piece of the puzzle, and he’d have it. Have it, and the story would be all his. Pamela Drake might be out on the aircraft carrier, but he was right here, right here where the story was breaking. He felt a gleeful satisfaction at being the first one to beat Pamela to the punch.

The cell phone rang, startling him out of his delightful reverie of edging out Pamela Drake. He reached for it, jabbed the answer button, and snapped, “Packmeyer.”

“Uh–Mr. Mike Packmeyer?” a voice on the other end said cautiously. “The reporter?”

“Yes. You’ve got him. Who’s this?”

American–most definitely, from the accent. That’s not one they acquired in four years of college or through self-study. No, that’s the genuine thing.

Still, he proceeded cautiously. “You’ve got this number–you must know it’s me.”

“Yes. Of course. Mr. Packmeyer, my name is Commander Hillman Busby.”

“United States Navy?”

“Yes. I’m not prepared to go any further than that in identifying myself. Not on an unsecure line. There’s no chance you can get to a STU-3 phone?” the voice inquired hopefully.

Mike grimaced. “Not hardly. You folks haven’t been too eager to give reporters access to top-secret secure telephone lines.”

“The American Embassy-“

“Listen,” Packmeyer broke in, “if we go through all the security bullshit, we’re going to be sitting out in the cold. Things are moving too fast–too fast to bother with that.”

A long silence. “I think you’re right,” the voice said finally.

“You’re on scene–I’m not. You made a call this morning–is there anything I should know about? My source at this end vouches for your reliability.”

The aircraft carrier. Mike knew it to a certainty, although the solid endorsement from Pamela Drake puzzled him momentarily. His motives at this point were a little bit different from hers. “Things are gearing up. I’m at Izmir–you know it?”

“All too well. Izmir has certain capabilities. How much of that are you familiar with?”

“Very familiar with the capabilities someone in your position would be concerned about,” Mike replied with grim satisfaction. “That’s why I’m here. I’m hoping to pick up something from the luncheon trade that may shed some light on our situations–both yours and mine.”

“No specifics yet?” The officer’s voice was suddenly hard and demanding. “I need anything you can tell me–we’ll sort it out here, but give it all to me. No filtering–even your worst rumors. And your opinions, if you will clearly indicate that’s what they are.”

“Got it.” Mike proceeded to fill in the anonymous voice on the other end. “Increased troop movements, and ships seem to be gearing up to go to sea. I see black smoke, people moving, and lots of traffic headed into the base–but none coming out.”

“These other facilities–you understand we’re quite interested in them.”

“No information,” Packmeyer reported with regret. “Is there a number I can reach you at?”

“Yes.” The officer reeled off a series of numbers preceded by the international code for accessing one particular satellite. “It’ll cost you about nine bucks a minute, but we’ll cover the cost. I think you know where to find us.”

“I do indeed. And from the looks of it, you’re not going anywhere else anytime soon.”

“Thank you, Mr. Packmeyer,” the officer said politely. “We appreciate your assistance in this matter. Rest assured it will not go unnoticed. Or unrewarded.”

“Thanks, buddy, but there’s one thing you people seem to forget sometimes. The rest of us are Americans too.”

Another silence. “Some people have different priorities.”

“Not me,” Mike shot back promptly. “Sure, I want the story–but for now, it takes second place behind this. As soon as I hear something, you’ll hear it from me first. Not on ACN.”

“Good enough.”

The line went dead, hissing static and odd echoes that were so common on cell-phone circuits in this part of the world.

Packmeyer toggled the phone off and set it back down on the table.

Interesting, that–a telephone call from, if he were not sadly mistaken, the USS Thomas Jefferson. And just who the hell was Commander Busby?

“And that’s the gist of it,” Lab Rat said, finishing up a summary of his conversation with Mike Packmeyer. “A good source, and it sounds like he knows what he’s doing.”

Tombstone turned to Pamela. “Does he?” he said bluntly.

Reluctantly, Pamela nodded. “He’s been in this area of the world for a long time. He knows the people, knows the normal movements–and what’s not normal. He’s been on a desk for a long time, but Packmeyer has good instincts.”

A guarded expression crept across her face. “Are you going to tell me what he tells you? I mean the next time?”

Tombstone considered the matter. “Maybe. It depends.”

“On what?” Pamela said, pressing the matter.

“On whether or not I decide to at the time,” Tombstone shot back. “No promises, Pamela. I’m not certain about this Packmeyer fellow, but I know what your priorities are. If he’s telling us the truth, then his are a bit different. At the same time, I’m not going to screw him over by feeding his stories to you if it’s going to hurt him.”

Pamela shook her head angrily. “You just don’t get it, do you?”

Tombstone shook his head. “No, I get it. You’re the one that won’t.”

“We’re only five miles from open water,” Batman said. “Five miles–dammit, you can see it from the bridge.”

The staff assembled around the table was silent. They all knew what their status was. Surrounded by a potentially activated minefield, the safest course was to simply sit where they were and wait for minesweeping help before proceeding.

But they didn’t have that luxury–not this time. Activating the minefield by itself was an act of war, and that didn’t even take into account the earlier attack on La Salle. Trapped here, not even moving forward at bare steerage, the carrier had lost its most potent weapon, the ability to launch and recover aircraft. Additionally, there were twenty fighters orbiting forty miles ahead over the Black Sea. Sooner or later, the tankers would exhaust their reserves and the fighters would be running on fumes.

Within the next hour, Batman would have to make the decision whether or not to bingo the fuel-starved aircraft to the naval base in Greece–that is, assuming that Greece would grant them landing rights.

Or Ukraine. He frowned, not wanting to consider that possibility.

Ukraine’s offer of assistance with the catapult had seemed wrong to him from the very first, as it had to Tombstone. Had it not been for the insistence of the State Department, the carrier would have remained in the relative safety of the Med, able to turn into the wind and generate enough airspeed across the deck to launch and recover aircraft. With the bare twenty fighters bingoing back and forth from an airfield somewhere, the carrier was almost completely exposed. Exposed, and trapped.

“Admiral, at least the Shiloh is with us,” his Chief of Staff said. “She’s a pretty potent ship.”

Captain Daniel Heather, CO of the Shiloh, who had ferried over by helo for the conference, nodded. “If we let the Spy One run the engagement, we can target and engage more incoming missiles and aircraft than any ship in the Navy.”

He frowned. “Of course, you all know the problem with sea-skimmers. The probability of kill is high–but not that high.”

“And this close to land, the odds go down dramatically,” the Air Operations officer chimed in. “Admiral, we need air cover–there’s no way around it.”

“I know that,” Batman said heavily. “We need our deck back.”

He turned to Captain Heather. “And as much as I hate to say it, there’s only one way I know to do that–break out of the Strait and get into the Black Sea.”

