‘They’re going in,’ Stig said. ‘Jesus, look at that.’
The Triple-A, at first curling lazily upwards, opening mushrooms of smoke in the paths of the bombers, grew thicker and faster until towers of flame and smoke seemed to reach up into the skies. Suddenly Stig yelled, ‘One’s hit. One’s hit.’
Drew glanced down. Frighteningly close, a bomber began trailing smoke and flame. As it dropped behind, spiralling away into a dive, two parachutes opened like tiny orange-and-white flowers scattered in its wake.
There was a burst of radio chatter from DJ and Ali. Drew felt, as much as heard, the fear in their voices.
‘Keep cool, keep your minds on the job,’ he reminded them. Another bomber blew apart in a flash of flame, but distance lent it a remoteness that made Nick’s death suddenly seem part of a different world. The other bombers flew on and there were larger, vivid orange flashes as the first bombs began to hit their targets.
There was a warning call from Stig. ‘Two contacts, Bullseye two-four-zero, at fifty miles, high level, high speed.’
Instantly the clinical detachment was replaced by a surge of adrenalin. Drew felt the blood pounding through his veins.
Ali called confirmation, then Stig corrected himself as two other dots appeared on the screen. His voice was urgent. ‘Four contacts, now thirty-five miles. Turning in towards us.’
Drew was beginning to sweat. ‘Looks like the Migs are coming to join the party.’ He could hear his own voice cracking a little as he stabbed his radio button to talk to the AWACs.
The crosstalk was terse. ‘Magic, four contacts, Bullseye two-four-zero, thirty miles. Instructions?’
‘Roger, Tiger,’ replied the AWACs controller. ‘Stand by.’ Precious seconds dragged by. ‘Targets Bullseye two-four-zero, declared hostile. Cleared engage.’
‘Authenticate,’ Drew challenged.
‘Time authenticate. Minute two-seven, X-Ray-Foxtrot.’
Stig scanned his authentication tables. ‘That checks out.’
Drew shivered. The fight was now in their hands alone. He called the other members of the fourship. ‘Okay, we’re cleared, this is it. Tiger Three and Four, turn hot. Let’s tap them.’
The four Tempests formed a wall as they streaked across the sky to meet the threat, their speed increasing to Mach 1 – the speed of sound. Stig was hunched over his screen like a Stock Exchange dealer, exchanging rapid-fire cross-chat with the other navigators.
Drew began the sort, flying his own jet instinctively as he concentrated on targeting each fighter on to a different enemy contact. ‘Three and Four, take the two high men, we’ll take the two low.’
‘Twenty-five miles.’ Stig counted down the distance in a voice as dry and matter-of-fact as a solicitor reading a will.
‘DJ, I’ve got left hand low.’
The response was immediate. ‘Roger, got right hand low.’
‘Twenty miles.’
As they completed the sort, the calls came over the headset from each aircraft: ‘Sorted.’ ‘Locked.’
‘Fox One, Fox One,’ Drew called as the radar-guided Skyflash missile came off the side of his jet with a bowel-loosening roar. Less than a minute had elapsed since the first contact. He did not pause to watch it go streaking across the sky at three times the speed of sound, for he was already hurling the Tempest into a savage turn, away from the hostile missile that might have been launched against him. As he did so, the radar warner began to clamour.
‘Come hard left. Descend,’ yelled Stig. ‘Come out heading two-zero-zero.’
‘It’s okay, Stig, I’ve got it, I’ve got it. Just keep an eye on the radar.’ The bombers were still weaving their own patterns of evasion against the Triple-A, but Drew had no time to spare them more than a fleeting glance. His jaw clenched and he tightened his grip on the stick still further, his muscles and sinews taut as he tried to merge himself with the machine. Flying the jet became instinctive. He struggled to hold the constantly changing three-dimensional picture in his head as his jet bucked and swerved across the sky. A microsecond’s hesitation could mean the difference between life and death.
High above the bombers, Drew and his fighters began the strange ritual dance of air defenders, advancing and retreating in a murderous gavotte. He repeatedly fired a radar missile and then turned away, before swinging back in for another chicken run.
