Viper Strike

CHAPTER 20

Tombstone leaned against the back of the pilot's seat, stooping so that he could look ahead through the helo's canopy. He wore a life jacket and cranial, which made his movements clumsy in the tight confines of the Huey.

He'd been shaken awake by Gunnery Sergeant Johnson at zero-dark-thirty that morning. A small mob armed with rocks and miscellaneous weapons had stormed the front gates of the embassy sometime in the wee hours and had been driven off when the Marines on the perimeter fired warning shots over their heads. One of the rioters had fired back and caught a Marine in the chest with a burst from an AK. Another had caught a bullet fragment in the shoulder. Both were strapped to stretchers in the back of the helo now, two Navy corpsmen in attendance.

And Tombstone, eager to get back to the Jefferson, was on the flight as well. He still hurt where his clothing rubbed the burns on his body, but he felt somewhat better for the more than six hours of sleep he'd had on the embassy floor. A battle had been fought outside the front door, and he'd not even heard it.

"This is Hardwire Eight-four-seven requesting clearance for final approach," the pilot said into his helmet microphone. "Jefferson, Hardwire Eight-four-seven. We have casualties on board. Please respond."

The Marine helo pilot glanced back at Tombstone after a moment. "We just got clearance, sir," the pilot said. "We'll put you down by the island."

Early morning sunlight gleamed from the surface of the ocean. Tombstone could see the carrier two miles ahead. The vessel was heading south, away from the helicopter, and its wake spread out from its stern like a pale blue arrowhead on the sea. The fires he'd heard about appeared to be extinguished, but there was a very great deal of smoke, a black, greasy stain against the sky above the carrier.

"They're making twelve knots," the copilot said. "Look at that smoke!

What the hell happened down there anyhow?"

"Embassy told me a rocket attack," Tombstone said. "I gather they upped-anchor in a hell of a hurry."

And I thought we had it bad at the embassy," the pilot said. "Okay, sir, hang onto your cookies."

Moments later, the Huey settled to the carrier's mid-deck, and Tombstone stepped aboard. A sharp wind across Jefferson's bow kept the smoke clear of the flight deck. The 5-MC was blaring, "Now hear this, now hear this.

Commence FOD walkdown." FOD stood for Foreign Object Damage, and the walkdown was an evaluation by all flight-deck personnel carried out routinely aboard Navy carriers. He could see the long line of sailors in dungarees or colored jerseys aft, stretched across the flight deck and walking slowly forward side by side, as each man searched for bits of metal, bolts, screws, or anything else which might be sucked into an aircraft's intakes with destructive result.

They would be looking for bits of debris left from the explosions and fire the night before, a prerequisite to any air operations planned for the day.

Tombstone wondered what was being planned as he stopped to clear the Huey's turning blades and hurried across the deck toward the island.

"Stoney! Ho… Stoney!"

He turned, his eyes widening in surprise at the familiar voice. "Batman!

You son of a… Where did you come from?"

"CATCC. CAG let me come down to play official greeter."

"No, you idiot! When did you get back? Where's Malibu? What happened…?"

Batman grinned. "Malibu and I both got back aboard yesterday evening, courtesy of the Tai army and some… some rather remarkable people out in the jungle." He sobered for a moment, then continued. "Malibu's in sick bay.

Nothing worse than a sprained ankle. And I think other questions had better wait."

"Why? What's going on?"

"Only about a million people on this tub want to question you, Tombstone.

Starting with your uncle and his entire intelligence staff." He jerked his head toward the island. "They're waiting for you topside, in CVIC."

"Then I guess I'd better get up there." He'd been looking forward to a shower and a clean uniform, but it looked like he'd have to settle for a change to his flightsuit. Wearily, he started to climb to the 0–9 level.

They'd pulled off the road at first light. Pamela and Bayerly were kept waiting in the truck until Pamela wondered if they were going to be shot.

Then their guards bullied them out of the back of the truck and led them at gunpoint along a path to a spot well away from the road. The area was heavily wooded. Pamela saw soldiers everywhere, some resting in small groups underneath the trees along the path, others coming and going along the trail.