Captain Heather was a tall, muscular man. Pale blond hair cropped short topped blue eyes and a genial open face. He stared at Batman for a moment, a puzzled expression on his face. Then he paled markedly. “You’re serious?” he said, reading the admiral’s mind. Heather’s soft Georgia accent made the question sound mild. “We can do it, Admiral, but the cost is going to be hellacious.”

Batman nodded. “I know. But we’ve got no options right now. None at all. We can’t go back the way we came–that’s too far. Clear water lies five miles ahead, and there are no minesweepers around. As much as I hate to say it, the priority at this point is on the carrier. That means Shiloh takes point. You’ve got minesweeping duty, Captain.”

Captain Heather tried for an optimistic look. “It could be worse. Most of these are older mines, tethered near the surface. Some good lookouts, the motor whaleboat going out ahead, sonar will probably pick up most of them. The fifty-caliber-gun crews can detonate some of them, and we’ll vector around them if they can’t.”

Batman recognized and silently applauded the man’s courage. He was overstating the odds by a good deal, but you had to give him credit for recognizing the situation and realizing that Batman had only one possible choice. “You’ll want to get back to your ship soon, Captain,” Batman said gravely. “You have some preparations to make. For starters, I’d recommend having everyone up above the waterline.”

The captain nodded. “We’ll be buttoned up completely, you can count on it. If I may take my leave, Admiral?”

Batman nodded. “Godspeed. We’ll see you in the Black Sea. Be ready to get underway in twenty minutes.”

Precisely twenty minutes after his conversation with Admiral Wayne, Captain Heather began inching Shiloh forward. Two motor whaleboats as well as his own gig were in the water, arrayed in a loose half-diamond formation in front of the Aegis cruiser. They were each manned with a boat crew, and were proceeding slowly ahead, carefully scanning the water in front of them. Gun crews were just inside the skin of the ship, waiting to try their skills on any mines.

Shiloh herself was buttoned up for battle, setting full General Quarters stations. The ping of the sonar reverberated throughout the hull as she searched the water ahead with her underwater sensors, trying desperately to generate an active return off any mines ahead.

Captain Heather was on the bridge, pacing back and forth, adding his own eyes to the barrage of faces turned toward the water ahead.

The Shiloh was tough, built for survivability, especially against EMP–but not that tough. Even an ancient mine, cheap and easily obtainable by any nation in the world, could do her serious damage. At the very least, if it hit the forward part of the ship, it would blind her, ripping off the massive sonar dome that protruded down into the water from her bow twenty-eight feet.

“Another possible,” the OOD announced. It was the third alert in the last five minutes. “They’re vectoring to check it out.”

“Anything from sonar?”

The captain tried to keep his voice calm, but despite his best efforts, tension edged up on the bridge. “No, Captain. Not a thing.”

“Warn the gun crews. We’ll detonate it if we can.”

He took a moment to watch the others on the bridge, noting the stark concentration and fixed gaze on every man and woman’s face. This was one of the most deadly effects of a mine, much like the effects of a submarine–the sheer terror, the gut-wrenching uncertainty that it evoked in any surface ship. There was danger beneath the waves, unseen and undetectable. The small metal casings of the mines were generally below the ship’s detection threshold. A minesweeper, equipped with an SQR-14 sonar set, a high-frequency, specialized piece of gear designed specifically for this purpose, could ferret them out of their hidey-holes.

If he had one. That, and a Special Forces team to disarm the ones too deep to reach with the fifty-cals.

But they didn’t. All they had was the Shiloh, and the aircraft carrier two thousand yards behind her that desperately needed open ocean.

“Sir?” The OOD turned toward him, his eyes fixed on the water ahead.

“There may be counters,” he concluded quietly, “and we might not see them in time.”

“I know. Let’s just make sure we find them before we have to worry about that.”

He tried to smile.

“We’ll get’em, Captain.” The OOD’s voice was firm and clear. He took a deep breath, turned back toward the watch crew, and issued a stream of orders and encouragements that steadied them.

A good man–how the hell do we build them like that?

Not a one of them over thirty, most of them are under twenty-five, and they’re doing a job that no one else in the world can do.

In that moment, the Captain of the Shiloh, a man with twenty-five years in the Navy and five at-sea commands, was so proud of his crew he could have cried.

He turned away from the OOD to hide the expression on his face. Just as he did, the ship rocked violently to starboard. Seconds later, water geysered up on the port side, spewing against the bridge window glass and splashing against the closed bulkheads.

The captain lost his balance as Shiloh pitched further and further to starboard, and loose gear and sailors slid across the deck toward the starboard side. He felt himself skid, and hit the deck hard with his right hip.

His eyes sought out the inclinometer. Twenty degrees, twenty-five–the red needle tipped toward thirty, then passed it.

Thirty-five degrees, forty. He knew a moment of despair, and yelled, “Come on, Shiloh! You can do it, you can do it,” urging the ship to recover from the roll.

The screams from the crew on the deck and throughout the ship almost drowned him out. Even braced as they were for the possibility of a mine, sailors would be thrown free, rammed into gear, and pinned by sliding equipment. Shiloh was built to take punishment, but serving as a minesweeper had never been in her design specs.

The moment lasted forever. Slowly, imperceptibly at first, he felt the ship hesitate in her downward swing. She hung there, suspended between water and sky, the ocean clearly visible through her starboard hatch porthole, far closer than it had any right to be.

The heel back to port started slowly, the barest shift in her deck evidence of her center of gravity taking control of the problem. The rate of change accelerated markedly, and Shiloh rocked violently to port, almost as far as she had to starboard. Injured sailors slid back across to the other side of the bridge, frantically grasping for a handhold, arms flung around the radar repeater, the corner of the plotting table–anything to stop their mad plummet from side to side as the ship rocked.

It seemed an eternity, but three minutes later the Shiloh settled into a five-degree list to starboard. Damage-control reports began pouring in from the outlying teams.

The captain swore violently and turned to the OOD, who was just regaining his feet. The OOD had his weight all on one leg, the other one trailing oddly behind him. He clutched his arm close to him, white and pasty-faced.

“Are you okay?” the captain asked.

The OOD started to crumple. The captain darted forward, grabbed him, and laid him out flat on the deck. He turned to the boatswain’s mate of the watch. “The corpsman–get him up here as soon as you can.”

“Aye, aye, Captain–but Damage Control just reported he’s down in the mess decks with two critically injured sailors.”

The captain turned to the junior officer of the deck. “You have the deck, mister. Get me a damage-control status.”

He glanced at the JOOW–the junior officer of the watch. “You still have the conn.”

Noting that both men looked stricken and shaken, he added, “Just do it the way we’ve trained. That’s all I ask. If you have any questions, speak up. But for now, you have my complete trust and confidence. Get hot.”

