The Sidewinder streaked toward the MiG, who at the last second seemed to realize that he was in deep, deep shit. The MiG jerked violently, shuddered as the pilot tried to bring it out of the descent. It seemed like he might pull it off for a moment, then his luck ran out.
The MiG exploded into an ugly yellow ball of orange and yellow, gas and black smoke boiling out from it. I whooped a war cry, and heard Sheila chime in. Maybe she wasn't such a bad guy, after all. But where was Tombstone? I scanned the ocean, looking for that white-gray fuselage against the water. Finally, I spotted him. 'You OK, man?' I said over tactical.
'I'm OK,' his voice came back, steadier now that he was no longer fighting the G forces. 'Thanks, Skeeter.'
'How ' we head back to the boat, sir,' I asked, the adrenaline still throbbing through my system. 'Me, I'm so hungry I could even eat a couple of sliders.' The sliders, the greasy flat hamburgers that seemed to be the mainstay of the late-night galley watch section, gave me my year's worth of grease and fat in one sitting.
'I like the sound of that. Wait for me there ? I'll climb back up and you can join.' True to his word, Tombstone's Tomcat picked up altitude quickly, and soon I was smack-dab off his wing where I was supposed to be.
'What was that all about, sir?' I asked finally. 'Why did they wait until we got out this far and then jump us?'
'I don't know for sure, Skeeter, but I've got some ideas on it. We'll talk about it when we're back on deck, OK?' It was clear from his tone of voice that the admiral was in no mood to answer questions. And now that we were out of the frenzy of the battle, we were no longer equals. No more shoving him around, telling him to break off and let me make the shot like I'd done with the last MiG. Not that that should have mattered, anyway.
The MiG was mine to start with. Three kills ? now, that was something.
Hell, I might even have two sliders.
'Tomcat flight, this is Home Plate. Be advised that we are red deck at this time. Repeat, red deck. Tanker support is on its way, guys.' The operations specialist continued, and reeled off a vector to our airborne gas station. I clicked back over to Tombstone's circuit, and asked, 'What's going on?'
The answer was slow in coming, and when it finally got there, it wasn't much help. 'Jefferson's got a few more important things on her mind just now. So button up, let's get some gas, and we'll wait her out.'
Great. Those sliders were getting farther away with every minute that passed.
15
I knew that Batman would rather have been down on the flight deck, standing on one of the catwalks that run just below it and supervising the whole evolution personally. Nevertheless, he was here, on the bridge. A gaggle of surface warfare officers and boatswain's mates were where he wanted to be, with another cluster on the elevator that had been lowered to the level of the hangar bay.
I would have rather been down closer to the action as well. After all, it was my plan.
And my career on the line if it failed.
But if the admiral felt that command leadership required him to be here on the bridge, calmly seated in his chair and watching the evolution from the top of a ten-story building, then the least I could do was keep him company. He had as much riding on the whole thing as I did.
The submarine had come shallow two hours earlier and poked her UHF antenna up above the surface. We had coordinated the entire evolution in short bursts of conversation, and so far it had gone well. We had slowed to two knots, bare steerageway. The submarine approached us from astern, since she was a little bit more maneuverable than we were. From there, it had gone like any standard underway replenishment operation, with the submarine maneuvering into position, then making her dash forward to come alongside us.
We couldn't stop, not completely. To do so would leave both ships at the mercy of the oceans, and the force of the water would eventually push us around to stay beam-on to the swells. Not too terribly troublesome for a carrier, but a real disaster for a round-hulled boat like a submarine.
As it was, we had planned to have her come onto our leeward side to shelter her a bit from the seas and the wind.
A sharp crack split the air, one we could hear even from the bridge.
The first shot line, the small cord tethered to a weight that was fired over to the carrier from the submarine. Attached to it were a heavier line, then another one, each one more substantial than the last. These would form the basis of the rig we would use to transfer a spare air compressor to the submarine, along with assorted other provisions and equipment.
It had been quite a chore, convincing the submarine's skipper that this was what he wanted to do. He hadn't initially, citing first the possibility of detection and later the dangers inherent in underway replenishment between a carrier and a submarine. The admiral had had to threaten to send them back to the States before the sub's skipper had capitulated.
So far, everything had run like we'd practiced this every day of the year. The high line was rigged, and the first transfer of loaded pallets was beginning.
With Tombstone and Skeeter safely back within the Aegis cruiser's air-protection envelope, at least one potential problem had been eliminated. But one of our biggest problems still remained ? the Russian submarines lurking somewhere below the surface of the ocean. Our last detection had been twelve hours ago, and at that time she'd been ten miles to the north. Too close for comfort, but perhaps far enough away that our submarine could sneak out of area and move alongside us without being detected. Just before we'd commenced the entire, tedious approach maneuver, Batman had launched tankers and S-3 Viking ASW aircraft. I thought about having them take along box lunches, just in case something went wrong.
Not only were the S-3s the best aircraft equipped to keep the Russian submarine out of area, and detect it if it tried to make a run on us, but they were also excellent aircraft for sea-air rescue. We also had helicopters in Alert Five, both SH60 ASW ones and straight SAR ones. God forbid that one of the submarine sailors should fall overboard, or one of our people either. But if it happened, we were prepared to deal with it.
The submariners had immediately laid down a long barrier of sonobuoys to the north, then laid a second line just for good measure. The two Vikings patrolled out up ahead of us, while two more monitored our northern flank and astern. I had no great faith in their ability to detect a nuclear submarine acoustically, not if said submarine were really determined to make a silent approach. But if it were there, at least we had a shot at catching it.
The walkie-talkie Batman clutched crackled to life. 'Ready to transfer the first pallet, Admiral.'
Batman lifted it to his mouth. 'Go ahead. And notify me when it's complete.'
'Aye, aye, Admiral.'
We were standing on the bridge railing, outside of the bridge proper and exposed to the elements. The submarine was perhaps sixty feet off our port side. Two thick lines ran between the two ships, onto which were attached the pallets and parcels we were transferring to the submarine.
To an outsider, the bridge would have seemed like a noisy, frantic space. There were four radio speakers mounted on the overhead, another two on each bridge wing. Into those were piped the various tactical circuits, including those that we were required to monitor continuously. Adding to the din were the commands from the conning officer, standing on the bridge wing with us, the OOD who was on the bridge itself, and the repetition and acknowledgment of other orders and directions. In addition to Batman, the officer of the deck and the safety officer held walkie-talkies as well.
When the trouble started, it was with the most innocent reports.
'Home Plate, this is Hunter 701. Buoy seventeen pattern Bravo Six Niner is hot.' The voice of the Viking TACCO was excited. 'Classify this contact as a possible Russian nuclear submarine, Victor Class.'
