With Hostile Intent

Chapter Twenty The Cave Dwellers

Pearly Gates was a mess. Both eyebrows were singed away, and his left arm was bandaged. His ankle was sprained from having the other LSOs land on top of him in the net.

He was taking Spam Parker’s death hard. The worst thing that could happen to an LSO was to lose a pilot he was controlling. He kept shaking his head. “I tried to help her. She wouldn’t respond. She wouldn’t answer my calls.”

“Nobody’s blaming you,” said Maxwell. “You did your best.”

To his surprise, Maxwell’s name had appeared on the letter appointing the investigation board. As squadron executive officer, he wouldn’t normally sit on an investigation. But then he realized the board’s composition had been decided several weeks before the accident, when he was still the squadron operations officer.

The senior member was Commander Duke Zybrowski, executive officer of VFA-34. Also appointed to the board were Craze Manson and the flight surgeon, Knuckles Ball.

“Big Mac got it the worst,” Pearly told the assembled board. “He was the last into the net and he was on top. He got second-degree burns on his back.”

“You guys were lucky,” said Zybrowski. “The LSO platform was roasted. The Fresnel Lens was trashed. It was amazing that no one was killed.” Then he corrected himself. “Except Parker, of course.”

Pearly was still shaking his head. “It was so weird. Like… she was getting other instructions.”

“Other instructions?” asked Maxwell, puzzled. “What do you mean, other instructions?”

“I don’t know exactly. It was like she was doing the opposite of what I was telling her.”

“Did you hear anything else on the frequency?”

“No, sir. But I had this feeling that… I wasn’t getting through.”

Maxwell’s brain was still processing this information. It didn’t compute. Other instructions?

“Could she have been listening on another frequency?” he asked. “Her back radio?”

“I had good comm with her when she called the ball,” said Pearly. “But when I tried calling her that she was going low, it sounded like the frequency was jammed.”

Maxwell stared at the bulkhead for a moment, trying to reconstruct the scene. Something was nagging at him — a tiny, vague image lurking in the back of his brain.

The board called Killer DeLancey.

He flashed the trademark grin and said, “Okay, guys, fire away. What do you want to know?”

“We’re having a problem establishing Spam’s radio setup the night of the crash,” said Zybrowski. “You were her flight lead. We have the tape record of all transmissions on the number one radio between you and the ship’s controllers. But we can’t find a record of any dialogue between you and Spam on the number two radio.”

“Probably because there wasn’t any,” said DeLancey. “The mission went as briefed. Nothing needed to be discussed on the second radio.”

Maxwell found that peculiar. “You mean Spam didn’t argue or discuss anything while you were airborne? Wasn’t that a characteristic of hers, always making spurious radio calls?”

DeLancey shook his head. “Not anymore. I straightened her out on that. Her attitude had really turned around.”

Maxwell was dubious. From everything he knew, Spam Parker’s attitude, if anything, had gotten even more argumentative. “How about your number two radio? What were you using for a tactical frequency?”

DeLancey gave him a withering look. “What do you think? Squadron common, 295.7 megahertz, just like we’re supposed to.”

Maxwell held up a rectangular card. “This is your kneeboard card from the flight. You didn’t fill in the box with assigned frequency. But there’s a symbol jotted down here — ‘X-W.’ What does that mean?”

DeLancey peered at the card. “’X-W?’ No idea. Something I jotted down while we were briefing. Maybe it meant ‘crosswind.’ Spam was having trouble figuring out wind and drift in the marshal pattern, and I was helping her with it.”

The board members asked more questions about Spam Parker’s flying discipline — or lack of. DeLancey handled all the queries with an easy nonchalance.

The board had no more questions for DeLancey.

“It’s a damn shame,” he said as he rose from his chair. “Parker was turning into a good fighter pilot.”

The board members looked at each other. No one offered a comment.

After DeLancey left the room, Zybrowski asked the others, “Do you think he really believes that shit?”

Lieutenant Commander Big Mac MacFarquhar had a walrus mustache and a booming voice. “Yeah, that was me who flattened Pearly. I was the last one in the net.”

Maxwell winced. Big Mac weighed in at an easy two-fifty. Having an object the size of MacFarquhar land on you from twenty feet above could be lethal.

MacFarquhar peeled away his flight suit and showed Maxwell the bandages on his back. “The fire was already on us when I jumped. One more second and I would’ve been a crispy critter.”

They were in the Air Wing office, where MacFarquhar had his own cubicle with his name on it. Big Mac was the senior LSO aboard the Reagan, and it was his job to supervise all the other squadron LSOs.

Maxwell looked at the yellow pad on which he had jotted notes during the interview with Pearly Gates. “Pearly said it seemed to him as if Spam were getting ‘other instructions.’ What’s your take on that?”