On the second run, one of the dots on the computer screen abruptly went out as a Skyflash blew the Mig out of the sky. Stig had just exultantly recorded the kill, when Tiger Three erupted in a ball of flame. A missile from another Mig had struck home, breaking the jet in two. The Tempest pilot had held his course a fraction of a second too long, condemning his own aircraft. He had gambled and lost. Somehow the crew ejected safely from the middle of the inferno. Drew gave them an anguished glance as their parachutes opened.
The Migs’ prime targets were the bombers. The Tempests barring the way were an obstacle to be avoided if possible, fought if not. The fighters were now closing. The two formations spread wider as they flashed towards each other.
Stig talked Drew on to each hostile aircraft in turn, shouting to make himself heard above the crosstalk in the split seconds before the jets hurtled past each other.
‘Ten miles, twenty left, two down, first man.’
‘Tally.’
‘Another pair ten left of him.’
‘Got them.’
At a closing speed of three miles a second they were upon them before the words had been exchanged.
Even though they fought at one thousand miles an hour, Drew and his target squared up to each other like thugs in a street brawl. Stig yelled instructions and warnings, twisting his head, trying to keep track of all three enemies and watch the backs of all three Tempests.
Drew fought the jet to the limit, struggling to extract every last inch of turn, his engines screaming in protest on full combat power. They twisted and rolled. Chaff and flares flew out in bursts as first Drew and then the Mig turned and corkscrewed, trying to break a missile lock.
Drew’s cockpit was a cacophony of noise. He and Stig kept up a constant crosstalk, punctuated by involuntary grunts as he threw the jet around and the scream of radar warnings as the Migs tried to lock them up for a missile shot. Frenzied radio calls from Tiger Two and Four cut across the constant rottweiler growl of their own Sidewinder aiming system: ‘Chaff! Flares! Break Left! Descend! Chaff! Flares! On you! On you! Go right! Go right!’
Drew gasped for breath, his arms aching with the effort of forcing the stick. Dragging his jet into a turn, he greyed out, grunting with exertion as he inched closer to his Mig’s six o’clock.
Stig shouted a warning: ‘Watch out, Drew. Bogie seven o’clock high. On us! On us!’
‘Shit.’ Drew let his target escape as he twisted the jet into a screaming turn, throwing out more chaff and flares.
Both sides took few risks, knowing that the loss of one jet would tip the balance, but finally Drew saw his chance. Closing hard for a kill on DJ and Ali, a Serbian pilot lost track of one element of the three-dimensional puzzle and paid with his life.
As the Mig slid across under Drew’s jet, he yanked on the stick with both hands, using every ounce of his strength to make the spiralling turn, throttles rammed forward all the way.
The growling of the Sidewinder changed to a high-pitched screech as the guidance locked onto the heat source, the Mig’s afterburners. Drew pulled the trigger and yelled, ‘Fox Two, Fox Two,’ as the missile snaked off the side of the jet, homing with deadly accuracy on the enemy aircraft.
The Serb tried to unload phosphorus flares into its track, but it was too late. The Sidewinder detonated. Thousands of titanium cubes spread outwards in a halo of destruction, obliterating anything in their path. Zirconium discs, burning at a thousand degrees Celsius, followed in their wake, igniting anything that had survived the first onslaught. When the white flash of the explosion faded, the Mig had disintegrated.
Drew watched, tran
sfixed, but Stig yelled, ‘Break right, break right, break right.’
He threw his waning strength into another plunging turn, flares and chaff flying out as the Tempest corkscrewed away. There was a flash of light as a missile streaked past their left wing. Drew did not even have time to contemplate how close it had come before he was harrying another Mig.
The odds in the battle were now stacked in their favour. As Drew hounded the Mig, he saw DJ pull to height and lie in wait. He judged his moment perfectly. As the Mig turned to evade Drew, DJ dropped in behind him.
Drew watched the Serb twist and turn desperately, then eject as the missile struck home, the slipstream hurling him back, away from his doomed aircraft. The last Mig turned and ran, streaking away too fast for Jumbo in Tiger Four.
Drew eased the throttles back out of combat power. He was drenched in sweat, his breath rasping in his throat, the muscles throbbing in his arm.
