"Way to go, Paddy! Come left to two-seven-oh! Bandits! Bandits at angels three!"
"Watch it, Stoney!" Batman warned. "Three coming' in on your six!"
At least Batman sounded like he was still in the fight. "Batman! Where are you?"
"On your three at eight-triple-oh.
"I see you. Get on them! Breaking right!"
Tombstone snap-rolled his F-14 to starboard. He was well above the walls of the valley now, but rocky crags seemed to claw the sky, reaching for his aircraft as he twisted into a tight split-S. As he leveled out two thousand feet above the ground, he caught a glimpse of Batman streaking overhead, the MiGs scattering. An arrow of white fire intersected one MiG in a blaze of orange and black. "Splash one for Two-oh-three," Taggart said. "Watch out for falling MiGs!"
"Shotgun Leader! Shotgun Leader! You still have one on your tail!"
Tombstone twisted in his seat, looking back past Snowball. "He's on us!" the RIO shouted. "He's still coming!"
There he was! Tombstone saw the flash of a missile as it left the MiG's wing.
There was no radar tone, and at short range it would be a heat-seeker. "Hit the flares!" Tombstone yelled. He yanked the throttle back and over into a barrel roll while Snowball stabbed the release on the chaff/flare board on the RIO's right cockpit panel. At the last possible moment, Tombstone yanked the Tomcat onto its back and plunged toward the ground, now less than a thousand feet away.
The heat-seeker missed, a streak of fire past the canopy. Tombstone kicked the F-14 to full burner and hauled it into a brutal, vertical climb. That was when he saw the ground attack fighters.
There were four of them, flying wingtip to wingtip in a diamond formation racing out of the valley at better than Mach 1, just above and ahead of their own shadows rippling along the uneven ground. Tombstone recognized the type: Nanchang Q-5s, a Chinese export ground attack fighter known to NATO as the Fantan. They were painted in green and brown camouflage markings and escorted by four low-flying MiGs. Each carried several dull-white missiles slung from pylons under the wings, AS-7 Kerry ASMs, most likely, with one-hundred-pound warheads. Tombstone knew exactly what their targets would be.
"Tally-ho!" he yelled as he rolled out of his climb. "Fantans! Fantans coming out of the valley!"
Time seemed to stand still for Tombstone. As he went port wing high, he could look down and see the Fantans emerging from the mouth of the valley from Majon-ni beneath him. In another few minutes, they would be across the city and out over the water, with dozens of targets to choose from. High on their list would be the distinctive, boxy shapes of the LCACs, by now well away from Blue Beach and on the way back to the fleet. A single Kerry planted in one of those hovercraft, and the odd-looking vessel would become a deathtrap, killing every rescued POW on board.
Or worse, they might try for Chosin herself, now recovering, refueling, and launching Marine helicopters at a furious rate. Though it was far larger and harder to sink than an LCAC, the flight deck of the LPH was a tangle of men, machines, fuel hoses, and ammunition. A Kerry or two into that mix could kill hundreds, could cripple or even sink the Marine carrier, together with the more than sixty wounded sailors from Chimera.
And there were other targets as welclass="underline" Little Rock, Texas City, and Westmoreland County with their flocks of AAVs and Mike boats, the destroyers closing with the Korean coast, the Sea Knight helos plying back and forth between ship and shore. A target-rich environment which would almost guarantee the Fantan drivers a hit… and a major blow against the American task force.
"Nightmare! Nightmare! He's on my six!"
"Break left, Shooter! Break left!"
"See if you can-"
"I'm on him! I'm on him! Fox two!"
"I'm too close for a shot! Going' to guns!"
"Get him off me, Nightmare!"
The background radio chatter told him the rest of the Tomcats were tangling with other MiGs in a colossal dogfight which arched across the sky over all of Wonsan. He banked his Tomcat left, lining up on the Korean Fantans…
… and then the F-14 shuddered as jackhammer blows slammed into its hull. He turned to look back. One of the North Korean fighters hung there, one hundred yards off his tail.
"Shit, Stoney!" Snowball said. "Where'd he come from?"
Flashes of light stuttered at the roots of the MiG's wings, and 23-mm tracers floated past his head, scant feet from his canopy. Two more MiGs dropped into view as he watched.
"Tombstone!" Batman yelled. "Three blue bandits on your six!"
"I know! I know!"
"On my way!"
"Negative, Batman!" Tombstone went to full burner, climbing rapidly. The MiGs stayed with him, matching each twist and maneuver. "The Fantans! You've got to keep those Fantans from reaching the fleet!" Cannon fire slashed into his Tomcat's right wing.
Batman looked up through his canopy, watching the four aircraft gleaming in the sunlight far above. Tombstone's Tomcat was dropping out of its Immelmann now, nosing over into an inverted dive.
The three MiGs stayed with him.
Below Batman, the Fantans and their escorts thundered toward Wonsan and the sea's edge.
There was no time to think, though the conflict within was cold and diamond-hard. He could save his wingman or attack the Fantans… but not both.
Biting off a curse, he pulled his wing over and plummeted, letting the altitude scale on his HUD rocket down the numbers, past five thousand… four thousand… three thousand…
"Sidewinders!" They were too close for a Phoenix.
"Yo!" Malibu said. "Watch it, Boss. We've got a missile lock on us."
He heard the tone. Somewhere, a MiG's radar was hunting for him. "Screw it!" He concentrated on the targeting pipper on his HUD, hauling the stick over as he lined up on the lead Fantan, now three miles ahead. Sun glint sparked fire from the surface of Wonsan Harbor beyond.
The target graphic changed to a circle, indicating a lock. Batman's thumb closed over the firing button. There was a pilot riding in that Nanchang Q-5…
… and there were sailors and Marines in those ships riding black against the sunlight. "Fox two!" The Sidewinder streaked from beneath the Tomcat's wing. "Batman!" Malibu called. "Missile launch, on our six!"
"Chaff!"
"Done. It's still coming!"
Batman slipped the Tomcat to the side, lining up on another target. From behind the Fantan formation, their tailpipes made perfect heat-seeker targets. The escorting MiGs were all over the sky, screening the Q-5s, dogging the F-14.
"Pull up, Batman! Batman!"
Damn! He pulled up sharply, dumping chaff as he twisted into a hard loop. The missile followed, but too quickly to turn inside the American's arc. A proximity fuse detonated the warhead thirty yards away, a thunderous concussion which rocked the Tomcat. The escort MiGs dropped onto his tail, and searing lines of tracers burned the sky.
Then the first missile hit and the lead Fantan exploded, blossoming in a succession of savage blasts as the Kerry missiles under the wings detonated. Burning fragments rained from the sky.
Tombstone twisted away from the gunfire in a clockwise barrel roll, slamming on his air brakes to kill his speed. The entire point in any ACM was always, always, to get the other guy out front; most dog-fighting maneuvers were designed to force the guy on your tail to overshoot and pass you, lining him up for a shot from the rear.
One of the MiGs flashed past, so close to Tombstone's port wing he could see the man looking back at him through his helmet's dark visor.
"Missile launch!" Snowball yelled. "Heat-seeker!"