0756 hours, 26 March
CATCC, U.S.S. Thomff Jefferson
On the PLAT monitor, a pair of VF-95 Tomcats squatted side by side on the forward catapults. Tombstone did a fast calculation. All six of the current CAP aircraft, including the Alert Five, were from Viper Squadron: Army Garrison and Batman Wayne, Nightmare Marinaro and Ramrod Kingsly, Shooter Rostenkowski and Coyote Grant. Only two more Vipers remained to be launched in the dance on the deck,
^ Tomcat 220 piloted by Lieutenant Hardesty—’ Trapper” to his ^squadron mates—and number 208, Lieutenant “Maverick” $? Bowman.
iff. Trapper and Maverick were botfi replacement pilots, kids on first blue-water deployment with a squadron. They’d iwn in with Coyote on the COD aircraft, and Tombstone had
yet had an opportunity to get to know them well. He grimaced. How many “Trappers” and “Mavericks” fljere there in the Navy? Or “Slicks” and “Ramrods” and ^Shooters.” The men—the boys—came and went. The run-; names never seemed to change … or the grinning faces cocksure attitudes.
He watched as red-shirted ordies completed their checks of |each Tomcat’s weapons load, pulling the safing wires from the siles’ fuzes, then holding them up so that the pilot could t die red tags affixed to the wires and verify that his ce was ready to arm and launch. Unlike the BARCAP, ppwhich had been armed strictly for long-range interdiction, Trapper and Maverick were carrying standard interception £, Wiarloads: a mix of four Phoenix, two Sparrow, and two IJSidewinder missiles. The Tomcat had originally been designed a stand-off interceptor, little more than a weapons platform • the Phoenix, but recognition that modern air combat ded close-in weapons for down-and-dirty dogfighting liad quickly led to the adoption of mixed loads. ,. They would need that range of distance and adaptability ^hen the Indian horde closed with them. There simply were IKJt enough Phoenix AIM-54-Cs for every Indian target . . . ‘$c enough planes to launch them. Unless the Indians got cold feet and backed off at the last moment, this was going to be one -nasty, toe-to-toe fight.
“The JBDs rose ponderously from the deck, and the Cat .^Officer stepped back from the Tomcats, vigorously cycling his above his head. The F-14’s tailpipes glowed orange as ir afterburners engaged.
£”‘ Safe behind the shelter of the raised jet-blast deflectors, the ats of VF-97, the War Eagles, were lining up to take dieir at the catapults. First in line, he saw, was number 101, lieutenant Commander Chuck Connelly’s bird. “Slick” llpotmelly had been given the vacant squadron CO slot after the
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death of the War Eagles’ previous skipper in Thailand. Tombstone heard Costello mutter something under his breath.
“What was that, Hitman?”
“Just wishing the skipper luck,” Costello replied. “Damn, I wish I was going with them.”
Tombstone knew the young, black-haired j.g. wasn’t in hack the way he was. Someone had to draw CATCC duty, and today it was Costello’s turn. But Tombstone could sense the kid’s eagerness, his impatience.
“So do I, Hitman,” he said. “So do I.”
0758 hours, 26 March
Sea Harrier 101, Blue King Leader
Tahliani was in position. With his eyes on the radar returns indicating both the American Tomcat and the more distant U.S. carrier, he moved the targeting pipper on the screen, locked on, then pressed the launch button. With a whoosh of smoke and flame, one of the two bulky, black-and-red-painted missiles dropped from the Sea Harrier’s underwing ordnance pad and ignited.
The Sea Eagle was a product of British Aerospace. Four meters long, four tenths of a meter thick, it had a range of well over a hundred kilometers. Far superior in every way to the small French Exocet, it had a 227-kilogram warhead that was believed capable of disabling even the largest warship.
But Tahliani was less interested in the Sea Eagle’s target than he was in mat target’s guardian. As the missile dropped to its programmed flight altitude and reached its cruising speed of Mach .85, the Indian pilot could see in the movements of his opponents the consternation the launch had caused.
Sensing the right moment, he pulled back on his throttles, letting the missile skim ahead.