Hogs #4:Snake Eaters

by DeFelice, Jim

  “Probably doesn’t even know you had him by the short hairs,” said Johnny as they turned to head south.

  Hack didn’t answer. He suddenly felt angry as hell at the Warthog and its driver, as if the plane had made him miss the MiG.

  Damn Warthogs had no business being in the war, let alone being so deep in Iraq. They were old, obsolete, slow, and worst of all, ugly.

  Hack ought to know: he’d been a Hog driver for nearly three years before finally kissing enough ass to get promoted to the real Air Force.

  Damn stinking Warthog and its dumb-as-shit drivers. Probably got lost.

  He checked his position and flicked the radar into air-to-air scan, hunting for his tanker.

  CHAPTER 21

  APPROACHING THE IRAQ-SAUDI BORDER

  26 JANUARY 1991

  1620

  Even a Hog driver had his limits.

  After nearly twenty minutes of temptation and ho-hum flight back toward Al Jouf, A-Bomb was overcome by boredom as much as hunger. He reached down to the pocket flap for the Twinkie. The cellophane wrapper teased his fingertips— the pilot rarely wore flight gloves— but the package had somehow wedged itself in the bottom of his pocket and resisted his gentle tug. Under ordinary circumstances, A-Bomb would just yank, squeeze and swallow, but with your last piece of pastry you had to consider Karma. Squishing the delicate icing was very bad luck, especially while you were still over enemy territory. So he leaned down, trying to slip his fingers beneath the cardboard at the base of the pastry and tease it out.

  As he did, his eyes caught something on the ground ahead, a small gray shape scuttling along like a crab in a shallow pool. A-Bomb left the Twinkie in his pocket and jerked upright in the seat. A Zil truck with a trailer was running across the desert ahead, maybe ten miles from the Saudi border. This wasn’t some Iraqi dad taking his kid to college, either— the trailer was a 122 mm D-30 towed howitzer, a large and effective medium range artillery piece designed to harass well-meaning trespassers and Coalition troops on the good-guy side of the border.

  The Hog sniffed and snorted, her appetite inflamed by the tasty treat. She was in almost perfect position to gobble it up; a good solid push on the stick, perhaps a tad of rudder, and the target would slide into the cannon’s crosshairs at maybe five thousand feet. A-Bomb pushed in, so excited by his good fortune that he forgot he was flying with only one engine.

  The A-10A promptly reminded him, bucking her tail behind him. It didn’t amount to more than a slight whimper of complaint, however— A-Bomb barely noticed as the altitude ladder on his HUD scrolled downwards, falling promptly through eight thousand to seven thousand feet. At six thousand, the truck passed into his targeting pipper, but A-Bomb held off, deciding that he would bank behind the truck and come lower, attacking it from the rear with a long, shallow approach, a tactical concession to the fact that he was running with only one engine.

  Technically, of course, the concession he should have made was to ignore the target and fly directly back to base. But A-Bomb had never considered himself a technical type. He banked and came around, down now to nearly three thousand feet, a turkey shoot except that the Zil was not only moving faster than he thought but had cut to his right, leaving whatever trail it was following to dart and dodge in the hard-packed sand. A-Bomb corrected but then threw his momentum too far to the right, not only completely losing the shot but nearly putting himself into a spin.

  Never again would he fly without a reserve supply of Twizzlers. Never.

  He sighed, straightening the plane and circling back in a long arc, the target now running toward him in the left corner of his windscreen. A-Bomb kissed the stick with his fingertips, pulling the Hog’s nose onto the radiator of the Zil as he nailed the trigger home. The gun roared as he gave the Gat a good double-pump, a personal signature kind of thing. The cannon’s recoil practically stopped him in midair, the plane jittering as her nose erupted with flames and smoke from the gun.

  As he let off on the trigger, A-Bomb realized two things:

  One, he’d blown the shot, because the truck was still moving.

  Two, things were suddenly awful quiet.

