Sea fighter

by James H. Cobb

  And that was the rub. She didn’t know, and it had been a long time since Amanda Garrett had last not known what it was that she wanted out of life. She didn’t like the sensation.

  Arkady was asleep, his head resting on her breast. Lightly she stroked his dark hair and stared at the sky, watching the stately march of the stars around Polaris.

  The doubts of the night lingered on into the day, keeping Amanda subdued as they got the Seeadler under way on the reach across the sound for Powell’s Point. Even the spanking breeze that put the placid little cruising sloop’s rail to the water couldn’t lift her spirits to their former level as they beat to the southeast.

  As the morning progressed, Amanda felt Arkady’s eyes resting thoughtfully upon her. He had the knack of reading her better than any man she had ever known beyond her own father. And that had its drawbacks as well as its advantages.

  “Any word yet on your next duty?” the aviator asked casually from his side of the cockpit.

  “Not really,” she replied, easing the tiller a few degrees. “I haven’t really given it much thought yet. I still have a year to go aboard the Duke. There’s no rush.”

  Arkady lifted an eyebrow at her. “A year isn’t all that long, babe. You always told us that with career planning, you had to start early to get the slot you wanted.”

  Amanda shrugged with more casualness than she felt. “I suppose I did, and I suppose I was right. I just haven’t had the time yet. I guess I should get working on something.”

  “So what are you going to be looking for?” he insisted.

  “I’m not sure. I’m due for a tour on the beach, I know that. But beyond that point I’m just not sure.”

  “Hell, you’ve got to have some idea.” Impatience crept into Arkady’s voice.

  “Well, I don’t!” she snapped back. “I just don’t. All right?”

  They both recoiled from her sudden burst of anger, and the only sound aboard the sloop for a time was the hiss of the waves and the working of the rigging.

  “I’m sorry, Arkady,” she said quietly after a minute. “But I really don’t know what I’ll be doing next. Why is it important now?”

  It was the aviator’s turn to shrug as he looked off at a passing cabin cruiser. “I just figured that we might want to try coordinating something. You know, so we could get the same duty station. You’re a great correspondent, babe, but it would be nice to at least be able to look at you once in a while.” A ghost of his old grad school grin crept back.

  Amanda was grateful for the chance to smile back. “I know what you mean, love. I don’t suppose finding a slot in San Diego would be that much of a challenge. Come to think of it, I’ve even had a couple of civilian headhunters from out that way offer me a fat consultant’s contract from Lockheed Shipbuilding. No, come to think about it, it wouldn’t be much trouble at all to get on the West Coast.”

  “Uh, that’s just the thing, babe. I might not be out on the West Coast for much longer. Well, there’s a chance of that, anyway. I’ve been offered a shot at the Fleet JSF Conversion Program.”

  “The Joint Strike Fighter Program?” Amanda fell half a dozen points off her course. “Arkady, that’s fabulous!”

  “Pretty neat, anyway,” he agreed, nodding somberly. “It’s for the operational workup of the Vertical Takeoff and Landing variant of the aircraft. The Navy and Marines both are looking for aviators who are both jet and helicopter rated, and I did finish my carrier qualifications before I transferred over to rotor-wing. There aren’t too many of us out here, and they seem really anxious to talk to me.”

  “I imagine so!” Amanda fumbled with the tiller for a moment, re-aiming the Seeadler’s jackstay at the distant Powell’s Point lighthouse and easing her off from the drive of the wind. “Arkady, this is what you’ve always wanted, another shot at flying fighters.”

  “Among other things, yeah.” He tucked his hands into the pockets of his denim jacket. “But if I take the shot, it’ll mean being posted to Jacksonville.”

  “So?”

  “So, babe, Jax is an aviation station, with damn few slots available for surface-warfare specialists.”

  “Oh.”

  Arkady continued, not meeting her eyes. “If I take this JSF job, it’ll mean another couple of years of us seeing each other for a week every six months. If I pass on the JSH, I figure we can at least both get something on the same side of the continent.”

