Ghost War

by Maloney, Mack;

  The battle went on like this for what seemed like forever—some of the MiGs apparently figured out that Bozo was defenseless when attacked from the right side, and they poured it into the huge airplane, even as the tremendous storm roared on around them.

  At some point Bozo crossed over land itself, where the storm actually grew worse. The weather was so bad, it took them a few minutes to realize the battle was over. The MiGs had disappeared; all the firing had stopped. They’d also lost sight of the rest of the C-5s.

  Now the C-5 was lurching blindly through the thundering sky.

  “I can’t see a damned thing, Hawk!” Ben shouted over the intercom.

  Hunter clenched his teeth and tried with all his might to keep his control column steady. He’d been in tight spots before—but this was the worse by far.

  The sky was dark as night even though it was the middle of the day. Sheets of rain totally blocked out any hint of guiding light, either from the ground or from the sun. The C-5’s wipers raced back and forth across the windscreen, trying vainly to clear away the pounding rain. Every warning bell, buzzer, and beeper on the airplane’s control panel was going off at once—all adding to the chaos inside the dimly lit cockpit.

  Bozo had given the MiGs a hell of a surprise with its massive, aerial broadsides—but the C-5 hadn’t escaped unharmed. The damage report was grim. Hundreds of MiG cannon rounds had ripped across the fuselage and wings during the air battle, severing hydraulic hoses, electrical wires, and fuel lines. Most critically, the right wing’s stabilizers were shot to pieces, causing the already-unbalanced airship to list even more horribly to the left.

  The flight controls were shaking so violently now that both Hunter and Ben had to struggle just to hang on. An earsplitting vibration was rattling through the entire airplane—it seemed that all the rivets holding the Galaxy together were going to pop at any second. Loud banging and screeches of steel on steel were echoing through the cavernous hold behind them. Shouts of concern and outright fear were coming from the gun crews below.

  The dials, gauges, and hydraulic pressure LEDs on the airplane’s shattered control panel all told the same story—the big transport-turned-gunship was in serious trouble.

  And things were quickly getting worse: because of their shot-up wing tanks, they were now running out of gas.

  Hunter rapped on the fuel gauge with his knuckle. “We’ve got about two minutes to put this baby down,” he yelled to Ben. “Maybe less …”

  “Easier said than done, Hawk …” Ben yelled back. “We need something long and flat, very quick!”

  They put the giant lumbering plane into a wide descending circle, trying to eyeball the jungle below through the horrible blackness of the storm. They were searching for anything clear enough to land the Galaxy, but no matter where they looked, nothing—no landmark, terrain, or landscape feature—could be made out. It was an eerie feeling, flying completely blind—if it wasn’t for quick glances at the gyro, they could have easily been flying sideways or even upside down.

  “We’re down to a minute-twenty of gas, Hawk,” Ben yelled, his voice filling with resignation. “This might be it, old buddy.”

  Hunter had no reason to disagree with him. Then, suddenly, he felt a tingling in the back of his neck. It was the feeling, his incredibly developed ESP, breaking through to his conscious state. He steadied himself, reacting purely on instinct as well as his learned acceptance of this lifelong unexplained phenomenon. For an instant, everything seemed calm inside the battered cockpit.

  “Southwest,” he told Ben. “About twelve miles …”

  Ben didn’t hesitate a beat. Together, they fought the murderous headwind and slowly turned the big plane to the southwest. As they did so, the feeling got stronger, telling Hunter that he was heading in the right direction.

  But it was also telling him something else….

  They continued to wrestle with the flight yokes, nearly out of control in the brunt of the howling wind and rain storm. The Galaxy shook under the strain of the turn and Hunter, Ben, and the gun crew in the hold were bounced around mercilessly as the plane was battered by powerful hurricane-strength airstreams.

  Then suddenly, Hunter spotted a flash of light below.

  “Do you see that?” he yelled to Ben. “About ten miles dead ahead …”

  Ben did. There was a bright glow cutting through the clouds.

  “What the hell is it?” Ben yelled back. “Searchlights? A fire? Explosions?”

