to it, the LINK reflected it.
Thor noticed a couple of leakers, an inbound pair of fighters veering off further to the west than most of the others. He thumb-clicked a target designation and waited for a split second for the screen to reflect his decision. As soon as it did, he peeled off toward it with his wingman in the high slot.
“Two, you got them?” Thor asked his wingman. “Sixty miles out, just over 600 knots. Looks like they’re going high-low.”
“That’s affirmative,” his wingman answered. “I’ll take the high, of course, then, give you a hand.”
“In your dreams.” And why the hell did everyone seems so convinced he needed any help, anyway? First Lobo, now his wingman. Thor had been killing MiGs long before either of them had strapped into their first ejection seats.
The sharp warning buzz of his ESM gear cut off the strain of thought.
Well, that will at least keep him busy. The AIM—120 (advanced medium range air-to-air missile) was a follow-on to the Sparrow. It was capable of turning on an active seeker head after launch, at either a given time or distance, and guiding independently onto the designated target. It had a blast fragmentation warhead with a smart fuse, and could receive midcourse guidance updates to refine terminal honing track. It was capable of speeds of up to Mach 4, with a range of forty miles. The 345-pound missile carried a fifty-pound warhead.
For just a moment, Thor wished that his beloved Hornet was capable of carrying the Phoenix missile. With its longer range of over one hundred miles, the Phoenix might not always find its target, but it certainly forced the enemy into a defensive mode.
Thor waited until the missile began its approach on him, then he initiated countermeasures. Chaff and flares kicked out of the underbelly of the aircraft, rotating wildly in the air and doing their damnedest to present an attractive target to the incoming missile. Seconds after deploying countermeasures, Thor cut the Hornet into a hard breaking turn. He watched the radar screen, and saw the missile waiver for moment, then settle on the massive cloud of metallic strips and heat sources.
Nothing to it, he thought. The day they come up with a smart long-range missile is the day I’ll worry.
The make was now barely forty miles out, just at the outer edge of his AMRAAM engagement envelope. Take the shot now? Or wait a few minutes, give time to close to a distance with increased probability of kill.
But now the enemy Tomcat was climbing, and turning slightly away from him. He could see it in the distance now, fire spouting out of the tailpipes as it streaked straight up in the sky.
Thor debated for a moment swapping targets with his wingman, and taking the other aircraft, which was now at a lower altitude than his original one. It made sense, since his wingman would have to expend less energy to match the other Tomcat altitude.
But dammit, this was personal. The bastard had
The heavier Tomcat he’d targeted was now below him, turning nimbly for an aircraft of its size. But while the Tomcat might be able to outlast the Hornet in the sky, there was no way the Greek pilot could put his aircraft through the same paces that Thor could with the Hornet. No way at all.
His prey cut hard to the south, sacrificing some altitude for additional speed and tightening the turn. Thor was on him in an instant, barreling down from on high to slip in behind in perfect targeting position. The Tomcat knew he was there — had to know — and started a desperate series of jinks and turns through the aerial killing ground, pumping out flares and chaff like there was no tomorrow.
And indeed there would be no tomorrow for this particular traitor, Thor thought, as he slid the weapons selector switch from AMRAAM to Sidewinder. Not at this range. Not with this weapon.
The nine-foot Mach-two missile exploded off the Hornet’s wing, streaking out for the Macedonian. The rollerons stabilized it in the air as the guidance system detected the irresistible lure of the Tomcat’s engines pumping heat out its ass. Thor pickled off another missile, wary of the first Sidewinder falling for the alluring flares now gyrating in the air in front of it, but there was no need for it. At this range, the first Sidewinder barely had time to clear Thor’s wing before it was trying to climb up inside the Tomcat’s tailpipe. Thor broke hard right, barely clearing the massive fireball of detonating warhead, unexpended aviation fuel and metal shards from the Tomcat. The second missile exploded inside the fireball itself, throwing the metal debris out at an even faster speed.
“Scratch one Greek,” Thor howled, breaking circuit discipline as well as Marine Corp cool to announce his victory. It was payback, and it felt good. Real good.
The harsh warning of his ESM gear broke off his Rebel yell in midcry. A radio call from his wingman confirmed the danger—“Thor, on your ass! Get the hell out of my line of fire.”
Thor dropped the nose of the Hornet down and headed for the deck. In his pursuit to wreak vengeance on the Tomcat, he’d forgotten the primary rule that every aviator learned early on, or paid for with his life — the scan. Even with the HUD, it was possible to get so fixated on a particular target that the pilot forgot to watch the rest of the battle or neglected to fly his aircraft. And Thor had done exactly that. While he’d been stalking the lead Tomcat, the other one had managed to slip by his wingman and turn into Thor, waiting until the right moment to slip in behind him.
“Get him off me, get him off me. He’s got a lock!”
“Thor on my mark — break right.
Thor slammed the Hornet into the hardest turn he’d ever experienced, standing the Hornet on wingtip and continuing his downward path toward the ground. His HUD showed two missiles clobbering the air above him, their tracks marked with elongated speed leaders pointing directly at the Tomcat on Thor’s six.
Thor continued the turn through one hundred and eighty degrees, knowing there was no way the Greek Tomcat could keep up. As he reached the reciprocal of his previous course, he pulled the aircraft up. The ground was coming up far too fast, craggy and foreboding in this part of the country. Not that Marines minded flying nap of the earth — hell, they lived for close air support to the guys on the ground! — but doing it at damned near max speed on a steep angle of descent bordered on suicidal. He had to have some altitude, and had to have it now.
“Goddamn it, Thor, you’re right back — left, break left! You can’t shake him, but you can get the fuck out of the way!”
Suddenly, Thor was fed up. Allies that turned into enemies, allies shooting down Marine fighters, the ribbing from Lobo and his wingman — enough was enough. Yes, by gaining altitude, he’d put himself squarely back in the path of the oncoming Tomcat, right. His wingman should have taken the shot — Thor would find out later why he hadn’t. But since he hadn’t, it was time for a little on the job training.
“Back off, asshole,” Thor snarled. “Let me show you how this is done.”
“Thor, you can’t — he’s almost on you!”
“I said, back off!” Thor nailed the Hornet into the afterburner zone, then cut hard back to the right. The Tomcat — the HUD said it was right behind him, closing hard and fast. The ESM warning buzzer confirmed it.
NINETEEN
The chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff stared down the folder on his desk. One last problem to wrap up with Greece and Macedonia — and one that should be fairly simple to solve. He turned to the chief of naval operations, who was sitting off to the side on a long, low leather couch that graced one wall. “You know what you
