CARRIER 5: MAELSTROM By Keith Douglass

fiery burst of flaming debris and whirling fragments. “Javelin

Three-oh-eight!” he heard over his headset. “I’ve got one on my tail! Got

one on my tail! I need help!”

“There he is!” Teejay warned. “Two o’clock, one mile!”

Javelin referred to aircraft of VFA-161, one of Jefferson’s Hornet

squadrons. Coyote could see the Hornet in a tight turn, a MiG close behind.

The range was great enough that Coyote decided to use a Sparrow. “Hang on,

Javelin Three-zero-eight,” he called. “When I give you the word, break left.”

“Hurry up! Hurry up! This guy’s all over me!”

“Three … two … one … break!”

Twisting hard to the left, the Hornet dropped clear of Coyote’s cone of

fire, clearing the way for a solid radar lock on the MiG. Coyote triggered

the lock, then sent the AIM-7 shrieking through the sky as Teejay continued to

illuminate the MiG with the AWG-9 radar. “Fox one!” he called, and held the

Tomcat steady for a desperate several seconds as the semiactive homer closed

on the target … merged with it … then detonated in a searing flash.

“Yah!” Teejay screamed. “That’s splash three! Splash three!”

A threat warning warbled in Coyote’s headset.

“Someone’s locked on,” Coyote called. “God damn it, Teejay! Where is

he?”

“I don’t know, man, I don’t know. Christ, it’s gettin’ too crowded up

here!”

The entire sky was now a confused tangle of contrails, of aircraft, of

the crisscrossing trails of antiship missiles, of plunging streamers of

smoke–funeral pyres of aircraft and men. It was impossible to single out any

one missile trail …

“He’s on our six, Coyote! Comin’ shit-hot fast!”

Twisting in his seat, Coyote saw the MiG. God … was it the same one

he’d nearly caught earlier? He couldn’t tell, but this one was crowding in

close, lashing him with fire-control radar, lining up a perfect shot, one that

couldn’t miss.

“Hang on, Teejay!” Coyote rammed the throttle to Zone Five afterburner

and hauled back on the stick.

The Tomcat clawed for the sky.

CHAPTER 18

Monday, 23 June

0419 hours Zulu (0519 hours Zone)

Tomcat 200

Over Romsdalfjord

Coyote held the Tomcat in a sharp, full-powered climb until Teejay

shouted that the Russian pilot was committed, goosing his Fulcrum in hot

pursuit of the F-14. Then he pulled the throttles back hard, cutting power to

seventy percent, and brought the nose up higher, until they were hurtling

straight toward the zenith. A thin layer of clouds exploded past them. Cold

sunlight bathed the aircraft in a dazzling radiance.

Bleeding off air speed, Coyote held the Tomcat in its climb, drifting

toward ten thousand feet, hanging the aircraft at the ragged edge of a stall.

Then he kicked the rudder over, letting the F-14 fall to port in a low-speed

vertical turn. Sky, clouds, blue mountains, and water wheeled around the

Tomcat’s canopy. In the space of three seconds, Coyote had reversed course

and was now hurtling straight down toward the Romsdalfjord, which filled his

forward windscreen like a huge and colorful map. Punching through the broken

clouds once more, he saw Jefferson below and to the west, a tiny, gray

rectangle walled in by black cliffs.

He saw the pursuing MiG, a thousand feet below and still climbing toward

him. With their combined velocities, the gap between them narrowed in a

flash. There was no time to take aim and fire, no time to do anything but

nudge stick and rudder in an instinctive maneuver to avoid collision.

They passed, starboard to starboard. In that instant, freeze-framed by

the adrenaline pounding through his system, Coyote glimpsed every detail of

the MiG: the high, angular tail fins; the flat body; the helmeted pilot

staring back at him through his canopy; the number 501 picked out in red and

white against the gray painted nose.

As soon as the MiG was past, Coyote brought the stick up, feeling the

massive, crushing weight of G-forces piling up on head and chest. Breathing

became difficult. He bore down with the muscles of neck and diaphragm,

grunting hard to deliberately force blood from heart to head as his peripheral

vision started closing down. It was as though he were peering through a

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