aiming sight, and the safety device above the pistol grip is disengaged with the right thumb. The actuator is engaged by depressing the button built into the reverse of the pistol grip. This starts the run up of the navigational gyro and releases a flow of freon gas to cool the infrared seekers as they become active. With the sights held on the target, all incoming infrared radiation is magnified and focused on the detector cell of the missile head. As soon as this radiation is of sufficient concentration to allow the mi ssi e to track to its source, the gyro stabilizer un cages and the missile emits a high-pitched tone.
To fire the mi ssi the operator depresses the trigger in the pistol grip with his Torefinger, which starts the electric ejector motor. The missile discharges from the launch tube through the frangible front seal and ejects to a safe distance, approximately eight meters from the operator, to protect him from rocket backblast. At this point the solid-fuel rocket engine fires, the blast of exhaust gas flares out the retractable tail fins, and the missile accelerates to four times the speed of sound. When an inertial force of twenty-eight times gravity is attained, the fuse shutout is thrown open and the missile is armed. It tracks the target on a fire-and-forget trajectory, guided not by the operator but by its own proportional navigational system.
With the specialized 'Hind' attack cassette inserted in the launcher's RMP-re programmable microprocessor-the system automatically switches into 'two-color' mode when it is a hundred meters from the infrared source. At this point it abandons the infrared radiations emitted by the engine exhaust suppressors and instead focuses on the much weaker ultraviolet emanations from the engine intakes. On tins target the high-explosive warhead hits to kill.
'Even a Shangane could learn how to fire one of these,' Job said.
Sean grinned. 'Tut-tut, your Matabele tribal racism is showing again.
It's like this-when you are genetically superior, there is simply no point in trying to conceal the fact.'
They both glanced expectantly at Claudia, but she did not even look up from the manual as she drawled, 'You're wasting your time, you two bigots. You aren't going to get a rise out of me this time.'
'Bigot.' Job savored the word. 'It's the first time anybody has ever called me that. I love it.'
'That's enough fooling around.' Sean broke it up. 'Let's take a look at the trainer.'
After they had connected one of the freshly charged battery packs and assembled the trainer equipment, Sean gave his opinion: 'With this stuff, we can have the lads ready to go into action within days, not weeks.'
Once a microcassette was inserted into the training monitor, the launcher screen simulated the image of a Hind, which the instructor was able to manipulate in various flight patterns, climbing, descending, sideslipping, or hovering. While he did so, he was able to watch the trainee's reactions as he attempted to acquire the ghost ship on his own screen and attack it with a phantom missile.
Sean and Job played with the trainer like a pair of teenagers, flying the image in complicated maneuvers. 'It's just like a PacMan game,' Job enthused. 'But what we need is a durn-durn, a pseudo-Shangane to act as a trainee for us.'
Once again both the men looked at Claudia, who was still sitting cross-legged on the table, studying the manual.
She looked up as she felt their eyes on her. 'A durn-durn?' she demanded. 'I'll show you durn-durn. Give me the launcher.'
She stood in the center of the amphitheater floor with the launcher balanced on her shoulder and stared into the sighting screw. The bulky equipment seemed to dwarf her. She had reversed her camouflage cap so the peak stuck out behind her head, and it gave her the ga mine air of a Little League baseball player.
'ReadyT' Sean asked.
'Pull!' she said, concentrating ferociously on the screen. Sean and Job exchanged smug supercilious i grins.
'Incoming!' Sean called sharply. 'Twelve o'clock high. Lock and load.' He brought the ghost Hind in on a head-on attack at 150 knots.
'Locked and loaded,' Claudia affirmed, and in their screen they watched the duplicate sight ring of her missile launcher swing up smoothly and center on the approaching Hind.
'Actuator on,' she said calmly, and a second later, they heard the launcher sob and growl in her grip, then settle into a steady insect whine, like an infuriated mosquito.
'Target acquired,' Claudia murmured. The Hind was six hundred meters out but coming in fast, swelling dramatically in the sights.
