Razor's Edge

by Dale Brown

  They were, weren’t they?

  Egg felt his brain starting to break into pieces.

  He grabbed the control yoke, steadied his feet on the rudder pedals.

  Come on, Egg, he told himself. Come on come on come on.

  No way in the world he could do this. No way.

  The collective felt almost comfortable in his hand. His fingers wrapped easily around it, and damn it, this was just another helicopter whirlybird rig, as his instructor would say.

  Engine panel on right.

  Checklist.

  Where the hell was the checklist Jennifer had given him?

  “Sergeant Reagan—before you begin, please cinch your belts. The g forces can be considerable during maneuvers.”

  God was whispering in his ears. With a Polish accent.

  “Yes,” he said.

  “Sergeant, my name is Robbie Pitzarski. I’m going to help you fly the Hind,” said the expert, speaking from halfway across the world in the Dreamland Command Center bunker. “Before we begin, let me emphasize that if you get in trouble, stick to the basics. It’s a helicopter, first and foremost. The Russians place things in odd places, but the blades are on top and the tail’s in the back.”

  “You sound like my old flight instructor,” Egg told him.

  “Very good. To the right of your seat, almost behind you, there is an emergency shut-down lever that connects to the fuse panel. It has a red knob and looks rather contorted. Let’s make sure that has not been thrown inadvertently. It would make it most difficult to proceed.” POWDER HAD TO SQUIRM TO GET HIS BODY INTO THE GUNNER’S cabin, slamming half the gear on the way. The hatch stuck for a moment, and he nearly broke the shock-absorber-like strut getting it closed. There were grips and gauges and pipes and all sorts of crap all over the place; it reminded him of the bathroom in his grandmother’s basement apartment. Luckily, Jennifer the goddess had given him a very good paper map of the cockpit, pointing out the key shit—her word, not his. The optical sight ocular for the missile system was on the right, the armament panel was in an almost impossible to reach position at his right elbow, the delicious gunsight with its well-rounded wheels sat at his nose, her perfect hand-sized mammaries at full attention.

  Jennifer hadn’t given him those. But he wouldn’t need a map to find them.

  Rumor was, she and the colonel had a thing. Rank had its privileges.

  But hell, she was here, and he wasn’t. Dogs got to run.

  Truth was, she was so beautiful—so beautiful—he might not make it out of the kennel for all his slobbering.

  With great difficulty the Whiplash trooper turned his attention back to the weapons.

  THE ROTORS SLIPPED AROUND FOUR OR FIVE TIMES BEFORE the Isotov turboshafts coughed, but within seconds the engines wound up to near takeoff speed, the helicopter straining to hold herself down. Egg took a breath, then went back over the dashboard, making absolutely sure—absolutely one hundred percent sure—he had the instruments psyched.

  He knew the whole damn thing. He knew it, he knew it, he knew it.

  Stop worrying, he told himself.

  “Very good so far, Sergeant,” said Pitzarski. His accent garbled some of his vowels, so the words sounded more like “vrr-ee gd sfar, surg-ent.”

  “You can call me Egg.”

  “Egg?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “And myself, Robbie.”

  “Cool.”

  “Hey, we takin’ off or what?” demanded Powder, breaking in.

  “Excuse me, sir,” said Egg. “Shut the fuck up, Powder, or I’m hitting the eject button.”

  “There ain’t no damn eject button.”

  “Try me.”

  “Ready?” asked Pitzarski, but Egg had already thrown the Hind forward, stuttering, bouncing on the stubby wheels, bucking, pushing forward too fast without enough juice, gently backing off, revving, going—airborne, he was airborne.

  TWO MEN CAME RUSHING AT THE AIRCRAFT’S OPEN BAY AS they started to move. Danny cursed; he’d thought everyone was aboard already. He started to reach to help them but the pain in his leg hurt too much. The helo lurched forward and up and he fell against the floor. He lay there for three or four seconds, not sure if Egg was going to fly or crash. Finally he pulled himself up, struggling into one of the fold-down seats, pushing up his leg.

  “Liu, wrap my knee, okay?” he said. “I sprained it or something.”

  A building passed in the cabin window, replaced by sky, all sky. Liu took hold of his leg and began poking it, not gently.

