PART TWO
CHAPTER 26
MIKE FITZGERALD WALKED OUT into the clear Texas morning sunshine and beheld the two massive airplanes in front of him.
They were C-5 Galaxys, the largest airplane ever built in the Free World. A cargo giant—it could haul 130 tons, more than three times that of the not-at-all diminutive C-141—a Soviet “wanna-be” called the An-124 was now larger by a few inches.
But the C-5 was tougher and smarter than the Russian flying dumptruck. The Galaxy could carry more, fly higher, faster and for longer spans of time. Despite its massive size—its length was only 53 feet shorter than that of a football field—it could operate from unfinished or even cratered runways.
Most importantly, pilots loved it …
Up until the outbreak of World War III, the only gun a C-5 had carried was one to shoot off emergency flares. It was strictly a behind-the-lines supply animal.
But Mike Fitzgerald had changed that.
He wasn’t exactly sure when the idea had first hit him, but it was a few days after he had arrived in Dallas at the request of General Dave Jones to inspect some aircraft for possible lease. The trip had meant he had missed the surprisingly quick outcome at Football City two weeks before, but even that couldn’t dampen the excitement about his idea for the two airplanes.
Everyone on the continent who was familiar with the art of air support for ground troops, knew Puff the Magic Dragon. Born in Viet Nam, Puff was the brainchild of a nameless Air Force officer who first got the idea to stick three machine guns into the side of a C-47, a small, two-prop cargo-only airplane. Then, by flying the airplane into a slight left hand bank, he found out that he could support ground troops below with an accurate, ever-moving, concentrated and manageable field of fire. The idea caught on quickly in Viet Nam, much to the bad luck of the Vietnamese communists.
The idea was made one better when the Air Force installed three 6000-round per minute Gatling guns into the side of the larger, more sophisticated C-130 Hercules cargo carrier. Dubbed “Spookys,” a number of these gunships were still in operation in the Pacific American Air Corps, the outfit home of Hunter, Jones, Twomey and Ben Wa.
Now Fitzie had taken the idea to its next logical extreme. He had armed the C-5.
The best part was that the Texans had given him two airplanes at a reasonable price, leaving plenty of money left over for him to work with. And there was no shortage of weapons the Texans could give him to stick inside the cavernous C-5 hold.
In fact he had enough to pack three airplanes. So Fitzie got another idea: one aircraft—C-5B-23E/R No. 1—would be fitted with one and only kind of weapon: the GE GAU8/A 30mm Avenger cannon. Later on he would admit that he might have gotten carried away with the number of guns he’d installed on Number 1. Some thought the number was excessive—that is, until they saw all 21 Avengers firing as one at an enemy. The critics shut up after that.
Each Avenger was capable of firing 4500 rounds per minute of cannon shells made of depleted uranium, the projectile which spontaneously ignited on striking its target. The effect, especially at night, was so frighteningly breathtaking it was almost otherworldly.
But after he had had the 21 guns—and their literally miles of ammunition belts—installed in Number 1, he still had many weapons left over, including 19 Avengers. But Fitz was a born Irishman and therefore one side of him leaned to the unconventional. So instead of lining up another neat row of deadly Avengers on C-5B-23E/R No. 2, he installed everything but.
He started with six elderly GE Gatling guns—each capable of firing 8000 rounds a minute. Then came the five Mk 19 automatic grenade launchers, complemented by a single Italian-made AP/AV 700, three-barrel multiple grenade-launcher. Only then did he get into the heavy stuff. First there was the Soltam 120-mm mobile field gun, which was capable of firing IMI illuminating rounds, as well as rocket assisted charges. Then there were the two Royal Ordnance 105-mm-field artillery pieces and the three German-made Rheinmetal 20-mm converted anti-aircraft guns.
A reasonable man would have stopped there. But Fitz hadn’t become a Thunderbird pilot and now a millionaire soldier/businessman by being terminally reasonable. So he installed the 17-ton West German-made LARS II 110-mm Multiple Rocket Launcher, specially-fitted with a “rearend blast” deflector, which piped the backfire down and out of the airplane. The monster was capable of firing 36, six-foot-long, high-explosive-filled rockets in less than 20 seconds.
