“That’s so sweet … I love you so much, Patrick,” Wendy said.
“But that’s not what I meant.”
“What? You don’t … I’m confused, Wendy. What are you saying?
Don’t you want me to quit flying?”
“Of course not,” Wendy said. “What, and watch you stare off into space and mope around the House all day and yell and scream at the employees all night? No, you’re doing what you love to do, and you’re the best at it, so keep doing it. I’ll consult for Jon Masters, and telecommute with Sky Masters from home while I take care of our baby.”
“Our … our what?”
“Our baby, bomber-brain—our offspring, our rug-rat, our cookie-cruncher,” Wendy said. “We can stop trying to have a baby because we did it—I’m pregnant.”
“But … but how …?”
“How? Your mom never told you the facts of life?”
“No, dammit … I thought you couldn’t have a baby after the accident because of trauma to your follicles or something … I thought we had to do all that in vitro fertilization stuff, do the test tubes and the echography and follicle punctures …”
“Well, either it was an immaculate conception or the doctors were wrong about the old lady’s plumbing, because we got pregnant the old-fashioned way—without Synarel sprays or Pergonal shots or micromanipulation,” Wendy said proudly. “You’re going to be a daddy after all—that is, as long as you come back to me.”
“Of course I’ll be back, Wendy,” Patrick said. “Even if I have to walk. If I’ve got any skill, if I’ve got any luck, if I’ve got any brains at all, I’ll use them all to come back to YOU.”
They embraced again, tighter than ever before; and even amid the sounds of external power carts and shouting soldiers and missiles and weapons being uploaded and all the other sounds of war in that hangar, for a brief instant in time, there were only the two of them, together forever Takeoff was shortly after darkness set in on Guam. After the area was cleared for any unidentified aircraft or vessels, Air Vehicle 011 launched from Andersen’s north-south runway, instantly 500 feet above the ocean as it left the runway because the end of the runway was on a tall cliff on Guam’s northernmost tip. McLanahan couldn’t help but think of the last time he had taken a B-2 bomber into combat from Guam—they almost hadn’t made it. But that was a lifetime ago, it seemed.
The launch brought the same thrill of fear into Tony Jamieson’s heart. He remembered all too well their mission against the Chinese navy and air force over the Philippines.
And this mission was even more insane. They had planned it less, and all the planning had been done by McLanahan—a damned civilian, no less!—along with his computers and his buddies at Sky Masters, Inc. The enemy was more numerous, better equipped, better prepared, and they were on their home turf, defending their homeland. But Jamieson had agreed to do it—he couldn’t back out now. He had to prove to himself that he really did have the right stuff to fly into combat.
Just two hours after takeoff, over the Philippine Sea between Luzon and the Batan Islands, they rendezvoused with a KC-135 tanker that had taken off before them, and they topped off their tanks—it was the loneliest feeling in the world to see that KC-135 leave. They began a step-climb to 48,000 feet, saving as much fuel as possible. Both crew members could see the lights of Manila about 300 miles to the south; 300 miles north were the lights of Taipei, and off the B-2A’s curved beak nose on the horizon were the lights of Victoria and Macao. They altered course slightly to avoid overflying Hong Kong …
… but went feet-dry over the city of Zhelang, Guangdong Province, in the People’s Republic of China. They were overflying China on their way to strike Iran.
“I don’t friggin’ believe this,” Jamieson said, “but we’re doing it. We’ve just violated China’s airspace with an armed strategic bomber.”
The huge naval and air base at Guangzhou was the biggest concern right now. They had picked up strong radar and air defense signals from more than 300 miles out, shortly after completing their aerial refueling. Guangzhou was alive with air defense systems—most older, ex-Soviet systems, like the Vietnam-era SA-2 long- range “flying telephone pole” missile; China was flying late-evening air patrols as well. The majority of Chinese air interceptors on patrol showed on the threat scope as MiG-21s, with a few more modern Sukhoi27s in the mix. “Well, the Chinese air force is certainly awake tonight,” Jamieson commented. “Training day, I hope.