  “It ain’t broke,” Danny managed. “Just fucking wrap the knee.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Ligament torn?” Danny asked.

  “At least,” said Nurse.

  Danny looked up. Two Marines were grinning at him through their face paint. One of the two looked vaguely familiar—the gunnery sergeant who’d come on the rescue mission the other day.

  “We thought you girls could use some help,” said the Marine.

  “What are you doing here?” Danny said.

  “I’m sorry, Cap—you looked like you wanted to pull them in,” said Bison. “So I helped them in when you fell.”

  “You.” Danny pointed at the gunnery sergeant, a short man with a face like a worn catcher’s mitt. “You look damn familiar. Before yesterday.”

  “Melfi,” said the sergeant. “You saved my butt in Libya couple months back. Last year, remember? You didn’t recognize me the other day.”

  Now he did—he was one of the guys they’d rescued when they were looking for Mack.

  “You’re gonna get in shitloads of trouble,” Danny told him. “But I ain’t dropping you off.”

  “Life’s a bitch,” said the Marine.

  “All right,” said Danny. “Let me tell your commander not to look for you.”

  “Not necessary,” said the Marine. “Let’s just say we showed up here accidentally on purpose. Whole platoon would have come with you if they could, sir. But the major kinda figured they’d be missed. Besides, two Marines are worth a dozen Air Force fags. Hey, no offense.”

  “Jarhead shits,” said Bison.

  “Bison, give Sergeant Melfi the rundown,” said Danny.

  “Call me Gunny,” said the Marine. “Just about everybody does.”

  “No they don’t,” said the lance corporal behind him.

  “They call you fuckin’ Gunny.”

  “And they duck when they say that,” said the sergeant.

  Aboard Quicksilver,

  over Iraq

  1530

  THE GEAR IN FRONT OF TORBIN HAD EXACTLY ONE THING IN common with the unit he was used to handling in the Phantom Weasel—it dealt with radars.

  The computer handled everything; it probably even had a mode to make coffee. The large flat screen on the left projected a map of the area they were flying through; the map had presets to display radiuses of 200, 300, and 500 miles out, but could zoom in on anything from five to five hundred. Radar coverage and sources were projected on the coordinate grid, each type color-coded. The screen on the right contained information on each of the detected radars. The computer could not only show whether they had detected an aircraft, but how likely that would be for any given plane in its library. Highlights of the radar’s likely function could be hot-keyed onto the screen, along with the preferred method of confusing it. Targeting data could be automatically uploaded to the air to ground missiles in the Megafortress’s belly. Under normal circumstances the plane’s copilot handled the jamming and bombing details, but the operator’s station was also fully equipped to do so. There were several other capabilities, including a mode that would allow the Megafortress’s fuzz busters to pretend to be an enemy ground radar, though he hadn’t had time to learn all of the details.

  Torbin felt like he had gone from the twentieth to the twenty-third century. Any second Captain Kirk was going to appear behind him and tell him to beam up Mr. Spock.

  “You all right back there, Torbin?” a
sked Captain Breanna Stockard.

  The equipment was blow-away, and the pilot was a knockout. Somehow, some way, he was going to make this into a permanent assignment.

  “Yes, ma’am,” he said. “Thank you, Captain Stockard.”

  “You can call me Bree,” she said.

  Thanks.

  “All right, crew.” Captain Stockard’s—Bree’s—voice changed slightly, becoming a little deeper, a little more authoritative. “I know everyone’s disappointed that we didn’t draw the laser assignment. But what we’re doing, protecting our guys, is still damn important. I know everybody’s going to do their best.” As they flew over Iraq carrying out their mission, the rest of the crew seemed almost bored, punching buttons, checking the progress of the attack groups they were helping. Torbin concentrated so hard on his gear that he didn’t even have time to fantasize about the pilot.

  Much.

  “That Spoon Rest radar—is it up?” Bree asked as they hit the halfway point on their mission chart. It was now 1730.

  “No,” he said tentatively, eyes jumping from his screens to make sure he had the right radar. The unit had come on briefly but then turned off. It was nearly a hundred miles south from the attack planes’ target; Quicksilver would splash it at the end of the mission, assuming they didn’t find anything of higher priority.

