“We’re just worshipping at the altar of Dreamland,” said Grizzly, rising. “This is Turk Mako.”
“No shit.” Beast held out his hand. Turk rose to shake it. “Pleased to meet you, Captain.”
“Turk.”
“There room for me here?” joked Beast. His name tag declared his last name was Robinson. “Or is this a segregated table?”
“It’s segregated all right,” said Grizzly. “Pauly boy was just leaving.”
“Hahaha.”
“Actually, I’m done,” said Turk, getting up. “You can have my place.”
“Don’t let them chase you away,” said Ginella.
“We can move to a larger table,” said Grizzly.
“No, I got some stuff I gotta do.”
“Look, I’m grabbing a chair and pulling it over,” said Beast.
“I gotta check my plane and do a million little things,” said Turk.
“Colonel, given that Turk here has flown Hogs,” said Grizzly, “maybe we can get him on board as a backup. We need subs.”
“That might not be a bad idea,” said Ginella. “What do you think, Captain?”
“Well, uh—”
“I understand your aircraft is grounded until they figure out what happened to the Sabres.”
“Something like that.”
“I am short of pilots,” said Ginella. “You want me to talk to your command?”
Turk hesitated. He did want to fly. Even Zen had suggested he should. He liked the A–10E, a predictable, steady aircraft. But it had been nearly a year since he’d been in a Hog cockpit.
“Does Dreamland have the stuff to be a Hog driver?” asked Paulson mockingly. “It’s a comedown from his sleek beast.”
“I could handle it,” said Turk.
“I’ll talk to some people,” said Ginella.
Turk shrugged. “Sure.”
Back at the Tigershark and Sabre hangars, Turk discovered that the guard had been doubled. The men were visibly tense, and not only asked for his ID card but examined it carefully.
“Hey, Billy, what’s up with all this?” Turk asked one of the security people he’d grown friendly with.
“Big honchos from D.C. are tearing apart the airplane,” said the sergeant. “How you holding up, Cap?”
“I’m good. What honchos?”
“Pinhead types.” The sergeant shrugged.
“Dr. Rubeo?”
“Couldn’t tell you. They drove up in a couple of SUVs, had attaché cases — kinda like the Men in Black movie. You ever see that?”
“Not in a long time.”
“We’re not supposed to go inside even because of the security.”
“No shit?”
The sergeant shook his head. “I don’t know. Maybe they think we’ll see that it’s put together with rubber bands.”
“It’s actually paper clips,” said Turk.
Inside AC–84a, the Tigershark had been stripped of much of the top of her skin. A large scaffolding ladder sat over her nose, and two mobile platforms extended over her wings. Several other ladders, ranging from four to sixteen feet, were arrayed next to various parts of the aircraft.
Gear was spread all around her. Men dressed in white suits dotted the aircraft. They looked like surgeons. Several others, wearing blue suits similar to the scrubs a hospital surgical team would use, manned a portable computer and other sensor screens at three different workbenches set up on the far side of the plane.
Another group of men and women were standing at the side of the hangar behind a velvet rope, as if the Tigershark were a nightclub and they were waiting to get in.
“Captain Mako,” said Ray Rubeo, walking over to him from behind the plane. He was wearing blue scrubs. “What can we do for you?”
“I just thought I’d see if the Tigershark was ready to fly.”
“It will be a few days,” said Rubeo. “I’m sorry, Captain. As I told the investigators this morning, this has nothing to do with you, or anything you did.”
“Thanks for that,” said Turk.
Rubeo stared at him.
“I just wanted to make sure the plane is OK,” said Turk.
“So do we,” said Rubeo.
“What do you think happened?”
Rubeo sighed. It was a loud sigh — Turk had heard it described by Breanna and others as a horse sigh.
“I cannot speculate,” said the scientist. “Even if I was given to speculation, which I am not, in this case, I simply can’t.”
“You think it was the Tigershark?”
“It must be ruled out.”
“Guess I’ll go take a nap,” he told Rubeo.
Turk wasn’t about to take a nap, though in truth he wasn’t really sure what to do with himself. He headed toward the headquarters building, thinking he might at least check in with the duty officer and see if there was an assignment he could rouse up. If not, maybe he would follow Ginella’s suggestion and check out some of Italy. She made it sound pretty alluring.
Maybe a nice tour of the country would divert him. Even better, maybe he’d find a nice Italian girl, one who’d whisper some sort of Italian come-on in his ear.
Ciao. Bene.
He was nearly at the building when he was flagged down by one of General Talekson’s aides. Talekson, an RAF officer, headed operations for the coalition; he was giving a briefing to the squadron leaders and wanted to know if Turk could detail his encounter with the four Mirages.
“Be glad to,” said Turk, happy to finally have something to do.
The session had already started by the time they got there. The general sat at the front of the large conference room, frowning. An RAF major on his staff — the intel officer, whom Turk had met only once — was giving an overall situation report. He flailed at a map projected on the large screen in front of him, waving his laser pointer around as he spoke of the government concentrations. The rebellion had started in the area of Benghazi, northern Libya, and slowly spread west and south. The government forces had done a good job moving their equipment down, and clearly had more of it ready to use than had been suspected.
“The airfields marked A3, A6, A7, and A8 have been hit this morning,” said the major. He used the laser pointer in his hand in a highly impressionistic way, barely pausing at the spots he referred to. A3 was the airfield at Ghat, where the Mirages had launched from the day before.
“The fields are only marginally usable. This is a double-edge sword,” added the major. “It means we will be delayed from making them usable when the rebels take them over.”
“Quite,” said the general.
The intelligence officer continued, saying that he didn’t believe the government could launch any more aircraft, as they were only in possession of two more airfields, neither of which was long enough for the fighters still in their possession. Nonetheless, the allies would have to be mindful, as he put it. The Libyan government still had upward of eighty fighters.
“Most are obsolete Mirages and older MiG–23s, –25s, and –27s,” said the general, interrupting. “But there are MiG–29s, and we have heard rumors of at least six Sukhoi Su–35s. We have not located them. Which frankly is more than a little worrisome. If they exist.”
The intel major smirked, and a few of the squadron leaders did as well. Clearly, they didn’t think the planes would materialize.
The general looked over at Turk.
“Captain Mako is here. Perhaps he can tell us about the Mirages he encountered.”
“Glad to.” Turk glanced around. “I don’t have the gun video — I’m kinda doing this off the top of my head. But there really wasn’t much to it, I guess.”
He ran through the encounter. It seemed pretty simple now that he recounted it.