The Gulf

by David Poyer

  “Got it in the mirror. Christy! Watch the hook, don’t let it snag. If they attach it to the ship, cut it right away.”

  “Rog.”

  “Crossing the deck edge.”

  “Ah, roger that … height!”

  “Fifty.”

  “Gauges are in the green.”

  As they slid over it, the ship enfolded them with light and heat. Yellow flickered inside the cockpit. Hayes couldn’t hear anything over the wing beat of their rotors. But he could imagine the roar of that immense mass of flame. Then he jerked his mind away. No imagining. He had to help fly this bitch.

  “Fifteen knots, slowing.”

  “ATO, ATACO.”

  “Go, Van Zandt.” Hayes kept his eyes on the instruments. “Looking good, Chunky.”

  “Where are you, Two One? Lost you on the scope.”

  “ATACO, Two One, we’re playing marshmallow over the merchant. Hook’s going down now.”

  “Roger. Two One, we have comms with a Royal Navy frigate. She’s prepping a Lynx for launch. Scylla’s closer to the freighter than we are. After pickup, proceed two-seven-two twenty-eight miles to offload survivors.”

  “Copy vector two-seven-two, twenty-eight, HMS Scylla.”

  “You’re drifting aft,” Hayes said.

  “Roger that.” Schweinberg was sweating. He could see nothing in the rearviews but yellow flame. When he looked away, his night vision was shit; he got floating red patches instead of dial readings. He was flying by hover bars, but he didn’t think it was going to work for long. The bird lurched to the right and he brought it back. Was the wind shifting? “Get that fucking sling down there, Christy!” he shouted.

  “It’s down. They’re putting a wounded guy in it first, looks like.”

  “Well, make ’em hurry the fuck up!”

  “Yessir!”

  Hayes glanced back to see him pump his arm. Doubted if they’d understand that. “You’re drifting aft!” he shouted. “Going into the bridge!”

  “Shit, shit, shit. Get him aboard, gunner!”

  The hoist whined. As soon as Schweinberg felt the weight, he increased lift and moved forward. When they were over the water, he relaxed his grip a bit, but still kept tight formation on the ship. Hayes, looking back, saw Christer, harness taut, lean out to pull a dark bundle into the cabin. “First guy’s aboard” crackled over the ICS.

  “How’s he look?”

  “Not so good.”

  “How many more?”

  “Eleven, twelve?”

  “We’ll get two more and then go find that Brit.”

  “Roger that.”

  Schweinberg decided backing in sucked. He made the second approach from port, transitioning to a hover over the bow with wind abeam. This way he got immediate hand-eye feedback. He parked himself forty feet above the deck, holding with the cyclic and only adjusting the collective when the weight came on the hoist. One man came up and was swung in. The hoist went down again. “Yeah, this works better,” he muttered.

  “Number three in the horse collar, sir.”

  Up, up, and away. When the gunner reported the man aboard, he hauled around to the west and brought airspeed up to 150.

  Hayes glanced back. The rescuees were huddling in the fuselage tunnel. One was sitting there smiling, looking around. He snapped his head back as Schweinberg asked him for altitude.

  When they found her, the British destroyer was on the move, tossing up a sparkling bow wave visible from miles off. Her pad looked smaller than Van Zandt’s. Schweinberg came in athwartships. They took some nasty buffeting but thudded down safely. Christer and Kane slid the wounded out to goggled corpsmen. A moment later, Two One had lifted again.

  When they came up on the freighter again, the other helicopter was over the bow. Schweinberg held a tight circle, staying in the firelight, but climbed as he came round the starboard side; he had no wish to be silhouetted. “See if you can get that guy on the radio,” he said.

  Hayes puzzled for a moment, then called Van Zandt. The ATACO answered and Buck asked him to get the frequency of the Lynx. He came back a few minutes later with 283.0. Buck keypadded this into the UHF and was rewarded with a lighthearted voice in midsentence: “… Right through the focking centerline.”

  “British Lynx, this is U.S. Navy SH-60, call sign Killer Two One, over.”

  “This is Scylla Prime, and how are you this evening, Yank Two One.”

  “Oh, smashing. How many did you get on that last pass?”

  “We have five souls on board, five souls.”

