Rogue Hercules

by Denis Pitts

  Sorrel was awake. She turned to Martin and said, ‘What do you mean, jig-saw?’

  Martin said, ‘You and the Mafia I can understand. There was something else I could never quite understand. I thought I’d got it when I saw the Russian spy plane. If that’s a MIG then the jig-saw is absolute.’

  The MIG was steering directly for the Hercules’ radome, banking steeply to the right at the very last moment. It began to circle, five hundred feet above them. It kept a steady pace with the Hercules.

  ‘What does he want?’

  ‘Listen out.’

  They heard the crackle of the static on the air-to-air frequency. Suddenly the “transmit” button was depressed in the other aircraft. It was Umboto who was obviously reading from a prepared script. He read slowly with difficulty on the long words.

  ‘Unidentified aircraft, this is Captain Umboto of the Mozambique Air Force. You are trespassing on the Mozambique air space. You are instructed to land. Proceed Mocímboa Airport, steering course two six zero. Acknowledge this message and proceed as directed. Do you read?’

  The “transmit” clicked off.

  Martin pushed his transmitter button.

  ‘Bullshit,’ he said succinctly. ‘We are two hundred miles from Mozambique.’

  ‘I repeat my instruction.’ Umboto was still obviously reading what he was saying. ‘You are to land immediately. Steer two six zero.’

  Martin chewed on his lip. He turned to Sorrel.

  ‘Strap the co-pilot into the bunk. Then yourself. I smell something very very nasty coming up.’

  *

  In the rear seat of the MIG, Uglov groaned once again and fought off a sudden new attack of nausea. He dare not take off his oxygen mask for more than a few seconds at that atmosphere and he closed his eyes and gripped hard on to the cockpit wall while he regained control of himself.

  ‘What did he say?’ he asked Umboto through the intercom.

  ‘Bullshit.’

  ‘What is bullshit?’

  ‘He will not land. What now?’

  ‘Tell him that you will open fire if he does not change course immediately.’

  ‘Okay, boss.’

  *

  The MIG had throttled back to a near stalling speed and lost height gradually until it was less than half a mile in front of the Hercules. Martin and Harry watched it apprehensively.

  ‘Now what?’ said Martin.

  The MIG waggled its wings and turned sharply to the right.

  ‘Follow me in this direction,’ said Umboto’s voice.

  ‘Get lost,’ said Martin. There was a terseness in his voice which made Stubbles look around at him.

  ‘Do you think he means it, all that about firing?’ he said.

  ‘The French knew where we were going. I’m damn sure those bastards do too.’

  ‘But, hell’s bells, we are miles away from their air space.’

  ‘All the better for them. VHF that no one can hear, no radar to track what’s happening. They could bring us out of the sky just like that and who the hell would know about it?’

  ‘The life history recorders would be recovered.’

  Stubbles was talking about the two flight recorders on board which kept a record of every conversation of the flight-deck on a thirty minute loop system.

  ‘Hey,’ he said, almost chirpily. ‘Anyone who picks this up. We are Juliet Mike Oscar and we are under threat and duress by a MIG 21 fighter near Mozambique. Do you follow me? The other guy is threatening to shoot us down. Okay, now it’s on record.’

  ‘A nice try, Stubbles,’ said Martin. ‘But you can bet your engineer’s licence that there’ll be a Russian destroyer down there somewhere to pick up any pieces.’

  Umboto came on sharply with total clarity. They could sense the fear and excitement in his voice.

  ‘This is my final warning. Obey my instructions or I will open fire. I am entirely serious.’

  ‘Shit, he means it,’ said Martin. ‘Emergency procedure. Sorrel, tighten that mask on Harry’s face and get one from the locker for yourself. Strap yourself in and brace yourself for anything. Stubbles, get on to oxygen pronto. Then into your own seat and wait for my signal. Then depressurise, got it?’

  ‘Got it.’

  Martin almost ripped the oxygen mask from its box beneath his seat, plugged it in and slammed it on his face. He snapped the auto pilot to its “off’ position and looked around.

  ‘Are we all on oxygen?’ he asked.

  ‘All crew on,’ said Stubbles.