Just then, one of the Chinese-built Xian J-7 fighters, copies of the Russian MiG-21, swept its radar beam across the B-2A stealth bomber—and the green triangle representing its search radar changed to yellow. Shit, that MiG-21 locked onto us!” Jamieson called out. “He’s at eight o’clock, twenty miles!”
“If we get intercepted, our best plan is an emergency descent, then deviate southwest across Laos or Burma,” McLanahan said, repeating their hastily planned escape procedures. “Range to the Laotian border is about five hundred miles. Radar coverage is almost nonexistent to the southwest.”
“If he gets an eyeball on us, we’ll be lucky to make it five minutes, let alone five hundred miles,” Jamieson muttered. But thankfully, the fighter’s radar broke lock a few moments later, and he did not reacquire. “God, that was close.”
But it wasn’t over yet. Several minutes later, another fighter—this one a Russian-built Sukhoi-27, a much more up-to-date fighter-bomber—started sweeping the area, searching for the B-2A bomber—and seconds later, it too showed a lock-on.
“The Su-27’s got us,” McLanahan said. “Seven o’clock, fifteen miles.”
“What in hell’s going on?” Jamieson asked. “Recheck your switches.” But after quickly scanning the status page of the computer readouts, they could find nothing out of place—they were in COMBAT mode, with all stealth and defensive systems on and functioning. “That’s two in a row.
Are we hanging something?”
“That’s got to be it,” McLanahan said. “Try a turn to the left.”
Sure enough, as soon as they turned into the fighter, the yellow target-tracking radar turned to a green search radar, and the fighter began sweeping the skies in other directions, trying to lock on. The closest he got was ten miles, well outside visual range even with night-vision optics.
“I was afraid of that,” Jamieson said. “Field maintenance in a B-2A bomber is not like any other plane. The maintenance crews have to be specially trained, and the plane has to be checked to make sure its stealth characteristics weren’t altered. One fastener not screwed in all the way, one seam not in perfect alignment, one ding in the skin, can destroy the stealth characteristics and increase the radar cross-section two or three times.” Jamieson turned to McLanahan. “We got a decision to make, bub. The Chinese generally are known to have shitty military stuff, but their standard line aircraft got a lock-on and closed within missile range—twice. Iran’s got top-of- the-line stuff; so do India and Pakistan. Burma’s our last safe chance to get out.”
McLanahan knew that they had no choice—the mission was in serious jeopardy. “All right,” he said, “I have to agree. I think we can still make it, but the risk is too much. We’ll execute the Burma escape route; once we’re clear of Chinese radar coverage, I’ll flash a message to Andersen to schedule a tanker.” In the back of his head was Wendy’s surprise message, too—he was going to be a father. He couldn’t risk his first child growing up without him.
As McLanahan composed their status and abort message for satellite relay, they continued on for another hour until they were well clear of the Chinese air defense region near Chengdu, where it was safe to temporarily deactivate the AN/VUQ-13 BEADS “cloaking device,” get a GPS satellite navigation fix, and activate the encoded satellite transceiver. Just as McLanahan was ready to send his message, a priority message came in.
“Shit,” McLanahan said. “Iran is attacking the United Arab Emirates and Oman!”
“What?”
“Bomber attacks on three bases in the UAE and two bases in Oman,” McLanahan read. “Iran is shutting down any Gulf Cooperative Council base that might threaten the carrier Khomeini while it’s stationed in the Gulf of Oman. Extensive Iranian fighter coverage throughout the region, including near the Abraham Lincoln battle group … no U.S. or GCC air defense units were able to respond.
The attack came out of nowhere.”
“We’ll get plastered,” Jamieson said. “If Iran presses the attack, we could lose every usable air and naval base east of the Red Sea. We’d …” He knew … they both knew, what this meant—they couldn’t abort their mission now. Their B-2A bomber was the only allied strike aircraft in the Gulf region ready to fight back, the only one that could shut off the Iranian surge.
