'I'm okay,' he said finally. The words were forced out between clenched teeth. 'My arm ? they fixed me?'
Okay, so maybe he wasn't all the way there yet. The last couple of hours must have been a blur for him. I debated rehashing them, then glanced toward the front. There was nothing separating us from the security man and the driver, and I had evidence that the security man knew at least one word of English. 'Yeah, they set your arm.'
Gator nodded, then looked back up at me. 'What happened?'
I shook my head. 'Not here, Gator. It's not safe.' I pointed to the guys up front. His eyes followed my gesture, and it seemed to make sense to him. He nodded, then said, 'Are you okay?'
Jesus, how could the guy even think of it? Here we were, trundling off to God knows where, his arm in a sling and my ass in one, and he asks if I'm okay? I don't know what I ever did to deserve flying with a guy like Gator, but whatever it was, it wasn't enough. He'd been taking care of me for years now, going along with some of the wild- ass schemes I cooked up ? the one over the Arctic came to mind first, where we'd whizzed along blind nearly at ground level to chase down some bad guys living in the ice spears ? and he'd damned near never said a word. Oh sure, he complained from time to time, but he went along with it. And so far, I hadn't done anything serious enough to get us killed.
At least not until now.
If I ever got out of here, I was gonna have to make it up to him somehow. Be more considerate, not roll inverted in a steep dive just for the sheer hell of it when I know it pisses him off. Listen to him occasionally, even laugh at those dumb-ass jokes he likes. Hell, I'd even make his rack every day if it would get us out of this situation.
'I'm fine,' I said finally. 'As fine as I can be.'
Gator nodded. It looked like the medicine had kicked in just a little bit more. His eyes, unfocused and glazed, drifted shut, then jolted back open wide as we hit another bump.
'Where are they taking us? Did they say?'
'They're not the most talkative of fellows,' I said.
I'd taken a long hard look at the sky when we walked out of the hospital and headed for the truck, wondering if the air battle was still going on. I hoped not ? it had looked like it was turning in our favor when we departed the pattern, but I couldn't be sure. Still, given enough Tomcats and Hornets, the United States Navy can whip the ass of any fighter air force around. And that included the bad-ass MiGs that were flown by the Vietnamese. Hell, I'd shot down a couple myself in the last Spratly Islands conflict.
I hadn't seen anything, but I was glad I'd at least looked. There was no chance that we would see it now, not this deep in the jungle. Trees towered overhead, tangled with vines and undergrowth. The sky was just patches we'd occasionally catch a glimpse of. The real overhead was the jungle.
I was halfway expecting it when we got there, but it still depressed me. Wire fencing, with guard posts set in every corner. One main building, no signs of barracks or anything like that. But behind the building, a structure in the ground that slanted downwards, about eight feet across at the entrance and maybe six feet high. The entrance was fortified with huge wooden girders, a nicety of construction that degenerated further back into unfinished tree trunks.
The open cavern inside was pretty big, and seemed to be well supported by timbering and boards. It was maybe fifty feet by twenty, illuminated only by a single strand of electric lights that ran across the middle of the ceiling. Near the rear, there were eight sets of bunk beds. A primitive bucket evidently constituted the sanitary arrangements.
One of our guards flicked on the lights, pointed us down the ramp, and gave me a gentle shove. I started to swing at him, but Gator caught my arm with his good one. 'Not now.'
I looked around the wire enclosure outside. Twenty, maybe thirty uniformed ground troops were milling around smartly, their curiosity about us evidently at a fever pitch. Our two guards held them back, waving them away with their weapons.
We went in and settled down on two bunks, the lower two that were side by side near the forward part of the cavern. It seemed important to me to be as near as I possibly could get to that one blank patch of natural sunlight. Gator stretched out on his rack and fell asleep. I lay down on mine and tried to think.
What were the odds that anyone had seen us taken by the Vietnamese? The helo had seen us in the water, sure, and had probably gotten a report back to Jefferson. But after it had been shot down, what had happened next? Had any of the aircraft overhead actually seen the Vietnamese fishing boat come out and pick us up?
And what about Fred ? General Hue, I mean? If he really was a general, what was he doing flying? You don't do that when you get stars, at least not in the United States Navy. You barely get to fly when you're a captain. And if he wasn't a general, what exactly was he?
My mind ran around in circles, trying to make some sense of it and wondering whether anybody even knew we were still alive. Finally, despite my best intentions of standing guard over Gator the entire time, I fell asleep.
6
I hauled my ancient ass up six decks to Pri-Fly to watch the preparations. We'd lost three Tomcats, one tanker, and one helo. That in addition to the E-2C that went down four days before.
It wasn't just the aircraft, although that was the way we phrased it to keep from facing the ultimate tragedy. Airframes could be replaced, but the men and women who'd flown in them could not. Not in my air wing, and not in the families ? wives, husbands, children, and parents ? that they'd left behind. I would be writing those letters all too soon, facing the hard reality of what we do as day-to-day business. Then there would be time to mourn, time to think about them as I knew them, as I saw them in the mess every day and in the passageways of my ship.
But for now, we went by the numbers. It reduced the war to what it had to be for us to fight it ? for if we really thought about our people too long and too hard, or even about the other guy, we'd lose what you have to have to get shot off the pointy end of an aircraft carrier and go into battle.
'Every aircraft you have, CAG,' I said for probably the third time. It wasn't necessary ? he'd heard me the first time.
CAG nodded. 'We have contingency plans, of course,' he began. 'Actually drafting up the flight plans and getting all the birds on deck in the right spots with weapons on wings will take a little time.' He shot me a glance that said he knew that I knew exactly how much time. I ignored it.
'Two hours ? every aircraft,' I said. 'Unless it's an out and out hangar queen, I want it in the air.'
'We'll do it.' CAG stood. 'And if you could excuse me, I probably need to be down below keeping an eye on it.' He pointed one finger in the direction of Vietnam. 'Get a good look at the coastline, Admiral. In a couple of hours, there's gonna be too much smoke and fire to see anything.'
CAG headed back down to his office on the 03 level, trailing a couple of Strike Warfare people in his wake like pilot fish. He was a good man, and if anybody could pull this off, he could. The tower was fully manned up because we had SAR assets airborne. I'd sent out four helos and three S-3s, hoping that by carefully quartering the area we might pick up some trace ? any trace ? of our downed aircraft.
Of our crews.
So far, the results had been zero. Three oil slicks, one chunk of a fuselage floating. No signs of any aircrew anywhere, and that was all that mattered. Evidence that they'd gone into the drink didn't matter ? hell, that was something we already knew.
The SH-60s and CH-46s had one advantage over the S-3. They could hover, get a good close look at the water, and see if there were any men in it. The S-3, on the other hand, had a lot longer legs. With tanking, she could stay airborne for five hours easy, although the noise and vibration would reduce crew efficiency considerably before then.