  “Does he have radar on that thing?” he asked Schweinberg. The pilot shrugged. Hayes clicked to transmit again. “Scylla Prime, be advised we hold several small boats on radar bearing oh-five-oh. Suspect they’re the bastards who hit the ship in the first place.”

  “Rojah, we hold them, too, and will avoid, thank you. Now lifting, clearing the area to the west.”

  Schweinberg said, “Let’s finish these fuckers up; we’re gonna need gas pretty soon.”

  “Maybe we can get a drink from the Limeys.”

  “Now you’re thinkin’.… Okay, here we go.”

  The second load went perfectly. Four uninjured men came up on the sling one after the other; Kane secured the hatch; Schweinberg tiptoed forward till he was clear of ship’s structure and could bank off toward the west. En route, Hayes called Scylla and set up the refuelling. The Lynx was gone when they got there and Schweinberg put 421 down again with her tail hanging over the side and held her there with the rotors while the rescuees debarked and she drank three thousand pounds of JP-5 equivalent. When they were in the air again, he said, “Okay, Bucky-boy. You wanta fly this last one?”

  Hayes grinned through his nervousness. He was scared, but anybody who wasn’t scared occasionally flying a helicopter didn’t understand the situation. He tested the controls, then steadied up. This time, he took a moment to look, really look, at the burning ship as they closed. At the long tapered flames groping at the stars; at the dance and glitter of the firelight on the sea. He could see flame within the ship now through the rocket holes. He thought again of that naphthalene stink, then erased it from his mind.

  He made his approach, as Schweinberg had, from the port side, and transitioned into a hover sixty feet up. It wasn’t hard to get there, but holding position was a different story in the gusting and dropping shamal.

  “How you doin’?” Schweinberg glanced across the cockpit. The dark face was sheened with sweat. Could his ATO handle it? The cross-cockpit hover was harder and maybe not too smart, but it gave him a break. He needed it.

  “Great. Great!” Hayes was surprised first at the question, and then at the answer.

  Suddenly he wasn’t nervous anymore. He was psyched. He glanced to starboard, to see the windows of the bridge staring out at him like the lit eyes of a Jack-o’-lantern, the flames blown back like glowing hair by the rotor blast. Two One hung magically, dipping and swaying.

  Flying. Flying! How could he live without this?

  “Sling going down.” Kane said, over the hoist whine. “… Guy’s in it. Weight comin’ on.”

  They dipped and Hayes added power. Too much; they started to rise; he dropped it, too much again. “You’re overcorrecting,” said Schweinberg. “Take it slow, take it easy. You got room.”

  “Comin’ up,” said Kane again. “Hal, get ready for his legs, there, haul him in—”

  A red light came on suddenly above the center console. Simultaneously, Hayes felt a bump, like a pickup going over a jack-rabbit. The left rudder pedal kicked his boot. The plane came up, yawed right, and staggered back toward the pyre. He tried to correct, but the cyclic was mushy.

  “Control problem,” he shouted, unable to look away from the looming superstructure long enough to fixate on the indicator. “Chunky, I’m losing it! Need some help!”

  “Holy shit. Boost failure! Beef those controls!”

  “What are you guys doing?” came Kane’s voice. “We got a man on the w
ire here!”

  Hayes had his legs locked against the rudder pedals. The torque of the rotors fought his rigid thigh muscles in the motionless agonizing balance of arm wrestlers. “Ah, get him aboard fast; we got a flight control problem up here.”

  “Shit! The fucking cable’s jammed!”

  “Get away from the ship,” said Schweinberg. “Get away! Get clear, Hayes!”

  “There’s a guy on the wire!”

  “Forget him, right? Get clear of this tub and then we’ll figure out—”

  “Okay, I get the idea. Transitioning to forward flight.” He hauled up on collective, but it didn’t move much, either.

  A boost failure meant there were no hydraulics to amplify their control inputs. They had to fly a ten-ton helicopter by main strength.

  “Chunky, gimme a hand! Gimme left pedal, help me pull some power!”

  They braced themselves in the seats and hauled together, cursing between clenched teeth. The torque climbed, and the ship crept away a little, then a little more.

