“Down” meant that the aircraft had mechanical problems that had to be corrected before it could fly again. Even as the chief spoke the purple-shirted men in the Fuels Division dragged a hose to the tanker and attached it. Jake depressurized the tanks and gave the men a thumbs up.
“We’re going again,” the pilot told Razor on the ICS “The spare crapped out.”
“Lucky us. How come we gotta go again? How come they don’t have another crew out here? Get the chief over here. Tell him to get the spare tanker crew to come hotseat this thing. Cowboy’s got it in for me because I gassed him in the locker room.”
“He just landed, Razor. Can it, willya?”
“When the weather gets cruddy I get stuck going up and down like a goddamn yo-yo. It happens every time. Doesn’t anyone else want a little of this fun?” Jake ignored the bombardier, who continued to fume on the ICS.
The refueling took five minutes. During that time the sour tanker trapped, but Stagecoach 203 boltered again in a shower of sparks as the hook point scraped the steel of the deck.
Perhaps the air boss would order the barricade rigged. That giant net of nylon webbing, raised on stanchions just forward of the last arresting gear wire could stop an aircraft on deck with only minor damage to the plane. But the pilot had to get his machine down on deck before he went into the barricade or there would be a catastrophe. Perhaps the air boss was weighing the pros and cons with the air operations officer. Jake glanced up at the air boss’s throne in the glassed-in compartment high on the island known as Pried-Fly. He was glad he didn’t have to make that decision.
“Too bad the barricade stanchions are out of whack,” Razor commented.
Jake felt embarrassed. That information must have been in the brief, and he had missed it. Damn! He wasn’t functioning as he should tonight. And he had given Sammy that gas without telling the ship. Razor had been right-he shouldn’t have flown tonight.
When the fueling was complete and the canopy once more closed, the tanker was directed forward to the foul line at the right edge of the landing area.
They would have to be launched from one of the waist catapults as both bow catapults were stacked with parked aircraft. Stagecoach 203 came out of the rain and mist one more time, but this time the fighter pilot knew his approach was hopeless and rotated to climb away before the wheels even touched the deck. The taxi directors motioned Grafton forward to the number-three catapult on the waist as the cat crew pile up from the catwalks, removed the protector plate from the shuttle, and retracted it for the shot. The pilot spread the plane’s wings, dropped the flaps, cycled the controls, and slipped into the shuttle.
Twenty seconds later the tanker was airborne and climbing.
Jake got on the radio. “Two Oh Three, what is your state?”
“Fifteen hundred pounds,” was the answer.
“Okay, listen up. You don’t have the gas to get on top, so I’ll rendezvous with you if you bolter on this next pass. Stay at about 250 feet, underneath the clouds, pull up your gear and flaps and I’ll join on you. Where are you now?”
The F-4 pilot gave him his position–downwind at 1200 feet seven miles out. Jake leveled the tanker at 1500 feet and turned to the downwind heading, which was the exact opposite of the ship’s course.
The air ops officer got on the air. “Two Oh Three, if you bolter this next pass and you can’t hook up with the tanker, I want you to climb to five thousand feet straight ahead and jettison the airplane. The Angel will pull you two guys out of the drink. Understand?”
“Two Oh Three, wilco.” As if they had a choice.
“And don’t either one of you fly into the water.”
Jake didn’t even bother clicking his mike. Neither man wanted to commit suicide. Of course, if they weren’t real goddamn careful, they’d be just as dead. More to the point, if the two men in the Phantom had to eject into this sea, they ran a good risk of getting tangled in their chutes and drowning before the helicopter moved in, Jake planned his approach. He had already screwed up twice tonight, not counting his dive for the deck, Please God, don’t let me get zapped passing sips! He concentrated on the problem before him.
The Phantom would slow when it dropped its gear and flaps, and the tanker would close the distance. They would have to be beneath the clouds then, about 250 feet over the water Jake would not have time to constantly check the altimeter. “When we get below three hundred feet I want you to call the altitude every five seconds,” he told Razor. The bombardier would have to watch the altimeter very carefully. Any unnoticed sink rate would lead to watery oblivion in a matter of seconds.