  The shock of the recoil had flamed the plane’s one good engine. Under other circumstances, A-Bomb would have undone his seat restraints and given himself a good kick in the rumpus area for flying like such an idiot. But he was down to two thousand feet, not a particularly good place to fly without means of propulsion. And besides, he was already being chewed out sufficiently by the plane’s problem panel. He nosed down for momentum, cursing over the stall warning as he worked to restart the engine. The turbines spun, the fuel combusted, and the GE turbofan on the left side of the hull kicked herself back to life. The Hog lurched and a whole lot of desert flew in front of A-Bomb’s face. He pulled out maybe three seconds before his job description would have changed from Hog driver to backhoe operator.

  Any other pilot would have called it a day and set sail for the Saudi border a few miles away. But whatever other characteristics he possessed, A-Bomb was not a quitter. He had a very deep sense of obligation, and realized that his boneheaded, hot-dogging stupidity had just brought serious embarrassment to Hog drivers everywhere. True, he had an excuse— obviously his blood sugar was out of whack. But how could he take his place in the great fraternity of Hog men, to say nothing of tomorrow night’s poker game, knowing that he had missed an easy shot on an unprotected target?

  He couldn’t just go in with the cannon, though. It wasn’t simply that he might flame the engine again. Hardly. That could be avoided or at least prepared for by simply climbing higher and attacking with a steeper angle. But doing that would be tantamount to admitting he was unworthy; it would be expected, it would be boring. The stakes had been raised. A-Bomb had to go beyond the mundane. Hog drivers the world over were counting on him to demonstrate élan and ingenuity.

  There was, fortunately, a way.

  He steadied the Hog at roughly twelve hundred feet over the desert, banking roughly two miles behind the Zil. Nudging his nose into the swirling grit, he picked up speed as he hurtled toward the rear of the truck. The Hog coughed for a second, wondering what he was up to, but A-Bomb kept on, his timing and aim perfect. He caught the Zil and whipped his right wing up in a terrific banking turn directly in front of the windshield, swooping into the driver’s vision so suddenly that the man yanked the wheel hard to the left, toppling the truck and trashing the howitzer behind him.

  A-Bomb’s wingtip was two feet off the road before he slapped the plane back level. He belatedly realized he could have smashed the truck’s windshield if he’d popped his landing gear at the right moment.

  But that was Monday morning quarterbacking. The truck and its trailer lay sprawled upside down in the desert sand, the howitzer broken in a half.

  A-Bomb checked his course for Al Jouf, did a quick instrument check, and then reached down for the Twinkie.

  Which, shaken loose by the encounter with the Zil, slid right into his fingers, demanding to be eaten.

  CHAPTER 22

  NEAR AL-KAJUK, IRAQ

  26 JANUARY 1991

  1630

  Captain Wong cast an eye toward the dark speck in the sky to the west as he continued to talk to its pilot over the satellite system. The Hog was undoubtedly into its reserves and ought to head back to its re-supply base. But Captain Glenon was as stubborn as the dogs he’d been nicknamed for.

  “There is no need for us to call a strike in on the mosque,” Wong told Doberman speaking patiently into the Satcom’s retro-black-plastic and steel handset. The radio consisted of the control unit rucksack and an antenna “dish” that looked like a large X fashioned from thin, flat metal blades. “If the Iraqis follow their usual pattern, they will move the missiles as dusk fall, perhaps slightly afterwards. It will then be rather easy to attack them. I would expect an approximate time of 1900 hours.”

  “Yeah, all right,” said Doberman. “I’ll be back.”

  Wong shook his
head. It wasn’t that he didn’t think Doberman could get back in time; on the contrary, given the legendary efficiency of the A-10A maintenance crews, not to mention Captain Glenon’s own snappy manner, he could undoubtedly rearm and return with four or five minutes to spare. The Hog, however, was not a night fighter; if the Iraqis deviated from their normal pattern he would have a difficult time locating his target, unless he managed to obtain infrared Mavericks during his reload. He was also flying without a wingman— a dubious situation at best.

