“Having a cruise missile sitting on your ass is no joke.”
“We were loaded up for antiair,” Bird Dog swore. “A couple of Rockeyes on the wings would have been a hell of a lot more help a little while ago.”
“Well, why don’t we go back and get some?” Gator asked. “After all, we don’t seem to have any weapons at all right now.”
“Trap on the carrier?”
“You have somewhere else in mind? There aren’t a whole hell of a lot of choices out here, Bird Dog,” Gator said sarcastically. “Besides, you have any better ideas?”
Bird Dog shook his head. He might not have a good idea, but he could see a hell of a lot that could go wrong with this one. Who knew how much control the carrier had over its own flight operations, with the terrorists on board? Additionally, what were the odds that they could land, get rearmed, and launch again without someone objecting?
“I guess it’s worth asking about,” he said finally. “Who do we have comms with?”
“just the air boss. From what he says, he hasn’t heard from the bridge, Combat, or TFCC in twenty minutes. I think that’s probably a good indicator of their tactical status.”
“If they don’t have control of the bridge, how are they gonna get us the right winds to land?”
“What, a little wind bothering you now? We can land in just about anything except a tailwind, you know. Still, well, let’s give them a call and see what they think of the idea. We’ll worry about the details later.”
Bird Dog picked up the radio to contact the air boss. As crazy as it sounded, if the Tomcat could do something about the submarine on the carrier’s tail, it might improve the situation.
The air boss shifted uneasily in his seat and glared down at the deck. With the carrier heading west, the anemometer indicated a tailwind of thirty knots across the deck. Even if he had an aircraft ready to launch, there was no way they were getting off the deck. Not with that wind.
And where would they go, anyway? The nearest air base was well out of tactical range, unless the carrier launched tankers to support a divert. No, he decided, better keep the aircraft on deck.
“Sir. A strange request from Tomcat Two-oh-one,” the operations specialist said. He pointed toward the air boss’s communication panel. “Button three, boss.”
The air boss picked up the receiver, acknowledged the call-up, and listened quietly for a few moments. A slow smile spread across his face. After a few short comments, he hung up the receiver and turned to his tower crew. He surveyed them quickly, finally fixing his eyes on Petty Officer First Class Berkshire. The operations specialist sported an Enlisted Surface Warfare insignia on his neatly pressed dungaree shirt.
“Berkshire! Get over here,” the air boss said. “Time for you to lay some of that black shoe magic on me. Here’s what I want to do …”
Thirty minutes later, the enlisted men and women had rigged up a sound-powered phone circuit between the tower and after-steering, the auxiliary compartment in the aft end of the ship that housed the rudder mechanism and alternative steering capabilities.
“With the bridge and Combat out of control, I reckon that makes me about the senior officer around,” the air boss said. He straightened and took a deep breath. “But this is a hell of a lot different from flying an F-14. People, you got any good ideas, I wanna hear them immediately. Don’t make me look stupid on this.”
Berkshire, now seated in the miniboss’s chair, swallowed nervously. “Boss, I had to stand some conning officer watches to get my pin, but that’s been a couple of years.”
The air boss turned and glared at him. “Are you saying you don’t remember?”
“No, it’s just that … I …”
The technician’s voice trailed off.
Berkshire started to wilt under the air boss’s glare. His hand reached up involuntarily and touched the ESWS insignia ironed on his shirt. It did mean something, didn’t it? His mind flashed back to the endless hours of study, the grueling written exam, and the six-hour oral examination he had to pass to win his water wings.
Yes, it did, he decided, feeling his confidence return. He’d survived hours of questioning by the captain, the executive officer, and the senior enlisted men aboard. They wouldn’t have qualified him if they didn’t believe in him, didn’t trust him to know his stuff. And now was the time to prove it.
“Yes, boss, I know what to do,” he said confidently. “The first thing you want to do is shift the steering to after-steering. We’ve already done that. Now you’ll want to test your rudder. I’ll relay your orders for you to after- steering — put ‘em in the right language, and make sure we’re not doing anything, uh-uh-“
“Stupid?” the air boss queried. He nodded sharply. “That’s exactly what you’re supposed to do, Berkshire. Keep me from doing anything stupid. And don’t you forget it.”
“Right, then. The first thing you’ll want to do, boss, is order five degrees right rudder. I’ll pass that on to them, and you watch the repeater to make sure we change course. Then, we’ll go back the other way. That way, we know we can maneuver. Make sure the linkages are all set correctly.”
“Make it so,” the air boss answered, turning to his right so that he watched the forward part of the ship.
“There’s only one thing that worries me a little, boss,” Berkshire continued. “Usually, you want to do a visual check on both sides of the ship to make sure there’s no traffic around you before you turn. We don’t have a clear look at the right side of the ship, so we’re going to be working on faith. Not a bad bet in this neck of the ocean, since there’s not likely to be any traffic around, but it’s something to be aware of.”
“Turn this puppy right five degrees,” the air boss responded. “I’ll take full responsibility for any mishaps.”
Berkshire nodded. “Right five degrees rudder,” he translated for the after-steering crew.
Both men watched the repeater twitch, then move slowly to the right, indicating the ship was responding to rudder control from after-steering. They repeated the maneuver, using increasing degrees of left and right rudder, until finally Berkshire was satisfied that they had control of the ship.
“Now find me some wind,” the air boss ordered. “You know what we need.”
“The easiest way to do that is to just start a turn and watch the relative wind indicator until you get what you want,” Berkshire responded. “I can do the calculations manually, but-“
“Do it the fastest way,” the air boss answered. He glanced up at the sky, as though looking for Tomcat 201. “Let’s get those boys down on deck, rearmed, and back in the air.”
“Will you look at that?” Gator said.
Bird Dog nodded and adjusted his own flight pattern to compensate for the carrier’s movement. “Trying to get her nose into the wind, is she?”
“Looks like it to me. Bird Dog, since we’re the only damned aircraft in this pattern, how about we settle in two miles astern? Save us some time when we want to start making our approach.”
“Good idea.” Bird Dog relayed their plan to the air boss, then moved the Tomcat back aft of the carrier. With no other aircraft in the pattern, he started executing a lazy figure eight instead of the standard oval orbit track.
The call came ten minutes later. “Tomcat Two-oh-one, you’re cleared for final,” Bird Dog heard the air boss say.
“Ready, partner?” he asked Gator.
“As ready as we’ll ever be. Remember, we’re going to be getting on board without an LSO. You keep a close watch on that meatball.”
“And you speak up if you see anything going wrong,” Bird Dog responded. “Unless there’s anything else, let’s get it done. We’ve got ordies with armament waiting for us on the deck.”
Bird Dog headed the Tomcat away from the carrier, taking it out to the five-mile point. He slowly decreased his altitude, finally settling in right on glide path two miles behind the ship. He headed for the boat, keeping a careful eye on the stern, making minute course and altitude corrections that his gut told him were right.
Finally, at the half-mile point, he got a clear visual on the meatball.
“Oh, shit,” he swore. “Gator, the meatball is down.”
“What? You mean-“