  Hunter didn’t know—but it was all they had to go on.

  They brought the bucking C-5 down to 1500 feet—finally breaking through the overcast. In that instant, they found what they were looking for—a long strip of black asphalt cutting through the rain and haze on a north-south position. Once again, the feeling had not failed; they were approaching a landing strip.

  They eased the C-5 down to 1000 feet and reduced their airspeed to just 150 knots. They were over a very mountainous area, mostly covered with thick jungle and foliage. The glow up ahead got brighter and gradually, they could see what was causing it. Flashes of lights, balls of flame, a long column of black smoke rising into the sky; Hunter and Ben were startled. They’d seen such things before. There was a battle going on down below. A big one.

  “Jesuzz—are we really going to land in the middle of a firefight?” Ben yelled.

  “We’ve got no choice,” Hunter yelled back. A second later, the left side outer engine kicked once—then died. The right outer one instantly followed suit. Both were out of gas. “We’ve got to go in….”

  The C-5 was down to 800 feet when a flare round went up from the treeline to their left, bursting right in front of them. Despite the torrential downpour, the magnesium round brilliantly illuminated the area for a brief moment. Hunter and Ben were astounded at what they saw below.

  Thousands of soldiers were charging from the treeline across an open marsh towards a haphazard collection of bunkers, foxholes, and shallow trenches that stood between them and the airstrip. The airstrip itself was littered with dozens of crashed airplanes—not a very good omen. Even worse, it didn’t look like a single round was being fired in defense from the airbase’s fortifications.

  In the blink of an eye, Hunter knew he had to make a tough decision. He had no idea who was fighting who on the ground, or who was on who’s side. But he did know from the hundreds of Mayday calls they’d received that the people of Vietnam were under attack. His gut then was telling him the thousands of attacking soldiers below were the bad guys.

  And he was about to land right in the middle of them.

  “I think we’re about to join the underdogs,” he yelled over to Ben.

  Ben took a quick glance out the window as the human wave attack was drawing closer to the weakly defended fortifications.

  “I don’t think you’ll get any argument from anyone on board,” he yelled back.

  Hunter brought the C-5 down even further as Ben patched into the plane’s intercom system to the gun crews in the back. At that moment, tracer fire came up from the ground directly at the plane, pinging off the huge nose, and left wing. That was it—they had just made an enemy.

  Holding the huge plane fifty feet above the treeline, Hunter twisted it into a wide arc, giving the guns on weapon engagement side just enough angle to be used effectively. Then he took a deep breath and called back for the half dozen GE Gatling guns to open fire on the massive human wave assault.

  Instantly, the six guns, each firing at a rate of 4,000 rounds per minute, tore into the mass of charging soldiers. Through the blaze of gunfire flaming from the port side of the C-5, Hunter could see the deadly Gatlings chew up the ranks of the attackers.

  But in the dimming glow, he saw something else that made his heart freeze. A second and even larger wave of attackers was emerging from the treeline on the heels of the first, charging over their fallen comrades, some even using the blasted and bleeding bodies as stepping stones to cross the foot deep water of the marsh.

>   With only enough altitude for one try, and no fuel to pull her up again, Hunter and Ben put the transport into another steep bank to the left which took them over a small mountain at the south end of the runway. It was near here that most of the base’s inhabitants seemed to be positioned.

  As the C-5 turned toward the head of the runway, for what they knew would be its final descent, Hunter saw that the second wave of attackers was closing in on the airfield.

  “Ben, call back to the crew,” he said evenly, “Get ready to open fire again….”

  Ben did as requested as Hunter calmly dropped the wing flaps to increase drag. In the hold, the rest of the portholes on the plane’s left side—the “killing side”—snapped open.

  Hunter continued to decrease his throttle while keeping the enormous plane steady through the crosswinds and the blinding rain. Behind him, the gun crews of Bozo were chambering rounds, cranking down elevation, adjusting ranges, all while being bounced around in an airplane that was practically coming apart at the seams.