  “No, love,” Amanda said quietly. “No. You can’t miss an opportunity like this.”

  “Sure I can,” he replied simply. He slouched lower on the cockpit bench, studying her face, his own impassive. “If that’s how it has to be, yeah, I can do it.” He paused for a moment, then continued. “It’s either that or we both try for a different deal of the deck. I’ve been thinking …”

  A shrill electronic warble issued from the Seeadler’s cabin, startling them both.

  “Damn, damn, damn! Arkady, take the helm!”

  “Got it,” he replied, snapping back to Navy mode. Deftly he ducked under the boom and took over the tiller. Going forward and hunkering low, Amanda reached inside the cabin hatchway and disconnected the cellular phone from the jack of the solar power charger. This was her personal work phone, the one that could not be disregarded.

  “Garrett here.”

  “Commander Garrett,” a distant and decisive voice whispered. “This is Commander Koletter, the OOD at NAVSPECFORCE Atlantic. A situation has developed that requires your presence at LANTFLEETCOM immediately. Admiral Maclntyre’s orders.”

  “Admiral Macintyre.” All thoughts of a personal nature drained away in an instant. That carefully deliberate phrase. “A situation has developed,” and Eddie Mac Maclntyre’s personal brand made this a fire-alarm call. “I’m aboard my boat at the moment, Commander, just off the mouth of Albemarle Sound. I’ll put in to Port Powell immediately and try and rent a car.”

  “That won’t be necessary, Commander. Can you give us your position?”

  “Affirmative.” Amanda reached into the cabin again and procured the Seeadler’s Admiral GPU. It was the work of a minute to establish and read off the fix.

  “Acknowledged, Commander Garrett. Maintain those coordinates. A Coast Guard helicopter is being launched to pick you up. They will be over your location shortly. Please be ready to signal them in.”

  “We’ll be standing by. Garrett out.” She snapped the cellular phone shut, not even realizing that she had slipped into naval radio discipline.

  “What’s the word, Skipper?” Arkady inquired crisply.

  “Something pretty hot,” she replied, her own thoughts jumping ahead. “They’re sending out a helo for me. Bring her into the wind and let’s get the canvas off of her. They’ll be doing a sling pickup, so we’ll need bare poles. While I get my gear together, you start the auxiliary and break out a marker strobe and some smoke flares. You’re going to have to take her back alone …”

  Amanda let her string of commands trail off. The bubble so carefully built the previous day and night had burst as if it had never been.

  She hunted for Arkady’s eyes. “Love,” she said carefully, “I think you had something you wanted to say before that phone call. What was it?”

  From his station at the tiller, Arkady smiled back at her. There was a degree of sadness in that smile, but his vivid blue eyes held only love and a quiet resignation. “It wasn’t anything important, babe. Nothing at all.”

  Atlantic Fleet

  Command Operations Center

  Norfolk, Virginia 1037 Hours, Zone Time;

  May 3, 2007

  The Coast Guard HH-60 Jayhawk settled onto the Operations Center helipad amid the whirlwind of its own liftwash. Amanda returned her cranial helmet and life jacket to the crew chief and disembarked, ducking low to keep well clear of the still-spinning rotor blade
s.

  A naval officer in now dust-stained Blue Bakers waited for her at the edge of the helipad. “Commander Garrett?” he called over the fading howl of the helicopter’s turbines. I’m Lieutenant Kravin, NAVSPECFORCE Atlantic Operations. Commander Koletter’s compliments. We’ve been expecting you, ma’am.”

  “What’s the situation?” Amanda asked.

  “Can’t say exactly, Commander. All I can say is that Eddie Mac—that is, Admiral Macintyre—wants you on a secure line ASAP. The scuttlebutt is that there’s big trouble with the U.N. mission in Africa.”

  They started across from the landing site to the Operations Center. Located in the heart of the largest naval base in the Western world, the masts of the in-port elements of the 2nd Fleet could be seen rising beyond the low windowless concrete building. Even escorted by a staff officer, it required both Amanda’s identification card and a voice-print authentication to get past the steel entry doors and alert Marine sentries. From there, a short elevator ride delivered them two levels down to the underground bunker-within-a-bunker of Atlantic Fleet Signals.

