“I think he said to go right,” Dork said. In fact, he was pretty sure the sergeant had said to go right, but the longer he looked at the two passages, the more he doubted his memory and sense of direction.
“Right is always right,” he said, “but I’m always wrong, so I’m going to go left.”
His mind made up, he hustled down the left-hand cleft in the surrounding rock formations.
* * *
Samkamka pointed the nose of the craft at the blimp in the distance and advanced the throttles.
“Not too fast,” Bowden warned. “And don’t watch the missile when it launches.”
“Just perform your tasks and allow me to fly the craft.” Samkamka’s voice was testy, but his statement sounded like it was still half-request.
“Sure.” Bowden said. Getting into a pissing match inbound to the target wasn’t the best way to score hits.
Bowden risked a glance at the ground in front of them. The town extended for several kilometers, almost to where two fingers stuck out from the mountain range behind it. The massive dish sat in the little valley between the two projections, with some sort of militia or army base in front of it.
He could see a number of vehicles, tents, and small figures running around as they approached. The men wouldn’t be much of a factor this time, as they didn’t have to fly over the base, but they’d have to fly over all of them on the bombing run. That’s going to suck.
His eyes snapped back up to find the blimp growing on the windscreen. They were almost co-altitude with it.
“Master arm is on,” he said, throwing the switch. “Port Sidewinder selected.”
He looked back up in time to see several tracers arc up in front of them. He pointed them out to Samkamka “Tracers. Every fifth or tenth bullet is one of those, so the guys on the ground can tell where they’re aiming.”
“Shit!” Samkamka exclaimed as he jerked the craft away from the tracer streams. “There are more bullets than the ones I can see?”
Bowden chuckled. “Yeah, lots. Bring us back onto the target.”
Samkamka gingerly pushed the nose back toward the dirigible. “How can we fly through them? There are so many!”
“Big sky, little airplane,” Bowden said, chanting the mantra from back home. Except he wasn’t in a little, agile plane anymore; he was in a big, fat, 120-foot-long interface craft that was never meant to dodge ground fire. Or soak it up, if the truth were known.
“If it makes you feel better, move the plane around in three dimensions to make their targeting harder,” Bowden suggested. “Just try to keep our nose close to the blimp.”
They were only a minute from firing range, and the blimp continued to grow. “Fifteen kilometers,” Bowden guessed. “We’ll fire when it’s at eight.”
“Thirteen klicks. Twelve, eleven …” Bowden’s held his finger poised over the release button. “Ten…nine…steady now…”
A stream of tracers flashed in front of the craft, and Samkamka jerked the stick back and right, flinching from the fire as Bowden hit the missile release. The Sidewinder leaped from the rail and roared off into the sky, arcing high over the blimp. Bowden knew there was no chance the seeker would acquire the blimp.
“D’jeq!” Samkamka cursed, trying to push the nose of the plane back down toward the blimp.
“No, no, no!” Bowden exclaimed. “Break right and get us out of here. You’re going to run into the blimp!”
Almost too late, Samkamka saw the airship right in front of them, and, at the last instant, yanked the stick back up and right, narrowly averting another mid-air collision.
“What do I do?” Samkamka asked.
“Take us out to fifteen klicks,” Bowden said, internally seething but keeping his voice level. “We’ll turn back in and set up for the shot again.”
Samkamka continued the turn away from the target, and Bowden looked down to turn off the armament switches.
Ptink! Something struck the cockpit blister. The plane seemed to wiggle once, then rolled wings level; Bowden looked over at Samkamka.
“Big sky, little airplane” was something aviators said to steel their nerves; however, they all knew it was a lie. Never had that been more clear than now. A bullet had pierced the starboard canopy at an angle and gone through Samkamka’ neck, severing his carotid artery. Blood painted the back of his seat and the firewall behind as it sprayed out.
Bowden started to unstrap to go to Samkamka’ aid, then caught sight of the mountain toward which they were now flying. At high speed.
* * * * *
Chapter 11
Bowden dove back into his seat, slammed the throttles forward, and pulled back and right as hard as he could, continuing the turn they were in before Samkamka was shot. The climbing turn helped him miss the promontory sticking up, but Bowden knew it hadn’t been by much. He came back to wings-level in time to see motion out of the right corner of his eye.
A handheld missile plumed up toward him, clearly having acquired lock.
“Shit!” Bowden exclaimed, pushing forward on the stick. He’d climbed so sharply that he’d highlighted himself against the clear sky. He pulled toward the missile in a diving turn, taking the engines out of the missile’s field of view, and watched as the missile went ballistic, unable to keep track of him.
Luckily, the weapon had been an early-model IR missile. A more advanced model, something like an SA-18, wouldn’t have been fooled as easily. He breathed a sigh of relief.
However, the close call answered the question of whether or not the satrap’s forces had missiles. Great. One more thing to watch for.
He pulled out of the dive at about 100 feet and retarded the throttles to keep from over-speeding his ordnance. A quick glance showed Samkamka was dead, having bled out.
One more investment in the success of this mission. Having talked Samkamka into staying, he owed it to the man to successfully complete it.
