CARRIER 6: COUNTDOWN By Keith Douglass

good grunt could lessen the effects of the turn by perhaps one G.

“Where … are … the … other … two?” he said, forcing each

word out past clenched teeth.

He was taking a chance, letting the bandits get between him and the two

Intruder flights, but the range had started out so tight that there’d

been little else he could do. Now he was behind one of the bandit

elements.

Mustang, with Walkman, his RIO, was still with him, on his right.

Then they were out of the turn and squarely on the six of the two

bandits. “Mustang, this is Coyote!” he called, even as he slid the

targeting box across one of the targets. “I’ve got the one on the

left!”

“And I’ve got the one on the right.”

A buzz sounded over his headset. “I’ve got tone. Fox one!”

An AMRAAM slid off the rail beneath his right wing.

1138 hours

Tomcat 209, shotgun 1/4

Lieutenant Commander Gregory Arrenberger had gotten his handle from

shipboard slang during his flight training at Pensacola. A “slider” was

a hamburger, as opposed to a “roller,” or hot dog. Commended by his CO

for the cold-blooded precision of his formation flying, he’d replied,

“Hell, sir, I’m no hotdog.” The nickname Slider seemed inevitable after

that, especially when connected with the “berger” in his last name.

Slider was using every bit of his engineer’s precision now as he pulled

his Tomcat out of a hard-right turn, tracking on the second element of

Russian planes streaking through the Tomcat formation. For a moment

there, tunnel vision had clamped down on him and he’d felt himself

wavering at the edge of consciousness, but he’d grunted away at an M-1,

forcing the blood to stay in his head … and then he’d been in the

clear, lining up on one of the low-flying MiGs displayed against his

HUD.

Where the hell was his wingman … wingperson, he corrected himself

with a wry grin beneath his mask. Glancing left, outside the radius of

his turn, he saw nothing and assumed she’d not been able to keep up with

him. He had nothing against Hanson personally, of course–she seemed

like a nice kid–but damn it, women had no business at the controls of a

hot combat fighter.

“Lock! Blue Grass!” he called to his RIO. “I got tone! Fox one!”

The AMRAAM shrieked clear of the Tomcat, and Slider immediately pulled

right, angling toward a second lock on the other Russian fighter.

“Pull up, Slider!” Blue Grass screamed in his ear. “Pull up!”

Instinctively he brought the stick back and eased back on the turn. A

shadow blotted the light to his right, then slid beneath his aircraft.

“Jesus, Slider!” sounded over his headset. “Watch where the hell you’re

driving!”

Only then did Slider realize that Lobo must have stuck with him through

the turn, had actually stayed inside his turn where the G-forces were

higher … and he’d come a thumbnail’s breadth from turning right into

her.

“God damn it, Hanson!” he yelled back. “Give me some flying room, huh?”

But he knew even as he said the words that he should have checked right

for his wingman as well as to the left.

“Let’s stay frosty, guys.” That was Lieutenant j.g. “Vader” McVey,

Hanson’s RIO. “I’ve got two more lifting up from Ura Guba.”

“Okay,” Slider said. “But stay off my ass, lady! No more of this

welded-wing shit!”

“Affirmative.” Hanson’s voice was tight and cold. Had she been as shook

by the near-miss as him? Or was she just mad because he’d snapped at

her?

There was no figuring women. He’d apologize later. It was his fault,

after all, and Arrenberger prided himself on being fair.

Ahead, the Russian aircraft Slider had fired at was climbing hard, close

enough now that he could distinguish the characteristic silhouette of a

MiG-29, with its widely separated engine nacelles and flared LERX, the

leading-edge roof extensions over the aircraft’s intake.

“He’s dumping chaff,” Blue Grass announced. “He’s pulling an

Immelmann.”

“I’m on him.” He hauled back on the stick, climbing rapidly to cut the

Russian off at the top of his twisting, vertical maneuver. The AMRAAM

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