“Monty’s the worst right now. We’ve stopped the bleeding but he’s at least lost the one leg. We’ve done what we can to try and save the other one. The Secretary’s in a lot of pain with her broken leg. Her body armor stopped another round so I’m sure she’ll have some sore ribs but she should be okay. There’s a few others but you and Monty are the worst.”
“How’re you doing?” Stonewall asked as she removed her body armor, leaving only her Under Armour sports bra on for a top.
“Oh, you know, I took two rounds in the chest and another in the back, but not all at the same time. The lungs are good this time,” she added with a grin. In their previous engagement, she suffered a collapsed lung after taking two rounds simultaneously in the back and the chest.
“Well, you do make a sexy target.”
“You think so, huh? Too bad you won’t be seeing any action, of any kind, for a few weeks anyway, Cowboy,” Arielle replied with a wide smile on her face. “You’ve got one badly mangled leg.”
“That sounds like a challenge,” Stonewall added as he tried to sit up. “Oh, Jeez that hurts!”
“I told ya. Now lay still. I don’t want you losing any more blood than you already have.”
“Gamecock Two-Six, Lancer Three-Six, I’ve got forty-two bandits at one-six-seven degrees from me, bearing two-nine-one at eight hundred knots, distance ninety-five miles.”
“Three-Six. I see ‘em, range 125 miles. Looks like you’ll get to them first.”
“You’ll need to do some cleanup for us. We won’t be able to take’em all.”
“Understand, Three-Six. We should be able to get’em all between the two of us.”
“Lancer flight, we’ll close to fifty miles before we engage. I don’t want to get within their missile range.” The Lancer Eagles carried the advanced AIM-120D air-to-air missile which had a decided range advantage over anything previously supplied to the Turkish air force.
“Mahdi flight, move to intercept. We need our brothers to get through.” And with that, thirty-two F-16s left formation and changed their heading to intercept the approaching Lancer flight. The active electronically scanned array radars in both the approaching F-15s and the F-22s picked up the shift in the ISIS formation.
“Gamecock Two-Six, you seeing what I’m seeing?”
“Roger that, Lancer. You’re closer. You going to try and take out the escorts or are you going to bore in for the eight on the far side? We’ll be able to pick them up if you want to take the escorts.”
“Gamecock Two-Six, we’ll take as many of the escorts as we can. Not sure that we can get all of them but we’ll try.”
“Lancer Three-Six, that’s fine. Doesn’t look they can see us anyway,” the Raptor flight lead replied, indicating that the stealthy nature of the F-22 completely hid them from the ISIS Vipers. “Looks like they’re all headed towards you guys.”
“Lancer flight, fire on my mark: Three, two, one, mark!” For even the experienced pilots of the Lancer flight, the visual display of the mass missile launch was impressive as thirty-six AIM-120D missiles suddenly leapt off of the rails of the supersonic Eagles in the night sky. The counter measures launched by each of the Eagles further enhanced the nighttime fireworks. “Lancer flight, break and let’s go find Texaco. Gamecock, we’re Winchester and heading to refuel. The bandits are all yours.”
“Roger that. Looks like you guys did pretty good. I’ve got eight remaining escorts and the eight special targets. Gamecock flight, doesn’t look like they can see us so ignore the escorts and go right for the last eight. We’ll pick up the escorts once we’ve eliminated the primary targets.”
The four F-22s of the Gamecocks flew to within twenty miles of the last of the ISIS F-16s. The Viper pilots never had a chance with the stealthy Raptors — they simply couldn’t see the threat on their radars. Each Raptor fired six AIM-120D missiles at the eight target aircraft — three missiles per target. It was all over in seconds.
“Archangel, Gamecock Two-Six. The targets have been eliminated. Hitting the remaining escorts.”
“Roger that, Gamecock.”
XLII
“Hey, big brother, you’re looking a lot better than the last time I saw you here,” Tanya said announcing her entrance into Stonewall’s hospital room. His last visit to BAMC occurred when he took an Iraqi mortar blast to the face and chest.
“Yeah, really don’t care to go through that again.”
“Tanya, nice to finally meet you,” Dani said.
“Oh, sorry,” Stonewall apologized. “Tanya, this is Dani. I know you’ve talked on the phone quite a bit but never really had the chance to meet each other face to face.”
“Not to worry,” Tanya replied. “Dani tells me they think they’ll be able to save your leg. That’s wonderful!”
“Yeah, that’s a huge relief! It’s going to be a long recovery, though. Everything from the knee down is pretty much torn up.”
“Well, if the docs think you’ll have a decent recovery, and they don’t even know you like I do, you’ll be on your feet in no time,” Tanya added. “And, I’m sure Dani will do what she can to motivate you!”
“That won’t be a problem,” Dani replied with a grin.
“Did you happen to bring that little package I asked if you could pick up for me?” Jackson asked his sister.
“I sure did,” Tanya replied with huge smile as she handed it to him.
“Awesome!”
“Dani, you know, what I’m about to ask you generally requires that a guy get down on one knee but, obviously, that’s not going to happen.”
“What!?!” she gasped as she opened up the small jewelry box Jackson handed to her. The box contained a three band, Black Hills Gold ring set featuring a one-third carat diamond within a rose, accented by green and rose-colored gold leaves. The flanking bands each featured two groups of three smaller diamonds accenting the center diamond. “Oh, my GOD!!! Stonewall, it’s GORGEOUS!!!” Dani exclaimed as she slid the ring on her finger.
“Congratulations, Dani,” Tanya said as she gave her a big hug. “And welcome to the family!”
“YES! I’m… stunned! Yes! Stonewall… Tom, you never cease to amaze me!” Dani added as she leaned over and wrapped her arms around his neck and gave him a very passionate kiss.
“Hey, sounds like I got here just in time.”
“Tamir! What are you doing here?” Arielle said as he walked into the room.
“I got wind that you might have something special going on here and I see I’m just in time. Nice rock, Arielle,” Tamir said as he winked at Stonewall.