He turned his attention away from the ship and back to the frantic messages from the damage-control teams being relayed over the sound-powered telephones. They’d taken a hit to port and the mine had opened up a two-foot, almost circular jagged hole on the forward bow. Sonar had dogged the compartment down. They reported there was little chance of repairing the damage, but that they would simply maintain watertight integrity.

“Did everyone get out?” the captain asked tersely. He could see it in his mind, one of the moments he dreaded and saw in his nightmares–men trapped behind a dogged-down hatch, struggling against rising water, drowning while still within the confines of the ship. He shuddered, trying to think.

“They all got out, Captain.”

The Damage Control phone talker looked as relieved as he felt. Instead of cheering, however, the captain nodded. “Very well.”

He dismissed the matter and turned his attention to the next crisis.

“What are they doing, Bird Dog?” Gator demanded. “Dammit, I can’t see from back here.”

“Hold on, I’ll give you a look.”

Bird Dog’s voice was grim. He put the Tomcat into a tight circle, edging closer to the mouth of the Bosphorus. “We could overfly.”

“No way.” Gator’s voice was firm. “That Aegis is going to be one pissed-off cruiser, and we’re not getting anywhere near the edge of her engagement envelope. You’re not anyway–not as long as I’m in the backseat.”

The two aviators gazed down at the ship ten miles from them. Aside from the cloud of dirty, debris-laden water churning around her starboard side, there wasn’t anything apparently wrong with her. Sure, there were no sailors on the weather decks, and she was not making any way. That and the motor whaleboats arrayed out in front of her would alone have been enough to cause them concern.

They listened to reports Shiloh made to the carrier on the mine strike, each one silently thanking their higher powers that they were aviators instead of surface sailors. If they were going to die in battle, let it be in freedom, in airspace, and by their own mistakes–not trapped in a ship, maybe even below the waterline.

“Dammit, I wish there was something we could do to help,” Bird Dog muttered.

“Not a thing except keep the bad guys off them,” Gator said. He shook his head. “That ship–hell of a captain on her.”

“Lead, Two.” The quiet voice over the tactical coordination circuit was from Skeeter. “Is there anything we can do?” he asked, unconsciously echoing Bird Dog’s comment just moments earlier.

“Not a thing, Two. You heard the report. How’s your fuel state?”

“Seven thousand pounds–enough for now.”

“Roger. Don’t waste it, Skeeter. The tanker’s still out here, but those Hornets suck down gas like it’s going out of style. Loiter speed, most conservative airspeed–you know the drill, straight out of the books.”

“Just like you did a little while ago?” Skeeter asked innocently.

Bird Dog sucked in a hard breath at the young pilot’s audacity.

Evidently, his wingman was not going to quickly forget about his dash on afterburner. He started to answer, then gave it up as a lost cause as Gator howled in the backseat with laughter. “Whose side are you on anyway?”

Gator ripped off his oxygen mask, choking and spluttering. “Dammit, it’s about time I saw that–that young’un’s gonna give you a taste of your own medicine, Bird Dog. Oh, shit, I can’t believe he said that-“

Gator’s voice broke off as a new peal of laughter ripped through him.

“Yeah, well–it’s about teamwork, isn’t it?” Bird Dog muttered.

The squeal of the RHAWS ESM warning gear cut through Gator’s jocularity. The RIO swore and reached for the silent switch. “F-14’s inbound, Bird Dog–and they ain’t ours. Based on their direction, I make them from Turkey.”

“Concur,” Bird Dog said crisply. He flipped over to the tactical circuit. “You getting it, Skeeter?”

“Got it.”

“High-low–I’ll take high.”

Bird Dog goosed the jet up, settling in the classic high-low combat spread that was the favorite fighting position of the United States Navy. Separated by altitude, with the higher aircraft slightly aft of the lower one, this combination gave the two-fighter team superb visibility. Additionally, it allowed the high station to back up the low as the low engaged the incoming target.

They fought the way they trained, in twos. Bird Dog just hoped Skeeter remembered that.

“Got him–bogey inbound. Fifty miles, bearing zero-nine-zero.”

“Tomcat 201. Weapons free, weapons free.” The carrier TAO’s voice was calm and assured. “Good hunting, gentlemen.”

“How many of them are there, Gator?” Bird Dog said, maintaining station on Skeeter. “A number.”

“I make it to be thirty-two–give or take a couple,” Gator said.

“Jesus, they’re launching a full-scale strike at us.”

“We need to get at least two of them real fast then. With twenty of us, and no ready source of fuel, we don’t have time to knife-fight it. Not for long anyway.”

“Skeeter, Phoenix–let’s get’em broken up a little bit. Who knows, we might even get lucky and hit something.”

“Fox Three, Fox Three,” Skeeter said immediately.

Bird Dog smiled. Evidently the younger pilot already had had his finger poised over the weapons-selector switch and had already acquired a tone lock on the lead target.

Over the tactical, he heard the other Tomcats and Hornets identifying their targets, selecting their Phoenix, and unleashing a barrage of the long-range missiles on the incoming targets. At the very least, it would force Turkey on the defensive, give the American fighters a little maneuvering room as the raid streaked in toward the trapped carrier below.

“Twenty miles and closing,” Gator reported. “They’re coming after us first, Bird Dog–not the carrier.”

“Good thing too,” Bird Dog said, “those assholes are–missile inbound.”

Bird Dog rocked the Tomcat into a hard driving turn. The missile had just appeared on his heads-up display and was only four miles away. He swore quietly. “What the hell was that, Gator? How the hell did it get so close so fast?”

“I don’t know–keep an eye out for another visual,” the RIO reported, his voice muffled.

Bird Dog twisted and weaved in the sky, shaking the missile easily.

It streaked on past him, tried to home in on a Tomcat behind him, and was just as easily evaded.

Finally, its fuel spent, it ceased forward motion and plunged into the ocean below.

“Got one,” a voice over tactical crowed. “Ain’t never saying another bad thing about a Phoenix.”

For a few moments, the circuit was cluttered with jubilant cries as five Phoenix missiles found their targets.

“Get this ship underway.” The captain’s voice was cool and confident. “We’ve got the damage under control, and whether or not we’re underway won’t make any difference to the corpsman.”

The situation around him was becoming increasingly desperate. The twenty fighters that had been loitering just north of them were fully engaged with the incoming Turkish fighters. They were holding their own for now, but under the constant pressure of attack, there would be no opportunity for them to refuel, and sooner or later they’d run out of missiles. The battle was already edging forward into the edge of Shiloh’s air-engagement envelope, but there was no way she could take a shot, not without risking taking out a friendly fighter instead. Not with the furball that they were in.

“Indicate zero-two-one revolutions for three knots,” the OOD said.

The captain watched as the helmsman carefully rang up the ordered rounds on the engine-order telegraph.

The cruiser inched forward slowly, preceded by her escort of motor whaleboats. She was still listing to starboard, and the five-degrees tilt on the deck felt much more significant than it actually was.