  The Phantom wouldn’t even have detected it. Nor would the Weasel have given him the option of spoofing the radar with a variety of ECMs, ordinarily the job of a Spark Vark F-111 or a Compass Call electronic warfare C-130.

  This was definitely the future, and he liked it very much.

  A warning tone sounded in his ear. A purple blob materialized on the left screen sixty-six miles ahead of their present position; beneath the blob was a legend describing the enemy radar and its associated systems as a point-defense Zsu-23-4 unit mapped on previous missions. A color-coded box opened on the right screen with a list of options for dealing with it. The computer suggested NO ACTION; the radar was too limited to see the Megafortress and the gun too impotent to strike the attack package, which was flying well above its range.

  Torbin concurred.

  “Gun dish,” Torbin told the pilots. “Twelve o’clock, fifty miles out. It’s in the index,” he added, meaning that it had been spotted and identified previously by CentCom.

  “Copy,” said Ferris. “Mongoose flight is zero-two from their IP. Watch them closely.”

  Torbin got another tone. This time a red cluster flared right over Mongoose’s target.

  “Flat Face,” he said, “uh, unknown, shit.” He glanced at the right screen, where the option box had opened.

  “Location,” prompted Ferris.

  Torbin went to center the cursor on the target, nail it down with a HARM.

  He wasn’t in a Weasel, though.

  “Jam the radar,” said Breanna calmly.

  “They’re being beamed,” reported Ferris.

  Torbin moved his finger to the touch screen, then froze.

  He wasn’t sure what the hell he was supposed to do.

  He had about ten seconds to figure it out—otherwise he was going to lose one of the planes they were protecting. And this time, it would be his fault.

  Aboard Raven,

  over Iran

  1602

  ON ZEN’S MAP THE BORDER BETWEEN TURKEY, IRAQ, AND Iran ran sharp and clear, curling through the mountains that swung down from the Caspian Sea and up from the Persian Gulf. On his view screen as he passed overhead, the border was indistinguishable; even in the few places where there were actual roads, the checkpoints tended to be a kilometer or more away from the border, where they could be better fortified. Unrest among the Kurdish population had struck Iran as well as Iraq, and the Iranian army had bolstered its forces near the borders and in the north in general. But the reinforcements appeared to have included almost no air units beyond a few helicopters; the radar in Hawk One located a pair of Bell Jet Rangers flying in a valley about ten miles southeast as it passed over the border ahead of Raven.

  “Civilian airport radar at Tabriz is active,” said the radar operator. “We’re clean. No other radars in vicinity. Hamadian, Kemanshah, Ghale Morghi, all quiet,” he added, naming the major air bases within striking distance.

  The Flighthawk and Raven were a hundred miles from the first of the three possible targets; Whiplash and its pilfered Hind were running about five minutes behind them.

  At their present speed, the ground team could reach the closest target in thirty-five minutes, the farthest in forty-five. Alou would launch the Quail in thirty minutes.

  Zen kicked his speed up, tucking the Flighthawk close to a mountain pass. As he shot by, his camera caught a small group of soldiers sitting around a machine gun behind a stack of rocks; he was by them so fast they didn’t have time to react, though it would have been next to impossible for them to hit the Flighthawk with their gun.

  A helicopter would be a different story.

  Zen flew up the pass about a mile and a half, making sure there were no reinforcements. In the meantime, Fentress marked the spot for him, giving him a straight-line course to target when he turned back.

  “Whiplash Hind, this is Hawk leader. I have a pimple to blot out.”

  “Whiplash Hind copies.” The roar of the helicopter engines nearly drowned out the pilot’s voice. “Should we change course?”

  “Negative,” said Zen as his targeting screen began to flash. “He’ll be in Ayatollah heaven in thirty seconds.”

  Aboard Whiplash Hind,

  over Iran

  1605

  DANNY PEERED OUT AT THE NEARBY MOUNTAIN UNEASILY, watching their shadow pass on the brown flank. Bits of snow remained scattered in the hollows; water flowed in the valleys in blue and silver threads, sparkling with the sun.

  Under any other circumstances, he’d look at the scenery with admiration; now it filled him with dread.