The package of bombers had turned and was already heading for home, still ducking and weaving to avoid the Triple-A.
There was a burst of chatter from DJ and Ali. Drew brought them up short. ‘Good work, but it’s not over yet.’
He asked each of them to check fuel and weapons status, then called AWACs. ‘Magic, Tiger 2–1, fuel state amber, weapon state low, request Gate 4 for Texaco.’
As Drew made the request, Stig called, ‘Four contacts, heading zero-nine-five, twenty-five miles, low level, slow speed. Looks like helis.’
There was a pause as the AWACs controller digested the new information: ‘Negative, Tiger. Request you stay on task to cover Panther 2–1 at Bullseye one-eight-zero.’
‘That’s 33 on the evacuation run,’ Drew told Stig, frowning as he checked fuel again. They were already too low for a supersonic intercept and had enough for only ten more minutes over the area, even at subsonic speed. All he had to protect the two Pumas were two Sidewinders and the rounds in his guns. DJ and Jumbo were in the same position.
He knew he should discuss it with Stig, but the thought of Michelle’s helicopter unprotected on the ground was too much for him. ‘Roger, Magic. We have fuel for only ten minutes, tops.’
‘Thanks for your help. Your replacement Buckeye 2–1, will be with you in eight.’
Jumbo’s voice cut in immediately. ‘Negative on that. We’re fuel critical, Gate 4, returning to base.’ As Jumbo’s aircraft pulled away to the west, Drew had a momentary pang of guilt. Jumbo was a seasoned enough pilot to make his own decisions, but DJ was always likely to trust his leader’s judgement.
Stig echoed his concern. ‘Drew, there are two of us in this aircraft. Don’t take my consent for granted. If any Migs return to the attack, we’re not only virtually defenceless, we haven’t even got enough fuel to run away.’
‘Someone’s got to cover those Pumas.’
Stig did not reply but Drew could guess exactly what was going through his mind. He hoped he would have made the same decision irrespective of who was flying the helicopters.
Quelling his unease, he swung his jet round in the direction of Srebanj. The Pumas would be almost invisible against the ground.
Stig was face down in his radar, searching for contacts, as Drew pushed the radio button. ‘Panther this is Tiger 2–1, inbound to your location. Give your position.’
Michelle’s voice crackled over the radio. ‘We’re south of the base now, coming under heavy fire.’
Behind the rhythmic beat of the rotors Drew could hear explosions.
Suddenly AWACs broke in again. ‘Tiger, heads up, four contacts fifteen miles, on your nose, showing as Hinds.’
Drew froze.
‘Christ,’ Stig said. ‘We wouldn’t want to tangle with those bastards even with full tanks and a full weapon-load.’
Drew caught sight of them a few moments later. The Hinds looked squat and ugly as toads and bristled with menace. As well as their guns, missile pods hung off either side of their pylons.
Drew called up AWACs. ‘We’re visual, four Hinds. Clear to engage?’
‘Confirm bandits, cleared to engage.’
Drew flicked over to speak to Michelle. ‘Panther, four Hinds inbound. We should engage them short of your position.’
‘Roger. We’re setting down now. Will need three minutes on the ground.’
Drew swung away to the east, then swooped down on the helicopter gunships. The Hinds scattered at their approach, speeding for the steep-sided valleys that might hide them from the fighters’ radar.
‘I’ll take the left pair, you take the right,’ Drew called to DJ. ‘Make sure you’re set for it – you’ll only get one chance at the attack.’
He closed on his first target. The Hind dodged and swerved to break the missile lock but as the growl of the Sidewinder aiming system changed tone, Drew pulled the trigger. His missile streaked towards its target. ‘Fox Two, Fox Two.’
He heard DJ make the same call a fraction of a second later. Both helicopters turned into balls of flame. Drew pulled his Tempest up to height again, searching frantically for the other two gunships.
The Pumas were desperately vulnerable as they loaded the base personnel under a constant barrage of artillery and mortar fire. The few buildings still standing were ablaze from end to end. Incoming shells exploded every few seconds, hurling debris into the air.
DJ had disappeared into a side valley hot on the heels of one Hind as Drew spotted the other, flashing in low across the river towards the UN base. The Serb gunner opened up, sending a stream of fire towards the Pumas.