For the next ten minutes, she proceeded by fits and starts, creeping forward at three knots, going into a full-astern bell at the slightest indication of trouble from her waterborne lookouts. They edged closer and closer to the edge of the Black Sea.

The second mine caught Shiloh just under the bow. The ship slammed up, her bow tossed out of the water by the violence of the explosion. The crew, braced unconsciously for another hit on the beam, was thrown back against the aft bulkhead. Again the screams, the wails of the dead and dying, as the explosion catapulted already injured sailors into cold steel surfaces.

The bow crashed back down on the water, the forward weather deck completely submerged. The sea coursed up over it, lapping hungrily at the forward bridge windows before subsiding. The fore-and-aft pendulum motion dampened out more quickly than the side-to-side roll had. Within a couple of moments, the ship was bow-down and still listing to starboard.

“Damage report.” The captain’s voice was a harsh croak, but still understandable. The reports started pouring in.

He made his assessment quickly, still somewhat dazed by the hard blow he’d taken against the chart table. The forward part of the ship below the waterline was a complete casualty. The explosion had ripped off the sonar dome, buckled steel plates, and twisted stanchions. The sea was pouring in, had completely inundated the forward boatswains’ locker, as well as the first twenty frames of the ship. The damage control team had already established watertight boundaries, but there was no hope of pumping out the flooding.

Most worrisome was the indication that some of the watertight doors forward had been buckled by the stress to which the steel frame of the ship was exposed. Damage Control teams reported leaking around some of the hatches, controllable for now, but likely to get worse. The captain ordered secondary boundaries set and casualties evacuated, and ordered the ship forward.

Yuri led his flight of MiGs due east, then cut southeast across the Caucasus mountain range. Skimming above the towering peaks, they rendezvoused with the tanker, took on fuel, and topped off tanks. Finally, when the last hungry MiG was at max capacity, they turned south-southwest.

The ancient Ottoman Empire below them was invisible through the light haze and cloud cover, but Yuri remembered the smells and sounds of his last trip to Istanbul. These people–close cousins but still so different. For a moment, he wondered why there couldn’t be room enough in the world for both of them.

No, it was a historical impossibility. Since the earliest days of their history, the Turks had sought to dominate the region. That they were now backed by Pan-Islamic nationalists from the Middle East did nothing to stabilize the area. Unless the Americans could be forced to intervene and stem the burgeoning tide of Muslim radicals, a second Ottoman Empire under the control of Shiite reactionaries would soon dominate the entire region.

The Caucasus Mountains would not hold them off for long–soon enough they’d cast greedy eyes on the fertile plains of Ukraine.

“Feet wet,” Yuri announced to his GCI, indicating they were now over the water. They out-chopped into the Aegean Sea, then vectored northwest toward the entrance to the Bosphorus Strait. The weapon under his wings–just what was it?

Remembering the damage that the last one had caused, Yuri had plenty of reason to be concerned. With a flight of forty-eight MiGs hot on his heels, another EMP pulse was not acceptable.

Though it might prove a decisive victory over the Americans, it would also wipe out the delicate electronics that kept them all aloft.

Were his superiors willing to make that sacrifice?

He knew the answer to that–of course they were. Balanced against the future of Ukraine under Muslim domination, the sacrifice of forty-nine fighter aircraft was insignificant, especially when the current Naval inventory held more than 250, and production facilities were in full gear to produce more.

He fingered the weapons-selection switch, still set in its off position. There was one setting–no, it didn’t bear thinking about. If he did that, his entire future was gone. Gone as surely as if it had disappeared in a nuclear blast.

Yet his thoughts kept returning to the possibility. Could he do it?

Jettison his weapon, go empty-winged into the conflict ahead?

He shook his head and dismissed the option. His career, not to mention all the family he still had remaining in Russia and Ukraine, was at stake. He had no choice but to follow the mission as briefed.

Heroes come in odd shapes and sizes, a silent voice insisted.

They were passing Istanbul now, and the sight of the city shook the captain almost as much as the mine attacks had. The waterfront was still and silent. The piers were crowded with fishing vessels tied up and vacant. Not a soul moved, not even the shipfitters and fishermen that normally crowded the waterfront and piers.

Ahead, the Black Sea beckoned. To the captain, it was probably the most beautiful sight in the world–free, open water, probably devoid of minefields. Probably. The thought made him pause. Who was to say the Turks hadn’t seeded the entire Black Sea with mines. Mines were cheap, readily available, and one of the easiest defensive emplacements to deploy.

But intelligence reports had been fairly uniform. There was no indication that there were mines past the point about five hundred yards ahead. Like it or not, he would have to rely on those reports.

Five minutes later, Shiloh slipped past the breakout point. She was battered, water-logged, and clumsy in the water–but she was free.

“Flank speed,” Batman snapped. “Send a signal to Shiloh–well done and clear the area. How bad is her damage?”

“She’s still afloat, Admiral,” the TAO reported. “Barely.”

Batman nodded. “I’ll see that her captain gets so many decorations he walks with a port list. In the meantime, get us back into this fight. I’ve got aircraft overhead that need some company right about now.”

“Right full rudder.”

The captain felt the ship respond slowly, too slowly. She sluggishly veered off to the right, steadying up on a new course to clear the area. He walked onto the bridge wing to stare aft.

Behind him, the aircraft carrier plowed through the ocean like a behemoth. Huge bow waves sputtered up around her hull, an indication she was balls to the walls. The captain stuck his head back into the bridge and ordered another five knots of speed. Best to be clear of the carrier. In any conflict over who had the right of way, tonnage always counted.

“What’s our relative wind?” Batman asked.

“Spot on,” the bridge answered. “Ready to commence flight operations.”

“Make it so.”

Batman had barely finished the sentence when the overhead reverberated with the deep-throated roar of a Tomcat at full military power. During the transit through the Strait, the Air Boss and handlers had pre-staged the entire complement of the air wing, prepositioning Tomcats on the two forward catapults.

The waist cat–was it usable? Batman wondered. An extra catapult could make all the difference in the world in getting gas and air support in the air right now. He glanced up at the plat camera, and noted that the Air Boss had staged aircraft within easy reach of all three catapults.

Was it time to take the chance?

It was one thing to launch pilots into the air with weapons loads and ask them to risk their lives against incoming adversary air. Another matter entirely to have them trust their lives to questionable catapults. Besides, if they lost birds off it, that was just as effective in depleting their forces as a missile strike by an incoming raider. An aircraft loss was an aircraft loss–the cause didn’t matter.

“Just the two catapults for now,” Batman decided. “And tell the Air Boss I want to see him setting a new record in launches.”

The TAO turned to face him for a moment, his face grim. “I think you’re going to get that wish, Admiral.”

