With Hostile Intent

by Robert Gandt

  The mood in the Buttwang was getting ugly.

  “She moved my gear out and took over the goddamn locker!”

  “They got better staterooms than lieutenant commanders. Can someone explain why the fuck that is?”

  “The tall one with the mouth like a megaphone, calls herself Spam? She went marching into the parachute loft and told the rigger she wanted her call sign stitched on all her gear. By tomorrow. And guess what? The maintenance officer told him he’d damn well better do it.”

  In normal circumstances the Buttwang — the term for the Junior Officers’Bunkroom — served as the sleeping quarters for the eight most junior officers in the squadron. It was a twelve-by-fourteen-foot space that contained four racks of two bunks each. Mounted to the deck was a pair of the ubiquitous Navy gray steel desks. Fixed against one bulkhead were eight storage lockers.

  Tonight the Buttwang was the site of an impromptu meeting of the JOPA — Junior Officers’ Protective Association. Fourteen officers — two junior grade lieutenants and nine lieutenants— were sprawling atop bunks, squatting on the deck, leaning against bulkheads. The only junior officers not present were Lieutenant Bud Spencer, who was the squadron duty officer — and the two new pilots, Parker and Johnson.

  The aliens had not been invited.

  The litany went on. The women pilots had been in the squadron a total of three days, and already the list of grievances had grown as long as the Congressional Record.

  Leroi Jones said, “I checked this Spam out with the replacement squadron training officer back in Oceana. He’s a classmate of mine, Ham Hoxe. Hoxe says she shouldn’t have made it through the Hornet transition program. Picked up three SODs, would have gotten an evaluation board but she started making threats about a sexual harassment case. They let her through.”

  At this, the mood in the Buttwang grew uglier. Since the Tailhook scandal in 1991, nothing inflamed the collective anger of male naval aviators as much as the suspicion that women pilots were being judged by a different standard. There had already been several celebrated cases of women pilots who had failed fighter transition training, then returned to the cockpit only to fail again. Or worse, to join a fleet squadron, then proceed to scare the living hell out of their COs, their squadron mates, their LSOs, and sometimes even themselves.

  “You guys who are section leads had better think about it,” said Flash Gordon, a senior lieutenant. Section leads were pilots qualified to lead a formation. “Those two are gonna be your new wingmen.”

  “We gotta watch our asses,” said Hozer Miller. “Especially around the ship, and especially at night. Don’t let the aliens get you or your wingman killed.”

  Undra Cheever spoke from atop a bunk. Cheever was a short, heavyset lieutenant with unruly dark hair that bristled like a cactus. “What about the short one, B.J. Johnson?”

  Leroi Jones said, “Ham didn’t have anything on her. No SODs, all average grades. Didn’t scare anybody when she qualified on the boat.”

  “Probably sucked up to the LSO.”

  Undra Cheever cracked up at that. “That’s it! How do you think she got a call sign like ‘B.J.?’”

  <>

  The dirty shirt wardroom was busy. Most of the tables were occupied by pilots and crew members. It was the only officers’ facility where pilots and crew members could dine informally, wearing their flight suits — dirty shirts — instead of the ship’s uniform of the day.

  As usual, a cluster was gathered around the stainless steel ice cream vendor, called the dog machine.

  Maxwell spotted B.J. Johnson. She was sitting alone at a table. He sat down across from her. “You mind company?”

  “You better not sit there, sir,” she said. “You’ll catch what I have.”

  “What do you have?”

  “Something awful. So bad that not a single officer in the squadron has dared to initiate a conversation with me since I checked in. Except you.”

  Brick looked around. “You want some ice cream? I’m going to the dog machine.”

  She nodded. “Thanks. But here’s a stupid nugget question. Why do they call it the ‘dog machine?’”

  Maxwell grinned and looked over at the machine. “Watch it while it’s dispensing ice cream.”

  She looked over at the great shiny machine. A thick stream of soft chocolate ice cream was oozing from the spigot. She frowned, studying the machine. Suddenly it came to her. “Oh, yuck! That’s disgusting. Now that’s really a guy thing.”

  Maxwell shrugged. “You had to ask.”

