Or rather, the SiCS bleeped to say it did.
Knife’s P&Ws were burning at 115 percent, and within seconds his F-15’s APG-63 radar tapped the second Flighthawk, just out of cannon range. Knife nudged his stick to the left as he closed, squaring in for a bull’s- eye.
Except the Flighthawk ducked off to the right, dropping down so fast he couldn’t react. But that was fine – his goal was to splash Zen, not the high-tech UAVs. And now that the Flighthawk had run away, Zen’s unprotected butt loomed at the top of his windscreen. Knife took a breath, adrenaline careening through his veins as he closed for the kill.
Damn good thing they were playing by cannon rules or he’d be dead, Zen thought as he jerked Hawk Two away. Sidewinder would have walloped him.
Then again, according to the rules, Knife was supposed to be about ten thousand feet higher, not flying low enough to stop for traffic lights.
Not that fighter pilots were expected to follow the rules, let alone fight fair.
Smith was probably pissed that he’d beaten him in the first round, and wanted revenge. That would make beating him again all the sweeter, wouldn’t it?
Zen waited until he was sure Mack was coming for him before ordering the remaining Flighthawk to try to acquire his opponent’s tail. Then he brought his full attention back to his own plight. The two ples were fairly well matched; Zen’s slightly more powerful power plant made up for the fact that Smith’s plane was a tad lighter. As long as they both had the pedal to the metal, Smith couldn’t catch him.
Then again, Zen wouldn’t be able to get away either. Nor would he be able to splash Smith, which was what he really wanted.
Duck and roll?
Smith wouldn’t be fooled by it twice.
Feint left, plunge right, swing back in a high-speed scissors, twisting around to let the Flighthawk nail Smith in a front-quarter attack.
Not easy, but also probably the last thing Smith would be expecting, since the U/MF-3’s were not adept at headon attacks. As the Flighthawk took its shot. Zen could buck into a tight loop and come up behind him. He’d have him for dinner.
Maybe. Very hard to execute, especially with half of his attention on the Flighthawk.
Go for it.
Zen backed his power off, sucking Smith toward him. As he warner buzzed, telling him that he was about to be nailed, Zen pushed left. He counted off two seconds, then came back hard right, rolling the plane downward with a burst of speed that got him out to Mach 1.2. Knife hesitated for a second, then began to follow.
Perfect. Zen slashed through the air like a ribbon unwinding from a spool, Smith barely hanging on. Stockard opened the Flighthawk visual screen in the lower right quadrant of his viewer, and asked for a sit map – a synthetic overhead or God’s-eye view – in the lower left.
Hawk Two was too far off the pace to complete the deal.
Cursing, Zen threw the Eagle over his shoulder, sliding and spinning downward to try to buy more time. Smith managed a snap shot, but couldn’t keep him in his target aperture long enough for the SiCS system to register a hit.
“Yo, scumbag, I would have put a half-dozen slugs in your wing on that shot,” snarled Knife. “Damn SiCS.”
Zen didn’t give him the satisfaction of an answer. He had to go hard on the stick as Smith dashed downward, cutting between him d the approaching Flighthawk.
Nice. Though the maneuver left Smith without a shot and potentially vulnerable himself, Zen was cut off and without enough forward energy to do anything but put his nose back down and try to pick up steam. Smith was on him again, accelerating across his path just when he thought he might try to recover. Zen threw the Eagle back down, slicing down to his left and then over into another invert as Smith somehow managed to twist h F-15C onto his tail.
The two planes twirled an elaborate ribbon in the sky, at times only ten feet apart. Zen played slapstick, ducking and bobbing just enough to keep from getting waxed. Finally he managed to get into a turn too tight for Smith to stay with; his pursuer had to back off or run the risk of overshooting him and becoming the target.
At that point, Zen should have transmitted the command “Knock it off” and ended the exercise. He’d fallen below three thousand feet and was low on fuel. He had only nominal control of Hawk One. He was far outside the stated parameters of the test. Both he and Knife had been rockin’ and rollin’ for more than an hour. Both had gotten out of bed shortly after midnight to begin the rigorous preflight procedures that were considered an important experiment if not those he personally lived by, win the engagement.
The inquiry would note all of this, in a pointed aside.
But neither Zen, nor Smith for that matter, was about to give up.
Zen cut south on a direct intercept for Hawk Two, determined to get his robot escort back into the furball. He’d used his air brakes to make his last slash, which had cost him considerable flight energy, and as he jinked onto new vector he got a stall warning. He dropped lower, quickly picking up speed, pouring on the gas as he streaked toward the desert floor. The Flighthawk, apparently confused by the twists of its target, was flying toward him at roughly ten o’clock, its own speed down to four hundred knots. Zen told the Flighthawk computer to plot a fresh nose-on-nose intercept with Smith, who by now had turned back around and had the stops out in pursuit. The plan was simple, a slight variation of the one he’d originally intended – the Flighthawk would force Knife to break; Zen would come back around and nail him from the rear.
Then he’d go home. He was bingo fuel.
“I’m coming for you, Zen,” gloated Smith.
“Hawk One, cannon,” Zen commanded.
“Not locked,” replied the computer, voice mode duplicating the visual indicator. “Outside range.”
They were at six hundred feet indicated, descending at a very slight angle. Smith was right on his tail, almost in range.
“Extreme range. Cannon.” commanded Zen.
“Not locked,” answered the computer. “Outside range.”
“Time to range,” said Zen.
“Five seconds,” said the computer.
Three too many. Zen twinged the rudder, hoping Smith would think he was planning a sharp cut. Then he held steady.
Knife bought it, but only for a second. Zen could practically feel his bad breath on his neck.
“I’m coming,” hissed Knife.
The Flighthawk bar went green.
“Fire!’ screamed Zen.
As the Flighthawk fired, Knife broke downward. The move – dangerous as well as brilliant, since they were now only five hundred feet over the desert floor – caught Zen by surprise. Zen started to pull up, then realized Knife had simply yo-yoed beneath him and was about to nail his belly. Stockard shoved the F-15 into a hard right turn. As he did, he gave the Flighthawk a command to break off its attack.
In the next second, a shudder ran through Zen’s body, something he’d never felt before. It was like a tickle from inside, starting in the middle of his spine and flashing like lightning into every muscle. His hands and feet went cold, his toes froze. The steady roar of the big Pratt & Whitneys behind Zen stopped.
The sensation lasted a bare millionth of a second. It was followed by a hard slam and unbearably loud screech, then silence.
The Flighthawk had sheared through the wing of Zen’s plane.
By the time the SiCS bleeped with the hit, Knife had pulled the plane onto its back, rolled leve, and was trying desperately to regain altitude and forward airspeed. For a moment, he lost track of everything – his target, the Flighthawk, even the ground and the sky. Blood rushed furiously around his brain, its flow distorted by the centrifugal forces of his hard-stick maneuvers. For a second or two, Knife flew on instinct alone, his arms and legs sorting what his mind could not. They got the plane stable, kept it in the air, even pushed his eyes where they belonged.