Bowden took a deep, steadying breath and turned back toward the blimp. Samkamka’s death actually simplified things; now he was flying his own aircraft again, and it was just like being back in his Hornet. Except it was about two and a half times as big and about as graceful as a giant pig in a concrete hang-glider. Aside from that, it was just like flying over Somalia again—No, don’t think about Somalia. Focus on the mission.
He steadied up with his nose on the target, descended to about fifty feet, and pushed the throttles forward again as he raced toward the target. At least there weren’t any power lines here to worry about. Hell, if B-52s could fly this low, he could, too. Too bad I don’t have their terrain-following gear.
Bowden glanced at the jury-rigged armament panel, selected the other Sidewinder, then turned the master armament switch on. Not having to deal with Samkamka meant he could run the attack exactly how he wanted, and he focused on the long, enclosed gondola. A thin haze trailed behind the exhaust stack projecting to its starboard. Perfect. The dirigible’s power plant was on and operational. He wasn’t concerned with the two propellers on the midships rail; they weren’t hot enough for the improvised missile to see.
He gently tapped the thruster that functioned like the rudder in his old F/A-18 Hornet and brought the craft into alignment with the blimp. He pulled back slightly so the nose of the missile was pointed at the gondola, which—by staying low—he had highlighted on the open sky behind it. He noticed the tracers reaching up for him out of his peripheral vision, but he was too low and fast for them to hit him—he hoped—and he wasn’t going to mess up the shot by yanking the plane away from his target.
Easy…nice and easy…gotcha, bitch!
He slapped the launch button, and the Sidewinder leaped from the wing and raced toward the blimp. The airship yawed to its port, trying to follow his craft so the men inside could shoot at him—but even though the interface craft was a pig, it was far more maneuverable than a blimp, and he was away from it and turning outbound before its crew had a shot at him. Bowden chuckled.
Bowden climb
ed up to five hundred feet in a right-hand 360 that took him to the other side of the J’Stull town, and he watched as the missile hit and blew the blimp from the sky. The way to the target was now clear. He eased the interface craft back to 200 feet and turned toward the massive dish on the other side of the town.
Bowden selected two of the Skipper stations, turned on the laser designator, then swore when the “Ready” light didn’t illuminate on the panel. Worse, the TV screen that should have shown him a view of where the laser was pointing stayed black, rather than bringing up an image. He cycled the switch again. Nothing. Damn it! He leaned forward then looked out the window to where the laser package was mounted. He could just see the device…and several wires flapping in the wind, having come undone, just like he’d warned the SpinDogs would happen.
Whether something had hit them or they hadn’t been able to withstand the speeds at which the craft had traveled didn’t matter. The designator wasn’t fixable in flight, and his worst fear was confirmed.
He was screwed.
* * *
“Has anyone seen Dork yet?” Aliza asked as they came to the end of the crevice and crawled up to the top to look around.
“Want me to send someone back to look for him?” Cook asked when the rest of the squad replied in the negative.
Aliza shook her head. “There’s no time.” She looked out over the plain and pointed. “Look—there are several big fires. The planes have already come and gone, and the antenna is still standing.”
“And it will remain standing,” a voice from behind her said.
Aliza spun to find twenty men along the edge of the crevice—in good cover—pointing rifles at the squad.
“Put your hands up,” the man commanded, “and no one has to die. As you can see from the fireballs out there, your mission has failed.”
* * * * *
Chapter 12
Bowden did a right 180 and headed outbound while he tried to think. He took a deep breath. He wasn’t totally screwed—the mission was still salvageable if he could get a hold of the ground team. Maybe they were in position.
“Cookie, this is Hornet,” he transmitted. “You there? I say again, Cookie this is Hornet. Come in if you can hear me. Over.”
Nothing.
He tried it again but didn’t get any response.
Well, fuck.
The bombs he was carrying were less than useless without a laser designator. The rocket motors were hard-wired to fire when they were dropped, so he couldn’t drop them as dumb bombs; they would race off in search of a laser spot. Where would they hit? There was no way to tell. Way beyond the target.
I’m not launching them just to kill another child.
The bombs were out. He didn’t have any missiles. He had to complete the mission, now. If there’d been time, he could have gone back to the base and gotten the other laser designator or reconnected the wires on the one he had. But that meant another takeoff, and he wasn’t sure the SpinDogs had any more pilots with enough in-atmosphere experience. Perhaps Burg Hrensku had survived the wreck earlier, but if not, they’d have to bring someone down from orbit.
And there wasn’t time for any of that.
A flashing light from the instrument panel caught his eye. Low fuel. He looked out the window and could see a line of holes across the wing. Fuel was wicking faintly out of them. Unfortunately, it was also probably pouring out of the matching set on the underside of the wing.
The gauge read just over one quarter full but was noticeably dropping.
He had enough for one run, maybe two, then he’d be bingo fuel and as done as done gets.
But, he realized with a sudden, cool calm, with no way to target the bombs, there wouldn’t be any need for a second run. The only weapon he had was the interface craft itself. And crashing it would be enough to take out the suspended antenna, which would set the satraps back months, if not years.