So if the effect of Number 1 firing all its guns was beautiful but scary, the sight of Number 2 firing all its guns was beyond description …
Fitzgerald, whose philosophy training came to him from the bottom of tea boxes, was now a firm believer in the school of thought that machines—like people—have personalities. He had proof. The two C-5s in front of him were brothers, yet they were worlds apart. From their crews to the way they flew, they were complete opposites, the yin and yang of deadly air support.
Inside Number 1, was a portrait of high tech. The 21 guns were lined up like so many soldiers preparing to fire a salute. The automatic ammunition racks ran in almost artistic cylindrical patterns around the inside of the cabin. Batteries of video targeting gear, radar imagers, electronic counter measures devices and a host of other futuristic doo-dads highlighted the starboard side of the aircraft. When the humans on the right side worked with the guns on the left side, the result was a neat, concentration of fire that was spit out at a rate of 94,000 rounds a minute, or 1575 rounds per second. The firepower was so intense, that special cowlings had to be installed on the C-5’s portside engines, so the jet turbines wouldn’t suck up all the smoke and gas resulting from the awesome 21-gun “salute.”
Inside Number 2 was a portrait of nightmare. The menagerie of weapons and their various ammunition and venting needs had turned the guts of the ship into a spaghetti bowl of wires, ammo belts, oil lines, gas lines, electrical generators, shell dispensers and everywhere, firing mechanisms. Number 2 also carried a battery of four Sidewinder missiles under its belly, and the controls for these were also jammed into the melee. Added to all this were four flare dispensers and a half dozen chaff dispensers. No wonder the air crews had dubbed the clownish Number 2 “Bozo.”
Soon after that, Number 1 was labeled “Nozo.”
So now Fitzgerald had all this fire power, plus two KC-135 aerial tankers to keep it flying, what was he to do with it?
He asked General Jones that question two days after the successful reclamation of Football City. The senior officer asked him two questions in return: first, could he get both planes and both tankers first to Football City, then prepare for a risky covert operation? Fitz answered yes, although he couldn’t imagine the two flying leviathans going undercover.
Jones’s second question was more technical: Could Fitzgerald fit a recently-reconditioned F-16 into the hold of one of the massive airplanes?
CHAPTER 27
IT WAS THREE WEEKS to the day after the victory at Football City when C-5 Number l—“Nozo”—screeched in for a landing at New Chicago’s airport.
Fitzgerald himself was behind the controls of the big plane, which had been given a hasty coat of dull black paint for the occasion. It also had all of its guns dismantled and packed away.
Fitz rolled the C-5 to a stop at the end of the airport’s longest runway and found the airplane immediately surrounded by a half dozen tanks and APCs.
“New Chicago Tower, this is C-5 requesting taxi and parking directions …” Fitz called into his microphone, ignoring the ring of hostile vehicles.
“C-5, prepare to be boarded by our landing fee collection officers …” came the reply.
The Irishman looked over at his friend in the copilot’s seat and shrugged.
“Can’t get away with anything these days,” Hunter said to him.
Fitz switched his radio over to intercom and called out: “OK guys, get ready. The New Order Cosa Nostra are coming aboard …”
Next to The Circle, the overlords of New Chi
cago—known as The Family—were the Westerners’ bitterest enemies. Soviet-backed and supplied, the criminals who ran New Chicago and the surrounding territories were still smarting from their defeat at the first Battle of Football City. Hunter himself had led a devastating air raid against the city at the height of that war, a raid which KO’d the city’s once vast railroad system and fuel depot facilities. So when the Circle took over the eastern half of the continent and more, the Family, still licking its wounds, simply sat back, signed a non-aggression treaty with them and let the conquering army pass them by.
Now The Family was working to regain its strength, just as The Circle was losing theirs. Its army—decimated at the first Battle for Football City—was now being rebuilt. Its war chests were again beginning to fill up; its tentacles were again beginning to spread.