“Now who the hell are these guys?” Gator shouted. His fingers flew over the distinctively shaped control knobs for his radar, his face pressed hard against the soft plastic hood. “Bird Dog, we’ve got a ton of new bandits inbound, coming directly from the east. Looks like forty, fifty of them. Jesus!”

“One at a time, Gator,” Bird Dog said grimly. “That’s how we kill them–one at a time.”

He toggled over to tactical. “Skeeter, you holding the new bad guys?”

“Affirmative. Lead, we need to start taking this first wave out. We don’t have time or gas for ACM.”

“Agreed. Go with the Sparrow. Pick your target–here’s mine.” Bird Dog centered his targeting blip over one radar paint and pressed Enter.

“Got it.”

Bird Dog felt the aircraft shake itself like a dog coming out of a creek as the Sparrow left his wings. He shut his eyes as it left to cut down on the afterimage it would paint on his retina. When he was sure it had a solid lock and was underway, he toggled off another one. Just for good measure, he picked out another blip and dumped a Phoenix at it. It might not hit–then again, it might, considering the success they’d had so far–but at least his fuel consumption would drop with the heavy missile off the wings. Besides, it might keep the Turks on the defensive.

“Tomcat flight, help’s on the way,” the carrier announced over the open circuit. “Launching now–stand by, fellas, the cavalry’s on the way.”

Bird Dog glanced down at his fuel indicator. “They’d better be the damned Pony Express if they’re going to get here before I’m in trouble.”

Yuri craned his head back, could see the other fighters peeling off from the pack as they vectored in to engage the small cluster of American forces already beating back the Turkish marauders. He snapped his head back forward and took a quick visual scan on the sky around him. It appeared clear. No one was watching him. He reached out and toggled on the sensitive skin that covered his airframe, completely engaging the stealth capabilities.

Had they been watching, the other aircraft would have seen him waver in and then blip off their radar screens. He doubted that they were–there were too many missiles, too many bogeys in the air for a pilot or a RIO to concentrate on anything but survival.

He tipped the fighter forward and dove for the deck. As briefed, he pressed in straight toward the carrier, ignoring the smaller escort floundering in the water before it.

Forty miles away, he got a warning on his ESM gear. He scanned the sky around him, annoyed–why the hell was somebody paying any attention to him with all the ACM in the air all around?

He saw the aircraft before he could even pick it out on his radar scope. An American Hornet–the worst possible choice.

The Hornet, unlike the Tomcat, was a close match for the MiG in weight-to-thrust ratio and maneuverability. With a Hornet, Yuri would find himself more equally matched, less able to exploit the slower turning radius of a heavier aircraft.

He glanced back down at his range indicator. Still too far away from the ship to fire–although who knew exactly how critical the briefed distance from target was?

Not very, probably–not if the weapon under his wings was what he thought it was.

In a small way, the appearance of the American Hornet was a relief.

It bought him time, a few more minutes to try to answer the questions that kept nagging him about the use of tactical nuclear weapons. If they could have listened in on his thoughts, his superiors would have been appalled that he dared to even question the nature of his mission. But that was the nature of a fighter pilot–to take responsibility for his own life, to make his own destiny in the skies. They might think he was simply a glorified carrier pigeon, but Yuri knew better.

Yuri tipped the nose of his MiG up to grab altitude, climbing to meet the Hornet.

Thor bore down on the MiG that was separated from the rest of the pack. It puzzled him momentarily why this one bird seemed to be avoiding the growing furball behind him. Was the other pilot frightened, running away from the battle?

If so, why wasn’t he headed back the way he’d come, to the east?

Or would that take him within range of his own radars, quickly exposing him for the coward he was?

Maybe the MiG was looking for a nice, safe corner of the sky to hide out from the battle, hoping to join the survivors after the action and finesse his way back to home base.

Attracting Thor’s attention had just eliminated that possibility.

“Kill them all and let God sort them out,” Thor said aloud. He waited until the MiG began its maneuver to gain altitude, then fell in behind it, easily pacing it.

As soon as he was in position, he selected a Sparrow, waiting for the tone lock telling him he had a good radar fix for the semiactive guidance head to follow. No tone–what the hell?

He tweaked and peeked, trying to regain radar contact on it, but there was simply nothing on his scope.

Too far for a Sidewinder–have to close him. Maybe even get in guns range if he could. Thor kicked his Hornet in the ass and headed off after the aircraft. The only contact he had on it was visual, and he was damned if he was going to lose that.

The MiG streaked upward, then rolled into an oblique turn that was the beginning of a maneuver to circle back on him. With two fighters of relatively equal performance capabilities, battle often came down to this–a matter of maintaining the proper angle of separation to enable a lock on the bogey.

But how was he going to get a lock?

Whatever it was about this MiG, it sure as hell looked like a ghost on radar. That left only guns and a Sidewinder, the heatseeking missile that didn’t give a damn about the radar-reflective characteristics of an aircraft. All it saw was the hot, burning hell of jet engines and afterburners.

Thor let the MiG begin its oblique roll and descent to the left, holding his own hard turn until he judged he was directly over the bandit.

He snapped the Hornet over at the top of his turn, dove back down, and was annoyed to find himself slightly leading the bogey.

A rolling scissors–that’s what we’re getting into. Not a bad tactic against a similar fighter, but a dangerous way to live, at least half the time. The aircraft in the top of the serpentine maneuver generally had the better firing position, and as they looped through the sky, alternating altitudes and relative advantage, Thor’s Hornet would be exposed to a rear-quarter-aspect missile during the period when he was at low altitude.

Well, it was better to cut this short. Thor rolled out of the scissors, then threw the Hornet into a tight starboard turn, all the while watching over his shoulder to see what the other pilot was doing. With any luck…

Luck was with him. The other pilot continued evasive maneuvers, but continued pressing in on the carrier. Now just what was so damned urgent about the carrier?

Thor checked his radar again to see if there were any heavy bombers coming in behind the fighters, but his radar screen showed nothing. Not that that meant anything, not with the lack of contact that this bogey was generating. Still, it was possible that there was a flight of stealth-equipped bombers carrying antisurface weapons just behind the fighters.

Thor tucked the jet into a tight roll and dropped back into a high rear-quarter position on the MiG. He was just barely within range of his Sidewinders, and had only two on the wings. He debated waiting, trying to gain a more favorable position on the MiG, but decided against it. The MiG seemed bound and determined to head for the carrier. Ergo, Thor was bound and determined not to let him do it.

But what was the bogey carrying?

Thor replayed his last glimpse of the aircraft’s undercarriage in his mind, simultaneously readying the Sidewinder. He heard the low growl indicate a lock, and toggled it off.

The missile on the undercarriage had looked like a standard anti-air missile–now why the hell would he want to be close to the carrier with that?

A number of possibilities flitted through his mind, and suddenly the only reasonable one seemed obvious.

