Curtis nodded, leaned back in the seat and closed his eyes. “Major Briggs, launch Cheetah. Now.”
9
Over Nicaragua
Cheetah’s control stick felt alive, pulsating with power. Mounted on the right side of the cockpit instead of in the center as in most pre-1990s fighters, it was almost rigid. Tiny pressure-sensitive switches in the fixed stick detected hand movements and applied the inputs to the triple-redundant flight-control computers, which then transmitted movement instructions to the hydraulic systems that moved the canards and tail stabilators, as well as the micro-hydraulic systems that recurved Cheetah’s wings.
The system was ultra-sensitive, very fast — not like the old gear, bell-crank and cable flight-control systems, or even the newer fly-by-wire electronic systems. The slightest touch on the stick would send Cheetah into an unexpected pitch-up or away. He tried to loosen his tight grip on the control stick, but it was hard to reprogram his head to the realities of electronic fiber-optic controls — and J.C. had set the system to its lowest sensitivity.
To complicate matters, a universe of information kept flashing on the windscreen, changing so quickly that McLanahan didn’t have time to read it before it disappeared and another line of numbers or symbols danced across his eyes. He had experimented with turning off most of the laser-projected symbiology but found himself repeatedly calling the information back up a few moments later. Finally he decided to leave it there and just deal with it — he hoped it wouldn’t distract him too much when
the shooting started. How J.C. could assimilate all this information was beyond him.
Suddenly Patrick saw a gloved hand reach across his shoulder. “By the way, I’m Marcia Preston.” He realized only then that he had not said a word except “prepare for takeoff” to his new back-seater. With all the things going on in Cheetah’s cockpit, he managed to reach across with his left hand and shake Marcia’s extended hand.
He had just leveled Cheetah off at only five thousand feet as once again he steered it southward toward Puerto Cabezas. At full power he was maintaining just under Mach one as he raced across the lush tropical forests and salt marshes of northeastern Nicaragua. He hit the voice-command control on the stick and in a deliberate voice said, “Autopilot, on, altitude, hold.” The computer repeated the command, which reminded McLanahan to double check the autopilot status indicators. Cheetah’s voice-command system had been programmed by J.C., and although it was supposed to be adaptable to any pilot, the subtle differences in pitch, accent and volume of voices sometimes confused the computer.
“Marcia,” McLanahan said after setting the autopilot, “I’ve got a question — why the hell did you volunteer for this mission?”
‘Because you needed me, and mostly because I wanted to go.”
“There’s a chance we won’t make it back.”
“Not to toot my own horn, sir, but your chances of making it back are much better now.”
“Can the ‘sir,’ okay?”
“Okay, Patrick. Where to?”
“It’s an outside chance but it’s possible that DreamStar could still be on the ground. We need to check the shelter at Puerto Cabezas.”
At seven miles per minute they reached Puerto Cabezas in a little over ten minutes. McLanahan pulled the power back to eighty percent. “I’ll line up so I can give you a good look out the right side,” he said. “The shelter is pretty low, but you should be able to see if an aircraft is in there.”
Their arrival at the Nicaraguan military base was greeted by a cacophony of warning messages in English, Spanish and Russian, ordering them to turn away. He ignored them — and there were no radar threat-warnings anywhere in the vicinity. They had decreased speed to less than five miles per minute to get a good look in the shelter. As they approached the base McLanahan hit the voice-command switch: “Arm, cannon, mode, strafe.”
“Warning; cannon armed, strafe mode, five hundred rounds remaining.” An holographic aiming-reticle appeared on the windscreen in front of McLanahan. He switched off the autopilot, descended to one thousand feet and began to line up on the shelter.
“You’re arming the guns?”
“If DreamStar is in there I want to shoot before he gets off the ground.” He hit the command button again: “Target select.” The reticle began to blink. He moved his head until the aiming reticle, slaved to follow the pilot’s head movements, was directly on the mouth of the shelter, then hit the voice-command button again: “… Now.” The reticle stopped blinking and a series of lines drew themselves on the windscreen like an instrument-landing director. Once McLanahan centered those lines, the cannon would blast the target to pieces.
“Target designated; select target off to cancel.”
“Watch your altitude,” Marcia Preston said. “You’re less than five hundred feet AGL with autopilot off.”
“Thanks.” McLanahan put the altitude-hold autopilot back on.
As they raced across the Nicaraguan base they could see men and vehicles darting all across the airfield, even over the runway — it was much too crowded on the flightline for normal air traffic. A number of emergency vehicles crowded the throat taxi-ramp that led to the alert parking shelters.
When they were about two miles from the alert area Marcia called out, “I can see the shelters. No aircraft in any of them.” Men were running from the shelter. “They think you’re going to bomb them, I think.”
“I should put a few rounds in there.”
“Waste of ammo.”
“It would make me feel better, though.” Instead of firing, however, McLanahan hit the voice-command button. “Target off. Cannon safe.” The computer repeated and verified. He shut off the autopilot and began a shallow climb, putting in full military power once again.
“Long gone,” Marcia Preston said. “Which way now?”
“Not sure.” Patrick McLanahan climbed to ten thousand feet, well above the mountains of central Nicaragua far off to the west. “James’ original plan was to fly DreamStar to Cuba. More secure than Nicaragua. Then on to the Soviet Union …” He switched frequencies to the channel set up with the communications facility at Puerto Lempira. “Storm Control, this is Storm Two. How copy?”
“Loud and clear, Storm Two,” General Elliott replied immediately.
“Our target wasn’t at Puerto Cabezas. Is the AWACS up?”
“Affirmative,” from Elliott. “He’s got complete coverage of the Caribbean north of Nicaragua. He’s got one F-16 with him. No word from him yet.”
“Target must be heading south, back to Sebaco or Managua.” McLanahan called up Managua on the inertial navigation unit and set the autopilot on course. “We’re en route back to Sebaco to check it out, then Managua.”
“Roger. Keep us advised. Storm Control out.”
They flew on for another few minutes, then Marcia clicked on the interphone: “Colonel, you said we’re flying to Sebaco, then Managua … What kind of air defenses does Sebaco have? I know Managua is heavily protected. Isn’t Sebaco that KGB base where they kept DreamStar?”
“Yes,” he replied testily, the questions interrupting his train of thought. “Sebaco was protected by fifty-seven-millimeter guns and SA-10 missiles and a few MiG-29 fighters. We destroyed them two days ago.”
“Are they back in place?”
“I don’t know.”
“What about Managua? What kind of defenses does it have?”