He sighed, his mind made up. When he’d signed his commissioning papers, he’d known that one day he might have to give his life on a foreign shore. He hadn’t realized it would be one so far away from home, but if it were, so be it. It was the only way he could buy the rest of the Lost Soldiers the time they needed to set up their base. And maybe this would—in some small way—make up for Somalia. Make up for the death of that little girl.
He began a climbing turn back inbound to the target and pushed the throttles forward. Speed was better on this run—he only needed to keep the missiles away from him for a few seconds; after that, they could chase him down and add to the destruction. A fitting pyre for him and the rest of those lost on the most screwed-up mission he had ever flown. Murphy’s Law, indeed.
The antenna was easy to find. He pointed the nose of the craft at it and leveled off. His airspeed continued to build as he raced to his doom.
* * *
“Guys?” Dork called, running as fast as he could with the pack on his back. “This ain’t funny! Where’d y’all go?”
He’d about come to the conclusion that he’d gone the wrong way at the intersection when he got to the dead end. There was no way forward. The sides of the crevice were worse than sheer—they leaned inward—and they were about five meters high and too far apart to use one to climb up the other. He tried to climb it a couple of times but couldn’t find adequate hand- and foot-holds.
His stomach sank; he’d gone the wrong way, and he wouldn’t have time to catch up with the rest of the squad before the planes arrived. He could hear distant gunfire, and then—with a roar—one of the craft raced overhead with a white plume coming from its right wing. They were already here and in combat! The quick flash he’d seen of the plane had shown it still had all its bombs attached—the pilots had counted on him, and he had failed!
Slowly, he slid down the side of the crevice, tears wetting his cheeks for a moment before the heat dried them into itchy, salt-crusted lines. It was just like Vietnam all over again. He’d been separated from his squad and, when they’d needed the machinegun he’d been carrying, he’d gotten lost. He’d heard the fighting, but by the time he found the squad, they’d all been killed. A man in sunglasses had shown up, and then he’d woken up here—only to repeat the process all over again.
They were right—all of them—to call him dumb, clumsy, and stupid. He was a dork. The tears fell, and he was unable to stop them.
Sniff! Grunt!
He looked up at the unexpected noise and saw one of the whinnies looking down at him. It looked like Scout, but Dork didn’t have enough time around the creatures to know for sure. The whinnie stared down at him with its head cocked to the side, grunted again, then flipped his head in a motion that looked like, “Come on up.”
Dork held up his hands. “I’d love to come up, boy, but I can’t make it.”
The whinnie looked down the crevice, then sprang into it with him. The passage widened at the end, and there was enough room for the whinnie—barely—though he scraped Dork’s side getting into it. The whinnie then knelt and looked back over his shoulder at Dork expectantly.
“You can get us out of here?” Dork asked. He clambered up and onto the whinnie. The creature looked back at Dork as it stood, then looked at the wall of the crevice.
“Got it. You want me to hold on,” Dork said. He grabbed the neck of the big lizard, clenched his legs hard against its flanks, and the whinnie sprang forward. As it reached the end of the passageway, it sprang up and to the left, bounced once, twisting as it did so, to land on the ground above the crevice.
Dork hit the ground like a sack of potatoes, having lost his grip when the whinnie twisted, but he was out! Better yet, he’d protected the box in his pack, at the cost of some lacerations on his back and what felt like a few cracked ribs.
“Thank you!” he exclaimed as he struggled to his feet. His back was on fire and breathing hurt, but he ignored it, knowing he had only seconds left before the plane came back—if it made it back at all. He snapped out the tripod’s legs and turned the box on.
“We’ll go find my friends in just a minute,” he said, “but first I have to do something.”
Although he could see the antenna—it was impossible to miss—he couldn’t see the control station because a series of low hills intervened. He ran up the side of one hill with the mule, and there it was! It was a long designate at about 2,500 meters, but it was within the pre-briefed range.
A quick glance to the south showed the plane was already inbound and appeared to be moving faster than what he’d thought the pilot had said he’d be doing. He only had seconds!
He dialed in the code—1555—for the control station, found it in the viewfinder, and turned on the laser, hoping—and praying—that this time he wasn’t too late.
* * * * *
Chapter 13
Tracers arced lazily into the air, but they hadn’t anticipated the interface craft’s new speed, and they fell behind him. Bowden saw movement as a missile launched parallel with his right wing, but he was in his final dive and gaining speed. There was no way the missile would catch him in time. Even if it guided on him, it was a tricky aspect angle.
His eyes returned to the transmitter facility suspended over the antenna bowl, and he smiled. His life had a purpose again. Take out the transmitter and give the rest of the Lost Soldiers the thing they needed most, time.
A flash of yellow caught his eye, and he glanced at his left panel. Laser Acquired and Code Verified were illuminated on the Skipper receiver. He’d forgotten to turn off the master arm switch, and the weapons were still armed and ready! And—even though the soldiers weren’t talking to him—the missiles were receiving a laser designate!
Waveoff (Murphy's Lawless Book 6) Page 8