Another tactical nuclear weapon–that had to be it. Thor felt his blood run cold. Even if the missile didn’t strike anything, the resulting EMP would effectively wipe out every aircraft now in the air, as well as destroying the combat capabilities of all ships within range. He reached forward and jammed throttles into the slots as hard as they would go, desperately seeking a few more knots. The Hornet responded, almost exceeding the design specifications on the books. Thor urged her on silently, rocking forward in his seat as though he could help her gain a few more knots.

He toggled the weapons-selector switch to Sidewinder again, waited for the growl, then let it rip. The first one was still en route to the jet.

The first missile locked onto the MiG’s starboard tailpipe. It bore in at Mach 2, entranced by the blazing infrared radiation coming out of the tailpipe and the jet’s hot exhaust.

Another target–the missile wavered for a moment, confused by the sudden profusion of bright heat spots around its primary target. It settled on the strongest one, changed course slightly, and headed for it.

Four seconds later, it exploded harmlessly in the middle of a flare in a cloud of chaff.

Thor swore vehemently. The MiG had ejected flares and chaff and executed a hard port turn. The first Sidewinder was decoyed. He fixed all of his hopes on the second.

The second missile had a steady lock on the port exhaust. The MiG’s turn only served to present it a more favorable aspect. The MiG spat out a last-minute flurry of chaff and flares, but even if the missile had been decoyed, its momentum would have carried it straight on. It rocketed up to the exhaust, poking its nose into the broad flow of hot air before exploding.

I’m going to dump it. Even with a Hornet on his ass and odds that he was just moments away from having to eject, Yuri felt an odd sense of relief. He closed his hand around the bar labeled Weapons Jettison. Just as he started to yank it, he saw the second missile, felt the cold clear knowledge that this one wasn’t going to miss. Rage engulfed him, an overriding regret for the rest of his life–or what could have been the rest of his life were it not for his superiors, for the Hornet welded to his ass. It isn’t fair–all I wanted was a little freedom. Without even pausing to reach for his ejection switch, he slapped his hand against the stick and fired the missile under his wing.

Thor shut his eyes against the glare as the MiG exploded in midair. A violent black and yellow fireball, shot through with red and white flames, erupted. He heard the small ping of shrapnel hitting his fuselage, and broke hard right to avoid it. That would be a hell of a thing–to shoot down a MiG and then get dumped in the water himself with shrapnel in his engine intake.

Over tactical, Thor could hear the cries and victory yelps from his compadres. The first aircraft launched from the carrier were just starting to arrive on station, and the desperate fighters that had held the line alone were breaking off one by one to seek out the tanker. He glanced down at his own fuel status–fine for a while. He went buster and rejoined the fray.

As he selected his next victim, Thor’s mind scampered back briefly over the odd, stealthy MiG. Had it been carrying nuclear weapons?

Someone on the carrier would know. No doubt the explosion would have spewed radioactive material through the air, and the damage would be detectable by the ship’s radiac meters. Still, at least he’d gotten it before it detonated. It took a helluva lot more than a fireball to set off a nuclear tactical weapon.

“Vampire inbound!” the E-2C TACCO howled. “Thor–he got it off just before you nailed him!”

“Just in time.” Bird Dog saw the tanker off in the distance, and cut the Tomcat sharply to the right to swing around and come up behind it.

Another Tomcat was currently glued to the basket trailing behind the KA-6, greedily sucking down fuel. At this point, the original fighters had been ordered to take on just enough fuel to take a pass at the boat, land, and be rearmed. They’d be completely refueled on the boat.

“Two thousand pounds,” Gator confined. “Man, we’re cutting it close.”

“How is our wingman doing?” Bird Dog asked. Gator pointed off to his right. Skeeter was welded into position, hovering virtually motionless off their starboard wing. “Doing fine. Gonna make a fine pilot, he is.”

“Maybe,” Bird Dog grumbled. “Got a little attitude problem.”

Gator stifled a chortle. If he’d had to design a scenario to brighten his day, it was this–to see Bird Dog get a taste of his own medicine from another young hothead.

The tanker was positioned halfway between the carrier and the furball, providing easy access to gas both for fighters refueling to rejoin the battle and those headed for the deck. As Bird Dog started his final approach on it, the Tomcat in front of him drew back slightly, withdrew his probe from the basket, and peeled off back to the furball.

Bird Dog lined up on the flexible basket trailing behind the KA-6.

His refueling probe, located on the forward portion of the cockpit fuselage, was extended. He slid the Tomcat forward, keeping his eyes fixed on the basket, not watching the relative motion of the aircraft. Of all the maneuvers a fighter pilot was required to perform, this one was second only to a night carrier-deck landing for stress. The two aircraft flew less than ten feet apart, linked basket-to-refueling-probe. There was no room for any mistake in judgment.

Bird Dog slid up slowly, felt a slight plunk as the probe seated, then glanced down at his instruments to check the fuel flow. As expected, he was taking on fuel at the optimum rate.

“Headed back for the boat, aren’t you?” the KA-6 pilot said. “Looks like your wing’s empty.”

“That’s affirmative.”

And it made a difference, it did, during the approach on a tanker. It was much easier to bulldog a lightly laden Tomcat into position behind the smaller jet than one carrying a full combat load.

“Be back soon, though, I expect.”

“If there’s anything left for you to do. Looks like the Turks are dropping like flies.”

“We do what we can. Okay, I think I’m good to go.”

“Roger. Securing fuel flow.”

As the instruments indicated that the flow of aviation fuel had ceased, Bird Dog eased back slowly on the throttle. The two aircraft separated, the distance between them growing at an almost imperceptible rate. Finally, when he was well clear of the tanker, Bird Dog peeled off to starboard and headed for the martial stack to wait his turn.

Five miles off the carrier, Gator started yelping. “Bird Dog, contact–Mach 2–Jesus, it’s a missile!”

“Where, where?” Bird Dog hollered, frantically scanning the sky around him. “I don’t have it.”

“On our six,” Gator snapped, his voice now cold and steady. “Come right, steady on four-zero-four. I’ve got it on radar–recommend we find a use for those Sparrows on your wings.”

Bird Dog followed the orders instantly, slewing the jet around in a violent turn that pushed her up to max Gs. As he came out of the turn, he saw it, a wavering glittery speck just dead ahead. He continued to turn to starboard, increasing their lead-angle geometry. As the radar lock growled, he turned off first one Sparrow, then another.

“They know–the carrier’s already screaming bloody murder,” Gator reported. “Bird Dog, we’re out of this–no more weapons. But Skeeter has two Sparrows left. Put him in chase–now!”

Gator’s voice was demanding, urgent.

Bird Dog glanced over at his wingman, still rock-steady in place.

“You heard the man–here’s your chance. Get out ahead of that bastard, take it nose-on-nose. The carrier’s got a close-in weapons system, but it’s for shit. If we wanna knock this baby down, it’s gotta be now.”