When the Circle Army retreated from Football City, they headed north, toward New Chicago. Now the bulk of that force was camped 30 miles south of the center of the city—and paying The Family a fortune in gold for the privilege. Allies like these The Circle could do without. It was only because Moscow was footing the tab that The Circle could afford the high-rent prices.
The moral of the story: Everything was for sale in New Chicago.
There was a sharp knock on the bottom hatch of the C-5, and soon, two Family majors were standing on the flight deck, palms outstretched.
“What’s the price, gentlemen?” Fitz asked them after introducing himself and Hunter as “merchants.”
The two men looked at Hunter very closely, but the pilot knew he wouldn’t be recognized. Although his face was well-known even before the big war, he was an expert at changing his appearance. For this occasion, he had dyed his blond hair to black, cultivated a two-week beard and popped in brown contact lenses to discolor his blue eyes.
“Ten bags of gold for landing,” one of the officers finally said to them. “And ten bags of gold per day for parking fees.”
“Is this negotiable?” Fitz asked them.
The two officers looked astonished. “Of course not!” one of them said sternly. “Now pay up, Shamrock, or we got to call the Boss.”
Fitz paid them twenty bags of gold, a fortune in New Order America.
“Now what are you doing here?” the other officer asked. “Business or just a stop over?”
“Business …” Hunter told them, pointing to the plane’s cargo hold. “Some of those crates you see are filled with 50-caliber ammunition. We’re meeting a guy here tomorrow who’s going to buy them.”
The Family officers studied the cargo hold for a few moments, then asked: “Why here?”
“Know a better place?” Hunter replied. “We don’t need any flag-wavers mucking up our deal.”
The officers shook their heads. “Well, you know there’s going to be a transit fee,” one of them said. “Plus a city tax.”
“All of it up front …” the other added.
“But we have to get our money from them first …” Fitz started to protest.
“Up front …” the Family officer said. “Those are the rules. And people who question them wind up in trouble.”
Fitz shook his head in disgust. “How much?” he asked.
“Thirty bags of gold,” came the reply.
The Irishman nearly went nuts. “Thirty bags!” he shouted. “The whole shipment is only going for sixty bags.”
The officers smiled. “That’s the price you pay for coming here,” one said.
The other turned very serious. “Now pay up or we have our boys break the wing off this monster …”
Fitz came up with the gold. The Family officers then inspected the front of the cargo hold, and finally left.
“Whew!” Fitz said, stage-mopping his brow. “Did they fall for it? Was I convincing, do you think?”
Hunter patted his friend on the shoulder. Fitzie was a notorious skinflint. “You acted like they were taking your own personal gold, Mike,” he told him.
“Damn they would,” Fitz replied. “I’d have shot them both if it were my own money …”
Three hours passed. Then, right on schedule, a battered old C-46 cargo plane came in for a landing at New Chicago airport.
The airport security force that had formerly surrounded Nozo now formed a ring around the unmarked cargo carrier. Watching intently from the C-5’s portholes, Hunter, Fitz and the 12 crewmembers saw the same two Family officers board the C-46, no doubt to extract the various fees from them too.
“Just as long as they don’t snoop around in the back of that rig, we’ll be OK,” Fitz said to Hunter.
“Don’t worry,” the Wingman replied. “J.T. will be flashing that gold under their noses before they’re even in the doorway …”
Hunter’s prediction seemed to come true. No sooner had the Family officers climbed aboard the C-46, when they were leaving again, all smiles.
“That looks promising,” Hunter said, as they watched the officers and the security tanks and APCs pull away from the old cargo plane. “Ready for part two?” he asked Fitzgerald.
It was just an hour before sundown when the chief of New Chicago’s airport security, a colonel named Crabb, received an urgent call from one of his captains.
“Boss, you got to get over to that C-46 that came in today,” the captain told him. “I think the deal between them and the C-5 just went bad.”
“How bad?” Crabb asked the man. He was busy at the moment with a hooker named Irene.
