“Look out!” Huerta shouted. He took two steps forward, grabbed Morning Eagle, and pulled him back away from the rift. “We’ve got to get the hell out of here.”
Morning Eagle blinked, startled out of his fascinated reverie of the deadly aircraft. He whirled, following Huerta, and took five steps forward before the world disappeared in a blinding whirl of white.
“Bird Dog! You get the hell out of there!” he heard Batman snap. “You don’t have a solid fix on the target. You miss, and you hit friendly forces. Break off; we’ll try again when the weather clears.”
“Can’t,” Bird Dog said tersely. “I’ve got a solid lock on this — I can feel it.” He tried desperately to regain his fix on the target, momentarily distracted by the sight of white-clad figures scurrying away from his impact point.
Damn it all, what the hell did they think they were doing? he thought angrily. Couldn’t someone have briefed them? The SEAL should know better at least than to stand that close to an IP. Even with advanced avionics and pinpoint targeting, there was still an error of five to ten feet built into launch calculations. Even under the best circumstances — and these were hardly those — there was a good chance he’d miss the exact spot at the rift. He shook his head angrily.
There was no help for it now — he was too heavy and too low to recover. In order to gain altitude quickly and clear the worst of the peaks, he had to get rid of the bombs. And it made no sense to jettison them harmlessly, not this close to the IP. He concentrated, bearing down on the target.
“Whiteout,” Morning Eagle screamed. He swung his arms wildly, felt them hit something, and pulled it toward him. Huerta grasped at him like a drowning man. With a firm grip on each other, they dropped to the ground, lessening their wind profile.
Huerta heard Morning Eagle shout something, the words unintelligible, swept away by the gale-force winds. He shook his head, then realized Morning Eagle couldn’t see the gesture. He reached for the other man’s hand and held it up, pointing it in the direction of the aircraft.
And the rest of their team — they’d been well back from the rift, he remembered, reviewing the last scene he’d been able to see clearly in his mind. With a little bit of luck, and some decent piloting, they’d be safe as well.
The laser designators. For a moment, he felt a flash of real fear, remembering how close the Tomcat had been when he’d last seen it. He turned his head, looking in the direction of the rift. There was nothing there except a solid white wall of flying ice crystals in the snow. Frustration replaced fear, as he realized the laser targeting information would no longer be visible to the pilot.
Absent skill, there was always luck. The chief SEAL started to pray.
“You’re never gonna make it, Bird Dog,” Gator said, his voice insistent. “Dump ‘em.”
Bird Dog shook his head, not bothering to answer. Concentrating on the spot where he’d last seen the targeting data took every ounce of concentration he had. He flipped the ICS switch off, locking out Gator’s voice completely. They’d either make it or they wouldn’t, and there was nothing Gator could tell him in the interim to change the odds either way.
Five … four … three … two … NOW. Bird Dog toggled the weapons release switch and felt the hard thump of ordnance leaving the undercarriage as the bombs dropped free. He wrenched the Tomcat up into a sharp climb, already feeling the difference that the loss in weight made, climbing for altitude as hard as he dared push the Tomcat. The sleek jet shook as it approached the stall envelope. Bird Dog dropped the nose slightly, hoping it was enough. He spared one glance at the altimeter — three thousand feet — and then cut the Tomcat hard to the right, praying he cleared the tallest spires.
The hard thunder of military engines at full afterburner cut through the high-pitched scream of the wind. It was a sound at least as much felt as heard, a deep, bone-jarring growl and rumble that cut through viscera and skin alike, settling into the bones with a comforting aftertaste.
He made it, the Chief SEAL thought, marveling. How many pilots could have pulled that off? For a moment, a deep surge of pride replaced the fear and anxiety he’d felt watching the aircraft approach. Damn, some days it was good to be an American. If he ever got out of this, he was going to do his damnedest to make sure that pilot got a commendation.
Suddenly, the ground underneath him exploded, shaking and rolling like the worst earthquake he’d ever experienced in California. He gasped and threw himself flat on the ground, no longer caring whether he lost contact with Morning Eagle’s hand. The hard ice surface rose up underneath him, smashing him in the face, and he felt the delicate bones in the bridge of his nose splinter. A falling rock bashed him in the leg, settling over his lower right shin and ankle. The SEAL screamed, feeling the wind whip away the sound as soon as it left his mouth. He clamped his mouth shut as icy air surged into his mouth, straight down his air passageway, and chilled his lungs. Stupid to survive the actual strike and then be killed by ice crystals forming in his lungs, he thought grimly, falling back on years of training and experience to override survival instincts. He clung to the ground for dear life and waited.
Bird Dog leveled off at eleven thousand feet, and suddenly started shaking. He was safe; he was safe. Until that moment, he hadn’t realized how doubtful he’d been that they’d make it.
Below them, the whiteout whipped violently, obscuring sea and island alike. The noise, however, had faded as the aircraft had climbed. Finally, he noticed an odd noise in the cockpit. It took him a moment to puzzle it out. Then an involuntary grin cracked his face. He reached over and flipped on the ICS switch.
“-and if you ever pull this bullshit again, I’m not going to wait for a court-martial, I’m going to personally-” Gator’s voice was saying.
Bird Dog cut him off. “Cool your jets, Gator, we made it.” He moved the yoke back and forth experimentally, testing his control over the Tomcat to reassure himself. “See?”
Gator’s voice broke off. “And just what the hell did you think you were doing, making a blind approach in the middle of a storm cell?” the RIO demanded. “You should have broken off like Batman said.”
“Not a chance. Those men were depending on us.”
He heard Gator sigh. “Well, I guess they were at that,” the RIO said finally. “How close do you think you got?” he continued, his professionalism overriding what must have been a terrifying ride for the backseater.
“Pretty damned close, I think,” Bird Dog said. He felt a sudden surge of joy. “Damned close. In fact, it felt like it went spot-on.”
“It’s not like we can fly over and do a BDA — A bomb damage assessment,” the RIO said. “But from what I could see from back here, it looked good to me, too. Let’s get back to the boat and wait for the weather to chill out.”
“Bad choice of words,” Bird Dog responded. He put the Tomcat in a gentle curve, the motion seeming unusually cautious after the wild maneuver he’d just pulled off.
“You icing?” Gator said anxiously.
Bird Dog glanced at his instruments, then out the window at the wing. “Looks like a little — but not enough to hurt us, now that we’re out of the storm. The deicers will take care of it.”