No, life would never be the same. For as long as he lived, he would feel this aching emptiness, this sense of a part of himself being irrevocably gone. But at least he would have a purpose in life, something on which to focus his energies. And eventually, he might even have a chance to strike back at the bastards that had taken Tomboy from him.
“Look,” Batman said, elbowing him in the side and bringing Tombstone back to the present. “She’s getting underway.”
FOUR
Admiral Willis E. “Coyote” Grant leaned over the railing, staring at the pier below. Even though the ship was moving away from the pier, the V-shaped configuration of the carrier resulted in the flight deck overhanging the pier for a considerable distance. The carrier would be well off the pier before he would see water between the ship and the concrete.
Not much was likely to go wrong, not now. Every senior ship-handler onboard was watching, bringing centuries of experience to bear on the evolution of moving away from the pier. Even his Chief of Staff, Navy Captain Jim Ganner, was watching, staring aft as though he could read the radio signals connecting the Officer of the Deck, the forward and aft observers and the tugs.
“Looking good, Admiral,” Ganner said finally, as though Coyote had been waiting for his opinion. Ganner had a way of sounding like he thought that any aviator around really needed the adult supervision of a surface officer. And that included his own admiral. No matter that Coyote had had command of Jefferson himself, as well as a previous command of a deep draft surface ship, both vessels far larger and more like the carrier than the destroyers and cruisers Ganner had commanded. In truth, Coyote judged himself a better ship-handler of a carrier than any surface sailor who’d commanded only smaller ships.
But it was only Ganner’s second week onboard, far too soon to be characterizing minor character flaws as mortal sins. Coyote would give him some rope, let him run with the bit for a while before he had to start jerking the man up short. He’d get him settled in before the first cruise — and if he didn’t, well, there were plenty of Navy captains around who’d jump at the billet. Plenty of ’em who’d know when to speak up and when to just stay out of the way. Like Ganner ought to be doing right now.
For the last thirty minutes, Coyote had paced the flag bridge, unable to settle down in any one spot. On the deck below him, the captain of the ship and his crew were making the final preparations for getting underway. Four tugs were already around the massive carrier, the lines firmly affixed. He heard the whistle blast from one that signified they were ready to commence operations.
Coyote knew all too well what was going on one deck below him. It was a nerve-racking game, to maneuver an aircraft carrier away from a pier, even with the assistance of tugs. Even more so when she was brand-spanking-new, not a scratch on her, with a price tag higher than that ever paid for any aircraft carrier before.
The flight deck looked strange empty, as did the hangar bay. There was not a single aircraft onboard yet. Oh, they would soon come flocking, just as soon as they cleared the harbor area and controlled sea lanes and could make their way to the flight operations area. Then the deck would be insane, as systems were tested real-time for the first time and the inevitable glitches sprang up.
In addition to flexing the flight deck and flight deck crew, the ship would also be testing every system in her engineering department. That meant full-speed runs, crash backs or emergency stops and emergency reverses, and a variety of tight turns and weaving maneuvers designed to give everything every possible chance to go wrong. There would be man-overboard drills, engineering casualty drills, firefighting drills, drills, drills, and more drills, until the entire crew and wardroom were ready to scream. And then there would be more drills.
But as grueling as the next two weeks would be, the honor of being a plank owner, or member of the first crew, made up for it. There would never be another acceptance sea trial, never another set of plank owners.
The handheld radio next to Coyote crackled to life as a stream of orders began issuing from the bridge to the tugs. Coyote listened critically, ready to step in if he thought the captain was hazarding the ship, but he could detect no flaw in the captain’s performance. Ganner kept up a running commentary, as though Coyote needed an explanation, before Coyote finally told him to keep quiet.
“Admiral?” A chief petty officer approached, a clipboard held in front of him. “Flash traffic, sir. I thought you’d want to see this.”
“Thanks, Chief.” Coyote reached past Ganner to take the clipboard, resisting the temptation to slap Ganner’s hand as he reached for it. Coyote had served a brief stint as Chief of Staff and he knew what the job entailed.
Yeah, so a chief of staff was supposed to run interference for his admiral and ensure that he only had to deal with stuff that really required his attention — so what? The chief radioman had been around the Navy just as long as Ganner and had been making the calls on radio messages for admirals for at least ten years. Sure, having Ganner screen routine stuff was a necessary part of the chain of command, but there were limits to that, too. What worked well in peacetime wasn’t always a good idea when flash traffic started flying around.
The carrier was moving so slowly than it was impossible to tell that she was leaving the pier and getting underway except for the one long blast sounded by the ship’s whistle and the order over the 1MC, “Shift colors.” Other than that, the only clue was the gradual opening of the distance between ship and the pier and the low vibration running through the deck.
Coyote scanned the message, then whistled softly. Without comment, he passed it over to Ganner, who scowled as he read it. “There goes the deployment schedule,” Ganner said when he’d finished.
“Maybe, maybe not,” Coyote said, perversely driven to disagree with Ganner although he had a feeling the man was right. “One antimissile shot’s not the end of the world. Nobody harm, no foul.” Even as he let the trite saying slip out of his mouth, Coyote knew he didn’t believe it.
Why didn’t they just let the missile go? According to the trajectory, it was headed for open ocean. Why shoot this one down when they’ve let others go before?
“Could be nothing at all,” Ganner agreed easily, although Coyote could see that he didn’t agree at all. Regardless of his faults, Ganner was no fool. “But it wouldn’t hurt to be ready for a change in the schedule. If we do get shipped out early, the time schedule’s going to be short. Not only supplies, but personnel as well. With your permission, I’ll tickle the system a bit, see if we can’t get some orders expedited.”
“Make it happen,” Coyote said. Maybe he’d been too judgmental — from the sounds of it, Ganner knew exactly what a chief of staff ought to be doing.
As the United States used her massive rudders and her propellers to twist her stern away from the pier, the tides pulled mightily on the bow, resulting in a sideways motion that brought her clear of the pier. The tugs remained tied off to the carrier until the ship had negotiated her turn toward the channel, and then, at the earliest possible moment, cast them off. The USS United States was underway, making way and ready to answer all bells.