  Wong’s preferred solution was to request fresh air support. But it was useless to argue with Doberman, who was even more cantankerous and aggressive than the normal Hog driver. Wong had a theory that this was due in large measure to his small stature— so little place to store the bad humors the body naturally accumulated.

  He didn’t bother sharing the theory with Doberman, just as he did not bother telling him that he would, indeed, be calling for another flight of bombers. Instead he wished Devil One luck.

  “Yeah. Be back,” said Doberman, almost cheerfully.

  Wong shook his head at the speck of a Hog in the distance, already disappearing. Then he clicked off the circuit and turned back toward the communications specialist, intending to ask him to contact the AWACS.

  The com specialist had his hands spread out wide. A few yards down the hill, six Iraqis were pointing guns at them. One of the soldiers gestured toward Wong, indicating that the captain should raise his hands and step away from the radio.

  It seemed expedient to comply, and so he did.

  PART TWO

  LOST AIRMAN

  CHAPTER 23

  FORT APACHE

  26 JANUARY 1991

  1640

  Air Force Technical Sergeant Rebecca “Becky” Rosen plopped her tired body down against a Spec Ops rucksack and leaned against the inside wall of the shelter. For the first time since parachuting into Fort Apache, she had nothing to do— no Hog to fix, no Army helicopter to rebuild.

  Fatigue surged over her like the green-blue waves of the Atlantic, salty and cold, numbing her feet and stinging her nostrils. But as tired as she was, Rosen couldn’t allow herself to fall asleep. The unit was evacuating south as soon as night fell; she was afraid if she dozed off now she’d never manage to wake herself when needed. So she reached beneath her jacket and pulled out the small spiral-bound notebook she’d carried with her since coming to Iraq some weeks back. Rosen had been intending to keep a journal of the deployment but until now had only made three one-word notes, each for a different day, and each confined to the weather – rain, cold, clear, in that order. Folding the book open to a blank page, she retrieved a silver-plated Cross pen from her breast pocket, sliding her callused fingertips across the smooth metal.

  The pen had been a present from a college professor, and she thought of him now, thought of his classes in Shakespeare and his funny pronunciations of words, a mix of British and down-home Texas. Shoehorning her studies around her duties as an Air Force NCO, Rosen had managed to earn a degree in English literature. She didn’t care about the degree; she wasn’t going to do anything with it. But that was the point. Poetry and big books tickled a side of her she hadn’t realized existed until a friend talked her into signing up for a continuing-ed class so it wouldn’t be canceled for lack of students.

  Becky Rosen was a mechanic. She saw things with her hands, whether they were Hog avionics systems or busted AH-6 engines. She’d been fixing things since she helped her uncle rebuild a Ford high compression 302 when she was seven. The real world was physical, in your face; Becky Rosen had overcome a for-shit childhood and done well, but she’d also had her fingers mashed, and a hell of a lot of worse, along the way.

  Literature, poetry especially, seemed like an exotic vacation of dreams, relief from the real world’s fumes and acid. Shakespeare, Wordsworth, Donne, Pound, Whitman, Elliot — they were far-away lands she could disappear to. The harsh rhythms of Gerard Manley Hopkins, the delicate balance of Byron, the false bravado of Dylan Thomas— all offered shelter.

  “Do not go gentle into that good night,” Dylan Thomas had told his father on his deathbed.

  Rage against it. Rage against the finality. Scream against your fate.

  Had Lieutenant Dixon screamed in that final moment before he’d been shot?

  She saw Dixon now in the dirt on the hill next to Sugar Mountain, face-down, body limp, limbs askew. He’d been such a nice kid, quiet but brave. Or foolish, maybe— he’d volunteered as a forward ground controller, working with Delta Force behind the lines.

  No more foolish than she’d been, volunteering for this mission. In her mind at the time, there was no choice— she had been the only person at Al Jouf capable of getting the Special Ops helos back together. But a lot of people might think it foolish.

  Definitely. To say nothing of being against regulations and probably the law.

  Not the time or place to worry about it. Rosen twisted the pen carefully so the point extended. She began to write:

  Jan. 25.

