“We’re installing mesh,” said Briggs. “We can push that up. I can’t do anything about your butt while you’re in uniform,” he added.
“Very funny. When’s the mesh going on?”
“ASAP. A thousand feet okay?”
“I’ll have to do the math,” Breanna said. “Major Cheshire has to be told. Raven’s heavier than Fort Two because of the older engines. If it’t wet and she’s carrying fuel, she’s going to have a hard time stopping.”
“Raven? Another Megafortress?”
“We made the flight without a crew,” said Breanna. “Cheshire’s following with a weapons officer and navigator. She should be here within twelve hours, maybe less.”
“Shit. We can use her.”
“Damn straight,” said Danny. “The plane has jamming gear.”
“It’s the next generation ECMs,” said Rap, throwing a glare at Freah. “I doubt they’ll have time to remove it all. Just as there wasn’t time to remove the air-to-ground missiles we were carrying. Officially, we’re only here as transports.”
Briggs shook his head slowly, but he had the start of a grin on his face.
“Of course, local conditions prevail. Assuming we do get airborne,” Breanna added, “I’m going to need as much target data as possible. The computer’s persnickety and my copilot’s a real whiner. Personally, I’d trade them both for a good weapons officer, or even a halfway decent radar navigator.”
Dreamland
22 October, 1200 local
“Colonel, I thought we had a date!”
Dog jerked his head up from his desk. Jennifer Gleason was standing in the doorway/
“I had to run by myself,” said the scientist, striding into his office. She plopped herself down in a chair.
“I’m sorry, Doc,” said Dog. “I got tied up.”
“So I heard.” Jennifer glanced back at the officer door. Dog looked in time to see Sergeant Gibbs closing it.
He’ll get his, Dog thought.
“Want to do lunch?” asked the scientist.
“I can’t. I’m sorry,” said Bastian. “I’ve been handling the fallout, from, uh, some recommendations I had to make.”
“You mean killing JSF, right?” She flicked her hair back impishly.
“That’s supposed to be classified.”
“Come on, Colonel. You can’t fart on his base without everyone catching a whiff. Not that colonels fart.”
For some reason, the word ‘fart’ and her beautiful mouth didn’t seem to go together.
“I actually didn’t come here to ask you to lunch,” said the scientist quickly. She leaned forward, somehow metamorphosing from a beautiful if slightly insolent young woman to a senior scientist. “I came to make a recommendation regarding the Flighthawk program. I feel the mission to Somalia should go forward.”
“It’s not a mission,” said Dog, angered that the flight was being openly discussed.
“I understand, Colonel. I also feel that I should be along in case something goes wrong.”
“Doc –”
“First of all, call me Jennifer. Or Jen.” She favored him with the briefest of brief smiles. “Second of all, there is on one in the world who knows that computer system better than I do. That’s not a brag, that’s a fact. If you’re sending those planes halfway around the world, I should be there with them.”
“I don’t know that there’s enough room for you,” said Dog.
“I checked with Major Cheshire. She says there is.”
“Major Cheshire only reluctantly approved carrying the Flighthawks,” said Bastian, who’d spoken with Cheshire only a short while before.
“She was worried about not having enough support. I’m the support.”
Dog shook his head. It was one thing to send the Megafortresses; while they were definitely still in the experimental stage, an early version had already seen some action. Justifying the Flighthawks was much more difficult, especially since they’d lack the veneer of a ‘transport’ mission. And sending a civilian into a war zone was potentially a hanging offense. Her loss would be a serious embarrassment, and not just to him.
“I’m afraid it’s not possible,” he told her.
“If you lose the U/MFs,” she told him, “they’ll hang you out to dry.”
“If I lose you, they’ll grind me up into little pieces.”
“You’re not going to lose me. Between me and Parsons –”
“Parsons? Sergeant Parsons?”
“He’s waiting in the outer office to talk to you. We drew straws to see who would go first,” she added.
