inquired, recklessly confident with the adrenaline screaming through his veins. “What more could you ask from a pilot?”
“The common sense God gave a gnat would do for starters.”
With that, the backseater fell silent.
“The air battle is still a standoff,” Batman reported to Tombstone.
He sighed, feeling the weight of responsibility of sending young pilots out to die. They were the finest pilots in the world, flying the most capable aircraft, but air combat was still unpredictable. Most would come back?but some wouldn’t.
“They don’t have a sustainable force,” Tombstone said shortly. “I notice there’re no tankers reported?that means they have to land to refuel. Lost time?we’ll take them eventually.”
The Turks were proving to be surprisingly tenacious, remaining engaged against the American fighters even after a second wave of Hornets and Tomcats arrived from Jefferson, even after it was clear that the Americans were outperforming their adversaries in all categories of skill. One by one the Turkish F-14’s dropped into the water, either accompanied by billowing parachutes as their aircrews escaped or raining down on the water in a fireball. “Sooner or later, they’ve gotta quit.”
Batman frowned. “There’s something else odd about it?that last wave of MiGs,” he said slowly. “They’re not Turkish?they’re Ukrainian. Oh, they’ve got Turkey’s colors painted on their tail, but it’s absolutely clear at this point that they’re not what they seem to be.”
Batman turned to Lab Rat. “Isn’t that so, Commander Busby?”
The senior Intelligence Officer nodded. “We caught one of them transmitting in the clear?otherwise, they stayed on secure lines. Definitely Ukrainian.”
Tombstone tossed his pencil on the table, and leaned back in the chair. “Ukrainian?that explains it, I suppose.”
He looked at the two men steadily. “So what do we do now?”
Batman turned to Lab Rat. “Go ahead and brief him.”
Lab Rat took a deep breath. “I’ve taken the liberty of preparing two strike packages. One is aimed against Turkey, the other Ukraine.”
He passed over a large-scale chart with hastily scribbled pencil markings on it. “Here you can see the two command centers, one in Sevastopol and the other in Izmir. Shiloh can have her Tomahawks retargeted against either one of them in a matter of minutes. Once we take out command-and-control facilities, the fighters may become confused, pull back some while they wait for an alternate command center to take over with new orders. You know how dependent they are on their ground-control-intercept officers.”
Tombstone studied the charts. He tapped the penciled target symbol on the Crimean Peninsula. “These bastards started it all?that first attack on La Salle. It looked like Turkey, but at this point I’m willing to bet it was Ukraine. That’s the first target. Let’s teach them a lesson.”
“You’ll get flak from State over this,” Batman cautioned. “After all, we’re supposedly en route to their shipyards for technical assistance.”
“I don’t give a fuck about State,” Tombstone blazed. “Their calls already got us into this?dammit, neither you or I would ever have been caught dead in this strait, not under these circumstances.”
“I agree,” Batman put in. “Just wanted to bring it up. But to hell with them all.”
He turned back to the Intelligence Officer. “You’ve got your orders?let’s retarget against Ukraine.”
Busby nodded. “Just as well?I was afraid you were going to say both. That would complicate matters a bit.”
“I can take out the command centers, but where does that leave us in the end?” Tombstone said, staring down at the chart. “This whole tactical scenario?dammit, one aircraft carrier is not enough. Shiloh’s doing her best, but we need an additional show of force, a battle group stationed with some air-power just off Turkey’s Mediterranean coast, while we quell the Black Sea. The U.S. Air Force base in Turkey at Incirclik is no help?they scrambled their aircraft out to safety when La Salle got hit. Greece bitched about allowing overflights, so they’re staging out of the United Kingdom for now. Too long a lead time to use them for immediate support, but just where the hell am I gonna get another carrier and some fighters?”
Just then, a voice called from TFCC. “Admiral Wayne? I think you might want to see this.”
The two admirals exchanged glances, then stood as one and walked into the TFCC. A new symbol had just popped into being on the large-screen display, something that had been happening all too often in the last three hours. With one big difference?this one bore the symbology of a friendly unit.
“Who the hell-” Batman started to say. He fell silent as the name of the ship flashed up beside the symbology: La Salle.
“Jefferson, this is La Salle,” a voice said over tactical.
Batman reached for the handset, paused, and then handed it to Tombstone. “Your ship, Admiral?I’ll let you sort this out.” Batman’s voice was grim. “I’ve got an air battle to win.”
He turned his back on Tombstone, and his attention back to the large-screen display.
“Captain?” Tombstone said, his voice sliding up the scale in incredulity. “What are you doing out here? I thought-“
“Pardon me for interrupting, Admiral, but you did give me a free hand,” said a familiar voice. It was the captain of La Salle, the man to whom Tombstone had given complete discretion in getting the ship back into the ball game. “You wanted your ship back?well, here she is.”
Tombstone glanced at the telephone, making sure that the light indicating secure transmissions was lit. “What are your capabilities?” he asked, still not believing that the flagship was cruising toward him. “God, man, you’re an answer to a prayer.”
The La Salle had just entered the tactical link, transmitting its positioning data to the aircraft carrier and all other units. It was still in the Mediterranean, headed for the Aegean and the eastern coast of Turkey.
“We’ve been following the battle from your transmissions, Admiral,” the captain continued. “I can offer you the surface-search radar and six Harriers.”
“How in the world are you even steaming?” Tombstone demanded. “From the condition of that ship that I saw, there’s no way you should even be underway.”
“New challenges demand special solutions,” the captain replied, satisfaction in his voice. “We had enough spare parts on board to cobble together some electronics?we’re not fully mission-capable, but I’ve got my close-in weapons systems operable, a surface-search radar, and all of my Link capabilities. And as for power?Admiral, did you have a chance to tour the ship? The entire ship, I mean.”
Tombstone thought for a minute. “Not all of it,” he said finally. “Mainly the flag spaces?that and the flight deck.”
“With all due respect, you missed a very important part of the ship. Underneath the flight deck that you aviators think so much about, there’s something called a well deck?it’s open to the ocean, and it’s where we keep all of our amphibious vehicles. Plenty of room in there for a couple of tugs.”
Tombstone was speechless for a moment. “Tugs?” he said finally, not believing what he was hearing. “You can’t be serious.”
“Well, it’s not that radical a solution. We use tugs for propulsive power all the time, don’t we? It’s just that they’re usually made up to the outside of the ship, getting us off a pier or into port. Fortunately, as we’ve just proved, a couple of oceangoing tugs can handily fit inside the well deck. They push as well as they pull. Besides, Harriers aren’t all that picky about wind across the deck for flight operations.”
Tombstone began laughing. “I don’t believe it. You mean to tell me you’ve got two tugs inside your well deck? And they’re shoving you around so that you can get underway?”
He laughed again, shaking his head in disbelief. “Captain, of all the-“
“Creative solutions you’ve ever seen, Admiral?” the captain finished. “Thank you very much, sir. After all, you did tell me to get the ship squared away.”
“Okay, you’re here,” Tombstone said. “Get those Harriers ready to launch?I’m going to need them for backup in case Turkey needs some additional convincing.”