The main encampment was a group of canvas tents heavily camouflaged with branches and palm fronds.

This, she realized, was a major rebel base. She could only guess at the location, but its presence so far from either Bangkok or the northern border suggested that the communist insurrection was far more widespread and better organized than anyone had realized. The soldiers around her were teenagers for the most part, armed with a motley collection of American weapons and the ubiquitous AK-47s. They did not look particularly formidable. Some swaggered or joked, but most looked simply scared. All, though, possessed an air of grim expectancy.

They were led to a cage, a narrow box of bamboo poles large enough for the two of them to sit side by side, but not large enough for them to stand or move around. A grinning That fastened the crude door shut with a length of chain and a padlock, said something incomprehensible with a harsh cackle of laughter, then left them alone. No one in the camp seemed to be paying them any attention, but Pamela was sure that any attempt to escape would bring them plenty of notice.

She was worried about Bayerly. He'd seemed withdrawn, almost shrunken in upon himself since her captors had thrust her in next to him back in Klong Toey. Each attempt to speak with him during the long, bumpy drive had been interrupted by a harsh word or gesture from one of the soldiers in the back with them.

"Commander Bayerly?" she asked when they were alone. What was his running name? She remembered. "Made It? Are you okay?"

The look he gave her was a mingling of horror and some inner pain.

"Listen, Commander," she said when he didn't answer. "Don't you go freaking out on me now. We're in a hell of a jam, and I'd like to think I'm not in it all by myself!"

"There's not much we can do about it," he said. He sounded distant, defeated.

"Maybe not. At least we could discuss our options."

"Options," he repeated. The word was bitter.

"What's with you, anyway?" she asked, exasperated. "Look, we should be trying to figure out how to get out of here while we can."

"Be my guest." He nodded toward the bamboo door with its padlocked chain. "It's not more than a couple hundred miles back to your hotel."

In this mood, Bayerly was going to be useless. Pamela had a special talent, though, an ability to draw people out in conversation even when they didn't want to talk. She'd used it to good effect for years during her career as a television interviewer. The key was first to get the subject comfortable with the interviewer, feeling that she was on his side, then to get the subject talking about himself. It was simple in theory, but this seemed to be a rather difficult situation in which to test it. "How long have you known Tombstone?" she asked.

Bayerly shrugged. "Maybe a year." He sounded totally disinterested.

"Since I joined the Jefferson."

"Is he a friend of yours?"

"That hotdog? No way."

"Hotdog? I heard him use that word once. What's it mean?"

He gave a wan smile, and Pamela knew she'd broken through his outer defenses. "A show-off," he said. "Someone who's always pushing the outside of the envelope… and wants people to know it."

"That doesn't sound like the Tombstone I know. He struck me as rather reserved." She smiled. "For a fighter pilot, anyway."

He didn't reply immediately, and for a moment Pamela thought she'd lost him again.

"Yeah, Tombstone's okay, I guess," he said at last. "Some of the guys give him a pretty rough time about his uncle and everything, but he doesn't flaunt it. Not really."

"Why do you dislike him so much then?"

Bayerly studied her for a long moment. "Ah… I don't know." He looked away, and appeared to be studying the surrounding forest. "I know this is going to sound pretty damned cruddy, but I guess a lot of it is all the attention he was getting after Wonsan."

"What's cruddy about that?"

"Oh, you know. It's like I'm jealous about his Navy Cross. The hero treatment, and all that."

"Are you?"

"I don't know." He sighed. "Not really jealous, I guess. Tombstone was the one who got the shot at flying CAP for our forces ashore at Wonsan, though. And I was stuck flying CAP over the Jefferson."

"He got the glory and you didn't. Is that it?"

"Shit. He didn't do a thing that any other man in the wing couldn't have done."

"Granted. So what's the problem?"

Again, he didn't answer for a long time. "I guess to be honest, the problem is with me, Miss Drake," he said. "Not with him."

"You want to tell me about it?"

He regarded her through narrowed eyes for a long time. He shrugged.