  He came back with two cups of ice cream and sat down. He nodded his head in the direction of the junior officers across the room. “Give ‘em time to get used to you. It’ll get better.”

  “It’s not getting better. It’s getting worse.”

  “How so?”

  “Some guy’s been calling our room.”

  Maxwell scooped a bite of ice cream. “Who?”

  “No idea. He goes to a lot of trouble to disguise his voice. Last night he said he had some advice for Spam and me.”

  “What was that?”

  “‘Quit while you can.’ So I asked him, ‘What if we don’t quit?’ The guy didn’t answer for a while, then he said, ‘You’re going to have one less trap than you have launches.’”

  Maxwell listened quietly, not liking what he heard. One less trap than you have launches. Somebody wanted to scare them. Maybe scare them enough to make them give up. “Who do you think it was?”

  “Any one of about thirty guys who hate our guts.”

  “Did you report the phone call?”

  She shook her head. “Who to? The skipper?” She forced a laugh. “You know better than that. I already know how the system works. As soon as a female complains about being hassled, she’s marked. From then on she’s just another troublemaker.”

  “How did Spam handle it?”

  B.J. laughed again. “She’s used to it. Spam’s a lightning rod. I’ve been getting the fallout from Spam Parker’s battles since we were plebes at the academy.”

  Maxwell thought for a moment, trying to imagine who in the squadron would make such calls. Undra Cheever came to mind. Yes, it could be Cheever, who was famous for an obnoxious sense of humor. Or Hozer Miller, almost as bad. Whoever it was, it would be impossible to prove. “I wouldn’t make too much of this,” he said. “It’s just some jerk who still thinks women shouldn’t vote.”

  “How many jerks are we gonna have to deal with before we’re accepted?”

  He looked at her, trying to fathom what she was going through. “Listen, I want you to tell me whenever something like that happens again. I promise I’ll look into it. And keep a record of those phone calls.”

  B.J. nodded glumly and poked at her ice cream. “I thought this would be fun. You know, a great adventure. But it’s not. It sucks.”

  <>

  Pearly Gates came in the back door of the ready room, still wearing his LSO costume. He looked like a panhandler, wearing old fatigue pants, jersey, survival vest, and a black watch cap pulled down to his ears.

  Pearly wasn’t superstitious, but he made a point of wearing the same tattered old costume when he was waving jets aboard a carrier. The turtleneck jersey and the ratty fatigue pants were the same that he’d had since he qualified as an LSO two cruises ago on the Roosevelt. Over the jersey he wore the float coat that everyone who worked on a carrier deck was required to wear. The float coat contained a flare pencil and had inflatable bladders in case you were swept off the deck into the ocean.

  Pearly’s vest had his job title stenciled on the back: VFA-36 LSO. On the front he wore the special embroidered LSO patch — a view of the ramp of a carrier with the motto: RECTUM NON BUSTUS.

  He took a quick scan of the Ready Room, then spotted Maxwell. “Hey, Brick, got a sec?” He led Maxwell through the back door, into the locker room.

  “What’s up?” said Maxwell. “Did I scare you that bad with my last pass?”

  “Not you.” Pearly glanc
ed around, making sure they were alone. “Brick, you and the XO are pretty tight buds, aren’t you? I mean, don’t you two go way back?”

  “Two or three centuries.” Maxwell liked Pearly Gates. He was the kind of officer Maxwell wished the Navy had more of. Though Pearly was only a junior lieutenant, his job out there on the platform entailed enormous responsibility, more than any other squadron assignment. Pearly not only liked the job, he was good at it.

  “Devo flew a couple of really ugly passes this afternoon. Boltered once, got a taxi-to-the-one wire next time.”

  “He’s been down a while with a cold. Maybe he shouldn’t be flying yet.”

  “Maybe he shouldn’t.” Pearly hesitated, glancing around. “This is between us, okay?”

  “Sure.” Maxwell was sure he knew what was coming.

  “When I debriefed him, I thought I. . . I smelled something.”

  “Like. . .?”

  “Like booze.”

  Maxwell kept his expression blank. He was right. “Are you sure. Did you ask him?”

  Pearly looked uncomfortable. “No. I guess. . . you know, he’s the XO, and it’s not my place. Most of us think Devo’s a good guy, and I didn’t want to go to the skipper about it. And, anyway, what if I was wrong? That’s why I’m telling you.”