  ‘Depressurise.’

  ‘Emergency depressurisation on.’

  ‘Stand by for emergency evasive action.’

  Stubbles pulled the red lever and there was a sudden hissing. All of them felt sharp jabs of pain in their ears.

  ‘May Day, May Day, Juliet Mike Oscar under threat of attack from Mozambique fighter aircraft, position thirty miles west of Comoro Islands.’

  Martin banked the Hercules hard to the left and pushed the wheel violently away from him.

  Juliet Mike Oscar had just entered a steep descent when Uglov pushed the “fire” button in the MIG.

  *

  It was the crisp delivery of the phrase “get lost” that decided Yefgeni Uglov to bring the Hercules down at any cost.

  He had hoped that the warning would be enough, that the American would turn meekly westwards and that he could bring them home and thus gain the kind of credit with his masters which would offset the scandal of the previous night.

  But was he in a fit state to make such a decision? The cabin heater in the MIG was fiercely inaccurate and the heavy, rancid smell of the palm oil was everywhere, sickly and cloying, even in his oxygen mask. The oxygen had helped at first and had eased the total discomfort of the hangover enough for him to ensure that Umboto took off safely, although he, Uglov, had nearly fainted as the other pilot had used the rocket assisted take-off system for no other reason than to show off to his conquests of last night. The extra gravity had distorted his already weakened body. He felt as though his whole face was being spread like a blini against the headrest.

  He had moaned and the giant African in front had howled with laughter and accelerated even more.

  He hoped that his tampering with the fuse of the missile would be effective, that it would merely show the other pilot dramatically that he meant what he said.

  Then came those two words. “Get lost”. Any further thoughts of morality froze in the Russian pilot’s brain.

  Very well, you warmongering jackal, he thought. The litany of Soviet propaganda came readily to his mind now. This arrogant bringer of death must be stopped. Uglov wrenched himself with a furious effort into the state of mind which he required to act decisively and see the operation through.

  ‘My controls,’ he shouted to the black pilot in front of him.

  Umboto’s voice was sulky. ‘This is my target,’ he said.

  Uglov slid forward the lever which overrode the trainee pilot’s control column and rudder bars.

  ‘My controls. You’ll get the medal, Comrade Umboto, have no fear.’

  Uglov made a wide, banking turn and flew on a reciprocal course away from the Hercules for thirty seconds until he was ten miles away from his target. He circled several times while he opened a perspex-covered, red-lined box on the panel in front of him and selected a switch marked PREPARE MISSILE.

  He waited for ten seconds until a bright blue light began to flash in the box and there was a reedy constant note in his earphones.

  He glanced towards the Hercules which continued to fly confidently along its original course as though nothing had happened. Uglov brought the MIG gently on to the same course. He continued to hold the same near stalling speed.

  ‘Now listen, Umboto. Very shortly I am going to increase speed to mach 1.5. I am going to release the missile, as near as I can estimate, at six kilometres from the target. The missile is set for detonation at about 1.5 kilometres from the target. As soon as the missile is released, I shal
l bank steeply to the right and climb. There is still a danger that we will be damaged by the blast.’

  ‘I understand.’

  ‘Be prepared to eject immediately. You know the drills. I have spent enough time teaching you.’

  ‘Okay, boss.’

  ‘Don’t call me boss.’ Uglov’s voice was testy.

  ‘Sorry, boss.’

  Umboto was suddenly deflated, he realised. Maybe it was the thought of ejection from the supersonic fighter at that height. Or maybe it was a fear of the water below. He saw the pilot in front of him make the sign of the cross.

  ‘No mumbo-jumbo, Umboto,’ he snapped. ‘Stand by.’

  Uglov eased forward the throttle and released the air brakes which had slowed the MIG down to its present speed. The fighter jolted forward with the increased engine power. Once again he felt his head jammed against the rest behind him. Then he applied full boost until the mach meter showed that they had passed through the sonic barrier. There was no other indication except for a faint vibration of the fuselage.

  The Hercules was already outlined against the vivid blue sky, just slightly higher than them. The MIG engine bellowed power behind Uglov’s back. His hangover was forgotten and now he was tense and exhilarated by the action. His heart thumped and he felt the whole of his body springing back to life.