  “Get ready …” Hunter called back to the gun crew.

  An instant later, he dropped the landing gear, applied the air brakes, and then he and Ben pulled back hard on the controls to lift up the nose.

  To the attackers, the C-5 looked for a moment to be suspended in midair. Confusion overtook them as many halted in midcharge and stood with their mouths agape, staring in confusion at this big plane inexplicably adorned in circus colors and scrolling details.

  For most of them, though, it was the last thing that they would ever see.

  “Fire!” Hunter yelled into the intercom.

  A heartbeat later, all of Bozo’s weapons opened up at once.

  The darkened sky was instantly lit up—the thunderous fusillade was deafening. Explosions erupted across the entire front of the attackers, carving deep within their ranks. A tremendous white hot flame, erupting from the right and rear side of the C-5’s specially-rigged rear-end blaster, deflecting the propulsion of the thirty-six rockets fired from the LARS II, added to the bizarre light show. Shattered bodies rose high into the air, obliterated by the forceful barrage. Hundreds were killed in a matter of seconds.

  But those that survived this lethal outpouring just kept coming—through the wire, past the defensive positions and straight for the airstrip where the C-5 was about to touch down.

  “At least now we know which side we’re on,” Ben yelled as the number 3 engine died. But he and Hunter had a more immediate concern. They still had to put the plane into a steep bank and to turn it over the runway. The ground was coming up fast towards them. Ben called back to the hold for everyone to brace themselves.

  Hunter clenched his teeth. “Here we go….”

  He slammed the control column hard to the left. The C-5’s wing dropped and the giant airplane seemed to turn on its tip in midair. The instant Hunter saw the nose of the plane line up with the runway, he pushed the column hard to the right, yanked back, then dropped her down.

  The C-5 hit the edge of the tarmac with a resounding thud, its remaining engine screaming for life. The plane bounced—fifteen feet or higher—then came crashing back down on the battered runway. Ben immediately deployed the drag chutes and Hunter locked up the main landing gear brakes—in seconds they were a screeching mass of burning rubber. But it was not enough. They were going too fast and running out of runway very quickly. Aided by the blazing fires burning out of control from the attack, they could see the rapidly approaching far end of the airstrip. And beyond that was the base of the small mountain.

  They had to slow down—fast.

  “Every weapon that’s loaded, fire right now!” Hunter yelled back to the gun crew.

  An instant later, a huge eruption of flame burst from the plane, its blast deflecting out and down. The C-5 shuddered to its rivets, lifting off the ground once again and slamming back to earth—the pure violence of the maneuver effectively cutting down the speed of the plane.

  “Hang on!” Hunter yelled.

  In the next instant, he disengaged the brakes on the left side, then pulled back hard on the stick. In a blur of movement, Hunter then yanked the controls hard to the right, jammed down with all his weight on the right rudder pedal, and gunned the last port engine with the remaining drops of fuel. The great plane lifted with a hellish scream, and in what seemed like one giant ballet movement, pirouetted on the locked right landing wheel until it did a complete one hundred and eighty degree turn. Dropping hard onto the side of the runway, the plane screeched backwards for several hundred feet until it skidded sideways off into the soft earth alongside the airstrip. Finally, it lurched to a sudden halt, its front gear collapsed, its right wing lodged in the mud.

  “Jesuzz!” Ben yelled as he tried to shake out the stars. “Did we really make it?”

  “We did.” Hunter yelled back—“But maybe not for long …”

  They were both astonished to see out the port window another human wave of attackers, bigger than the first two combined, racing right towards them.

  Hunter didn’t have time to think about it.

  “All weapons—fire at will!” he called over the intercom to the gun crews in the back.

  The big guns behind them began to blast away, violently shaking the airplane once again. Hunter and Ben quickly unclipped themselves from their harnesses. Hunter grabbed his M-16 and a bandolier of tracer clips from the cockpit rack.

  “Cover up!” Ben yelled as he unholstered his 9-mm Berretta. He fired off six quick rounds, blowing out most of the C-5’s windscreen. A blast of glass shards and pounding rain blew back on them and into the cockpit. But they were now able to see the first line of attackers just as it reached the left side of the plane.