"Why not? But if you're looking for a story, I don't think much of your chances for getting it on the air."

She rested one hand on his knee. "I'd like to know, Made It. Really."

"Well." He looked away, as though unable to meet her eyes. He seemed to be having difficulty knowing how to begin. "A year ago I was stationed in Washington, D.C. I'd just finished a tour of sea duty aboard the America. CO of one of her Tomcat squadrons." He gave an ironic smile. "Lady, I was on my way up. A tour as squadron skipper… and now a hitch at the Pentagon. Know what that means to an aviator?"

She shook her head.

"It means that the powers that be are grooming him for command. Command!

After a tour in Washington, I'd have a crack at a CAG slot. Then another tour in D.C. maybe… all leading up to a carrier of my own some day."

"Sounds good."

"It was good. I was on Admiral Fitzroy's staff. God, that guy's only about four jumps down the pyramid from the CNO himself!" He gave a wan smile.

"My career, to say the least, was off to a promising start."

Pamela read the pain behind the words. "What happened?"

"There was this girl. Sharyl Fitzroy."

"Fitzroy! Not-"

"Yeah. The traditional admiral's daughter. I don't think he cared for having a lowly lieutenant commander date his daughter, but she was the independent type, y'know? Anyway. I was the one with the promising career and all that, right?

"One night I took her to the Kennedy Center. She loved the opera. There was a performance of La Bohme." He said nothing more for a time. Pamela waited quietly. After a time, he continued. "Afterwards, we went out for a walk, down by the Potomac. A moonlight stroll, and all that. We were…

attacked. Punks out joy-riding. Washington… Washington's got the highest crime rate in the country, did you know that?"

She nodded.

"There were three of them. They knocked me down, took my wallet. One of them grabbed her… dragged her off. They had a van parked nearby."

Pamela realized with a start that the man was crying. "It doesn't sound like something you could've helped."

He shook his head. "We shouldn't have been off by ourselves. Away from the crowds. Away from the lights. Bad judgment… at least that's what the admiral said later." His fists clenched. "Damn it, I was there on the ground begging for my life while they… while they…" He stopped again, and drew a long, ragged breath. "One of them shot me. It just grazed my scalp, but I guess in the dark and with all the blood they thought I was dead. They left me out there on the ground while they took turns with her in the van. Then they shot her, tossed her out. The police found us the next day."

"You were wounded. There was nothing you could have done anyway!"

"Maybe." He sounded bitter. "But I Played dead, lay there and didn't make a sound. I thought… I thought maybe they'd let her go afterwards, but they killed her.

"So I got branded as a coward."

"I don't understand. Why?"

He looked at her as though trying to decide whether or not she was joking. "Let's just put it down to the Navy's old-boy network," he said, finally. "Admiral Fitzroy had lost his only daughter, and I was the… the fucking wimp who played dead while she was murdered. I got transferred real fast after that. Probably a good thing. Fitzroy might have shot me himself."

Slowly, he rubbed his mustache. "But the word was out, y'know? This man had gone as far as he can go in the Navy. Oh, nothing official, you understand. I was even assigned a squadron skipper's slot aboard Jefferson.

Wouldn't do to have a former CO get taken down a peg. But it was damn clear I wasn't going anywhere anymore.

"I suppose the real revelation came during the Wonsan crisis. My whole squadron was held in reserve, while VF-95 went in to tangle with MiGs. You… you've got to understand, Miss Drake. A Navy aviator spends his whole life training for the moment when he can strap on an airplane and go up against MiGs, one on one. Most men never have that chance.

"And I didn't either."

"You think Admiral Magruder has it in for you? That he chose his own nephew instead of you?"

There was a long silence. "I don't know. Maybe not. It seemed like it at the time. And something… something happened on a flight a few days ago.

Up by the Burmese border. I did something stupid, see. Something I shouldn't have done. CAG came down on me like a ton of laser-guided ordnance, and I got relieved. It felt… it felt just like the bastards had been waiting all that time just to see me busted." He looked at her. "Like I said, pretty cruddy, right?

