getting preferential treatment, morale would take a nose-dive, and there
were troubles enough in that department already.
The only special treatment Tombstone had okayed–and that in complete
secrecy–was to keep Lieutenants Strickland and Hanson in separate
flights.
The rumor had managed to spread throughout the wing that those two were
sleeping together. While there was no meat to that rumor beyond the
strictly circumstantial evidence of their PDAs, both Coyote as Squadron
CO and Tombstone as CAG agreed that having them in the same flight
risked the cold and professional calm, the engineer’s detachment valued
in combat flying.
Human emotions didn’t follow predictable patterns or lend themselves to
graphs or flight data tables. What would happen to one if the other got
into trouble? For the time being at least, Hanson would fly with
Shotgun One, while Strickland was assigned as Batman’s wingman in
Shotgun Two.
Coyote’s thoughts touched only lightly on the flight assignment
problems.
Right or wrong, the decision had been made. The primary problem at the
moment was those aircraft taking off from Ura Guba.
“Shotgun Two-one,” Coyote called. “This is Shotgun One-one. Do you
copy?”
“Affirmative One-one,” Batman’s voice replied. “What’s the gouge?”
“How about taking the reins for both White Lightnings, Batman? We’ll
slide east and eyeball those bandits coming up at zero-eight-five.”
“Roger that, Shotgun One. We’ll mind the store.”
“Shotgun One, this is One-one. On my mark, break left and go to a
two-by-two dispersal. Let’s see if these boys want to play.”
“Roger that,” Slider replied. “Let’s nail us some of those sons of
bitches!”
“Ready then, on three … two … one … break!”
As one, the four Tomcats stood on their port-side wings, slipping away
from the Intruder flight ahead and angling off toward the east.
Splitting into two groups of two, Coyote and Mustang moved high and to
the north, while Slider and Lobo went low and to the south. The bandits
were approaching rapidly, already at a thousand feet and coming on at
better than Mach one.
“We’re closing too fast to risk a Phoenix launch,” Cat told Coyote.
They were flying with a standard interception warload of four AIM-54s,
two Sidewinders, and two AMRAAMs. “Recommend AMRAA.M.”
“Rog.” Though if they got much closer they’d be in knife-fighting range.
“One-one, this is One-three!” That was Arrenberger. “I’ve got four
bandits now, repeat four. Range ten miles and still coming hot!”
“Confirmed,” Cat said over the ICS. “Four bandits. Coyote, I’ve got a
threat warning.”
Coyote heard it in his headset, the thin, high warble that meant an
enemy fire-control radar was painting his aircraft. “I’m switching to
air-to-air mode on my HUD.” Damn! Adding their speed to his, the lead
target was closing at over 1,500 knots, a good half mile every second.
There was no time to think … only to act. “Mustang! Stay with me!
Going to full burner!” He rammed his throttles forward to zone five,
felt the kick-in-the-seat boost of the F-14’s powerful GE turbofan
engines.
As he accelerated, his wings folded themselves to their
sixty-eight-degree backswept configuration, and a moment later he slid
smoothly through the sound barrier. “Launch! Launch!” Cat cried.
“Bandits have launched!”
But by going supersonic, Coyote had unexpectedly closed the range so
quickly that he was already inside the Russians’ optimum range for a
head-on radar lock. He saw two of the enemy fighters as they flashed
past, a pair of specks against blue sky that appeared, then dwindled
astern almost too quickly to follow.
Immediately, Coyote chopped back on the throttles and went into a hard
left turn. The Tomcat shuddered as he yanked it into an
edge-of-the-envelope angle of attack, his wings sliding out to full
extension, the G-forces squashing him and Cat down into their seats with
the force of six full-grown people sitting in their laps. Spots danced
in front of his eyes … and then his vision started to turn gray,
closing in from the sides as blood drained from his head.
He grunted hard, tensing the muscles of his legs and torso in order to
keep the blood from draining from his head. The practice was properly
called the M-1 maneuver, though aviators simply called it the grunt. A
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