“At first I thought so too. It was like one of the other LSOs had cut in and told her, ‘Easy with it,’ or something like that. But I checked the tapes. Nobody said squat.”

“Then what made her dump the jet onto the ramp?”

MacFarquhar shook his head. “Pilot error. Arrogance. Parker flew into the spud locker. Period.”

“Then why was she even allowed to be out there?”

“You guys tell me. She was your problem, not mine. I told Killer we oughta send her packing.”

“What did Killer say?”

“He said to keep her in the loop, don’t worry because she was getting better.”

“But she wasn’t getting better.”

“Yeah, and now she’s dead. And pardon me if I don’t get all remorseful about it. That dumb broad nearly killed me and all my LSOs.” MacFarquhar glanced around, then lowered his voice. “Good riddance, I say. Too bad it had to cost us a Hornet. I’ll tell you this much, I’ve got no stomach for any more fucking social experiments like Spam Parker.”

Maxwell let MacFarquhar rant for while. Big Mac was a good LSO, but Maxwell knew he was not an objective witness. He was still reliving the horror of the fireball on the flight deck.

Finally Maxwell thanked him and left the office. Walking down the passageway, he pondered again what little he had learned. Why did DeLancey, a fervent anti-feminist, not act when the LSOs told him they wanted Spam taken off flying status?

Why did Spam Parker, who wasn’t known to be crazy or suicidal, ignore the radio calls that would save her life?

It didn’t add up.

Petty Officer Third Class Jose Ruiz was still wearing his flight deck float coat. His cranial protector lay on the padded seat next to him. He scratched his head and said, “Well, sir, it was dark, and I wasn’t paying that much attention.”

They were sitting in the back of the ready room. Maxwell prompted him. “But you definitely saw Commander DeLancey remain in his cockpit after he landed and you had secured the tie-downs?”

“Yes, sir. When he raised the canopy, he told me he was going to reprogram the radio.”

Maxwell tried to visualize DeLancey reprogramming his radio. Something wasn’t making sense. “Why would he do that?”

Ruiz chuckled. “He said he screwed up and forgot to use the ‘crypto hold’ function that saves the frequencies.”

“Isn’t it your job to reprogram the radio when that happens?”

“Sure, but the skipper said he needed the practice. He’s a cool guy, Commander DeLancey. Most of the pilots just walk away and leave that stuff to us.”

Maxwell thought for a second, mentally reconstructing the scene on the flight deck the night Spam Parker crashed. “So Commander DeLancey was sitting in his cockpit when Lieutenant Parker’s jet hit the ramp?”

“Yes, sir, I believe so.”

“Weren’t you there?”

“As soon as the fire broke out, I ran over to man a hose.” Ruiz looked worried. “Did somebody do something they weren’t supposed to, Commander?”

Maxwell wondered briefly how perceptive the nineteen-year-old enlisted man was. Had he read anything into the questions? “No, not at all. This is what we do when we investigate an accident.”

The young plane captain shook his head. “Do you know what happened to Lieutenant Parker? Do you know why she flew into the back of the ship?”

“Not yet, but I’m going to find out, Ruiz.” Silently he added, Even if it kills me.

With that thought, Maxwell looked up, over Ruiz’s shoulder. In the front of the ready room, DeLancey was watching them intently.

Half an hour later, DeLancey stopped him in the passageway outside the Roadrunner ready room.

“You’re off the Mishap Investigation Board. As of now.”

Maxwell tried to read DeLancey’s expression. Nothing the man did surprised him anymore. “It’s not a good time, Skipper. The board is in the middle of making its report, and I’m —”

DeLancey cut him off. “You heard me. Butt out. You shouldn’t have been on the board in the first place. As executive officer, you’ve got real work to do. Right now you’re supposed to be up in strike planning putting together the coordinated ops plan.”

There was no use arguing. “Yes, sir. Who’s taking my place on the investigation board?”

“Lieutenant Cheever. Hand over all your notes and material to him. He’ll finish the report.”

Maxwell watched DeLancey walk away. DeLancey now had his acolytes, Craze Manson and Undra Cheever, on the board. It meant that he controlled the investigation.

The phone in Maxwell’s stateroom rang.

“It’s B.J. Johnson, XO. Can we talk?”

Maxwell glanced at his watch. “I’ve got an intel briefing in about an hour. How about the wardroom in ten minutes?”

“Someplace more private would be better.”

He thought for a second. “Okay, the hangar deck, by the number two elevator.”

“See you there.”

In another few minutes, they were walking along the perimeter of the hangar deck. Maxwell said nothing, letting her talk.

“Spam never actually told me something was going on,” said B.J. ‘But she was my roommate, you know. You get a sense of these things.”

She paused to watch a tug hauling an F/A-18 across the deck to a maintenance bay. The Reagan was between flight operations cycles. Blue shirts were respotting jets, shuffling aircraft from the flight deck to the hangar deck, getting ready for the next aircraft recovery.