  The radar in combination with a small computer would normally have triggered the detonator in the missile’s solid fuel propulsion engines at precisely the distance he required. But now Uglov had to make the fatal guess at one thousand five hundred miles an hour, doing the job of both electronic instruments with his own mind, with no yardstick to draw on except his own experience.

  The Hercules loomed large in his sight now, its engine vapour distorting the air five hundred feet above them. Ten kilometres, he estimated, eight, seven, six — fire. He pushed the release button and saw the dense white smoke of the missile streak away from under them. At the same time he noticed that the Hercules had begun to turn steeply away.

  Immediately he put the control column hard to the right and pulled it towards him. The “G” suit he was wearing was not sufficiently adjusted to prevent a sudden inrush of blood from his head. He heard Umboto scream. He automatically eased the control column to a normal level flight position. He remained blacked out for several seconds.

  Even at that distance, the blast of the missile two miles away from him caught the MIG and threw it crazily around the sky as though it were a paper dart in a tornado.

  *

  The blast-wave hit Juliet Mike Oscar as she was descending at an angle of thirty-five degrees. The tail unit took the main brunt of the series of shock waves which engulfed the giant aircraft, threatening for several seconds to rip her to pieces. Without warning she was in the centre of a vast area of disturbed air and, deprived of aerodynamic security, she bucked and weaved and was tossed violently around the sky, her engines yowling unevenly as a series of vacuums overtook them, rendering them worthless at a time when the captain needed them most to control the Hercules and to stop her from flipping disastrously on to her back.

  They did not hear the explosion on the flight-deck. The first indication was a sudden punch in all their backs by a force which held them immobile in their seats. Martin felt the control column fly out of his hands and snap against the instrument console in front of him. He could not move. The gravity held him in steel bands. It took all his strength, together with an extra dimension of power, to get forward and try to steady the wheel which rocked crazily from side to side.

  Juliet Mike Oscar was out of control in a dive of fifty degrees, being borne forward by a secondary area of blast at a speed at which no designer had ever conceived she could fly.

  The force should have ripped off her wings; indeed at the very worst of the maelstrom they bent upwards and downwards again to the very maximum limit of stress.

  These were sounds which could be heard on the flight-deck. A thousand tuneless discords echoed through the cargo hull as every joint, weld, rivet, screw, anchor point, pylon and every square inch of the alloy fabric was put to the ultimate test of strength and design. She groaned, that aircraft, as sailing ships of old had groaned in any tempest. For those few seconds she was a living creature, roaring at this monumental affront to her strength and grace.

  And then she began to dive, back in solid air now, her four Hamilton propellers straining to take her almost vertically to the sea below.

  It was a critical test for the captain, too. His instinct was to pull the control column back sharply, to force her into level flight. Experience overcame that instinct. He allowed her to go ahead long enough for the groaning to stop so that they could be further away from the menace in the sky nearby.

  He eased back on the controls and felt the elevator respond. The Hercules pulled out gradually and he saw the air speed drop to the steady three hundred knots at which he had been flying. She flew well, perfectly indeed.

  Except that she pulled heavily to her left.

  Martin had to ram his foot hard down on the right rudder to correct this pull.

  With his right hand he motioned Stubbles back into the co-pilot’s seat.

  ‘Take the strain,’ he said.

  The engineer’s size made it difficult for him to put his foot fully down on the rudder pedal. But when he did so it eased the considerable effort which Martin was making.

  Something was wrong, radically wrong. There was no time to look around and check the others on the flight-deck.

  ‘Your guess?’ asked Martin.

  ‘The tail stinger. They’ve blown off the tail stinger.’

  ‘That figures.’

  ‘She’ll fly, but it’s going to take a hell of a lot of sweat.’

  ‘Can you hold her in a circle?’

  ‘I guess so, Captain.’

  ‘Try. I want to go back.’

  ‘Hey, Captain, I can’t fly this bucket.’

  ‘I’m going back. She’ll fly level now. Just let her ease her way round.’