  Then, suddenly, the heading indicator rolled. Four Two One spiraled to the left, hammered as it flew through the updraft of smoke and hot air, and curved off into the darkness. “Gimme some right pedal, right pedal,” Buck said very distinctly into the ICS. “Okay. Kane, what’s your guy doing back there, you got him in yet?”

  “He’s too heavy. He ain’t coming up.”

  “Look, we’re kind of wrapped up flying this crowd-killer. Either pull him in by hand or cut him. I can’t screw with him anymore.”

  “I can’t move him, sir.”

  “Okay, he goes. Standby to cut, now, now, now.” A flat crack came from outside the fuselage.

  He was looking down, out of the aircraft, into the blackness that lay north of the burning ship, when below him there was a flash. Then a ripple of them, white flashes, and a moment later a string of red Christmas lights floated past. “They’re firing at us!” shouted Kane.

  “No shit, Sherlock,” muttered Schweinberg. “Forget ’em, Bucko. You see a tracer, it’s already missed you. We lose control now and we’re crab meat. Straight and level’s the only way we’re gettin’ home.”

  Hayes suddenly remembered he’d left his body armor in his stateroom. The one time he’d decided he didn’t need it … “Where do you think you’re going?” shouted Schweinberg.

  “Scylla.”

  “Like hell, hotshot, no way we’re doing a boost-off landing on that Ping-Pong table.… ATACO, Two One: we got a major glitch here, feels like a pilot assist module leak. Request emergency flight quarters, break from the convoy and give us best wind over the bow. I got controls. Gimme RADALT hold, Buck.”

  “You have the controls,” said Hayes. He didn’t like Schweinberg’s tone but this was no time to argue over it.

  “Help me out, left rudder, straighten up.”

  “Coming left.”

  “Scylla Prime, this is Killer Two One: we got a flight-control problem. Request you pick up a guy we cut loose off the bow. Two more left aboard.” Schweinberg clicked off UHF without waiting for a response. “Kane! Gimme home plate range.”

  “Seventy miles, sir.”

  “Anything else flat around here? Any icebergs?”

  “Got an island, sir.”

  “That’s Abu Musa, that’s where these gun-happy sheepfuckers came from. It’s Van Zandt or swim, boys. Hang on tight.”

  Hayes got the checklist open and the light on it. This would not be easy. Putting a machine the size of the 60 on a frigate required delicacy. Just what they didn’t have. Yaw control was tough with no boost. Especially over a rolling flight deck. Schweinberg would have to do this right the first time.

  Shaker came up on the link. Hayes explained the situation, interrupted from time to time as Schweinberg shouted for help. He could feel sweat pooling under his buttocks.

  “Two One, LSO.” It was Woolton’s voice. “Emergency flight quarters set, crash team manning up.”

  “Roger that, Woollie, what’s deck motion?”

  “Wind’s ten to port at twenty-two, pitch one, roll two, altimeter twenty-nine point eighty-two, say your ETA.”

  “Roger that, on top in plus five.”

  Schweinberg said, “I’m gonna try a slow approach, see how the controls feel, then start descent.”

  “Roger, green deck. Good luck, guys.”

  “What’s your feel for this, Buck?”

  “Not exactly warm ’n’ fuzzy, Chunky.”

  “Christer, Kane, you guys strapped in back there? Got your emergency air handy?”

  “Ready for impact, sir.”

  Schweinberg cinched his straps. The ship came up suddenly bright ahead, as if every light had been turned on at once.

  He blew out. It’s simple, boy, he told himself. All you got to do is squat this bitch in one piece. On the deck is number one. Second best’s in the water, clear of the ship. Some of us ought to make it out then before she sinks. Hitting the superstructure, you get no points for that. We all go crispy critter then. His arms were cramping. “Hummmbaby,” he muttered, then, “Help me out, some right pedal.”

  “Two One, LSO: green deck for port recovery; say your position.”

  “Roger that, six miles on your stern.”

  “Roger.”

  “Death,” Schweinberg muttered through his teeth. “But first—cheech.”

  “Two One, LSO: roger your cheech. These lights good?”

  “Look good from here.”