“If you kill me. Grafton,” Razor told him. “I’ll kick your ass in hell for the next ten thousand years.” When the pilot did not respond, Razor added, “Why in the fuck didn’t I have the good sense to join the goddam army?”
Jake Grafton extended his pattern downwind as the Phantom turned crosswind to intercept the final bearing inbound. When he was sure he had enough separation Jake also turned crosswind and let the plane begin a gentle descent toward the water. He was at 500 fee when he turned to the final bearing and began to close on the ship. Two Oh Three was at two miles on the glide path.
Come on, you son of a bitch, get aboard this time!
But Jake knew it was a forlorn hope. The fighter pilot had lost confidence, much like a football team that is twenty points behind. He needed something to restore his faith in himself. Maybe a full bag of gas would calm him down. Jake descended through 300 feet, still in the clouds. At 250 feet he was in and out of clouds but he leveled there, afraid to go lower.
The airspeed read 275 knots, the distance on the TACAN five miles.
The F-4 was at a mile now, calling the ball. This should work out.
He was listening to the LSO between Razor’s altitude calls when a cluster of lights loomed ahead in the darkness.
Holy-!
“Pull up!” Razor screamed.
Jake jerked the stick aft and slammed the throttle forward as confusion and adrenaline flooded him. His eyes darted to the distance indicator on the TACAN as the Gees slammed him down into the seat and the nose came up. It couldn’t be the carrier!
Oh, God! It was the plane guard destroyer.
He pulled the throttles back and shoved the stick forward. The two men floated in their seats as the plane nosed over. They were at 1000 feet and two miles from the ship. They had to get down under fast. Jake let the nose go to ten degrees down, then put two Gees on to pull out at 250 feet.
“Bolter, bolter, bolter!”
After a last check to ensure he was level, Jake looked ahead through the rain. The adrenaline kept pumping. He could see nothing and terror welled up.
He fought it back.
“Get ready to put the hose out,” he told the bombardier between altitude calls.
At last he saw the carrier, a mass of dim red light in the rain. He added power. The fighter was somewhere up ahead at 250 knots. Grafton squeezed on more power. The airspeed increased. They went by the ship at 350 knots, 250 feet. “Stagecoach Two Oh Three, call your posit.”
“Two miles straight ahead, four hundred pounds.”
The fighter’s fuel was almost down to the accuracy margin of the fuel gauge; it could flame out at any second.
“Speed?”
“Two fifty.” Jake saw him now. Elation replaced the fear that had gripped him seconds before. He levered back the throttles and cracked the speed brakes a trifle.
“We’ll tank at three hundred,” he announced. In seconds they were together. Jake passed the fighter on its left wing, stabilizing at the chosen airspeed as the F-4 pilot increased power-perhaps for the last time if he didn’t get fuel-trailed in behind the tanker, and guided the refueling probe home in one smooth, sexual motion. Grafton raised the nose when he saw the transfer light come on and began to climb. “You’re getting fuel,” he said over the air.
Apparently the Phantom’s crew didn’t trust themselves to speak, because the repl
y was several mike clicks.
“How much does Stagecoach Two Oh Three get?”
Razor asked the ship.
“Give him five grand and if he doesn’t get aboard on the next pass, he can divert to Da Nang. The field is open now. You copy, Two Oh Three?”
“Roger. Copy one more approach.”
As they reached 1200 feet Jake turned downwind and led the fighter back for another approach. The fighter pilot keyed his mike when the Phantom finished tanking: “Thanks for saving our assets, you guys.”
He dropped his gear and flaps and receded in the tanker’ rear-view mirror.
Good luck, thought Grafton as the lights of the fighter faded.