Two clicks on the tactical circuit acknowledged Bird Dog’s order. His wingman rolled hard to starboard, dived to gain speed, and headed out for front position on the missile.

“Bird Dog–what was his fuel status?” Gator said urgently. “He was just starting to take it on when I called the Vampire.”

“I don’t know,” Bird Dog said grimly. “Little shithead probably thinks he’s got enough. He knows how fast he’s going to burn it up–at least according to the books–but he doesn’t really know, not like you and I do.”

“Let Mother know to get SAR ready,” Gator said grimly. “I have a feeling your wingman is headed for the drink.”

Skeeter let out a loud howl as he gave chase. The missile was still ten miles away, and if he played it right, he had just enough time to get in front of it and take it out with a nose-on-nose shot. He fingered the weapons-selector switch, making sure it was in position for the Sparrows.

There was nothing else that had even a chance of catching the missile at this point, not from a nose-on-nose aspect.

Behind him, his backseater, a new guy he’d never even had a chance to talk to, muttered vector information and guidance. Skeeter followed the orders mechanically, watching the missile, relying on his eyeballs to warn him if the geometry got radically out of synch. So far, the backseater seemed to know what he was doing.

“Recommend you fire now–now, now, now,” the RIO said finally.

Skeeter toggled the missiles off–one, two–then made the Fox call over tactical. He could see the bright flares of the engines of his own missiles, tracked them readily as they dove down toward the incoming missile.

“Skeeter–get the hell out of there,” he heard another voice say over tactical. He glanced back over at Bird Dog, as if he could see who was talking.

“Skeeter, that’s Thor–Marine jar-head. He just took out the bastard that launched that missile.”

Bird Dog’s voice was almost frantic. “Head for the deck, Skeeter–that missile’s probably a tactical nuke–you stay within range of it and you’re going to catch the EMP blast head-on. It’ll wipe out everything you’ve got, even if the buffet doesn’t knock you out of the air. You hear me? Get out of the way.”

“I can’t–the Sparrows haven’t shifted to independent tracking. I’ve got to keep the radar lock on–got to.”

Skeeter’s voice was determined. “If you think it’ll do some damage to me, just think what it’ll do to every aircraft in the air, not to mention the surface ships. I’ll get out of here as soon as I see it dead, not before.”

“Skeeter!” Real anguish permeated Bird Dog’s voice. “The Sparrows will make it, they’re close enough now–get the hell out.”

Skeeter bore on, following his missiles into their target. Finally, as the two tracks were intercepting, he rolled violently to starboard and dove for the deck. Seconds later, a hard wash of air buffeted the massive Tomcat like a boat bobbing in the water. He fought the aircraft, lost control, and the Tomcat spiraled down to the deck in a flat spin.

Skeeter let the aircraft go, fighting with the controls to establish a stable flight attitude. The violent spinning slowed slightly, then stopped completely as Skeeter pushed the nose down and traded altitude for airspeed. The increased airflow over the wings, coupled with the manual extension of the wings, gave him back control of the aircraft.

But they were close to the sea, so close. At one thousand feet, the Tomcat had broken out of its spin, but was still headed at a steep angle for the deck. Skeeter howled, yanked back on the yoke, not even bothering to warn his backseater about the maneuver. It either worked, or it didn’t.

He suspected the man’s hand was poised over the ejection-seat handle–that is, if he could get to it under the driving G forces of their flat spin.

At the last second, the Tomcat pulled out of the dive, returning to vertical flight a bare forty feet above the ocean.

Skeeter howled again, this time in victory. He heard the backseater breathing raggedly over the ICS, and said, “What’s the matter, man?”

His bravado masked the real fear he’d felt just a few seconds earlier.

“Nothing–everything’s fine back here,” the backseater snapped. “There’s just one little problem–when we get back to the carrier, I’m gettin’ the fuck out of your cockpit and never gettin’ back in again.”

“Now, now, now–didn’t I just pull us out of one of the nastiest spins you’ve ever seen in your life?” Skeeter inquired, recklessly confident with the adrenaline screaming through his veins. “What more could you ask from a pilot?”

“The common sense God gave a gnat would do for starters.”

With that, the backseater fell silent.

“The air battle is still a standoff,” Batman reported to Tombstone.

He sighed, feeling the weight of responsibility of sending young pilots out to die. They were the finest pilots in the world, flying the most capable aircraft, but air combat was still unpredictable. Most would come back–but some wouldn’t.

“They don’t have a sustainable force,” Tombstone said shortly. “I notice there’re no tankers reported–that means they have to land to refuel. Lost time–we’ll take them eventually.”

The Turks were proving to be surprisingly tenacious, remaining engaged against the American fighters even after a second wave of Hornets and Tomcats arrived from Jefferson, even after it was clear that the Americans were outperforming their adversaries in all categories of skill. One by one the Turkish F-14’s dropped into the water, either accompanied by billowing parachutes as their aircrews escaped or raining down on the water in a fireball. “Sooner or later, they’ve gotta quit.”

Batman frowned. “There’s something else odd about it–that last wave of MiGs,” he said slowly. “They’re not Turkish–they’re Ukrainian. Oh, they’ve got Turkey’s colors painted on their tail, but it’s absolutely clear at this point that they’re not what they seem to be.”

Batman turned to Lab Rat. “Isn’t that so, Commander Busby?”

The senior Intelligence Officer nodded. “We caught one of them transmitting in the clear–otherwise, they stayed on secure lines. Definitely Ukrainian.”

Tombstone tossed his pencil on the table, and leaned back in the chair. “Ukrainian–that explains it, I suppose.”

He looked at the two men steadily. “So what do we do now?”

Batman turned to Lab Rat. “Go ahead and brief him.”

Lab Rat took a deep breath. “I’ve taken the liberty of preparing two strike packages. One is aimed against Turkey, the other Ukraine.”

He passed over a large-scale chart with hastily scribbled pencil markings on it. “Here you can see the two command centers, one in Sevastopol and the other in Izmir. Shiloh can have her Tomahawks retargeted against either one of them in a matter of minutes. Once we take out command-and-control facilities, the fighters may become confused, pull back some while they wait for an alternate command center to take over with new orders. You know how dependent they are on their ground-control-intercept officers.”

Tombstone studied the charts. He tapped the penciled target symbol on the Crimean Peninsula. “These bastards started it all–that first attack on La Salle. It looked like Turkey, but at this point I’m willing to bet it was Ukraine. That’s the first target. Let’s teach them a lesson.”

“You’ll get flak from State over this,” Batman cautioned. “After all, we’re supposedly en route to their shipyards for technical assistance.”

“I don’t give a fuck about State,” Tombstone blazed. “Their calls already got us into this–dammit, neither you or I would ever have been caught dead in this strait, not under these circumstances.”

“I agree,” Batman put in. “Just wanted to bring it up. But to hell with them all.”