Drew was off to the side of the Hind and not at the best attacking angle for the missile, but fired his last Sidewinder. It thrashed through the air, seeming to home on the helicopter’s engines, but suddenly nosedived into the ground and exploded well short of its target.
Drew swore as he flashed past the Hind, forcing the stick across to make a turn back onto his target. As he looked down, he saw the line of explosions from the Hind’s guns cut straight through one of the grounded Pumas. Figures were blown high into the air as it erupted and one blundered helplessly away, aflame from head to toe.
Drew stared at the wrecked Puma, praying that it was not Michelle’s. Hard-eyed and determined for revenge, he screwed the turn even tighter, bringing the Tempest round as the Hind swung in for another pass. The second Puma struggled into the air, wallowing under its heavy load.
Drew fought to hold the black silhouette within the cross hairs in his head-up display. The Hind weaved to and fro, slipping across the sight without a firing solution, but a moment later the cross hairs intersected on the helicopter and Drew pulled the trigger. The airframe juddered like a pneumatic drill and the smell of cordite filled the cockpit as the guns spat out two thousand rounds a minute.
Two lines of tracer marched the length of the Hind, like stitching. Its rotors disintegrated in a fine black spray and the helicopter plunged to the ground.
The Puma rose agonisingly slowly into the air, then swung away to the west, now pursued only by bursts of small-arms fire from the Serbs pouring into the abandoned base.
Drew made one last pass to keep their heads down, ignoring Stig’s fuel warning. He emptied his guns into the troops and then pulled up and away from the town. He delayed the call for a few seconds, too scared to hear the answer. Finally he jabbed at the radio button. ‘Panther, this is Tiger. What’s your condition?’
‘Shrapnel and small-arms damage. We’ve taken casualties, but we’re okay. Thanks for your help.’
Michelle’s voice was flat and drained, but relief flooded through Drew as he heard it.
He scanned the sky for DJ as he called him on the radio, then spotted him, still in pursuit of the other Hind. His flight had taken him over the main Serb artillery positions and Triple-A was rocketing up at him. ‘DJ, leave it. They’re out.’
‘Two more seconds, two more seconds. Fox Two, Fox Two.’ DJ was exultant.
Drew saw the missile come off his aircraft and, as DJ began pulling up to height, the last Hind disappea
red in a blinding flash.
‘Two kills, Drew,’ DJ crowed, as he flew back to reformate. ‘I think we’ve earned a little celebration.’
‘I know the adrenalin’s still pumping, DJ, but take it easy. Let’s head for home.’
‘Stand by for victory roll.’
As he levelled out alongside him, DJ waggled his wings and then put his aircraft into a victory roll around Drew’s jet. As his jet plummeted out of control, his exuberant shout died in his throat.
Drew could hear his alarms screaming. ‘I can’t save it,’ DJ said. ‘Eject, eject, eject.’
The radio crackled and went dead as the Tempest spun away and smashed into the ground, sending out a wave of fire. Seconds passed as Drew and Stig frantically scanned the sky behind them, but they could see no sign of parachutes.
‘We’ve got to go back and search,’ Drew said, hauling on the stick.
‘There’s no fuel,’ Stig warned.
‘But I’ve got to. It’s my fault.’
‘Don’t be stupid, Drew. If you turn back, we’ll be banging out as well. We don’t have the fuel. Leave it to Search and Rescue.’
Numb, Drew nodded and turned back towards the coast. He looked behind him once more, then stared fixedly ahead.
He mechanically checked out with AWACs as Buckeye – a formation of F16s - streaked in, then he flew on in silence, piloting the jet like an automaton.
‘There’s still hope,’ Stig said gently. ‘Not seeing any chutes isn’t conclusive. They were well off to the west of us and there was so much shit in the air from Triple-A and burning helicopters…’
‘I know,’ Drew said quietly. ‘Let’s get home shall we?’
Chapter Eighteen
Drew landed back at Gióia drained by fatigue and in the blackest of moods. As he braked the jet to a halt on the line outside the hangar, he saw a party of visiting brass, watching the conquering heroes return.
Point of Impact Page 27