Confidence is so slippery: one either has it at a give instant or one does not. Now the fighter pilot, whose name Jake did not know, had it-that willow-the-wisp that had eluded his grasp so many times-now he had it, for he successfully trapped aboard on his next approach.
“Now let us get down again,” Razor muttered almost in prayer after the Phantom had trapped.
“Five Two Two, you are at seven miles on final approach. Slow to landing speed. Say your state.”
“Three thousand pounds.” Jake slapped the gear and flap handles down and lowered the arresting hook.
“Three down and locked, flaps in takeoff, slats out, boards out, hook down,” Jake told Razor, who then read the rest of the landing checklist as the pilot slowed to the on-speed indication on the angle-of-attack indexer and stabilized there.
“Five Two Two, you are approaching glide path.”
Jake retarded the power and clicked the nose trim forward.
“Five Two TWO, you are below glide path.” Damn!
He had taken off too much power too soon. He added some and checked the vertical speed needle as he tried to flatten his descent and intercept the glide slope. The plane was bouncing in the turbulence and the needles flopped maddeningly.
“Slightly below glide path. Call your needles.”
“Low and right.”
“Disregard. You are below glide path, on centerline.” He was fighting the controls. He knew it, yet there was nothing he could do. Finesse seemed impossible. No adjustment of power or stick brought exactly the right response from the machine; it was either too much or too little.
“You are below glide path, three-quarters of a mile, call the ball.”
Razor made the call. “Five Two Two, Intruder ball, two point eight.”
“You are low.” That was the LSO.
Jake clicked his mike and added power. Too much.
“You are high and fast.”
Jake could see that. Frustrated, he pulled off a wad of power and clicked the nose up, trying to descend and slow down all at the same time. It was working. The ball was sinking. He added power to catch it. Not enough. The ball sank below the green datum lights that marked the glide path, and turned from yellow to red. Can’t stay down here; the ramp’s down here, and tearing metal, black sea, and watery death. He crammed on the power and tweaked back the nose.
He crossed the ramp with the ball climbing and reduced the power. Too late! The ball squirted off the top of the mirror just as the wheels collided with the deck. He rammed the throttles to the stops and thumbed in the boards.
“Bolter, bolter, bolter The deceleration didn’t come. The engines were still winding up when the speeding aircraft ran off the deck into the night air sixty feet above the water.
He rotated to ten degrees nose up and eyed the altimeter as he began to register the climb.
He caught himself lingering upon individual instruments, taking precious seconds to decipher the bits information. His scan was breaking down.
Come on, Jake, he drove himself. Keep those eye moving. One more time! One more good approach!
Razor toggled the bleed air switch as they sank beneath the clouds on their next approach, but nothing happened. Rain drops which were swept away at knots ran up the windscreen in vertical streaks creating a prismatic miasma of double images.
“Gimme air,” Jake demanded of Razor.
“It’s not working. Your wings are level.”
The yellow ball and green datum lights were merely smears on the windscreen. Jake fought back panic and tried to respond to the half-heard comments from the LSO. The desire to trap was now an obsession. He was fast-the LSO and the angle-of-attack indexer agreed -but in this living nightmare he couldn’t reduce the power. He fought the stick with a death grip, The splotches that were the drop lights swept under the nose and he leaned sideways to view the ball through the plexiglass quarterpanel. The ball was a little high and sinking! He felt the wheels smash home and the nose drop down.
He held his breath as he jammed the throttles forward and waited for the deceleration, then exhaled convulsively when it came. Oh, that welcome sound as the arresting gear machinery below decks soaked up the millions of foot-pounds of kinetic energy. He felt the little wiggle the plane gave as it quivers on the arresting hook like a snagged bass.
Then it came to a complete stop and began to roll backwards.
Later Jake relived the entire sequence in the darkness of his stateroom. He examined his confidence and attempted to glue the missing pieces back together. He told himself no one would ever notice the damage.