“Real bad,” came the reply. “The guys from that C-5 went into that ship about five minutes ago and they were packing the heavy artillery. Now we just heard a lot of shooting …”
Crabb shook his head in disgust. “I’ll be right there,” he told the captain, hanging up the phone.
He turned to the beautiful redhead. She had just finished undoing his buckle and zipper when the call came in. “Got to put you on hold, baby,” he told her, redoing his pants and putting on his uniform jacket. “Got some trouble out on the flight line.”
Irene looked authentically disappointed. “How long will you be gone?” she asked.
“Not long,” he said, putting his .357 Magnum into his shoulder holster. He reached inside his desk and retrieved a vial of cocaine and a gigantic dildo that had been left behind by another of his hired girlfriends.
“Here,” he said, giving Irene the coke and the obscene modality. “Use these until I get back …”
Crabb walked out of his office at the airport’s control tower and found his limo waiting for him.
He was upset and in a bad mood. If it were up to him, he wouldn’t allow any outsiders to land at the airport to do business. The money extorted from the traders was usually substantial, but it never made up for the trouble that always seemed to break out between the buyers and sellers.
But as his limo pulled away and streaked across the tarmac to the C-46, Crabb knew that he couldn’t change the rules of order at the airport. They were blessed downtown, at City Hall. And to question the mayor—whoever that may be this week—was dangerous.
Crabb arrived at the C-46 and was met by the captain who had summoned him.
“What’s the situation?” Crabb asked him.
The captain gave him a shrug and said: “These C-5 guys play rough. They just took out every guy on the C-46 except the pilot.”
“Just like that?” Crabb asked, mildly shocked upon hearing of the violence.
The captain snapped his fingers and repeated: “Just like that.”
Crabb climbed the access steps and walked inside the C-46. He looked in the cargo hold and saw twelve-bullet ridden bodies scattered about.
“Jesus Christ,” he said with disgust. “What a mess …”
It wasn’t like he hadn’t seen it all before. The deal goes bad, someone gets shot. But 12 guys machine-gunned to death? His captain was right. The C-5 guys did play rough.
“Where’s the pilot now?” he asked his captain.
“Went back to the C-5,” the man replied. “I think he
was in on the deal from the beginning. He seems to be pretty buddy-buddy with that Mick and his friends.”
A few minutes later, Crabb and six of his heavily-armed security guards were walking into the flight deck of the C-5.
“You boys made quite a mess back there,” he said to Hunter and Fitzgerald.
Hunter shrugged. “Just a little disagreement,” he replied, nonchalantly.
“Well, things like this are bad for our reputation here,” Crabb told him. “The mayor doesn’t like violence, especially when it’s so out in the open.”
“We don’t like violence either,” Fitz told Crabb. “So we have something in common with your mayor, now don’t we?”
Crabb looked at Hunter and Fitz and at J.T. who was lounging in the background.
“What was the scam, guys?” he asked them. “You really hauling fifty-caliber ammo? Or did you just tell that to those guys in the C-46?”
Hunter laughed. “Sure we’re hauling it,” he said. “We’ve been hauling it around for a year …”
Crabb laughed himself now. He could appreciate the simplicity of the double-cross. Entice a buyer for the ammo, agree to make the deal at a neutral spot, get the sucker’s money then machinegun him. Crabb knew these guys were real pros—they had even taken the added precaution of planting their own guy as pilot of the sucker’s airplane.
“Where you guys work out of?” Crabb asked.
“Been down in Mexico for a while,” Fitz told him. “This operation works like a charm down there. It gets hot south of the border though, so we moved up to a more comfortable climate for a while.”
Crabb looked around the cabin of the C-5. “This is one motherfucker of an airplane,” he said. “What else can you do with it?”
A little bell went off in Hunter’s head. Bingo …
“What do you have in mind?” he asked the man.
Crabb just shrugged. “Nothing in particular,” he said. “But the mayor might be interested in hearing about you. If the right person mentioned you to him …”
Fitz already had the bag of gold in his hand. “Will you be talking to His Honor soon?” he asked, smoothly passing the bag of gold to Crabb. At the same time, Hunter was distributing a bag of silver to each of the lowly Family guards.
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