sight of land had brought back.
Two years chained to land hadn’t dimmed the sheer joy of strapping on an
F-14 and reaching for the limitless skies.
Of course he’d flown often enough those last two years, but it hadn’t
been the same. Getting in enough hours to qualify each week wasn’t like the
day-to-day cycle of carrier ops. He had always felt tied to the land, bound
to that hated Pentagon office that would reclaim him when each flight was
done. It had been two years of Hell but it was over now.
Now he was going home to the Jefferson. It should have been the happiest
day of Tombstone’s life … would have been, if not for the circumstances that
surrounded the new assignment. Seemingly overnight a minor boundary dispute
between Norway and the Soviet Union had blossomed into armed conflict. With
NATO virtually a dead letter and the United States hesitating over unilateral
intervention, the crisis was still a local one confined to Scandinavia. But
everything pointed toward a change in the wind, and it looked as if Jefferson
would once again be sailing into harm’s way. Why else would Mercury Flight be
ferrying planes out to replace aircraft destroyed in the flight deck accident
the carrier had suffered almost a week ago? It wasn’t normal practice …
except when it looked like those planes would be needed.
He supposed the same could be said for himself. That same accident had
cost CVW-20 her Deputy CAG. Someone back in Washington must have thought the
carrier’s air wing would be needing a new second-in-command soon, or they
wouldn’t have tapped Tombstone for the job. It had been a hurry-up job all
around, with no time at all for Magruder to be properly briefed on his new
job. It was nice to know that someone thought he could handle the position
all the same.
Of course, there was always the chance that this was just another
public-relations ploy. The hero of Wonsan and the Indian Ocean crisis was a
useful card to play when public support was the goal. And America’s new
President, the first Democrat to occupy the White House since Jimmy Carter,
needed every good card he could lay his hands on now that it looked like the
Soviets were bursting back on the world stage with a vengeance.
The thought made Tombstone cringe inwardly. He had never been
comfortable with the hero treatment even though he’d come to terms with it
after North Korea. But his staff job at the Pentagon had been little more
than an excuse to keep him available for public appearances, Congressional
testimony, and media events. He had joined the Navy to become an aviator, to
fly a fighter like his father and his uncle before him. Boring paperwork and
exercises in public relations had never been his goal. A sleek fighter and
open sky were all Matthew Magruder wanted or needed.
If his return to active duty on the Jefferson was intended or just
another piece of PR work, Tombstone thought, then the people who’d ordered it
were going to be surprised. He wouldn’t allow anyone to saddle him with
another rear-echelon role. Never again, he vowed silently.
The moonlight gleamed off the Intruder’s wing again. The bomber was
drifting right, out of formation. Magruder bit his lip and keyed in his
radio. “Mercury Five-one-one, Mercury Leader,” he said. “Let’s tighten it
up, there, Lieutenant.”
The reply was a startled “Sorry, sir.” Slowly the Intruder nudged back
into formation.
It had been a long flight, and all four pilots were tired. This had been
the most sustained flying Magruder had done in two years, and he imagined the
others weren’t much better prepared. They’d been drawn from Reserve Air
Groups in the States, and like Tombstone they wouldn’t have had much excuse
for practicing any of the types of operations that were routine for
carrier-based flyers.
Two Tomcats, two Intruders … and at that they’d still be short of a
full complement by three more planes. That accident on Jefferson’s flight
deck had been a messy one. It wasn’t the best way Tombstone could think of to
get the assignment he’d coveted, especially when the Deputy CAG he was