  “You did the right thing, Pearly. I’ll take care of it. You can trust me on it.”

  “Yes, sir, that’s what I thought.”

  <>

  “Bullshit,” Davis said.

  It was exactly the response Maxwell expected. “Pearly wasn’t making it up.”

  They were standing in the passageway outside the wardroom. Davis waited while a couple of sailors walked past. “He was mistaken. He was probably sniffing the Vicks Nite-All stuff I take to sleep in the afternoon.”

  “You know you can’t self-medicate when you’re flying off the boat.”

  “What are you, my goddamn counselor or something?”

  Maxwell knew Devo would react like this. Even if it were true, he wouldn’t admit it. And for all he knew, Devo was telling the truth. Maybe he did have sleeping problems.

  “No, I’m your friend. You told me you were going to stay grounded for a while. No flying while you got over —”

  “DeLancey hit on me. In front of half a dozen JOs. He wanted to know why the hell I wasn’t scheduled to fly in the exercise tomorrow. As much as accused me of being a pussy.”

  “You should have told him you were sick. Knuckles would back you up.”

  Davis shook his head. “If I’m gonna take over command of this squadron, I gotta be in the thick of it, like everybody else.”

  “You scared the hell out of the LSO today. You shouldn’t be back flying yet. Look, I’m the Ops officer, and I make the schedule. Let me worry about DeLancey.”

  Davis’s eyes looked wet and red. Maxwell worried for a moment that he might break down and cry. Devo was a basket case.

  Finally Davis heaved a sigh. “Okay. I’ll tell ‘em I’ve got the trots or something. No flying. What’s Delancey gonna do?”

  “I don’t know. I’ll take care of it.”

  At the moment, he had no idea how he would take care of it. But his first priority was to keep Davis out of an F/A-18 cockpit. Then maybe he could talk him into taking leave, going somewhere to get his head straightened out. Then he would worry about DeLancey.

  <>

  With his receding hairline and prominent forehead, Spook Morse, the Air Wing intelligence officer, looked like Ichabod Crane. “That’s correct, gentlemen,” he said. “The Joint Task Force Commander has ordered all patrolling of the southern No Fly Zone to be restricted to the 32nd parallel instead of the 33rd.”

  The pilots in the briefing room were incredulous. “That doesn’t make sense,” said a Prowler pilot. “Why the hell would the battle group be pulling back now?”

  “That’s sixty miles,” said Killer Delancey. “Why are we cutting them that much slack?”

  Morse shrugged. “JTF wants to back off and let the tension subside after the. . . uh, shoot-down the other day.”

  A triumphant look flashed over DeLancey’s face. “So they confirmed it?”

  “Yes, sir. Your fourth kill. Satellite imagery and Rivet Joint both confirm that a MiG-29 was destroyed fifteen miles inside the NFZ.”

  “Any sign of a response from the Iraqis?”

  Morse took his time. Like all intelligence officers, he considered himself God’s appointed custodian of need-to-know information. He figured that pilots really only needed to know just enough to complete their narrowly focused little missions. The strategic and vital information — The Big Picture — was the exclusive property of intelligence specialists like himself.

  After a sufficient pause he said, “We’ve obtained some. . . ah, evidence from certain. . . assets. . . inside the country that the Iraqis might be gathering a supply of anti-shipping missiles. Probably from North Korea, transporting them overland through Iran.”

  “Assets?” asked Craze Manson. “Do we still have inspection teams in Iraq?”

  “No.” Spook enjoyed feeding the little morsels to the pilots like scraps to a terrier. “Saddam evicted all the United Nations weapons inspectors. But it would be safe to assume, of course, that we still have. . . ah, sources.”

  “And just what do your sources say happened to the second MiG?” asked DeLancey.

  “Possibly destroyed. AWACS lost him before he got back to Al-Taqqadum. They think he might have run out of fuel.”

  DeLancey pointedly gazed across the room at Maxwell. “Somebody should have shot the sonofabitch before he ran out of fuel.”

  Maxwell sat with his arms folded, ignoring DeLancey. For an awkward few seconds, no one spoke.

