The Art of War

TWO

The non-skid coating of the flight deck still held the heat from the day, but for the sailors accustomed to the blazing heat, even the slightest drop in temperature was a welcome relief. The slight breeze even more so — wind chill was a phrase that would never be applied to the searing heat in this part of the world, but air moving was cooler than air standing in thick, cloying masses around them.

It was slightly cooler inside the two F-14D Tomcats pulling alert-five on the bow catapults, but not by much. Yellow huffers were attached to each aircraft by an umbilical, powering the jets to provide air-conditioning, but the hot sun baking down through the shaded canopies still raised the interior temperature to unholy levels.

The Tomcats were fueled to full capacity, and carried two auxiliary tanks as well. The current loadout was two AIM-9M Sidewinders, two AIM-7M Sparrows, two AIM-54C Phoenix, a flexible, all-ranges antiair loadout. While the Tomcat was also a capable land-attack platform, there were no over-ground attack missions planned for the foreseeable future. Configured as a “Bombcat,” the aircraft could carry more ordnance further than its lighter Hornet brethren.

“I’m too senior to pull alert five,” Lieutenant Commander Curt “Bird Dog” Robinson said from the forward seat of Tomcat 106. He was complaining over the ICS — interior communications system — to his RIO, Lieutenant Harmon “Music” David.

“Yes, sir,” Music answered. “I agree completely. Far too senior.”

Bird Dog sighed. They’d had a rash of nuggets arrive in the squadron all at one time, and Music was part of that gaggle. Nice kid, wore glasses — what else could you say about a new RIO? And he seemed to have the proper respect for pilots, which was something you didn’t find often enough, in Bird Dog’s humble opinion, in the nonflying part of a cockpit crew. Yeah, that was a bit of a relief, especially after about a million years of being paired up with Gator.

Bird Dog’s thoughts drifted away from the cockpit and back to the past missions he’d flown with Gator. He knew what the admiral and the squadron thought about the team — there’d been too many times that Gator had threatened to punch out if Bird Dog didn’t go along with his decisions. The rest of the Navy seemed to think that this was a good thing, putting a killjoy in the cockpit with an experienced pilot who was more than capable of making tactical decision on his own, thank you very much.

Why, when they’d been up in the Arctic, what would have happened if he’d listened to Gator? The Russians would have fried a whole SEAL squad, and who would have said boo to Gator about that? Bird Dog had punched his way through the landscape to put ordnance on target at precisely the right moment and saved the day. All over Gator’s objections. Well, Bird Dog bet he could roust up a couple of SEALs who were more than happy that someone had the balls to—

“Sir?” Music’s voice broke in on his reverie.

“What?”

“Nothing, sir. Just wanted to make sure you were okay.”

Shit. Like he’d be the first pilot to catch a few winks in a hot cockpit on alert-five. Yeah, he was definitely too senior to be pulling alert-five.

But with nuggets, what were you going to do? You had to pair them with someone that had some experience, that’d managed to prove themselves in more than one combat arena. Bird Dog conveniently ignored the fact that that was exactly why he’d been paired with Gator.

So because BUPERS, the Bureau of Naval Personnel, screwed up and flooded them with newbies, every experienced pilot and RIO in the squadron was flying more hours than normal, trying to whip the youngsters into some sort of shape. Gator was currently sitting in the wardroom on alert-fifteen, pounding back cold sodas and baby-sitting a new pilot. Figured. Gator always did have a way of finagling his way around things.

It wasn’t like he was the only one, either. Over on the other catapult, Rat was saddled with Fastball, and he wasn’t so sure that he didn’t have a better deal than Rat did. Lieutenant Brad “Fastball” Morrow had already earned himself a bit of a reputation within the squadron as a cocky bastard, and Bird Dog felt pretty sure that having a female as his mentor-RIO — even a damned fine RIO — wasn’t his idea of a good time. He wouldn’t be so stupid as to make an issue of it, but there were a thousand ways a pilot could make a RIO’s life miserable without even breaking a sweat.

“You think we’ll launch today, sir?” Music asked.

Bird Dog sighed. “Now how the hell should I know that, Music? And I told you, knock off the sir shit in the cockpit. We’re crew, okay?”

“Yes, si — yes, Bird Dog. I was just asking because, I mean, after all — you’ve been to the War College and all. I thought you might have it all figured out by now.”

Bird Dog listened carefully, but could detect no note of sarcasm in the RIO’s voice. Well, what the hell — Music did have a point. Even Lab Rat, the carrier’s intelligence officer, hadn’t been to the War College, and for all that Lab Rat was smart as hell.

“It’s just a matter of history,” Bird Dog said, and tried to decide whether he was in the mood to lecture for a bit. Not really, but it beat the hell out of getting woken up every few minutes when Music got worried about whether or not he was still breathing. “That’s what you always have to understand about the Middle East — all this stuff goes back a long ways.”

“But they wouldn’t attack an American aircraft carrier, would they? That would be suicide.”

“They might,” Bird Dog admitted. “That’s what you don’t get about this, kid. A lot of these people, they figure they go straight to heaven if they kill infidels. That’d be us. Granted, they don’t have the training or the advanced weaponry that we do, but that won’t keep them from being a pain in the ass if they decide to cause some trouble.”

“So maybe we’ll launch today.”

“Maybe. Maybe not.”

“Wow. Thanks. That helps a lot.”

Bird Dog tried for a moment to convince himself that he had indeed clarified the whole situation in his nugget’s mind, but couldn’t manage to buy it himself. For just a moment, he felt an intense nostalgia for hearing the clipped accent of Gator coming out of the backseat. Up until now, he hadn’t realized how fast a yes-man suck-up could get on your nerves.