Keith Douglass
Terror At Dawn
ONE
By the time the aircraft carrier USS
None of the above had materialized, at least not in a way that he’d expected. The much-anticipated “exciting adventures” had consisted primarily of being yelled at by chief petty officers, first in boot camp and then at his A school. All he’d seen of the world so far was Great Lakes, Illinois, and it had been a cold, inhospitable place filled with people who talked funny to a kid from San Diego. The high-tech training, okay, the Navy had come through on that count, but it wasn’t exactly like he’d had a chance to use it. His Data System A school had been six months long, and he’d studied hard to graduate first in his class. He’d been given first choice of the available billets and he’d picked VF-95, an F-14 Tomcat squadron currently deployed to the Persian Gulf on board the USS
And the Persian Gulf — now that was another whole disappointment in itself, wasn’t it? The war on terrorism had shifted its focus back into the Middle East, as the connection between Osama bin Laden’s henchmen and Iraq had become so obvious that even public opinion supported the recent increased presence in the area. With rigorous internal security measures in place within the Continental United States, a growing National Guard involvement in keeping track of foreign visitors, and a few months without overt threats of violence, the President had decided that now was the time to deal with the Middle East once and for all. The USS
To Williams, that sounded like the place to be for a hotshot young avionics data — systems technician. But daydreams of flying attack missions over hostile territory and astounding his squadron mates with his cold determination and heroism had not survived A school. Somehow, the Navy did not seem to feel that his duties encompassed flying sidekick on combat missions, although he was still convinced he’d heard the recruiter mention something of that nature. Nor did his squadron seem particularly impressed with his potential ability to contribute to the war.
The day Williams checked into his squadron, they’d sent him to the galley for cleaning detail and mess cooking for three months. Since then, he’d been scrubbing decks and peeling potatoes all the way across the Pacific.
Airman Williams was willing to tolerate most of the indignities inflicted on him, except for the failure of the recruiter’s last promise to materialize. So far, he wasn’t feeling a helluva lot of pride at serving his country. Mostly, he felt tired and lonely.
Like now. His day had started at 0400. Eight hours later, he’d been informed by the mess management specialist senior chief that he was being transferred back to his squadron. He’d been excited, expecting that now he would finally have a chance to show them what he could really do fixing the data systems on an aircraft, but that hadn’t materialized either. He’d been assigned to the line division, told to qualify as a plane captain, and then maybe after a year he would be transferred to his rating work center. So much for training and high-tech electronics.
As it happened, the line chief petty officer had had a hole in his night watchbill to fill. Williams showed up just as the petty officer was trying to rearrange too few bodies to cover too many watches, and the young airman had promptly been slotted into the 0200–0400 roving security patrol. Williams spent the rest of the afternoon and evening checking in, and caught three hours of sleep before being roughly awakened by the roving patrol and told to get his ass into the hangar bay. There, another airman had passed over a flashlight, sound-powered phone, walkie- talkie, and a few brief instructions on what he was supposed to do.
It was never really cool this time of year in the Persian Gulf, but the temperature had dropped to an almost bearable ninety degrees. There was a light breeze blowing in through the open hangar bay doors, not enough to really cool him off, but enough so that he could pretend it did. He tried to not remember the fantasies he’d had before reporting to the ship, the ones about walking the streets of exotic cities, hearing the babble of other languages, coolly bargaining down sinister merchants in the local market until an exotic — try as he might, Williams thought that the word
His current assignment was every bit as hot as his fantasies about exotic women, although in an entirely different and most unpleasant way. For the next two hours, he was expected to walk around the hangar bay checking to make sure that all aircraft were securely tied down, that no fires started, and just generally keeping an eye on the security of the place. His fantasy woman was replaced by the few technicians still working on aircraft, the dim lights of a scented candle replaced by hangar bay lights far overhead.
There were eight aircraft packed into the hangar bay, all in various stages of disassembly. Most minor repairs were taken care of on the flight deck, but major evolutions such as an engine change-out or major component replacement took place below. Aircraft were lowered into the hangar bay on one of six elevators that lined the edge of the flight deck immediately overhead.
It only took about fifteen minutes for Airman Williams to reach his boredom threshold. It was better duty than the galley in some ways. At least he was alone, allowed to roam around at will and take a good hard look at whatever interested him, alone to daydream about how duty in the Persian Gulf was supposed to be. While there might not be any exotic women around — and none of the female sailors he’d met so far came even close to filling that description — at least there was no first-class petty officer standing over him bitching about how many massive pots and pans there were still to clean, no clouds of chemical-laden steam from the dishwashing machine enveloping him. Instead, there was a sharp tang of aviation fuel and grease and the acrid smell of metal.
The carrier was never entirely silent, not even at night. The massive machinery that kept her running vibrated through her steel hull, producing a dull background noise that Williams had long since ceased to hear. Metal clanked on metal as technicians struggled with avionics boxes, slammed panels shut, and shouted for tools.
So what exactly was he supposed to be looking for? It wasn’t like this was a shore station, with the threat of civilians wandering onto the base and trying to damage aircraft. Everybody on the ship was Navy except for a cadre of contractor representatives and a few squads of Marines. Sure, he’d heard stories about disgruntled sailors trying to sabotage the birds, but how likely was that? Not very. So what really was the point of this whole watch? At least in the galley, he had a stack of clean pots and pans to show for his hard work.
He paused by one of the open hangar bay doors, a massive opening in the side of the ship. The hangar bay ran two thirds of the length of the ship, and when the hangar bay doors on either side were pulled back, almost the entire area was exposed to the open sea.
With the lights on in the hangar bay, the night outside was a dark, impenetrable black. He could see a few bright stars on the horizon, the lights of the cruiser keeping station to the east, but that was it.
His radio crackled to life, and the brusque voice said, “Hangar Bay, what’s your status?”
Carefully remembering his training on proper radio communications, Williams keyed the mike and said, “Watch Supervisor, Hangar Bay. All secure, sir.”
“Don’t call me sir, asshole. I know who my father is.”