  A few minutes more and Amanda found herself seated alone in a small briefing room, facing the glowing screen of a live videocom link.

  “Admiral Macintyre is on line, Commander,” a crisply professional voice spoke seemingly out of midair. “The channel is secure, and we are putting you through now.”

  The Atlantic Fleet Command test pattern on the wall screen snapped over to the grim visage of the NAVSPECFORCE C.O. From the curved bulkhead behind him Amanda surmised that he was speaking from the communications bay of his personal command-and-control aircraft. Also given the way his eyes met hers, she too was visible on a reverse visual link. Amanda became acutely aware of the frayed casualness of her jeans and sweater, and of how her hair was bound back in a shaggy amber ponytail.

  Macintyre, on the other hand, seemed to pay no note at all. “Good morning, Commander Garrett. I’m sorry I had to interrupt your leave.”

  “No problem, sir. I apologize for being out of uniform. I came in directly from my boat, and I haven’t had the opportunity to change.”

  Macintyre waved the point away. “Lord knows that’s the least of my problems, Commander, or yours.”

  Amanda noted that the Admiral, who usually gave the impression of being as imperturbable and durable as an oaken dock piling, looked tired, a haze of unshaven beard darkening his squared jaw. “What’s going on, sir?” she inquired, concerned.

  “I’m speaking to you from the tarmac here at the U.N. base in Conakry. We’ve just had the hell shot out of us by the West African Union. We’ve taken casualties.”

  Amanda’s heart froze in her chest. Christine! The Admiral knew full well that she and the little blond intel were close. And given the way Macintyre worked, it would be very possible that he would make a death notification himself.

  He must have read her expression. “Your friend Commander Rendino is all right,” he said. “She was with me during the attack, and she only picked up a few cuts and bruises. Outside of that, she’s fine.”

  Macintyre gave Amanda a second or two to digest the welcome information before continuing. “Unfortunately, the same can’t be said for Captain Emberly, our Tactical Action Group commander. He was killed in last night’s mortar barrage, and his loss threatens to knock this whole damn UNAFIN operation into a cocked hat. We need a replacement for him, fast. How would you like the job?”

  Amanda’s heart skipped another beat. “Me, sir?” she floundered, momentarily at a loss for words. “But this UNAFIN job is a littoral operation, coastal work. I’m blue water.”

  Macintyre tilted back the S.0.’s chair he was occupying. “You’ve had some interdiction experience working with the Coast Guard, and God knows you took the Cunningham in close during the China operation. Anyhow, that isn’t my primary concern. And as the TACBOSS for our inshore patrol operation, I can promise that you’ll be commanding all sorts of very smart and very capable young hands who can push all of the right buttons. They can teach you everything you’ll need to know about any of the new technologies involved.”

  He looked directly into the screen and into her face. “What we really need down here is a leader who can pull a group of diverse elements into a fist and a good, innovative doctrine person who can figure out where that fist needs to be aimed. You’re my first choice in both of these areas.”

  “I’m very flattered, sir.” Amanda’s reply came slowly, but her mind was racing. “Will this be a TDY assignment?”

  “Think long term, Commander. The show down here is going to take a while. You’d have to be released from the command of the Cunningham.”

  Amanda’s knee-jerk reaction was a decisive no. But then she paused for a moment. Was she giving up command of her ship? Or just of an office trailer parked beside a dry dock?

  “What will the package entail, sir?” she asked cautiously.

  “The core element of the Tactical Action Group is our new seafighter squadron, PGAC-1. That’s why Phil Emberly was initially chosen for the TACBOSS slot. As backup, you’ll have a pair of Cyclone-class Patrol Craft and eventually a Special Operations Capable Marine company for boarding and security operations. The whole package will stage off of the Mobile Offshore Base we have positioned off the coast of the West African Union.”

  “What are the mission parameters?”