  Morse cleared his throat and broke the silence. “Here’s the good news. The Reagan is scheduled to sail into the southern gulf next week. We’ll be conducting a coordinated strike exercise against the Saudi base at Al-Kharj.”

  “Exercise? What about port call?” asked Lieutenant Bud Spencer.

  Spook consulted his fist full of index cards. Now he could really tantalize them. The Reagan had been at sea for nearly a month without an in-port liberty period. “Port call? Well, let’s see. Oh, yeah, here it is. A week from tomorrow. The Reagan will be making a port call in —” he paused, dragging out the suspense as long he could — “Dubai.”

  The cheering reverberated off the bulkheads. It was so loud it could be heard up and down the passageway, all the way to the O-3 level. Dubai was regarded as the best liberty port in the Persian Gulf.

  “Hot damn! Dubai!”

  “Hide your daughters, Dubai, here come the Roadrunners.”

  “BAGs and GAGs! We’re on our way, girls.”

  BAGs was shorthand for British Air Girls. GAGs meant Gulf Air Girls. The hotels and bars and swimming pools of Dubai were renowned for their contingent of lithesome airline flight attendants.

  “We already have a suite booked in the Hilton. . .”

  “Party till we puke. . ..”

  “Met this girl from New Zealand — loved to do it in the Jacuzzi. . .”

  Spook Morse sighed and put away his index cards. The intel briefing was effectively ended. He had been around pilots long enough to know that not one of the shallow-minded Neanderthals had the slightest interest in Iraq or the No Fly Zone or the geopolitics of Southwest Asia.

  It would soon be party time.

  <>

  “Hi, guys,” said the visitor, poking his head into the ready room. “Just introducing myself. I’m Dave Harvey. New shooter, just out of catapult school. Wanted to get to know the pilots in the air wing.”

  A few Roadrunners looked up from their ready room activities. The visitor was tall and skinny, about six-two, with shiny gold oak leaves on his collar indicating that he was a newly minted lieutenant commander. He had a long neck with an Adam’s apple that bobbed like a counterweight.

  “What’s your call sign?” asked Leroi Jones, looking up from his current
task, which happened to be watching Oprah on the ready room television monitor.

  “Well, I was a P-3 driver back in my squadron tour. We didn’t go in much for call signs.”

  “Patrol plane puke!” shouted Flash Gordon, causing several more heads to raise. “Man, you must have fucked up big time to get sent to a boat.”

  The new shooter looked hurt. “Actually, I sort of requested it. You gotta have shipboard duty in your record if you want to get ahead in the Navy, y’ know.”

  More heads raised. This was really peculiar — someone who actually wanted to be a catapult officer. Volunteering to be on an aircraft carrier like the Reagan — without flying.

  “Hey, man” said Pearly Gates, “if you’re gonna hang around with fighter pilots down here, you’re gonna have to get a call sign.”

  “Aw, I dunno,” said Harvey, his Adam’s apple bobbing. “‘Dave’ has always been my. . .”

  “Not allowed,’” said Leroi. “No first names, no cutesy nicknames, no patrol plane stuff. You gotta have a real no-shit call sign like the rest of us. Otherwise we won’t let you drink with us. You don’t want to be an outcast do you, Dave?”

  Harvey looked dubious. “I just don’t know what my call sign would be. . .”

  “You want us to make one up for you?”

  “Well, I guess that would be all right. Just so it wasn’t something, you know, too. . . raunchy.”

  “Raunchy? asked Leroi, his voice dripping with sympathy. “What would that be, Dave?”

  “Oh, you know, something really gross, like. . .” He had to think for a second, “Oh, something like. . . dog balls.”

  The instant he said it, he knew it was too late. The ready room swelled with the voices of cheering pilots. “Dog Balls! You got it!”

  Harvey heard an alarm signal going off in his mind. “No! No, guys, what I meant was anything but that. You know, it’s just too —”

  “It’s perfect. Dog Balls Harvey! It’s gonna look great stitched on your vest.”

  A horrible thought struck Harvey: These crazy bastards are serious. They’re going to label me with the worst name imaginable.

  He began backpedaling toward the door. “Guys, it was really fun kidding with you like this. . ..”