  Iraq. How I got here is a long story. It started –

  She held the pen up from the paper. There was always a possibility of being captured. She had to watch what she said.

  Rosen scratched out the words and began again:

  Jan. 25.

  Iraq. How I got here is a long story, to be told later. All I can say is it was a hell of a trip.

  I saw a dead man today, my first, believe it or not.

  I loved him.

  Tears erupted from her eyes and she began to shake uncontrollably.

  She loved him?

  Yes. She’d never admitted it until now, let alone told him or anyone else. But they’d kissed once, a moment stolen in the dark back at King Fahd.

  They’d kissed.

  The only time in the Air Force that she’d really, truly felt something like that, felt the steel hooks in her gut, felt love.

  One kiss, all she had.

  CHAPTER 24

  IRAQ

  26 JANUARY 1991

  1640

  Dixon knew it was a Hog the instant he heard the sound, even though the plane was so far away the sound was less than a whisper. He froze, eyes upward, exposed near the highway he’d been following. The sound faded completely, a tease or a delusion.

  Except he knew it wasn’t. He saw a dot passing in the sky overhead, far overhead.

  A Hog. One of his squadron mates. Had to be.

  And then it was gone. He stared upwards for a long time, more than a half hour, until he heard another sound, this one much closer. He turned his head and realized it was a truck, driving toward him.

  Dazed by hunger and fatigue, it took forever for him to get his legs in motion. Dixon took a step in exactly the wrong direction, toward the highway. In agonizingly slow motion he twisted his body back, clutching the rifle to his belly. He spotted a clump of low trees ahead. The ground sloped upwards behind it into a large, squat hill, half-covered with vegetation. Another hill, this one much lower and nearly all rock and dirt, lay to the left. He could see the roof of a building beyond the trees as he ran, and realized the dirt included a dusty, primitive roadway.

  His side hurt, but there was no choice but to keep running. He could hear the truck on the highway behind him slowing to a stop. He threw himself down as it whined into reverse.

  Had they seen him? Dixon twisted around to look. The truck was coming in his direction over the dirt road, but it was still a good way off.

  He had to assume they had seen him. In any event, if he stayed here very much longer they surely would. Perhaps with the shadows he might make the low trees without being seen.

  Dixon pushed himself back to his feet, stooping forward as he ran. He made the trees, still unsure if he’d been seen. The truck was on the road, moving slowly, but still coming. A small house made of painted clay or cement lay on his right, ringed by upright stubs that could be parts of old trees or perhaps abandoned fence posts. The doorway was open; it looked empt
y. Dixon considered running for it but changed his mind. If they’d seen him, it would be the first place the people in the truck would stop.

  The dirt road veered between the large hill on the right and the smaller one on the left. Fifty yards ahead up a bald slope on the left, an old car sat near a dilapidated stone wall. Dixon pushed his rifle but into the stitch in his side and ran for it. The ground flew behind him. Pain and confusion narrowed his vision as he dove head first over the rocks, rolling in the dust, out of breath. His chest and throat heaved. He fought against the reflex and swung around, checking the AK-47’s clip as he leaned low against the rocks.

  The truck, a pickup, steered gingerly along the road, dodging rocks. It was not only new, it looked immaculate, the white body gleaming as if freshly waxed. It stopped in front of the house.

  Dixon saw that there were only two men inside. He might have a chance if they came for him.

  They didn’t. The truck lurched forward, resuming its slow crawl around the rocks in the road. It began picking up speed as it followed the path around the base of the hill to the left.

  Dixon waited until he could breathe normally again. Then he eyed the house carefully. He saw something move around the back, then realized there were animals there, two dogs and a goat. The dogs seemed to be tied to one of the stubby trees; the goat moved freely, though hardly at all, grazing on slivers of vegetation.

  Food.

  Someone would be inside the house.

  The ground went up sharply behind the building, climbing through brush. There didn’t seem to be an easy way, though, to circle around. He’d have to expose himself by walking along the road where the pickup truck had gone.

  Better off going for it. Come straight in the front door, Hog style, gun ready.