“What things? For example?”

“For example, I’d come in, and she’d be talking on the phone with someone — she wouldn’t use a name. But I could tell by her voice that it was someone…” B.J.’s voice trailed off.

“Someone she was intimate with?”

B.J. nodded. “That was Spam. It didn’t surprise me. She called it ‘stud du jour.’ It was just her style. Wherever she was, she had a boyfriend.”

“She never told you who it was?”

“No.”

“But you have a pretty good idea, right?”

B.J. nodded again. “It must have been after Dubai. It was like, her attitude changed. She suddenly stopped badmouthing everyone, going on about how we were being screwed over by the establishment, like she used to. She talked about how she was going to get moved up to section lead. She was really upbeat.” B.J. paused, and said, “For a while.”

“Just for a while?”

“She was having trouble coming aboard, as you know. She was blaming it on Pearly. But then she started worrying about a FNAEB. She was afraid they would take her wings. I heard her say one time, if he let them FNAEB her…” B.J. didn’t finish the thought.

Maxwell gave it a moment. “Who was ‘he?’”

“She never actually said. But I could guess. So can you.”

He could. “The skipper?”

“It’s just a hunch. Call it intuition if you like.”

More than a hunch, Maxwell knew. They both knew she was right. He was shocked but not surprised. It wasn’t unheard of in the Navy that a senior officer, even a squadron commander, might become involved with a female subordinate. It would explain DeLancey’s coddling of a weak pilot.

B.J. was looking at him. “What do you think? Could it have had anything to do with her getting killed?”

“I don’t think so,” he said, trying to sound sure of himself.

He could see by her expression that she didn’t believe him.

“When?” CAG Boyce said, repeating the question. “That’s up to the President. Could be as soon as tomorrow. Or the day after.”

On the bulkhead behind him was an illuminated map of Iraq. All his strike leaders were assembled in the intelligence briefing space.

Boyce went on. “It seems that our intelligence assets in Baghdad have been compromised. But they sent an alert that Iraq has completed its weapons assembly project and is ready to push the button. The United Nations is now going through all the usual posturing. They’ve issued a forty-eight-hour ultimatum to Saddam to open up all his weapons facilities and submit to inspection.”

A Hornet pilot piped up, “Hey, great. Saddam’s gonna invite the inspectors over to his palace for tea and then give them all his new toys. We can all go home.”

A ripple of laughter ran through the room. Boyce said, “Yeah, right. What it means is he gets two free days to hit us before we hit him. And we can forget the element of surprise. He’s gonna know we’re coming.”

Boyce walked over to the map. “Strike leaders, I want each of you to finalize your strike plans. Re-plot all your run-in lines according to the latest threat assessments. These will be updated hourly based on satellite and recon data.”

“What about the air-to-air threat?” asked a Tomcat pilot.

“Al-Taji and Al-Taqqadum still have small units of flyable MiGs, but they shouldn’t have any ground-controlled intercept capability left. Anyway, the Brit Tornadoes are tasked with eliminating the interceptor threat on the ground before we get there.”

It was a place only bats could love.

The Carrier Air Traffic Control Center was as dark as the inside of a cave. What little light there was in CATTC came from the greenish glow of the radar scopes and the large lucite grease board that covered the opposite wall.

Chief Petty Officer Mark Williams, the senior enlisted controller, greeted Maxwell. “Good morning, Commander, how can I help you?”

“I’m looking for tapes from the ship’s air traffic control communications on the night of the Hornet crash, Chief.”

“We’ve already made copies of all that for the Aircraft Mishap Board, sir.”

“I know, but we don’t have anything with the mishap aircraft’s tactical communications. You know, transmissions made on the squadron discrete frequencies.”

Chief Williams scratched his chin. “I’m sure we made copies of your squadron’s tac freqs — both of them — for the board. You say there was nothing on them from the mishap aircraft?”

“Hardly anything. Maybe they were using another freq.” Maxwell was fishing now.

“If they were, we wouldn’t be taping it down here. Maybe she was just using good radio discipline that night.”

Maxwell had to smile at that one. One thing Spam Parker had never been known for was radio discipline. “Yeah, maybe so. Well, thanks for your help anyway.”

A dead end, he decided. He walked back toward the lighted passageway.

Williams called after him. “Just a minute, sir.”

“Yeah, Chief?”

“Sometimes the spooks down in Surface Plot monitor the Battle Group’s transmissions to make sure we aren’t breaking EMCON or broadcasting any classified information. They’re the guys who monitor the spectrum and report EMCON violations. Maybe they could help.”

“Good call, Chief. Thanks a lot.”

Maxwell’s mind went into high gear. Why hadn’t he thought of it before? The spooks were equal opportunity spies, he thought. They didn’t just eavesdrop on the enemy; they did it to everyone.