  They were big, easy targets flying low in the middle of the day.

  He should have insisted on a proper deployment at the very beginning, brought his Osprey here, more men. He wasn’t working with a full tool chest.

  What was he going to do if he got his butt fried? Go back East and into politics like his wife wanted?

  Hell, he’d be dead if this didn’t work.

  Was that why he’d gone ahead with it? Or was it the opposite—was he thinking he’d be a hero if he grabbed the laser?

  Danny looked around the cabin at his men, fidgeting away the long ride to their target. Was blind ambition the reason he was risking these guys lives?

  No. They had to pull this off to save others. That had nothing to do with ambition. That was his duty, his job.

  “Hawk One to Whiplash. Pimple’s gone,” said Zen on the Dreamland circuit. “Clear sailing for you.”

  “Whiplash Hind,” acknowledged Egg in the cockpit.

  “Thanks, Zen,” added Danny.

  “Bet you didn’t know Clearasil comes in twenty millimeter packages, huh?” joked Zen.

  “Well, I must say, your code words are exceedingly clever.” Rubeo’s sarcastic drone took Danny by surprise, even though he knew the scientist would be in Dreamland Command. “I wish I could be there for the fun and games.”

  “Yeah, me too,” said Danny, too tired at the moment even to be angry.

  “We have some new ideas about the laser,” said Rubeo.

  “Our friends at the CIA now believe it is part of a project initiated at least a year ago called Allah’s Sword. If they’re right, it’s largely based on technology nearly a decade old.”

  “Reassuring.”

  “My sentiments exactly,” said the scientist, the disdain evident. “Nonetheless, the spy masters have given us some things to consider. First of all, we’re looking for something larger than a tank chassis. Your pilots have already been briefed. As far as you’re concerned, our wish list remains essentially the same. Concentrate on the software and analyzing the chemical composition. A physical piece of the
mirror in the director would be useful as well.”

  “You know what, Doc, let’s just take it as it comes.”

  “Danny—”

  “That’s Captain Freah to you,” said Danny, hitting the kill switch at the bottom of his helmet.

  Aboard Raven,

  over Iran

  1700

  FENTRESS WATCHED AS ZEN FLEW THE FLIGHTHAWK JUST above the hillside, barely six or seven feet from the dirt and rocks. The plane moved as smoothly as if it were at thirty thousand feet, and nearly as fast. Zen worked the controls with total concentration, jerking his head back and forth, rocking his body with the plane, mimicking the actions he wanted it to take.

  Fentress knew he would never be able to fly as well.

  Never.

  The replay of the shoot-down showed he’d flown right into the antiaircraft fire. He’d been oblivious to it in his rush to help Major Smith.

  Stupid. Completely stupid.

  He could do better. He wasn’t going to give up.

  “Two minutes to Quail launch,” said the copilot. The assault team was now ten minutes away from the nearest target.

  THE SMALL, BLOCKY QUAIL 3/B FLUTTERED AS IT HIT THE slipstream below the Megafortress’s bomb bay, its ramjet engines momentarily faltering. But then the scaled-down model of an EB-52 bobbed away, its engines accelerating to propel it above the mothership’s flight path.

  Changes in doctrine as well as electronics and radars had rendered the original ADM-20/GAM-72 Quail obsolete no later than the 1970s, though there were some circumstances under which the “kill me” drone proved useful. Mechanically, the Quail 3/B was an entirely different bird, though it remained true to the function of its predecessor—it gave the enemy something to look at, and hopefully fire at, other than the bomber itself. Where the original had been a boxy, stub-winged glider, the Quail 3/B looked exactly like a Megafortress from above and below. Powered by small ramjets and carefully proportioned solid rockets augmented by podded flares on the wings, it had the same heat signature as an EB-52. Rather than being coated with radar-absorbing materials to reduce its return, the intricate facets on the Quail 3/B’s shiny skin amplified its radar return to make it appear to most radars almost exactly the size of a B-52. Fanlike antennas inside the drone duplicated the signals transmitted by a B-52H’s standard ALQ-155 and ALT-28 ECM and noise jammers. The Quail couldn’t fly for very long, nor could it be controlled once launched, but the decoy was a perfect clay pigeon.