very, very important. Tombstone had taken it on himself to personally contact the members of his previous pickup game in Hawaii, and was waiting for their answers. His uncle also had a number of men and women in mind, people he had served with over his decades in the Navy. Between the two of them, they were about to embark on a looting mission within the ranks of the United States Navy.
His uncle Thomas Magruder was brother to Tombstone’s father. Tombstone’s father had been a naval aviator during the Vietnam War. During a daring inland mission to destroy a critical resupply bridge, Tombstone’s father had been shot down. For decades, he’d been listed as missing rather than killed. It was only during the last five years, as Tombstone had acquired enough power within the Navy to give him some degree of flexibility in his assignments, that he’d begun to suspect the truth. During an encounter with a Ukrainian naval officer, Tombstone had learned that there was a possibility that his father had survived the ejection and been taken prisoner. Following the old path through Vietnamese prison camps, Tombstone had found evidence that his father had been taken to Russia. In one of his most grueling missions ever, Tombstone had finally found his father’s grave in Russia.
Uncle Thomas, a naval surface ship officer, had stepped into the gap in Tombstone’s life as a surrogate father. He’d been the one to teach Tombstone to throw a killer curve ball, to encourage him in his studies and coach him in his early years in the Navy, to stand by his side as best man when Tombstone finally married Tomboy. And now, as both of their careers were coming to an end, his uncle had been the one to lead him back to his real passion — flying.
As a former Chief of Naval Operations, his uncle’s possible second career opportunities had been virtually unlimited. But instead of signing on as a highly paid consultant to a defense industry contractor, his uncle had heeded a call to head up a specialized black operations unit composed of men and women who were willing to do what had to be done to prevent war before it started. They were so far off the books that their missions were completely deniable.
Foremost among the scenarios Tombstone and his uncle had planned for were ones involving China. The potential for difficulties in that region was enormous. And, with so much of America’s might committed long-term to the Middle East, there was every chance it would flair into chaos in the near future. Tombstone knew those waters well, having dealt with the Chinese on far too many occasions.
Most of the aircraft would be requisitioned rather than permanently assigned, along with the necessary complement of maintenance technicians. That was one way to keep the budget numbers low enough to cause no alarm elsewhere. The cover story made recruiting the most difficult part of it all. Tombstone’s face was too well known to too many of the operating forces all over the world, and there was little chance that he could avoid being recognized. He even briefly considered plastic surgery, but decided against it.
Ever since his return to the civilian world, Tombstone had felt a lightening up of spirit. The tragedies of the last year were no less real, but for the first time, he thought he might be able to survive losing Tomboy during the last attempted invasion of Hawaii. He had watched helplessly as her plane had gone down, unable to save her. In one sense, his life had ended when his RIO wife had died. Had he simply retired from the Navy at the same time, he thought the pain would have been unbearable. But the prospect of flying again full time had been the only sliver of hope and light in his otherwise dark world.
No, life would never be the same. For as long as he lived, he would feel this aching emptiness, this sense of a part of himself being irrevocably gone. But at least he would have a purpose in life, something on which to focus his energies. And eventually, he might even have a chance to strike back at the bastards that had taken Tomboy from him.
“Look,” Batman said, elbowing him in the side and bringing Tombstone back to the present. “She’s getting underway.”
FOUR
Admiral Willis E. “Coyote” Grant leaned over the railing, staring at the pier below. Even though the ship was moving away from the pier, the V-shaped configuration of the carrier resulted in the flight deck overhanging the pier for a considerable distance. The carrier would be well off the pier before he would see water between the ship and the concrete.
Not much was likely to go wrong, not now. Every senior ship-handler onboard was watching, bringing centuries of experience to bear on the evolution of moving away from the pier. Even his Chief of Staff, Navy Captain Jim Ganner, was watching, staring aft as though he could read the radio signals connecting the Officer of the Deck, the forward and aft observers and the tugs.
“Looking good, Admiral,” Ganner said finally, as though Coyote had been waiting for his opinion. Ganner had a way of sounding like he thought that any aviator around really needed the adult supervision of a surface officer. And that included his own admiral. No matter that Coyote had had command of
But it was only Ganner’s second week onboard, far too soon to be characterizing minor character flaws as mortal sins. Coyote would give him some rope, let him run with the bit for a while before he had to start jerking the man up short. He’d get him settled in before the first cruise — and if he didn’t, well, there were plenty of Navy captains around who’d jump at the billet. Plenty of ’em who’d know when to speak up and when to just stay out of the way. Like Ganner ought to be doing right now.
For the last thirty minutes, Coyote had paced the flag bridge, unable to settle down in any one spot. On the deck below him, the captain of the ship and his crew were making the final preparations for getting underway. Four tugs were already around the massive carrier, the lines firmly affixed. He heard the whistle blast from one that signified they were ready to commence operations.
Coyote knew all too well what was going on one deck below him. It was a nerve-racking game, to maneuver an aircraft carrier away from a pier, even with the assistance of tugs. Even more so when she was brand- spanking-new, not a scratch on her, with a price tag higher than that ever paid for any aircraft carrier before.
The flight deck looked strange empty, as did the hangar bay. There was not a single aircraft onboard yet. Oh, they would soon come flocking, just as soon as they cleared the harbor area and controlled sea lanes and could make their way to the flight operations area. Then the deck would be insane, as systems were tested real-time for the first time and the inevitable glitches sprang up.
In addition to flexing the flight deck and flight deck crew, the ship would also be testing every system in her engineering department. That meant full-speed runs, crash backs or emergency stops and emergency reverses, and a variety of tight turns and weaving maneuvers designed to give everything every possible chance to go wrong. There would be man-overboard drills, engineering casualty drills, firefighting drills, drills, drills, and more drills, until the entire crew and wardroom were ready to scream. And then there would be more drills.
But as grueling as the next two weeks would be, the honor of being a plank owner, or member of the first crew, made up for it. There would never be another acceptance sea trial, never another set of plank owners.
The handheld radio next to Coyote crackled to life as a stream of orders began issuing from the bridge to the tugs. Coyote listened critically, ready to step in if he thought the captain was hazarding the ship, but he could detect no flaw in the captain’s performance. Ganner kept up a running commentary, as though Coyote needed an explanation, before Coyote finally told him to keep quiet.
“Admiral?” A chief petty officer approached, a clipboard held in front of him. “Flash traffic, sir. I thought you’d want to see this.”
“Thanks, Chief.” Coyote reached past Ganner to take the clipboard, resisting the temptation to slap Ganner’s hand as he reached for it. Coyote had served a brief stint as Chief of Staff and he knew what the job entailed.
Yeah, so a chief of staff was supposed to run interference for his admiral and ensure that he only had to deal
