toggled my ICS. 'You see that? Looks like we've got some weather blowing in.'
'Yeah, looks like.' Sheila's voice was calm and noncommittal. 'I guess they know it on the ground.'
I shook my head. 'They should, if they've got the same weather prediction capabilities that the United States has. Do they?'
'How should I know?'
'Well, I better let them know when we get back down during debrief.
We're supposed to be flying every day for the next couple of weeks, but if that shit rolls in there's not a chance in hell of us getting up tomorrow.
Too bad.'
'Well, maybe they'll take us on a sight-seeing tour.'
'Wonderful. Just what I joined the Navy for.' I couldn't keep up the light banter, pretending that nothing had happened back there. 'Sheila ? I blew it. Sorry, buddy.'
There was a vague note of amusement in her voice when she answered.
'What, Skeeter apologizing? You practicing up for what you're going to say to the admiral? Because if you are, let me tell you that I don't think that's going to cut it.'
'I'm not apologizing, I just- Hell, I guess I am. I should have been watching the altitude more closely.'
Just then, the air traffic controller's voice came on, directing me to a new vector for approach on the base. I lined up on the radial he indicated and glanced down at my altimeter. 'Funny, they're starting our approach out this high.'
'Tomcat 101, request you maintain angels seven on inbound radial.
Currently show you at angels eight.' 'Angels eight?' I said out loud. I glanced back down at the altimeter. We were at eight thousand five hundred feet according to my altimeter. What the-?
'Altitude ? Skeeter, check your altimeter settings. Now!' Sheila said.
I clicked on the mike. 'Request revised altimeter setting for Arkhangelsk,' I said.
The altimeter is one of those funny little instruments onboard an aircraft that will get you killed as fast as a missile. One of the first things you do on approach to a new airfield is reset the altimeter according to your charts. If you leave the altimeter set on, say, San Diego ? basically at sea level ? and you try to land at an airfield significantly above sea level, you'll discover the ground far sooner than you expect to.
I'd reset the altimeter according to our charts during our approach on Arkhangelsk. The numbers came back to my mind ? twenty-nine forty-nine. I glanced down at the setting. It read twenty-nine sixty.
I started swearing, while I flipped the numbers back to the right setting for Arkhangelsk. 'Damn it, somebody's been in here ? Sheila, they tampered with our altimeter!'
'That explains it,' she said, her dawning comprehension clear in her voice. 'Skeeter, I didn't want to say anything. Your ego's big enough as it is, but I've never known you to keep up that lousy of an instrument scan. It's not your fault you were below altitude ? somebody tampered with the altimeter. It was reading well above seven thousand feet when you were actually below seven thousand feet.' 'I should have checked it,' I said.
'We both should have.'
'That sneaky bastard,' I muttered. 'Not enough that he tries to trip me, but playing with a man's altimeter can get somebody killed.' Summaries that I'd read of too many aircraft mishaps flashed through my mind.
Altimeter mistakes and lousy weather were responsible for too many pilots auguring into the side of a mountain. That I'd failed to catch that error pissed me off. 'Wait till the admiral hears about this.' 'Are you really going to tell him?' Sheila asked quietly.
'You put yourself on report for that.'
I shook my head, realizing that I was in a no-win situation. If I kicked up a stink about the altered altimeter, Admiral Magruder would know I'd screwed up on my preflight. Additionally, it would sound like I was whining. I couldn't prove that the Russians had tinkered with it, and I'd just look like a sore loser.
'What do you think?' I asked finally.
'We keep quiet and eat this one,' Sheila said promptly.
'But now that we know, we double-check it next time. The altimeter, and everything else, including the fuel. Real, real, carefully. And then we kick some Russian ass.'
'I'd like that,' I said when she'd finished, rather gratified at her vengeful tone of voice. 'I'd really, really like that.'
'Skeeter, level flight ? no maneuvering!' Sheila said suddenly. 'Don't twitch a muscle.' 'Why?' I asked, although I obeyed her command immediately.
'It's that little bastard MiG. Looks like he wants to play some games.' Her voice was grim.
I craned my neck back around to see. I saw him immediately, the MiG-31, barreling down out of the sky toward me in a steep dive. He pulled up in front of me, maybe half a mile ahead, waggled his wings from side to side for a moment, then executed a series of flawless barrel rolls. He pulled out of that smoothly, gracefully, dived under me then reappeared on the other side, looping around and around me like some sort of insane porpoise.
I swore quietly. 'He wants to see aerobatics, does he? Well, let me just show him-' 'Not a twitch, Skeeter,' Sheila warned again. 'You don't know what he's doing. Two aircraft pulling unbriefed maneuvers in the same airspace is a guarantee that something's going to get fucked.'
I kept on swearing, knowing she was right. Bad enough that the little MiG bastard was rubbing it in, but if I started pulling the same shit to show him what a Tomcat could really do, our chances of a mishap increased dramatically. So for now it was straight and level, vectoring back into the air base with my new altimeter setting and planning my revenge.
From inside a Tomcat, a Russian airfield feels pretty much like an American one. Easier to land on than an aircraft carrier, and international standardization of airfield markings and directions indicators makes getting around fairly straightforward. A white truck with follow-me lights was waiting to direct us to our assigned spot. Sheila and I ran the shutdown checklist quickly, but by the time we were finished, the admiral was already waiting for me just off the flight line.
I popped out a sharp salute and waited for the blast that was sure to come. To my surprise, Tombstone just stared levelly at me. 'Admiral, about what happened up there,' I began, and then let my voice trail off as I realized he wasn't looking for answers. I had the uneasy feeling this was going to be a one-way conversation. Just then, Sheila stepped forward.
She saluted, then touched Gator lightly on the elbow and drew him off to the side for some RIO-to-RIO talk, leaving me alone with the admiral.
'Good move, Skeeter,' the admiral said finally. 'I liked the way you suckered him into revealing more about his performance capabilities. I don't think we've ever seen a MiG pull that dramatic of a maneuver before.'
'What? You mean you think I-'
The admiral cut me off before I had a chance to dig myself even deeper. 'Exactly the sort of intelligence we're here to gather,' he murmured, motioning me to follow him back to the air control terminal.
'Good work.' I followed him, too stunned by his comments to start explaining. Was it possible that the admiral thought I'd really planned that maneuver just for that purpose? Or was he just offering me up a face-saving excuse?
And what did Sheila have to talk to the other RIO about that was so urgent? The altimeter, probably. While she might not want me making excuses to the admiral for my mistakes ? hell, it wasn't excuse, it was reason! ? she'd probably want to make sure that the admiral's own RIO double-checked their own altimeter before their first flight. Fool us once, shame on us; fool us twice ? I let the thought go, oddly reassured by the admiral's explanation.
Even if it weren't true.
The Russians' version of a bachelor officers quarters were no great shakes. It was more spartan than anything I'd run into in the United States Navy. Damn near as uninhabitable as my own compartment onboard Jefferson. Before the modifications we'd made, I mean. Over a period of months onboard a carrier, you get around to customizing your compartment so it's not quite as bleak. My roommates and I had come up with a TV, a VCR, and a bitchin' stereo system that routinely drove the people next to us batty.
The Russian BOQ room was more like a cell. It held a narrow, uncomfortable cot and a chair. That was it. The head facilities were down the hall. Two showers, and I didn't hold out much for a good supply of hot water, judging from how grimy they looked. There were windows to the outside, no curtains or blinds, and I could already