"The worst of it is, it looks like they were right. All of them. I broke. Maybe endangered my boat, my shipmates. I lost it." He looked away towards the woods beyond the cage. "Maybe I never had it."

She didn't answer for a long moment. "Made It? Back in that warehouse.

When they were questioning you. Was that why you told them you'd talk?"

"What do you mean?"

She couldn't help feeling that Bayerly must have been reacting on some level to what was happening to her, comparing it with what had happened to Sharyl Fitzroy. But he looked so shaken now. Maybe it was best not to dig too deeply.

"Never mind," she said. "Made It?" She pressed herself closer. "Hold me?"

Gently, almost reluctantly, he put his arm around her shoulders.

She'd thought they were going to stay there at the rebel camp all day, but less than an hour later, uniformed men arrived in jeeps and began shouting orders. Soldiers kicked out fires, others gathered weapons.

And then Pamela and Bayerly were again on their way north.

Tombstone leaned against the guardrail and looked out to sea. The wake foamed out beneath his feet, spreading astern all the way to the horizon. The sky overhead was a clear and piercing blue, but there was still a dirty, oily tang to the air, the smell of burned rubber, plastic, and paint. He had the fantail to himself. The entire crew, it seemed, had turned to in the cleanup, making Jefferson shipshape again after the attack and fire. He could hear the thump and bang of repair crews working in the hangar bay, the sounds echoing down the open machine shop passageway at his back.

His debriefing, the preliminary part of it anyway, was over. It had been routine and automatic, a recounting of what had happened at the hotel, and afterwards, at the Kiong Toey warehouse. Made It Bayerly's betrayal had been duly recorded. And it was a betrayal… whether the information which had led to the attack on Jefferson had come from him or from the three sailors butchered by Hsiao earlier. At the very least, Bayerly had provided Hsiao with the confirmation he'd needed, and quite possibly he'd provided details the sailors could not have known.

They were going to nail Made It if they ever found the guy again. Nail him… and why? He'd tried to stop them from hurting Pamela. The thought of what might be happening to the two of them at that moment made him shudder.

It felt as though he'd just reached a new low. He'd abandoned Pamela and Bayerly. And while he'd run in order to warn the carrier, the fact was that he'd run… leaving Pamela and a brother aviator behind. Hardly the behavior expected of a hero.

Slowly, he reached up and unzipped the breast pocket of his flight suit, where a small lump of metal pressed against his chest. He pulled out the medal which he had retrieved from its case in his cabin only minutes earlier.

The Navy Cross. It lay in his palm, catching the afternoon sun, the blue and white ribbon bright and clean in the light. His fingers closed over it.

He was no hero. Tombstone knew that, knew it to his very bones, and all of the medals, all of the television interviews on Earth would not make things different. Heroes were men like his father who had laid their lives on the line trying to drop a bridge in downtown Hanoi.

Tombstone remembered his feelings during the Wonsan op. Half the time he'd been too busy to think, riding on pure training and instinct, and the rest of the time he'd been scared to death. Landing a damaged Tomcat on the carrier with his RIO wounded in the backseat… hell, what else could he have done?

He looked at the medal again. If it hadn't been for the hero nonsense, maybe none of this would have happened. Tombstone would have been flying the recon out of U Feng, not Batman. It would have been him in the jungle… and maybe Pamela would never have been involved.

He opened his fingers and looked at the medal again. Almost… almost he cocked his arm to hurl the bit of metal and cloth out into the pale blue wake.

Something held him back. Throwing away the medal would change nothing, accomplish nothing.

That, he realized, was what was gnawing at him more even than anything else. Pamela and Bayerly were gone and there wasn't a damned thing he could do about it. Tracking the captives through Bangkok's teeming streets was a job for the hard-pressed That National Police, not the U.S. Navy.

With a start, he glanced at his watch. Almost a quarter past… and an all-departments meeting had been called for 1030 hours. He just had time to make it up to CVIC. He pocketed the medal, then turned away from the railing and plunged back into the machine shop passageway.