  Hunter took an instant to get a good hard look at these soldiers. They were dressed in black “combat pajamas,” wearing canvas hats and pith helmets. They looked exactly like an enemy of years ago. But who these men were or for what cause they were fighting, Hunter hadn’t a clue.

  The Gatling guns were cranking furiously in the back, their muzzle flashes silhouetting the dozens of attackers racing along the tarmac right at the front of the plane. Hunter slapped a 30-round clip into his M-16 and yanked back the bolt to chamber the first round. Then he laid the forearm stock across the shattered windshield’s frame and squeezed the trigger.

  His tracer rounds found their marks as if they were laser guided. One small line of attackers fell—but more kept coming.

  Hunter slapped in another clip as Ben tossed out two hand grenades. Hunter snapped his M-16 to auto and opened up again, trying desperately to cut down the stunned attackers.

  Round after round of incoming 7.62-mm ammo zipped and pinged, slamming into the cockpit all around him. Hot shrapnel from detonated grenades sizzled through the air, and the sounds of concussions, explosions, gunshots, mortar blasts, and screams blended into the one long, inexhaustible, blood-curdling roar of all of Bozo’s weapons going off at once.

  Suddenly a tremendous baaaaang rocked the entire airplane. It came from the right rear side.

  “I’m going back!” Hunter yelled to Ben. “Do your best up here!”

  Ben continued to blast away with his pistol as Hunter scrambled over the tangled masses of hoses, wires, oil lines, and ammo belts, and down the ladder into the weapons hold to investigate.

  It was a madhouse.

  The gun crews were frantically reloading and firing their weapons as fast as they could. Empty casings were flying everywhere as the crews laid in volley after volley of concentrated firepower.

  But outside, the attackers just kept coming.

  Orders were shouted, and the hurried sounds of gears clicking could be heard as the muzzles of the guns were depressed as far down as they could go to meet the charge head on. Proximity fuses for the AA guns were set for detonation almost immediately upon leaving the barrels. Shouts of “Ready!” echoed up and down the firing line.

  “Fire …!” came the screams, over and over.

  And
each time, the guns opened up once again into the swarming mass of aggressors.

  To Hunter, Bozo seemed like a three-masted man o’war, unleashing broadside after broadside in a great naval battle on the high seas.

  But now the blasts themselves were beginning to rupture the side of the plane. And the attackers kept coming.

  In between fusillades, cases of hand grenades were being dispensed in the hold. Now each member of the gun crew put their personal weapon near at hand—the situation was so chaotic and the attackers getting so close that hand-to-hand fighting was looming as a grim possibility.

  More explosions rocked the C-5 as Hunter made his way to the rear. He dashed to a port hole on the other side, keeping low to avoid the armor-piercing rounds that zipped back and forth through the skin of the plane’s hull. Peering out he saw the entire outside of the plane was covered with enemy troops trying to blast their way inside.

  The situation was beyond critical. The big guns aboard were now ineffective. With their elevations cranked all the way down they could now only fire above the attackers heads—not down at them. The gun crews began to drop hand grenades out the portholes on the left side and through ragged-edged holes on the right side in attempt to blast off the attackers just twenty feet below. Others were firing their small arms at the ceiling of the plane, trying to kill the attackers who were racing back and forth along the top of the fuselage. By now, the Galaxy was peppered with so many bullet holes and shrapnel punctures that the rain was coming down as hard inside some sections of the plane as it was outside.

  Three explosions rocked the rear blind spot of the plane. Hunter bolted to the back of the weapons hold, fired a burst through a jagged shell hole in the cargo bay doors to the ground below, and then once again took a look out.

  A sizable force, unseen by the gunners on Bozo, had amassed underneath the back of the plane. They appeared to be laying explosives under the C-5’s huge rear cargo doors, hoping the resulting explosion would split the plane wide enough for them to get in. Hunter passed down the word: this threat had to be dealt with immediately—and preemptively.