  The ship changed from a distant glitter to a place. Hayes noted the topaz glow of the glide-slope indicator, saw it fade to ruby as they sank too fast. Beside him, Schweinberg wheezed, and he grunted too as they hauled the plane up bodily. Out of nowhere, he remembered the summer he’d worked in the cemetery in Creston. His arms felt as if he’d been digging graves. Green luminescence unrolled beneath the stern, spinning like blurry green galaxies above the invisibly turning screw.

  “LSO, Two One: on your one five-five at two miles, got an amber, starting my approach. Clear the deck.”

  “Roger, deck cleared, this final?”

  “Affirmative. I’m committed. One mile.”

  “Two One, Paddles got you in sight. Say what seat.”

  “Right seat.”

  They were sliding inexorably downward. The glide-slope indicator went green again; too high. The two pilots thought like the two halves of one brain now, hardly speaking, moving the controls together. “Checks complete,” said Hayes after several silent seconds.

  “Roger. Half mile, looking good, coming through fifty-five knots. Help me on the pedals.”

  “More left pedal,” warned Hayes.

  “Quarter-mile, one hundred twenty-five feet, looking good, thirty-five knots. Here comes translation.”

  The fuselage shuddered. “Drifting left!”

  “Crossing deck edge. Over the deck!”

  The dark mass, light-outlined, of the hangar loomed in front of them. A graze with a rotor tip and it would all be over. “Right pedal,” Schweinberg grunted. “Jesus. Help me out, Buck, for Christ’s sake!”

  “We’re drifting.”

  “Roger—”

  “Easy back.”

  “Looking good. Down, down, down—

  The wheels hit the deck with a whomp that brought Buck’s helmet off. “Two One, all right, you’re down, nice landing,” said Woolton.

  “Chocks and chains, please,” said Schweinberg, breathing hard. To Hayes he said, “Cut her, disengage, shut down, get me a beer.”

  “Nice flying, Chunky.”

  “Thanks, Montana, you done a nice job too.”

  The ship was steel-solid under them. The engines wound down, juddering the fuselage. The two pilots sat motionless, sweat dripping off their noses and running down their backs, for several seconds before they were able to trip their harnesses.

  Schweinberg, stepping down from the right seat, found himself looking down into blackness. The right tire was six inches from the deck edge. He found he couldn’t wal
k real well. So he straddled the landing gear and unwrapped a stick of Big Red.

  Hayes found he had Gummi Bear legs, too. He made it to the hangar, then had to prop up a bulkhead. But that was all that was different. The hangar looked the same, the faces looked the same, the hollow metallic voice that said now “Secure from flight quarters; set the normal underway watch” was the same.

  He felt a hand on his shoulder, and turned his head, expecting Schweinberg or Woolton or Bonner—one of the fliers. But it was Terry Pensker. The faded khakis of a surface officer looked out of place among the flight suits.

  “I was following you in on the radar, up in CIC,” he said. “And listening. I’m glad you made it, Virg.”

  “Thanks, Terry.”

  “We got to take care of ourselves, man.”

  “You got that right.”

  Pensker said nothing more. Just slapped him on the back, nodded to the other pilots, and left the hangar. Hayes looked after him, blinking off a sense of déjà vu. Then he remembered; the night in Manama, the encounter when he was lit and Pensker was CDO. Well, it must be lonely being the only black officer in a ship’s wardroom.

  He steadied his legs and strolled outside again. Four Two One squatted in the glow of the deck edges, looking fatigued somehow, her blade tips quivering. Already, panels were hinged down, mech were crawling over her. Everything was routine. Everything was familiar.

  He lifted his eyes to the sky. Up there, down here: How different the two worlds were.

  The strangest thing was that nothing had changed at all.

  15

  U.S.S. Mobile Bay, CG-53

  SHE arrived at dusk, crammed into the back seat of a tiny and extremely fast helicopter. She’d looked forward, between the pilots, unsure whether what she was seeing—a tiny gray thing blending in the failing light with the sea—was really a ship.

  But it was.

  Blair thought, Surely we’re not going to land on that.

  However, it looked as if they were planning to try. She craned forward, trying to hear what was going on above the howl of engines. But the helmets ignored her, talking silently into throat mikes as the horizon stopped rolling and the gray structure, larger now, settled into the center of the windscreen.