The ground mission was under way.
At the same time Patrick was at the hangar entrance with the squadron’s blue-and-white Cessna 182R and the other members of his flight crew, Leo Slotnick and John de Carteret. Leo was in his midthirties, a former U.S. Air Force aerial refueling tanker pilot and currently a Nevada Highway Patrol sergeant and pilot from Battle Mountain, who had only been a member of the Battle Mountain squadron for five months. John de Carteret was just the opposite: he was in his early sixties, a retired captain in the U.S. Coast Guard, and was the co-owner of a gas station and convenience store in town just off the interstate with his wife, Janet, also retired Coast Guard and a CAP volunteer. He had been in the Civil Air Patrol since he first came to Battle Mountain eleven years earlier and was qualified in numerous emergency-services specialties, both ground and flying. Even though he was a pilot, he preferred to be a mission observer and act as copilot and mission commander. Slotnick could qualify for mission pilot after flying a few more actual or exercise sorties as a mission scanner and taking another flight check.
Rob Spara came over with several forms. “Flight release and weight and balance,” he said. To the entire crew he asked, “How’s everyone feeling today? No one popping open any brewskis early on a hot Saturday afternoon?”
“A couple hours later and I might have,” Leo admitted.
“No late nights last night, no allergy medications?”
“A late night for me is eight P. M., Rob,” John said.
“I’m right with you, John,” Spara said. The “IMSAFE” check, which stood for illness, medications, stress, alcohol, fatigue, and eating/hydration, was a required briefing element to be sure each crewmember was fit to fly. Since none of them was on alert and they all led normal lives, being suddenly thrust into a flying assignment meant that the aircraft commander and flight-release officer had to be sure everyone was ready to fly. “How about you, General?”
“I feel good, no meds, no alcohol, and things are so slow here on the base I can’t be stressed,” Patrick said.
“Good.” Spara tapped some instructions into a BlackBerry, waited a few moments; then: “You’re released. Good luck.” He wrote their release number on the flight-release form. “I’ll see you on the radio.”
Patrick opened up the airplane maintenance logs. “Okay, last crew reports they filled the plane to the tabs, so we have plenty of gas. Open discrepancies… loose copilot’s armrest… and left rearmost window is crazed. Let me know if you think it’s too bad to look out of, Leo.”
“Will do, sir.”
“No other glitches.” Patrick filled out log sheet from data on the flight-release form, closed it, then referred to a mission briefing card he had filled out after getting a mission briefing from the operations and planning officers. “Okay, guys, we’ll head on out directly to the southwest corner of grid SFO 448, and hopefully we’ll get a few ELT bearings. Altitude will be one thousand feet AGL, which will be around five thousand five hundred feet MSL in that area. Thirty minutes out and thirty back will give us three hours on station with an hour fuel reserve — hopefully we won’t need that long. We might have enough daylight when we get back to return, refuel, and relaunch if necessary. With the front blowing through, we might get some turbulence, so let me know if anyone feels queasy. Flat terrain except for Adam Peak, good visibility, and a half-mile track separation gives us a probability of detection of eighty-five percent, so let’s get this one. Questions?” Leo and John shook their heads. “Okay. I’ll do an airplane preflight. You guys preflight the radios, camera, and DF, copy the airplane hours into the logbook and the mission forms, and get a good radio check with the IC and ground team.”
Patrick put on a pair of Nomex fireproof gloves and began to work on preflighting the four-seat Cessna, working with a plastic-laminated checklist. John met up with him a few minutes later. “Comm is good,” he said, “and the DF self-tests okay.”
“Which means it’ll be almost useless?” Patrick deadpanned.
“If you talk badly about the DF, it will hear you and act badly,” John deadpanned back. “I thought 406 megahertz satellite ELTs were required on all planes.”
“They are,” Patrick said. “But everyone is cutting corners to cut costs these days, and ELTs are one of those things that you never think you’ll ever use. The owner was probably waiting until his ELT battery replacement was due before buying the new one.”
“Well, hopefully it’ll keep on working long enough to get a good steer,” John said. He nodded to Patrick. “I’m always amazed watching you work, Patrick.”
“Why?”
“You’re the guy who’s flown all sorts of heavy iron, from B-52s to spaceplanes,” John said, “and here you are, preflighting a plane that probably weighs less than one of the bomb-bay doors on a B-52, and you’re using a paper checklist. You can probably preflight a Cessna 182 blindfolded.”
“I probably could,” Patrick said, “but when I think I know it all, that’ll be the time to quit flying.”
“True enough,” John said. He paused for a moment, then commented, “I… I’m not sure if I’ve said this to you before, Patrick, and if I have, I apologize, but…”
“What?”
“I just can’t believe you are here,” John said, his eyes filled with unabashed wonder — one might even describe it as amazement. “I mean, you are Patrick McLanahan. The Patrick McLanahan. It seems like one day you’re leading a group of bombers against Russia to avenge America for the American Holocaust, then the next you’re on the space station, and then you’re in Iraq stopping a major war from breaking out between Turkey and America. The next day, you’re in little Battle Mountain, Nevada, flying Cessna 182s and 206s for the Civil Air Patrol. With all due respect, sir… what in hell are you doing here? I mean, here ?”
“I explained this to the squadron when I first joined, John,” Patrick began. “I retired from the Air Force—”
“You mean, you were forced to retire.”
“President Phoenix put his political life on the line during his campaign when he supported me and stood against President Gardner prosecuting me for the Aden and Socotra Island incidents,” Patrick said. “I felt I had no choice but to retire. President Gardner still decided to prosecute the others and myself. I was lucky: the case hadn’t gone to the jury by the time President Phoenix was sworn in, and he pardoned me.”
“The others weren’t so lucky.”
“I know,” Patrick said somberly. “A lot of good people had their lives turned inside out because of the orders I issued, even though no one spent any time in prison.” He straightened his shoulders. “Okay, let’s get our heads back in the game, John.”
“But wait, Patrick,” the retired Coast Guard officer said quietly. He put a hand on Patrick’s arm in earnest. “You still didn’t answer my question: Why here ?”
“I explained that,” Patrick said. “Battle Mountain is still a vital bomber, spaceport, UAV, and joint air facility. It’s been downgraded to part-time status, but there’s no money in anyone’s budget for a large support staff. I’m familiar with Battle Mountain and all the Air Force and Space Defense Force activities here; the high school has a good football program for my son, and he likes being part of the Civil Air Patrol. Probably most important: I can work for a dollar a year and live pretty well off my retirement, government housing, and expense reimbursements. I run a small caretaker staff, keep the networks and communications systems alive, and keep the lights minimally on and support the few missions we fly out of here until the economy recovers, and we can start rebuilding the force. It’s that simple.”