Stationed beside the center-strip runway was the base's Bombardment Group.
There were 18 aircraft in all, including ten massive B-52s, four nearly-antique B-57s, two A-3 "Whales," plus a cranky, old B-58 "Hustler," left over from the Football City War.
Next to the bombers sat the fighter-interceptor squadron — among them four F-104 "Starfighters," two F-106 "Delta Darts," six souped-up A-7 "Strike-fighters," six converted T-38 "Talon" trainers and two F-105X "Super Thunderchiefs." Two of these airplanes were always in the scramble mode — armed, fueled-up and ready to go up and intercept any perceived threat to the base. And, with proper configuration, each of these airplanes could be converted to a fighter-bomber role.
Further along the flight line sat the "oddball" unit. The twelve airplanes — known throughout the base as "The Dirtiest Dozen" — were favorites of Hunter.
PAAC had come upon them in a variety of ways — some were thrown in free when the base purchased other high-end aircraft, others were found abandoned at air bases throughout the west. Still others were liberated from a small air museum in old Utah. There was the F-84, a veteran of the Korean War; an F-94, the two-seat mid-50s interceptor that was designed with chasing UFOs in mind. And there were two A-1 "Skyraiders," hulking prop-driven planes that were already grandfathers when they were used in Viet Nam.
But these planes were youngsters compared to aircraft that the base's ground crew mechanics (known by all as "monkeys") had somehow resurrected from the Utah museum. There was one P-38 "Lightning," and a P-51 "Mustang," both heroes of America's effort in World War II. The oldest plane on the base was a veteran Curtis biplane, which carried a still-working Vickers machine-gun.
Then there were the five B-47 "Stratojets," bombers nearly as big as B-52 and nearly as old. Hunter had purchased them for duty in the Football City War and they served well, if briefly. Now the PAAC had inherited them, as well as the oddest duck of alclass="underline" an enormous B-36 bomber. This airplane, built just before the Jet Age dawned in the late 1940s, had six propeller engines fitted backwards onto ultralong wings. Hunter kept promising himself that he would take the big bird up for a ride one day, but he never seemed to find the time.
The base also maintained a small fleet of helicopters, including the Crazy Eights, and used three Boeing 727 converted airliners as cargo planes and also on convoy duty.
It was an air fleet that rivaled any power on the continent — even PAAC-San Diego could boast only six more aircraft. In free-for-all New Order America, air power was usually the determining factor in most disputes, big or small.
The continent was united — for trade purposes — only by air travel. Huge supply convoys — made up of reconditioned airliners like Boeing 707s, 727s, and 747 Jumbo jets — traveled between eastern Free Canada and the West Coast. As the skies were filled with air pirates who made a living shooting down stray airliners, convoy protection — in some cases provided by free-lance fighter pilots — was in high demand.
But it was one pilot — and one jet fighter — that was known as the best in the business. The pilot was Hunter. The airplane was his F-16. And within minutes of the status report being completed, Hunter was roaring down the base's center runway, taking his jet up for its daily workout.
Chapter Five
It was the same airplane Hunter had flown when he was part of the USAF's Thunderbirds acrobatic demonstration team. When the Soviets "won" the war and the New Order became a reality, one of the dictates was that sophisticated weapons like the F-16s — along with just about every front-line weapon in the West's mighty arsenal — be destroyed. In the wave of disarmament fever that followed — carried out for the most part by fanatical, if slightly suspicious National Guardsmen in the U.S. — literally billions of dollars of equipment was blown up, dismantled or otherwise made useless. Except for this one F-16…
A year after the war, General Seth Jones, the late twin brother of PAAC's Commander-in-Chief, Dave Jones, had found the plane locked away in an isolated hangar at the abandoned Thunderbirds' HQ at Nellis Air Force Base near Las Vegas, Nevada. Why the plane had escaped the disarmament destruction, he never knew. But to be caught with the aircraft was a crime in the eyes of the New Order, punishable by death. Nevertheless, as part of his plan to draw Hunter out of his self-imposed exile on a New Hampshire mountain, Jones risked death by firing squad and had the aircraft disassembled, then flown piece by piece back to ZAP's Jonesville base on Cape Cod where it was put back together in secret. Once Hunter got a look at the '16 — probably the last one left in the world — he immediately agreed to give up the hermit's life and to join ZAP.
Jones had the plane repainted in its original Thunderbird red-white-and-blue colors, but it was Hunter who modified the aircraft to carry up to a dozen Sidewinder air-to-air missiles, instead of the usual four. He also installed a "six-pack" of Vulcan cannons, three on each side of the jet's nose. The pilot put his aeronautical doctorate to work when he disassembled the jet's GE engine and uprated it to nearly twice its power. Now the F-16 could reach speeds of nearly 2000 m.p.h. with the afterburner kicked in.
Even before the war, Hunter was well recognized as the best fighter pilot who had ever lived. Now, in the dangerous, post-war world, his fighter was well known and accorded the highest respect across the continent. Consequently, the F-16 was known as the best fighter ever built. If any plane was built with a pilot in mind, it was the F-16 and Hunter. They were made for each other.
Hunter put the F-16 into a long slow turn back over the base. At this point he knew he was serving as a "target" for the anti-aircraft crews below — these daily flights allowed the crews to test their tracking and aiming equipment.
His flight path brought him over the dozens of quonset huts that served as the base's barracks. There were about 15,000 troops in all stationed at the base — the infantry division, the Airborne group, Dozer's 7th Cavalry. With their support groups and families, the population at PAAC-Oregon reached 25,000. And just as with the old ZAP base on Cape Cod, a large community of ordinary citizens had sprung up around the installation. In the anarchaic New Order, the prime real estate was near the protection of friendly forces like PAAC.
Not only did the citizens know that in times of trouble they could seek refuge inside the base, but living next to the installation also provided them with work in the many support operations needed to run the huge operation.
Once he received radio confirmation that the AA crews around the center of the base had completed their exercises, Hunter steered the fighter toward the outer defense perimeter of the base. Below him he could see the acres of farmlands, tilled by citizens, that supplied the base with its food. Just as the small fleet of fishing boats docked near the base provided the servicemen with fresh catches daily, these farms put the vegetables on the mess tables.
The neat squared-out patterns on the ground were broken occasionally by an anti-aircraft battery or a SAM site. Corn grew right next to a string of ack-ack guns, and a Hawk missile system cohabitated with a field of carrots.
The outer defense line was located some 11 miles out from the center of the base. Its perimeter ran nearly 30 miles and was demarked by several waves of barbed wire. In front of this was a half-mile wide, heavily-mined and booby-trapped defoliated area that would discourage the feistiest infiltrator. Guard towers appeared at 200-yard intervals and the perimeter was patrolled endlessly by the base's security forces and the local civilian militia. The commanders of PAAC-Oregon were vigilant to a fault. But with good reason. Just beyond the no-man's land and the barbed wire sat the hills and forests of old Oregon. This is where the uncertainty began. The land that stretched all the way down the coast and east to the Rockies and beyond, was filled with bandits, raiders, terrorists. The PAAC-Oregon base was the exception, not the rule in New Order America, just like the old U.S. Cavalry forts in the old Wild West days. Along with the Frontier Guardsmen outposts that were scattered throughout eastern Oregon serving as the trip-wire for the main base, PAAC-Oregon was an island of sanity and civilization on the edge of a lawless, out-of-control countryside.