“Because the truck’s cargo isn’t milk,” said Captain Wong.
Hawkins watched him walk around the tanker, searching for something. Wong waved his hands over the shiny metal surface of the tanker, as if he were a faith healer. Finally he stopped.
“Sergeant Rosen, would you happen to have an acetylene torch handy?” he asked.
The Air Force technical sergeant shook her head. “Sorry, no.”
“The difficulties of operating in contingent circumstances,” sighed Wong. “We’ll have to drain the tank.”
Hawkins had met Wong on a clandestine mission in North Korea two years before; while eccentric, the intel officer was probably among the smartest and bravest guys in the service— certainly in the Air Force, a branch rapidly sinking, in Hawkins’ estimation. But it was often hard to tell what the hell Wong was up to.
“What’s the story?” Hawkins asked him.
“You wouldn’t want to drink this,” Wong told Hawkins as he opened the spigot at the rear and began draining the liquid. “Believe me.”
“No shit.”
Wong nodded.
“You going to explain what’s going on, Bristol?” Hawkins demanded. “Because I’ll be damned if I can make sense of what the hell you’re doing.”
“There will be a compartment at the bottom of the tank, with bladders inside. We can get into through the manhole once the liquid is removed is out. There isn’t much.”
“What are we looking for?”
Wong glanced over at the men, then back at Hawkins. He frowned as the liquid continued to flow, but said nothing.
Hawkins finally guessed what Wong suspected.
“Coors, go get ABC gear on,” he told his sergeant. “You’re going to personally get to the bottom of this.”
“It would be best for everyone to be prepared,” Wong said to him. “And if Sergeant Coors is going inside the tank, a suit over his normal suit would be optimum.”
CHAPTER 11
It wasn’t until he became a squadron commander that Knowlington truly appreciated how hard enlisted personnel worked. Not all the time, of course; just when it mattered. He’d given lip service to the clichés about NCOs being the backbone of the air force, and owing his life to mechanics and crew dogs, etc., etc., but he hadn’t really understood how true the sayings were until the first time he’d been responsible for getting a squadron of F-4 Phantoms in the air.
Partly that was because his first command was so badly screwed up when he arrived. The pilots were mediocre, but the real problem was the planes. The maintenance people were poorly trained, disorganized, and dispirited. And they stayed that way for exactly five days— which was how long it took him to get Clyston and a few other men he’d worked with over to his team. He called his guys “The Mafia,” and together they kicked enough butt to make their squadron one of the best in the Air Force— his bosses’ opinion, not just his.
Most had long-since retired, except for Clyston. But the new kids who came along to replace them were every bit as good, maybe better: if not smarter, they were more thoroughly trained and worked with better systems. Standing in the middle of the maintenance area— aka “Oz”— Knowlington marveled as his people overhauled the tailfin of a battle-damaged Hog; in the space of maybe twenty minutes, they had the plane stripped and reskinned.
“A little slow today,” growled Clyston, winking at Knowlington as he passed to inspect the crew’s handiwork. The colonel waited for the capo’s well-rehearsed grunts to change to grudging approvals before stepping forward himself to tell the men what a kick-butt job they were doing.
“And I mean kick-butt job,” he repeated, aware that his voice was a little loud and a little shaky. “This is damn good work.”
“All right, you heard the colonel,” barked the capo. “Everybody take ten. Then I want that flap on six checked out. Let’s go, let’s go! Come on. Don’t you guys know how to take a break, or do I have to send you back to school for that, too? Jee-zus-f’in hell!”
Clyston grinned at Knowlington as the men scattered.
“You’re getting a little predictable in your old age,” Skull told him.
“Yeah, but they love it.” The sergeant put his arms on his hips and snorted, laughing at himself.
“How are the men reacting to Dixon?” Skull asked.
“Well, I wouldn’t say they’re pleased.” Clyston folded his arms together across his chest. “But we’ll get on. He hadn’t been with most of these guys too long. And it wasn’t one of our missions. That makes a difference.”
Skull nodded. Clyston’s cold assessment was undoubtedly correct. War’s inevitable hardening process was well underway.
“How are you taking it?” the sergeant asked.
“Oh, like a wimp.” Skull laughed. Clyston didn’t. The colonel rubbed his neck and realized he hadn’t shaved this morning, an odd thing to forget. “I hate losing kids, Allen. Especially like this.”
“Sucks,” said the sergeant.
More than two decades had passed since he’d met Clyston, who had been an E-5 or E-3, or maybe even an airman then, crewing on butter-bar-nugget Michael Knowlington’s “Thud,” an F-105 Republic Thunderchief. They’d said hello and shared a cigarette— one of the only two Knowlington ever smoked in his life— shortly before the green lieutenant climbed into the cockpit. Within the hour he had dropped his first bombs and gotten his first air-to-air kill.
On that very same mission, a lieutenant who had flown with Knowlington back in the States went down over Laos. He was the first of many.
Vietnam had been a damn stupid war. But Knowlington didn’t know that then. He didn’t think it was a smart war, particularly, but he did think it was necessary. He figured he was sweating his fanny for something important, something like democracy and freedom, as corny as that sounded.
He still thought that— mostly. But Vietnam had turned out to be a damn stupid war. Maybe this one would turn out the same way. It hadn’t started all that smart.
“Colonel? You want some coffee or something?”
Knowlington snapped his head up, realizing his face was being scrutinized by the capo.
It was more than that. The colonel realized he smelled of the Depot, its smoke and its booze.
He resisted the urge to tell the sergeant he was still sober— it would come off phony, making it sound like exactly the opposite was true.
“Thanks anyway,” Knowlington said instead. “I’m about to start jittering with all the caffeine I’ve had already. I have a bunch of things to take care of back at the office. I just wanted to make sure you hadn’t bitten off any heads today.”
“None that didn’t need biting.”
Knowlington nodded.
“We’re open twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week,” said Clyston. “For any reason.”
“I appreciate that, Allen. I appreciate it a lot,” he told his old friend before walking away.
CHAPTER 12
Rosen volunteered to go inside the tanker when it became obvious Coors and his two suits wouldn’t fit through the manhole without vast amounts of butter. Doberman couldn’t object, not really. It was pretty clear they had to find out what the hell was inside the tanker, and she was the only one who could get in and out. Still, he made them tie a rope around her so she could be hauled out in case something happened.