Nothing. The boom operator saw nothing below him except a single light. Everything else melted completely into the space around it.
The precontact position on most large aircraft was twenty feet behind and ten feet below the nozzle, less than sixty feet from where he and Colonel Sands sat in the boom pod. They were looking directly below the nozzle, in the glow of the small nozzle light, and there was nothing. In the depths of the growing twilight, Mason thought he could see the outline of a large aircraft-but it could just as easily be his imagination playing tricks on him. 'Genesis, I'm going to turn on the belly lights.'
'Who's in the pod?' Elliott asked quickly.
'Colonel Sands and Tech Sergeant Mason,' the boom operator replied.
'Okay. Eddie, make sure that's all that goes in there.'
'Hell, I'm not sure if I want to be here.'
'Clear on the belly lights,' Ormack said, taking a firm grip on the yoke. The boom operator reached above him and flicked a switch.
And suddenly there it was. The long, pointed nose stretched underneath the boom pod. Just on the edge of the pod window the outline of the eleven missiles were visible on their gray pylons. In the direct glare of the tanker's light the forward fuselage could now be seen, but the rest of the plane, aft of the training edge wing roots and beyond, was invisible. Through the sleek, sharp, Oriental-like angles of the strong-looking cockpit windows, the pilot and co-pilot, without helmets or oxygen masks, could barely be made out.
'What the The boom operator's words stuck in his throat.
'You got him, booms?' Reynolds asked over the tanker's interphone.
'What is it?'
'It's… it's a B-52… I think,' Mason stammered over interphone.
'You think?What the hell is it?'
'It's a damned spaceship. It's…'
'Acknowledge, Icepack,' Ormack repeated. 'Stabilized precontact and ready.'
'Elliott, what the hell are you flying?' Sands demanded.
'Gas first, Eddie. Questions later.'
'Forward ten,' the boomer asked. 'Cleared to contact position. Icepack is ready. 'Ormack expertly slid the Megafortress ahead. His practice and experience made for a steady platform, so all the boomer had to do was extend the nozzle a few feet.
'Genesis showing contact,' Ormack asked. 'Nice job, boom.
Icepack has contact,' Mason reported. He started the fuel pumps.
'Taking fuel, no leaks.'
'Taking fuel,' Ormack acknowledged.
'All right, Genesis,' Sands asked. 'How about some answers?'
'Eddie, you don't want to know,' Elliott told him, glanced over at John Ormack and managed a smile. The Megafortress was so smooth and steady that it was easy for Ormack to keep the huge bomber in the boom's refueling envelope-it seemed he was scarcely touching the controls.
'You don't want to know where we've been, where we're going, or what we're doing.'
'Where you're going?There's no question about where, General. You know-hell, you knew about my code words so you must know-that I can only give you enough fuel to make it to Shemya or a suitable alternate.
I can't fill you up.'
'You've got to, Colonel. We need as close to full tanks as possible.
'General, I've busted more rules in the past twenty minutes than I've done in two years. And that's a lot, even for me. I can't give you that much-' 'This isn't a strip alert refueling any more, Eddie,' Elliott asked. 'This is now an unscheduled, alternate tactical refueling.
We had tanker support from Eielson and Fairchild scheduled but they didn't launch. Now you're it.'
'You had two tankers?' Sands asked. 'Where the hell you going with two-T' And then Sands stopped, looked in disbelief at Mason. They arrived at the answer simultaneously.
Missiles on the strange B-52's wings…
'Elliott,' Sands finally asked. 'What the hell is going on?'
No reply.
Jesus Christ,' Sands said. He rubbed the bridge of his nose and stared at the bomber below them.
'Ashley?'
'Computing max off load now, Colonel,' the co-pilot replied, pulling out his performance manuals, charts, and flight plans.
'Give us enough to land at Anchorage with ten thousand over the high fix,' Sands told the co-pilot. 'We may need it if runway conditions at Shemya deteriorate. God damn.'
Under the close eye of Mason on board the KC-10 and Elliot aboard the Old Dog, it was nearly an hour later when Ashley nodded to the flight engineer, who radioed back to the boompod on the tanker's interphone.
Elliott looked across the cockpit and rechecked the fuel distribution system's indicators. Ormack had taken it off automatic' to avoid putting fuel into the left outboard wing tank in case it sustained any damage when the tip ripped off at Dreamland, and now the system required careful monitoring.
'Showing no flow down here,' he radioed to the tanker.
'That's it, Genesis,' Ashley asked. 'We've got enough to return to Shemya, shoot one approach, go missed approach, and arrive at Anchorage with ten thousand over the fix.'
Elliott totaled up the gauges and checked it against the fuel totalizer. It would have to do.
— I'll take a disconnect, Icepack,' Ormack said. In the refueling pod Mason gave a short countdown and punched the nozzle out of the Old Dog's receptacle. Ormack reached up and closed the slipway door.
'Descending to two-seven zero,' Ormack reported.
'Eddie, I want to thank you for your cooperation,' Elliott said as the Old Dog began its descent away from the KC-10 tanker. 'I assure you, I'll take full responsibility for any heat you might take.'
'I'm counting on that, General,' Sands asked. 'I guess this makes us even.'
'We were always even.'
'Maybe… You know I have to file a report about this.
The refueling, the comm jamming, the expended munitions.
Everything.
'Of course. No offense intended, Eddie, but I know you'll file the report in your usual complete, timely, thorough manner.
'Anything else you need, General?' Sands asked, biting out the words.
'A name, Eddie,' Elliott asked. 'A tanker, a deployment, a large aircraft from Anchorage that passed by within the past twelve hours.
— Sure, why not?' Sands turned to the interphone, asked the co-pilot for the communications kit, then said over the radio, 'Might as well set an all-time record for breaking the rules in one glorious day.'
''Bag' was a KC-10 fighter drag from Elmendorf to Nellis,' Ashley said, checking his classified call sign booklet.
''Crow' was an AWACS from Eielson to Sapporo. 'Lantern' was a KC-10 from Elmendorf to Kadena.'
'I'm not going to ask why you needed that,' Sands said.
'Can we turn around now?How much further toward never never land do we have to follow you?'
'Clear to turn, Eddie-and thanks.'
'See you Sands watched as the descending bomber melted into the darkness.
'Genesis is clear,' Elliott reported to him- Then, silence.
The lights on the huge aircraft blinked out, and it disappeared completely.
The boom operator looked wearily at Colonel Sands.
'Reynolds, are the radios clear?'
'Negative,' the pilot told Sands. 'Still heavy jamming.
'Well, he can't jam SATCOM, — Sands replied angrily.
'Transmit a post-refueling report directly to SAC.Label it URGENT.
Report the receiver's call sign, direction of flight, onload, everything. As soon as we're out of range of their