When Jake Grafton and Razor Durfee got off the escalator on the second deck, the pilot went into the head. He relieved himself, then sat on the toilet and lit a cigarette. The place reeked of stale urine and disinfectant, but the cigarette tasted good after hours without one. Jake rested his elbows on his knees and cupped his chin in his hands as fatigue permeated him.
His flight boots were almost worn out. One sole had an inch-long split along the side. The leather was cracking. Not once in five years had he polished the boots.
Most of the blood stains were gone from the G-suit and survival vest, rubbed off as he sat and walked and moved around. The fire-retardant nomex outer layer of the G-suit was oily and dirty and torn in places, but the worst of the brown stains had faded to mere discolorations, difficult to see. Grief is like that, he thought. It fades in the course of living.
He closed his eyes and savored the darkness. At length he opened them and stared at his hands. They quivered, and he could not still the tremors.
The door opened and Sammy Lundeen stepped inside. He slouched against the door.
“That was a helluva chance you took to tank that guy, Cool Hand.”
“Yeah.” Jake stared at the faded brown stains, all that was left of Morgan McPherson. “Is the skipper pissed off.”
“No. He’s smoking his cigar, as usual. That fighter crew’s in the ready room telling everybody what a hero you are. They keep saying something about you saving their butts, but all fighter pukes are crazy and they’ll say anything.”
Jake took a deep drag on his cigarette. “Boy, we’re having fun now,” he said, thinking of Morgan. “What happened on your hop, anyway?”
“We flew right into a flak trap and almost got our asses shot off. Still haven’t figured out why they didn’ get us. Then we had to run the target without the computer.”
“Any luck?”
“Who knows? No secondary explosions. We probably missed that truck park by a mile or two. Some commie’s probably complaining right now to some half-wit reporter that the American warmongers just bombed another church.”
“A truck park?”
“A suspected truck park.”
“Is that worth dying for?”
“There isn’t anything in Indochina worth dying for man, and that’s a fact. But tonight those gomers shot like we were trying to bomb Ho Chi Minh’s tomb. I bet the Kremlin doesn’t have that many guns around it We were real goddamned lucky.” He shook his head “Real lucky. Got three secondaries when I dropped the Rocks on the flak trap, though.” Lundeen showed his teeth. “That made it worth the trip.”
Jake shifted enough to drop the cigarette butt into the bowl. “How come the spare tanker didn’t get airborne?”
“Good God! What a way to buy it.”
“He didn’t buy it, amazingly enough.
The chief saw him approach the intake, figured he was going to and made a diving grab. He caught the guy’s legs just as he went in. The plane captain went down the intake headlong to his knees. He’s shook up plenty, though. Lost his helmet and goggles and flashlight into the intake off that engine. There’s $150,000 of the taxpayers’ money down the crapper.”
“Who was the poor sucker?”
“He’s down in sick bay. Maggot.”
“Maggot! poor guy!”
Jake found Maggot in one of the wards in the sick bay suite. Mad Jack was standing beside him. The doctor said. “He’s still in shock.
Don’t stay too long.” Glancing at the stains that marred the pilot’s flight gear, he add “And don’t touch anything down here, either.”
Maggot’s face was white as the pilot leaned forward and spoke loudly “I hear you tried to get out of a little work” the boy’s mouth twitched.
Maggot nodded nervously and licked his lips. “It just sucked me up like I was a leaf or something, I Was walking and then I was going down that intake headfirst Mister Grafton. I thought I was a goner.”
“From what I hear you almost were.”
you Mister Grafton, his eyes were wet. “Damn, The boy’ was unbelievable was scared. it was Clark and the noise could feel myself I couldn’t see anything and I c _ , and I co that compressor. I Knew those being pulled toward ming, ready to chop me into blades were there, tu the ger but I couldn’t see them.”
He gazed at wall a moment and blinked back the tears. “I think I peed my pants. Don’t tell anyone.”
“I won’t tell. But I know what you mean about being scared. McPherson and I have been scared so many times I lost count.” The reply was a wan smile.
*** The ready room was crowded when Jake opened the door.
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