The target reticle drifted across the MiG-29's fuselage and Batman squeezed the trigger. The F-14's Vulcan cannon shrieked… but the Fulcrum was already rolling clear of the floating burst of tracers that seemed to slide past the MiG's twin tail and wing tip, missing by inches. Then the MiG was clear, falling toward the sea twelve thousand feet below. Batman rolled after him.
'Striker! Batman!' he yelled over the tactical channel. If his wingman could close in, they could squeeze this guy, one Tomcat moving in close, the other covering from behind. 'Where the hell are you, boy?'
'I'm on your four, one mile,' Striker's voice replied.
Strickland and his RIO, K-Bar, had become separated from Batman and Malibu minutes before, when they'd been jumped by a pair of Fulcrums. 'I'm clear and I'm moving in.'
'See if you can cut this guy off. You take the left, I'll stay on his right.'
'Rog.'
Half a mile ahead and below, the Fulcrum was pulling out of its dive and cutting to the right. Batman brought his stick over, trying to lead the Russian with a tighter turn to starboard. A thousand feet off the deck, the Fulcrum hurtled past an American helicopter carrier, the huge LHA Nassau.
Batman had just switched back to missiles when the hurtling Russian interceptor disintegrated in midair, silvery fragments spraying out like a shotgun blast, then ignited in a billowing cloud of orange flame.
'Scratch that MiG,' Malibu said in Batman's headset. 'I think he just got nailed by one of Nassau's CIWS.'
'I think you're right.' He pulled the F-14 up sharply. Phalanx point-defense systems sometimes had trouble telling the good guys from the bad, and Batman had no wish to fly into its deadly, mile-deep kill zone.
Pulling level at six thousand feet, Batman checked his stores. They'd launched with four Phoenix, two AMRAAMs, and a pair of Sidewinders. They were down to two AIM-54s and one each of the others. 'Talk to me, Malibu,' he said. 'Where's a target? Gimme some ass to kick.'
'Nothing close. I think the leakers all got capped. I'll see if I can tag a Hawkeye for a vector.'
Strickland's Tomcat drew alongside to the left. Looking across the distance separating them, Batman could see Striker in the front seat, K-Bar in the back, the numerals 211 of the other aircraft's modex number vivid on its nose.
'How's the score standing now, Batman?' Striker asked.
Batman shook his head. 'I got four, but two of 'em were Phoenix kills at extreme range, and we might not get credit.' With so many missiles in the air at the same time, it was sometimes difficult to assess whose AIM-54s had killed which enemy aircraft. 'I don't know how Brewer did.'
'Why not ask her?' Brewer's voice cut in. Brewer's 218 Tomcat pulled in on the right. 'What, Batman? Only two confirmed kills? You're slipping.
Pogie'n me got four already! Fox threes, every one!'
'Tracked 'em all the way to target,' Damiano added. 'And no others anywhere close, so we know we scored.'
'Nuggets' luck,' Malibu said.
'Yeah,' Batman added. 'What's that make it now, Brewer? Nine to eight?'
'Nice try, Batman,' Brewer replied. 'We're still only counting confirmed kills. Make that nine to six!'
'Damn, Batman,' Malibu said, sounding hurt. 'We can't let a mere slip of a girl do this to us!'
'I'll 'slip-of-a-girl' you, Mal.'
'Gee, I don't know, Batman,' Malibu said. 'What do you think? I don't feel these Phoenix kills should count, do you? I mean, did John Wayne shoot down a bad guy from a hundred miles away? We oughta just keep score on the ones that're up close and personal!'
'Uh-uh,' Brewer replied, and Batman heard her chuckle. 'No changing the bet. Score's nine to six, women's advantage.'
'I think we're being taken, Malibu. These women nowadays. You can't-'
'Gold Eagles, Gold Eagles, this is Eagle Two-oh-one,' Coyote's voice said, cutting in. 'Gather in, chicks. Time to head for home.'
'Two-oh-one, Two-oh-two,' Batman called. 'Hey, Coyote! What's the gouge?'
'Batman, Coyote. We're going back in by squadrons for refuel and rearm, and we're up first in the Marshall Stack.'
'On our way. Are the bad guys gone?'
'Most of 'em. But we're leaving the ones that're left to the Ike and the Nimitz. We've got other fish to fry.'
'Two-oh-one, Two-one-one,' Strickland called. 'What fish did you have in mind?'
'The skipper's got a job for us, Striker,' Coyote said. 'And man, if you've been having fun so far, you're gonna love this!'
Lieutenant Chris Hanson slumped back into her chair in VF-95's ready room, aware of the rustle and thump of other NFOs filing in, aware of the murmuring conversations around her, but mostly aware only of how tired she was. It seemed like the Vipers had been on alert for years. She'd been aloft on CAP last night until 0730 that morning, had just gotten to sleep when an alert had been sounded, had just gotten to sleep again when the Russians had launched this latest attack. She and her RIO, Lieutenant McVey, had catapulted off Jefferson's deck, and been aloft for over an hour. They'd made two Phoenix kills, then had a narrow scrape with a Fulcrum over the Norwegian coast. On the way back, they'd used their last two Phoenix missiles downing a couple of sea-skimming cruise missiles.
God, she was tired.
She looked across at the young, black-haired man slumped in the seat beside her. Roy G. McVey was about as young and raw as they came. Somehow, they'd all started calling him Vader, playing on his last name. His head was back, his eyes closed, his lips parted. He looked like he was asleep.
'Hey, Lobo.'
She looked up. Striker was standing behind her, his hands on the back of the chair.
'Hello, Steve.'
He bent over, so his lips were close by her ear. 'Listen,' he said, whispering so no one else could hear. 'I was wondering about tonight?'
'Uh-uh,' she said. 'Uh-uh! If they let me, I am going to sleep for about five hundred years. Call me in 2500.'
He smiled. 'Actually, I had the same thing in mind. This watch-on, watch-off stuff is-'
'Attention on deck!'
The men and women in the room rose to their feet as Tombstone walked in, Coyote close behind him. 'At ease. At ease.' He took his place behind the podium at the front of the room. 'Sit down and listen up. We don't have much time.'
At his back, Coyote was tacking up a large-scale map of the Kola Peninsula. Lines of bright red quarter-inch tape had been stretched across it, all starting at Bear Station, reaching along several distinct paths through several doglegs, and terminating at various points inland.
'Ladies and gentlemen,' Tombstone said. 'The air phase of Operation White Storm.'
Chris's exhaustion faded back, replaced by intense excitement. An alpha strike, an all-out assault against Russian targets in the Kola Peninsula!
And the Vipers were going to be in it up to their necks!
'The lead attack elements will be Jefferson's VAQ-143 and Eisenhower's VAQ-132. They'll go in first, using HARMs to hit the radar sites at Ozerko, Titovka, and Port Vladimir. Right behind them will be our attack squadrons, VA-89 and VFA-161, plus VA-66 from the Eisenhower. Their targets will be those SAM sites and radar installations we've been tagging with our Hawkeyes, plus naval installations up and down the Kola inlet.
'VF-95 will fly close escort on the Intruders.'
There were several groans in the room. 'Aw, CAG!' Arrenberger said from the back. 'Why us? We've been at full throttle for the last forty-eight hours!' Other voices chimed in, agreeing with him.
Tombstone gave Slider a long, gray stare. 'You have a problem, mister?'