'Fire!' she said. They saw the red light blink and then change to green, signaling that the rocket engine of the fictitious missile was running. Almost instantaneously the image of the Hind disappeared from the screen, to be replaced by the flashing legend: TARGET
DESTROYED! TARGET I)ESTROYM!
A profound silence followed. Job cleared his throat nervously.
'Flukes happen,' said Sean. 'Shall we try it again?'
'Pull!' said Claudia, and concentrated on her aiming Screen' Incoming Sean called. 'Six o'clock high. Lock and load.' He brought the next Hind in from behind her at treetop level, attack speed. She had three seconds to react.
'Locked and loaded.' Claudia pirouetted like a ballerina and picked up the Hind in the sight ring. 'Actuator on.' As she said it, Sean flung the Hind into a climbing sideslip, giving her deflection in three planes. it wQAd be like trying to hit a high bird in a gale of crosswind.
in their screen the watched with disbelief as Claudia swung smoothly, keeping the image in the exact center of her aiming ring and the missile sobbed and then settled into its high-pitched tone.
'Target acquired. Fire!'
TARGET DEsTROy mi TARGET DEsTRoYED! The screen blinked at them, and they fidgeted uncomfortably.
Job murmured, 'Twice on the trot. That ain't no fluke, man.'
Claudia laid the launcher on the table, readjusted the peak of her cap over her eyes, then placed her fists on her hips and smiled at them sweetly.
'I thought you said you didn't know how to shoot,' Sean accused her with righteous indignation.
'Would a daughter of Riccardo Enrico Monterro not know how to shoot?'
'But you are stridently opposed to blood sports.'
'Sure,' she agreW. 'I've never shot at a living creature. But I'm death to clay pigeons. Papa taught me.'
'I should have guessed when you said 'Pull.'' Sean groaned softly.
'As a matter of interest'--Claudia examined the fingernails of her right hand modestly---'I was Alaska State women's skeet champion three years running and runner-up at the national championships in 'eighty-six.'
The two men exchanged embarrassed glances. 'She got you with a sucker punch.' Job shook his head. 'And you walked straight into it with both eyes closed.'
'AD right, Miss Alaska,' Sean told her sternly. 'You are so damned clever, you've just landed yourself the job of instructor.
From here on you are in charge of this equipment. Job and I will split the Shanganes into two classes and give them the basics. Then we'll pass them on to you for simulation. It'll speed up the whole works.'
General China interrupted them as he strode into the amphitheater, beret cocked jauntily, slapping his swagger stick against his thigh and taking in their preparations with quick, inquisitive eyes.
'How soon can you begin training? I expected to be further J
along than this.'
Sean recognized the futility of trying to explain to him. 'We'll get along better without interference.'
'I came to warn you that Frehmo have launched their offensive.
They are coming at us in force from the south and the west, a two-pronged drive, obviously trying to push us out of these hills, away from the river, into more open terrain where they can deploy their armor and their helicopters to better advantage.'
'So they are whipping the hell out of you,' Sean needled him with a thinly concealed sneer.
'We are falling back.' China acknowledged the jibe with just a glitter in his eyes. 'As soon as my men attempt to hold up their advance at a natural strongpoint, Frelimo simply calls in the Hinds. The Russian pilots are showing us the close-support skills they learned in the mountains of Afghanistan. They simply obliterate our defenses. It is not a pleasant experience to listen helplessly on the radio while my field commanders plead for help. How soon can I send them the Stingers?'
'Two days,' Sean said.
'So lone. Is there no way you can hurry it up?' Impatiently China slapped the swagger stick into the palm of his hand. 'I want you to let me have at least one trained team immediately. Anything to be able to hit back at them.'
'That, General China, would be crass stupidity,' Sean told him.
'With all due respect'-Sean showed none in the tone of his voice-'if you deploy the Stingers piecemeal, you'll be tipping your hand to the Hind crews.'
'What do you mean?' China's voice cracked like breaking floe ice.
'Those Russkie pilots have met the Stingers before, in Afghanistan, you can be pretty damn sure of that.