  Martin watched Stubbles for a few moments. He could see the strain on the other man’s face as he straightened his leg on the rudder bar and he could hear him breathing hard into the oxygen mask.

  ‘Good boy,’ he said. ‘Stay like that.’

  He put his foot back on the pedal to help Stubbles and began to talk quickly and quietly.

  ‘Now listen, all of you,’ he said. ‘This guy means what he says. He will shoot us down if we don’t comply. Okay, so we can land over there. If we do that means you can bet your sweet arses that they’ll try us as mercenaries. That means a firing squad. And I’m pretty damn sure that that’s what the game has been all the way along the line.

  ‘Now, a while back I broke open a Red-eye missile and launcher from a crate in the cargo hold. I reckon to take a chance with it through the cargo door.

  ‘Now you men know that there’s a fifty-fifty chance that the Red-eye is going to turn round and hit us right up our own Allisons. Right? So I’ll take a vote. It’s your lives. Be quick. Do we land her to take the gamble? Stubbles?’

  ‘Can you do it?’

  ‘I can try. Harry — if you are awake?’

  Harry’s voice sounded weak. But he said, ‘Go ahead. Hit the bastard.’

  ‘Sorrel, whatever you say, you’re outvoted.’

  Stubbles butted in, tapping Martin on his knee. ‘The MIG. He’s right beside us.’

  ‘Listen out.’

  It was Uglov who spoke. The Russian accent hit them immediately.

  ‘Unidentified aircraft, you now see that we mean exactly what we say. That explosion was intended to incapacitate you. It has clearly succeeded in doing that. Now proceed as directed or the result may be your total destruction.’

  Martin said, ‘We are repairing damage. Then we will follow your instructions, you bastard.’

  He turned to Stubbles.

  ‘Okay, you take her.’

  Martin took a deep breath of oxygen and unplugged the mask, k
eeping it over his face.

  *

  Uglov recovered to find the MIG climbing frantically, its engine at full power. He wrenched the throttle back and the sudden loss of boost and the effect of gravity brought the aircraft to what seemed to be almost a standstill in mid-air. He flipped it on to its back and saw the Hercules diving towards the sea. He pulled the controls towards him and began to dive after it.

  He was still not sure that he had not damaged it so badly that it would crash. But then as he approached it from above, he saw it pull gradually from its steep descent and begin to level off. He approached it gingerly and watched it begin to circle. He made several passes and on the third of these he saw the small piece of tailplane streaming horizontally from the Hercules.

  It was only then that he knew just exactly how successful his impromptu, pure guesswork missile attack had been.

  *

  Clutching the oxygen unit in his hand, Martin made his way rapidly across the flight-deck to the steps to the entry well. He paused there and plugged the oxygen lead into another point. As he charged his lungs once again, he looked up and saw Sorrel’s pale face. She was watching him with eyes filled with concern over her own mask. He winked at her and disappeared through the cargo hatch.

  Even at twenty thousand feet the newly depressurised cargo hold was bitterly cold and ice was forming on the roof and bulkheads. Martin had to slither across the crates, gasping loudly for breath between the red-coloured emergency oxygen points.

  Finally he reached the rear of the massive hold where the Red-eye missile lay as he had left it, the four foot long cylinder already in its launching tube.

  He plugged into the loadmaster’s oxygen point.

  ‘Stubbles, get ready to adjust the trim when I open the cargo door. She’ll go tail heavy with the suction and try to rear up.’

  ‘Roger.’

  ‘Warning light coming on. Any sign of the enemy?’

  ‘He’s just ambling all around us, looking for damage, I guess.’

  Martin took a webbing strap attached to an anchor point on the port paratroop door and fixed a harness on to himself. He had about twelve feet of movement. But he knew that the suction once the huge rear cargo door had opened upwards would be enough to snatch him out of the aircraft, helpless as he dangled in its slip-stream. He released the safety catch over the button which operated the hydraulically upward lifting door and pushed, praying quietly that the explosion had not distorted the frame and so jammed the mechanism. The door slid upwards and immediately there was a fierce rushing noise as Martin faced a large expanse of freezing blue air. He picked up the Red-eye and took up his firing position.