He turned back to the Intelligence Officer. “You’ve got your orders–let’s retarget against Ukraine.”

Busby nodded. “Just as well–I was afraid you were going to say both. That would complicate matters a bit.”

“I can take out the command centers, but where does that leave us in the end?” Tombstone said, staring down at the chart. “This whole tactical scenario–dammit, one aircraft carrier is not enough. Shiloh’s doing her best, but we need an additional show of force, a battle group stationed with some air-power just off Turkey’s Mediterranean coast, while we quell the Black Sea. The U.S. Air Force base in Turkey at Incirclik is no help–they scrambled their aircraft out to safety when La Salle got hit. Greece bitched about allowing overflights, so they’re staging out of the United Kingdom for now. Too long a lead time to use them for immediate support, but just where the hell am I gonna get another carrier and some fighters?”

Just then, a voice called from TFCC. “Admiral Wayne? I think you might want to see this.”

The two admirals exchanged glances, then stood as one and walked into the TFCC. A new symbol had just popped into being on the large-screen display, something that had been happening all too often in the last three hours. With one big difference–this one bore the symbology of a friendly unit.

“Who the hell-” Batman started to say. He fell silent as the name of the ship flashed up beside the symbology: La Salle.

“Jefferson, this is La Salle,” a voice said over tactical.

Batman reached for the handset, paused, and then handed it to Tombstone. “Your ship, Admiral–I’ll let you sort this out.” Batman’s voice was grim. “I’ve got an air battle to win.”

He turned his back on Tombstone, and his attention back to the large-screen display.

“Captain?” Tombstone said, his voice sliding up the scale in incredulity. “What are you doing out here? I thought-“

“Pardon me for interrupting, Admiral, but you did give me a free hand,” said a familiar voice. It was the captain of La Salle, the man to whom Tombstone had given complete discretion in getting the ship back into the ball game. “You wanted your ship back–well, here she is.”

Tombstone glanced at the telephone, making sure that the light indicating secure transmissions was lit. “What are your capabilities?” he asked, still not believing that the flagship was cruising toward him. “God, man, you’re an answer to a prayer.”

The La Salle had just entered the tactical link, transmitting its positioning data to the aircraft carrier and all other units. It was still in the Mediterranean, headed for the Aegean and the eastern coast of Turkey.

“We’ve been following the battle from your transmissions, Admiral,” the captain continued. “I can offer you the surface-search radar and six Harriers.”

“How in the world are you even steaming?” Tombstone demanded. “From the condition of that ship that I saw, there’s no way you should even be underway.”

“New challenges demand special solutions,” the captain replied, satisfaction in his voice. “We had enough spare parts on board to cobble together some electronics–we’re not fully mission-capable, but I’ve got my close-in weapons systems operable, a surface-search radar, and all of my Link capabilities. And as for power–Admiral, did you have a chance to tour the ship? The entire ship, I mean.”

Tombstone thought for a minute. “Not all of it,” he said finally. “Mainly the flag spaces–that and the flight deck.”

“With all due respect, you missed a very important part of the ship. Underneath the flight deck that you aviators think so much about, there’s something called a well deck–it’s open to the ocean, and it’s where we keep all of our amphibious vehicles. Plenty of room in there for a couple of tugs.”

Tombstone was speechless for a moment. “Tugs?” he said finally, not believing what he was hearing. “You can’t be serious.”

“Well, it’s not that radical a solution. We use tugs for propulsive power all the time, don’t we? It’s just that they’re usually made up to the outside of the ship, getting us off a pier or into port. Fortunately, as we’ve just proved, a couple of oceangoing tugs can handily fit inside the well deck. They push as well as they pull. Besides, Harriers aren’t all that picky about wind across the deck for flight operations.”

Tombstone began laughing. “I don’t believe it. You mean to tell me you’ve got two tugs inside your well deck? And they’re shoving you around so that you can get underway?”

He laughed again, shaking his head in disbelief. “Captain, of all the-“

“Creative solutions you’ve ever seen, Admiral?” the captain finished. “Thank you very much, sir. After all, you did tell me to get the ship squared away.”

“Okay, you’re here,” Tombstone said. “Get those Harriers ready to launch–I’m going to need them for backup in case Turkey needs some additional convincing.”

He spent the next five minutes reeling off a set of orders, directing the La Salle to take station on the west coast of Turkey. Finally, after a last congratulatory comment, Tombstone replaced the receiver. He stared at it for a moment, then started laughing again.

“It’s done, Captain.” The fire-control technician looked up at him with bleary, battle-worn eyes. “I’ve downloaded a complete retargeting package.”

“Let’s hope it works,” Captain Heather answered. He walked out of Combat up and forward to the bridge. Normally his station during a missile launch would be in Combat, but this one he wanted to see himself.

Could the vertical launch tubes take it?

He shook his head–there was still no real answer on that. The flooding had been contained, and the tubes appeared to be structurally sound, but there was no way to really tell how much damage the mine explosions had done. The delicate circuitry of the missiles might have been fatally jarred, the tubes cracked somewhere they couldn’t see and unable to maintain the air pressure that they needed to lift the missiles out of their tubes. He stared down at the hatches on the deck, wondering just how much of his combat capability he had left.

Finally, he turned to the Officer of the Deck. “Weapons free. Fire when ready.”

“Weapons free, fire when ready, aye, sir,” the OOD echoed. He picked up the bitch-box speaker and relayed the order to Combat.

The captain held his breath and waited. A slow rumble shook the ship, deepening and spreading throughout every structural member. The square cover on the first tube popped open, and the captain gazed down into the blackness inside it. The sound built, higher and higher, until it encompassed his entire world. Finally, with a final shriek, a Tomahawk missile burst out of the vertical-launch cell, then seemed to hover over the deck for the barest instant before its motor ignited. It splashed fire down on the deck, charring the nonskid, then tipped over and streaked away from the ship at speeds almost impossible to imagine.

Moments later, the scenario repeated itself. In all, four Tomahawk missiles lifted out of their cells and headed for Ukraine.

The captain released his breath, giddy from pain and lack of oxygen.

“Good job, people.” He let his voice convey more than words ever could. “Someone find me the corpsman. I think-“

The engineer caught him as he crumpled to the floor.

“Here they come,” Batman said as he glanced at the Plat camera. “First thirsty Tomcat on board.”

With the carrier now in open water, the fighters that had taken the initial brunt of the raid were coming back on board for refueling and rearming. La Salle’s Harriers took over the air battle, decimating the already thin ranks of Turkish fighters while the American air base steamed threateningly toward their coast.

Batman kept his eyes moving quickly between the large-screen tactical display and the Plat camera. As fast as the technicians were working, it looked like it might not even be necessary. One by one, starting immediately after the missile attack on Ukraine, the Turkish fighters were breaking off and heading for home, escorted by La Salle’s Harriers and the remaining Tomcats.