Goaded by blows and snarled orders, the sailors dragged the Captain to the center of the semicircle and propped him up. Gilmore was weaker today. Coyote wasn't even certain the man was aware of his surroundings.
The major surveyed the scene, then turned to face the door. "Turo ose yo!"
More soldiers spilled into the room, followed a moment later by Colonel Li. The man exchanged several low-voiced phrases with the major, then surveyed the gathered Americans. "We will try something different," he said, the words cold and without accent. "Captain Gilmore, I hold you responsible for the lives of your men. You can order them to cooperate, or watch them die one by one."
"Go… hell…" Gilmore said. His voice was very weak, his face pale and drawn.
Li shrugged. "As you will." His gaze passed across the Americans once more. Again, his eyes locked with Coyote's, then passed on to a sailor kneeling nearby. He pointed. "Paro ku kot!"
Two North Korean soldiers slung their rifles and advanced on the sailor, who tried to back up, tried to rise, but was grabbed before he could get to his feet. They grabbed him, one holding each arm, and dragged him to the wall next to the door. Colonel Li nodded to the major, who drew his pistol and snapped back the slide with a loud snick-clack, chambering a round.
They made the American kneel again, his face against the wall. The major stood behind him, the muzzle of the pistol pressed against the back of the sailor's head.
"Captain?"
"Don't do it, Captain!" the sailor screamed. "Don't-"
One of the men holding him slammed an elbow against the side of his head. "Kae!" the soldier snapped. "Choyong hi!"
Struggling, the Captain tried to rise. Coyote felt the tension, the sheer rage among the Americans building, felt his own heart hammering under the assault. He remembered the staged firing squad, the fear and the sheer relief he'd felt at the unexpected reprieve, and wondered if this was the same thing again.
"Hang on, Sobieski!" someone shouted. "The bastards don't mean it!"
Li looked at the major. "Kot hasipsiyo!"
The shot was like a physical blow, unnaturally loud inside the bare-walled room. A splash of scarlet appeared on the wall in front of the sailor's face. The two soldiers released Sobieski's arms and he sagged to the floor. There was a gaping red cavity where his forehead had been.
"Two hours, Captain," Li said. His voice was scarcely above a whisper, but every man heard it in the ringing silence which followed the shot. "In two hours I shall return. You and your men will sign the confessions we have prepared for them, or in two hours another of your men will die. Until then, Captain…"
The silence remained long moments after the Koreans departed.
The immense hangar deck occupied fully two-thirds of Jefferson's 1,092-foot length, two levels below her flight deck and extending from just forward of her number one elevator almost all the way aft to the fantail. The deck was covered by the same dark-gray, non-skid surface as the flight deck, while bulkheads and overhead were painted white. Hanging in row upon colorful row along the overhead were flags of countries, U.S. territories, and states, as well as Navy signal flags. The hangar deck echoed with voices, the metallic clangor of tools and hand carts banging and squeaking in the vast, almost subterranean space.
Tombstone picked his way carefully across the deck. It was busy, a maelstrom of purposeful confusion. The room was crowded with aircraft, so much so that navigating in a straight line was impossible, for the planes, wings folded, were parked so close together that each nearly touched its neighbors. With over eighty aircraft in a carrier air wing, there never seemed to be space enough on board ship to store them all. Indeed, even during launch and recovery operations, some had to be kept topside on the flight deck. Tombstone found himself wondering again how the Mangler could possibly work out the intricate geometry of moving them from hangar deck to flight deck and back without becoming hopelessly mired in an aircraft carrier's version of gridlock.
He'd been heading aft toward the fantail but found that route blocked. Jefferson's boats and launches were stored in the aft end of the hangar bay, close by the passageway leading to the fantail, stacked two-high on spidery wheeled cradles, and the way through was a narrow one. This afternoon it was walled off by a row of flat-topped mules. Crews were moving among the parked aircraft on preflight inspections, readying them for combat in case Operation Righteous Thunder was given a go, and spare equipment had been wheeled back out of the way.
Tombstone decided to get his view of the sea at an elevator instead.
Jefferson had four elevators, three to starboard, one to port, flat deck sections which moved between the hangar deck and the flight deck along rails on the outside of the hull. They were accessed from the hangar bay through broad, oval openings in the bulkheads which were normally left open for ventilation below decks, though they could be sealed off with massive sliding doors in cold weather. Dodging blue shirts and their mules, Tombstone made his way to the elevator portside and aft.
Like the fantail, the elevators offered unobstructed views of the sea rushing past the ship some twenty feet below. Walking into the light spilling into the hangar bay from outside, Tombstone had to stop and fish in his jacket pocket for his sunglasses. A mule and several blue shirts were manhandling an F-14 onto the elevator, and he moved out of their way, leaning against the elevator's safety netting.
Musing, he looked at the sunglasses before putting them on. They were the teardrop pilot's model with gold wire frames… like his leather flight jacket, very much in keeping with his image as a Navy aviator.
The image he was no longer able to maintain.
"Ho, Tombstone. I've been looking for you."
He turned and saw Batman advancing across the red and yellow warning stripes painted on the deck. Like Tombstone, Batman wore sunglasses and jacket, his hat cocked at a rakish angle. He acknowledged the lieutenant with a nod and hoped the man didn't want a conversation. Tombstone didn't feel like talking just now.
"Listen," Batman said. "I've been trying to find you all day." Tombstone smiled. Jefferson was a small city with a population of over six thousand. Usually it was easy to get lost in her, but somehow, this time, he'd failed. "Well, looks like you found me."
"Yeah." Batman looked uncertain… even embarrassed. "Look, I know this might not be the best time, Stoney, but I don't know who else to talk to. I'm… I'm wondering if I can do it again." With a sharp motion, Batman pulled the sunglasses off and looked into Tombstone's eyes. "I killed two guys yesterday. You shot down your MiG and it didn't even faze you. I need to know how you handle a thing like that."
So that was it. Several sharp or sarcastic replies rose in Tombstone's mind, but he pushed them aside. The openness, the vulnerability in Batman's expression was something he'd not seen there before.
"I don't think I have any answers," he said, shaking his head. "I didn't… handle it. I have a feeling it's going to stay with me for a long time."
When Batman didn't answer, Tombstone continued. "That was what all the training was for, right? ACM? Making the kill?"
"Making the kill… right. But it was always… you know. A target. Not a man."
"I doubt very much that the enemy pilot would have extended you the same courtesy, but that's beside the point. You strap on an F-14 for one purpose only, to engage the enemy, to shoot him down before he shoots you down or before he kills friends and shipmates. If there's a better reason than that, I've never heard it."
"I keep wondering if those guys I nailed had families."