  “Twofold. To enforce the U.N. maritime embargo in place against the West African Union and to provide security for the nation of Guinea against hostile naval incursions.”

  Amanda called up her mental chart file of the world’s oceans. “Admiral, you’re talking about covering over seven hundred miles of extremely wild coastline with only five small hulls.”

  Macintyre smiled without humor. “I indicated it would be a challenge, Commander. U.N. operations are not popular with Congress currently. They’re holding us to an absolute bare-bones deployment. Minimal assets. The counter to that, as I see it, is to deploy a small Tactical Action Group backed by extensive intelligence assets in the hope we can get there ‘firstest with the mostest.’ You’ll have Commander Rendino’s full Tactical Intelligence Network at your direct disposal, including two reconnaissance drone squadrons and two aero-stat-equipped intelligence-gathering ships.

  “You will also receive a degree of assistance from the other UNAFIN assets. The French have a corvette squadron running offshore interdiction patrol, and Great Britain has a mine hunter group and a patrol helicopter squadron working Guinea coastal security.”

  “What about my own aviation assets, sir?” Amanda inquired.

  “Beyond the drones and a small composite Marine and Navy utility helicopter group for logistics and support, you don’t have any.”

  “No strike aircraft at all?”

  “Not authorized. Since the West African Union doesn’t have an air force, the Security Council couldn’t see why we needed one either. Don’t ask—I don’t pretend to understand the logic of it either.”

  Macintyre leaned forward and rested his crossed arms on the console before him.

  “There’s your package, Commander. You will be decisively undermanned and handicapped by the rules of engagement set by the U.N. The tactical situation is fluid and deteriorating, and you will be fighting a tough, cunning, and capable enemy. We are just beginning to learn how much so. This will be hazardous duty. For you especially in more ways than one.”

  Amanda frowned. “What do you mean, sir? Why me?”

  “I had a long talk with BUPERS before calling you in. The Bureau of Personnel was not pleased with the notion of you going to Africa. In fact, they screamed bloody murder at even the concept.”

  “Why?”

  Macintyre smiled wryly into the screen. “It seems that certain parties in high places have been doing some career planning for you, Commander.”

 
“I still don’t understand, sir.”

  “Here’s the situation. It appears you have become some thing of a PR icon within the New Age Navy. Living proof that the gender integration within the Fleet has been a success. On completion of your tour aboard the Duke and your obtaining your fourth bar, it has been decided that you will be given a high-visibility position as military attache to one of our major embassies overseas. Either France or Moscow—they haven’t decided yet.

  “Following that, as a senior captain, you’ve been penciled in to command a major unit within Fleet Amphib, probably a Wasp-class LHD. Beyond that point, even BUPERS gets a little vague. However, I get the impression that if you don’t blot your copybook, you may very well end up as the youngest female rear admiral in the history of the United States Navy.”

  Amanda shook her head, a little awed. “I had no idea.”

  “That’s the game plan as it was given to me.” Macintyre lifted an eyebrow sardonically. “Consider that copybook proviso well, Commander. If you take on this Africa job, and if it blows up in your face, as it gives every indication of doing, you could end up flushing this entire chain of events, along with the rest of your career, right down the head.

  “In return, all I can offer is a drumhead promotion. This TACBOSS position calls for a four-striper. You’ll be receiving the provisional rank of captain. In title only for the moment, however. You’ll receive none of the pay and benefits, just the responsibilities, until we can get the rank officially on the books. You may consider that another big if and when as well.”

  Macintyre lifted his hands in an apologetic gesture. “In the face of all this, Commander, please feel free to tell me to shove it where the sun doesn’t shine. There will be no recriminations if you elect not to accept the assignment.”

  Amanda looked away from the screen. Be careful of what you wish for, for you may receive it. For weeks now, she’d been brooding about what her future might hold. Suddenly she had more futures than she could possibly ever hope to live. She’d whined about not being ready to give up her combat command yet. Well, here was another combat command, with a plentiful supply of real combat to go with it. She’d procrastinated about making decisions about what to do with her life. And apparently there were plenty of people more than willing to make those decisions for her.