He wondered what kind of gas it was.
On the south end of the runway were another seven bombers, all lined up nicely on the runway and the taxiway. A couple hundred yards away from the taxiway were two MiG-23s being tended by fuel trucks. They were also being abandoned as figures ran away from them.
The bombers’ route to freedom and the skyways was blocked by the destroyed aircraft on the runway.
If the ant-like things he could see scurrying about on the screen were men, they were leaving the bomber aircraft where they sat, taking off in panicked flight for the desert, probably upwind. More ants were streaming up the ramps from the underground hangars.
Wyatt centred the reticule on the first three bombers in the line-up and pickled the bombs off.
The HUD reported, “BOMBS COMMITTED.”
There was suddenly a hangar opening on the screen. He quickly locked the reticule in place, then clicked the release button again.
“BOMBS COMMITTED,” blinked twice.
Waited two seconds.
Wheeled the magnification down to normal.
Closing on the target.
The ants became terrified men, running at top speed for the open desert.
“Bombs away,” Jordan reported.
The tail pipes of the Phantom ahead of him suddenly
turned white-hot as Gettman went to afterburner and turned the nose skyward.
Another second.
Tha-WHUMP!
The F-4 lurched sideways as an antiaircraft shell burst right alongside him.
Despite his tightened harness, Wyatt was thrown hard against the right side of the cockpit.
The first stick of bombs released.
The Phantom tried to go over on its left side, and he fought the control stick back to the right.
The second stick of bombs released.
Wyatt’s ears rang from the concussion of the antiaircraft shell.
The airplane danced a jig.
A terrible rending noise erupted behind him on the right side.
He glanced down at the instrument panel. His vision seemed dimmer than normal.
The right turbojet was coming apart, spitting up turbine blades like a new-born. He had a whole bank of red lights blinking at him.
He shut it down.
The Phantom steadied.
He checked the rear-view mirror.
Marada Air Base, what was left of it, was several miles behind him. Dozens of fires raged now.
He eased into a right turn.
His speed was coming down drastically.
“My God, Andy,” Gettman said, “you must have gotten a couple inside the hangar. There’s secondary explosions just rocking the ground. The desert floor is caving in in about a hundred places.”
“How about the bombers, Karl?” Wyatt was forgetting his own fiat regarding call signs.
His head felt thick and sluggish.
Concussion. Mild concussion. That was all.
“What bombers? They got a scrap heap there. We can count eleven kills on the surface and take a wild-assed guess as to what was below ground.”
“They’ll rename it Ramad’s Salvage and Recycling Centre,” Gettman said.
Wyatt tried to assess the damage he had sustained. The fuselage skin on the right side was shoved into the cockpit by five or six inches.
Down near his feet, he could see three rips in the skin. The wind shrieked through them.
He seemed to have all of his flight controls. He carefully tested each.
The engine monitors for the left turbojet were still operating, as was the engine. His airspeed indicator was gone, however, and he had to estimate that he was maybe holding three hundred knots.
That wouldn’t last for long.
No altimeter either.
Looking through the right side of the canopy, which had a major and expanding crack in it, he saw that the leading edge of the right wing was peppered with holes. One hole, maybe two feet in diameter, went clear through the wing. The camouflage paint blended nicely with what he could see through the hole.
He wondered if he was thinking irrationally.
The right side of his face felt numb. The hearing in his right ear seemed to be gone.
He unclipped the oxygen mask and felt his right cheek. There was no blood, but he had definitely just left the dentist’s chair.
“Hey One, Three.”
“One.”
“You coming up here with me?”
“I don’t think so,” Wyatt said.
Martin Church was still in Embry’s office.
He had tired of studying Madonna.
Embry had sent out for a large pizza, but each of them had only had one slice out of it.
After number six, he had lost count of the cups of coffee he had poured down.
“If I’d been thinking ahead,” Embry said, “I’d have put a descrambler into our satellite circuits so we could listen to what was going on.”
“You think there’s much going on, now?”
“All you have to do is look at that,” Embry said, pointing to the monitor.
The heavy smoke over the chemical plant and Marada Air Base was very apparent in the satellite picture. After careful scrutiny of the screen and checks with the analysts at NS A, both Church and Embry were certain that none of the bombers had gotten off the ground.
The satellite lens couldn’t capture the camouflaged aircraft in near real time, actual imagery, so they weren’t sure which airplanes were still aloft. Embry had called the NSA and had them switch to infrared tracking for a few moments, and they had been able to count five infrared tracks, all headed south. In addition, the camera angle gave them the infrared tracks of the two C-130s circling about two hundred miles south of the target zone.
There were three alarming aspects, as far as Church was concerned.
First, there were two apparently heavy aircraft approaching from the east.
Second, a flight of eight aircraft, identified by their infrared signatures as probable MiG-23cs, had turned back from original courses, though they were apparently headed directly for Marada Air Base.
Third, he was deeply saddened by the loss of two of Wyatt’s airplanes.
“George, do you suppose we can do something for the families of those pilots? Quietly, of course.”
Embry’s eyes narrowed, then he said, “Oh, I forgot to tell you, Marty. There weren’t any pilots in those planes.”
“You son of a bitch!”
Embry grinned. “I’ve got to have one card up my sleeve when I’m dealing with you, Marty.”
Eighteen
Nelson Barr found that his Phantom still had almost six hundred knots left in her. He used all of them, found a heading of 210 degrees, and climbed to fifteen thousand feet.
The F-4 seemed to prefer flying in a slewed fashion, canted to the right, and he used practically all of the left rudder trim available to counter the drag of the extra three feet of wing on the right side.
Karl Gettman moved in on his left wing and surveyed the damage.
“What do you think, Karl?”
“You’ll dance again, Bucky. You’re dangling some cabling and what looks like the hydraulic jack for the leading edge slat. Where the slat used to be.”
Barr tried his navigational computer.
Negative.
But he had all the basics, and that was what he had learned to fly with.
“Where’s that MiG, Dave?”
“About sixty miles south, burning fuel like he’s got his own oil well,” Zimmerman said.
“You guys go on ahead. The Herc may need help.”
“You sure?” Gettman asked.
“Go.”
Formsby had been listening. He said, “We’re quite all right, you know.”
“So am I,” Barr said. “Take off, Four.”