Surface Plot was almost as bad as the CATCC cave — dark and lit mostly from the glow of the various wall-sized electronic boards. Maxwell asked a dungaree-clad petty officer where to find the surface watch officer.

“Through that hatch, sir, and buzz in at the entry portal. He’s back in the SCIF.” SCIF stood for Special Compartmentalized Information Facility. It meant beyond Top Secret classification. Eyes only, need-to-know.

Maxwell was out of his element. He was far below decks, down in the spaces of the carrier’s Surface Plot, called Alpha Sierra. They called this black shoe country, and it was occupied by surface navy officers, who wore black shoes with their khaki uniforms. The black shoes looked in disdain at the brown-shoed aviators who, they were convinced, were incapable of rowing a canoe.

Maxwell stood in front of the remote camera and pressed the buzzer.

A voice from an invisible speaker said, “May I help you?”

“Commander Maxwell, VFA-36. I’d like to see the Surface Watch Officer.”

“Present your ID card.”

Irritated, Maxwell removed his ID. He wondered if the spooks knew the carrier had been under way now for three weeks and that not a single spy had been seen swimming out from the shore.

“Place the card in the drawer.”

Maxwell placed his card in the drawer next to the buzzer switch. After several seconds, the voice said, “You may enter, Commander.”

The door buzzed and popped open as the electronic latches released.

It was chilly inside the darkened space, and Maxwell rubbed his arms for warmth. A bespectacled, khaki-clad commander strode up and extended his hand. “Chris Foley, Surface Watch Officer,” he said. “What brings an airedale down into the bowels of the Reagan? Too hot on the flight deck?”

“We ran out of ice cubes and heard this was the coldest place on the ship.”

“You heard right.” He smiled and waved his arm. “This stuff is extremely temperature-sensitive. What can we do for you?”

“We’re investigating the F-18 mishap the other night. I heard that you sometimes monitor the Battle Group radio frequency emissions, for content and such.”

“We monitor a lot of frequencies — and not just our battle group.”

“Do you keep track of airborne transmissions from our aircraft?”

“Sure. Especially when the BG is under emissions control. The admiral wants to know if we’re keeping strict radio silence, and if anyone breaks it, he wants to know who. The command ship Blue Ridge does most of it, though. We’re sort of the auxiliary.”

“Were you guys keeping track of the upper UHF spectrum the night of the Hornet crash?”

“As a matter of fact, yes. You’re the second air wing officer to ask that question today.”

Maxwell stared at the watch officer. “Someone else was down here?”

“Your skipper, I think. You know, the one who shot down that MiG —”

Maxwell felt sick to his stomach. “DeLancey?”

“Yes, that’s the one.”

“What did he want?”

“Same thing you’re looking for.”

“Did you give it to him?”

“The tape? Oh, sure. We were about to throw it out anyway.”

Maxwell tried to sound calm. “You mean you didn’t keep a copy?”

“No, we don’t keep that stuff unless there’s some level of intelligence interest.”

Maxwell felt a pall of gloom descend over him. He knew he had been on the right trail, but he was too late. The trail had gone cold. Now he was out of ideas.

He thanked the watch officer and left.

Outside the frigid Surface Plot area, the air seemed hot and stagnant. As Maxwell turned down the long passageway he saw DeLancey standing four or five hatches away. DeLancey nodded and gave him a smile.

Maxwell returned to his room. He put on a Vivaldi CD, then turned on the computer and checked his email.

Nothing. No surprise, he thought. It was over.

He tried again to make sense of the Spam Parker accident. He remembered again what he had learned about accident investigations when he was in test pilot school. They liked to compare an investigation to an archeological dig. You worked with an event that was frozen in time, and you tried to recreate what actually happened. It was like looking at the remains of a fossilized dinosaur and guessing how it died. You could invent theories about why this or that happened, but in the final analysis that’s all you really had — theories.

But this wasn’t archeology, he reminded himself. They weren’t dealing with ancient history. This was a recent event, and they damned sure ought to be able to come up with credible evidence. The trouble was, you could gather as much good evidence as you wanted — and still come up with the wrong answer. Especially if someone was hiding the critical piece of evidence. Or planting a red herring.

For a while Maxwell ruminated, listening to the bright, warbling sound of the baroque music. Then, abruptly, something else came to him. It was an old adage — one they used to teach back in test pilot school about accident investigations: Remember your first impression; it’s almost always the right one.

Well, he remembered his first impression about this accident, unthinkable as it was. He had nothing else to go with it, just an impression — a hunch, really. It was too bizarre, too inconceivable to even discuss it with the other members of the board.

No evidence, no clues. Just an impression.

His mind was clicking forward again. Maxwell turned off the CD player and picked up the phone.