turning away, edging back towards the Syrian border. They had completed
their taunting gesture, they had flaunted the colours of Islam in the
face of the infidel, and were making for safety.
David felt the blade of anger in his guts burn colder, sting sharper,
and with an effort of restraint he waited out the last few seconds
before making his climb. The moment came and his voice was still flat
and without passion as he called to Joe, Two, this is leader, commencing
storm-climb. 'Two conforming. David eased back on the controls and
they went up in a climb so vicious that it seemed to tear their bowels
from their bellies.
Almost immediately, Desert Flower picked up the radar images as they
emerged from the ground clutter.
Hullo both units Bright Lance. We are now tracking you. Show friend or
foe. Both David and Joe were lying en their backs in the thrust of
storm-climb, but at the order they punched in their IFF systems.
Identification Friend or Foe would show a distinctive pattern, a bright
halo, around their radar images on command plot identifying them
positively even while they were locked with the enemy in the close
proximity of the dogfight.
Beseder, we are tracking you in IFF, said the Brig, and they went
plunging into the pillar of cloud and raked upwards through it. David's
eyes darted between the boule that contained his blind-flying
instruments and the radar screen on which the enemy images shone bright
and with hard outline so close now that the individual aircraft in the
enemy formation stood out clearly.
Target is increasing speed and tightening starboard turn, Joe intoned
and David compensated for the enemy's manoeuvre.
David was certain that they had not detected his approach, the turn away
was coincidental. Another glance at the screen showed that he had
achieved his height advantage. He was now two miles off their quarter
above them, with the sun at his back. it was the ideal approach.
Turning now into final leg of attack pattern, he alerted Joe to his
intention and they began to pitch in.
The last-second strike which would send their speed rocketing as they
closed.
The target centred dead ahead, and the gunsight lit up, glowing softly
on the screen ahead of him. The sidewinder missiles caught the first
emanations of infrared rays from their victims, and they began to growl
softly in David's earphones.
Still blinded by thick grey cloud they raced in, and suddenly they burst
out into the clear. Ahead and below them opened a deep through of
space, a valley between cloud ranges and close below them the five MIGs
sparkled silvery in the sunlight, pretty and toylike, their red, white
and green markings festive and gay, the clean geometrical sweeps of wing
and tail nicely balanced and the shark-like mouths of the jet intakes
gaping, as they sucked in air.
They were in loose V-formation, two stacked back on each flank of the
leader and in the fleeting seconds that David had to study them, he had
assessed them. The four wingmen were Syrians, there was an indefinable
