G.I. BABY (23 page)

Then his RWR went hysterical with the beeping. He was locked on now and the threat was VERY close. Threat he couldn’t distinguish from the mess on his HUD, so he would lump them all as a war party of SAMs out to end his days. Lots of nasty symbols moving on the screen. He didn’t think the Muj could still be this aggressive after suffering the wrath of the French. Wrong again.

His men were busy saving their own asses.
 

Just then, he saw Trojan Three zoom by at more than 500 knots, followed by a 6. It looked like Three was dragging an air-skier.

It was spectacular, a missile tailing a fighter jet on the cloudless sky. They were like playing an aerial cat and mouse game. The missile was actually just a few seconds from destroying the plane, if it caught it.

“Three, this is Trojan One. I got joy on your nasty. Go high-level G. Will shoot it down, over! All Trojan players, all Trojan players, One shooting down 6 at my two o’clock in 20 secs, over.”

“Roger that, One. Fuck, this hooker’s got an ambitious pimp after my nuts, over,” was Trojan Three’s cool answer. He wasn’t fooled. Three was nervous. In the thick of combat where life and death depended on quick judgment and sharp instinct delivered at a mere flick of a finger or twist of the hand — you could be blown out of the sky in a confetti of Titanium and your own skin and teeth before you’d even know what hit you— sense of humor was a must. This was the coping mechanism of most soldiers in the tour, to laugh in the fangs of death, flip the bird at it and die fighting. Three was a younger pilot with genius-level results in Red Flags (elite air combat exercises) but still very much a rookie in actual combat. This kid was a general’s son. They were, in fact, baby-sitting him.

He chased after them. Three pumped the afterburner and shot off, then turned sharply to the right. The sudden shift in Three’s angle made the missile lose tangent, giving him a window to fire. He sicced a Sidewinder on it, guiding the Death Dot to kiss its tail, then locking on it.

He fired the missile.

He counted a few seconds. The 6 went off in a giant fireball in the distance.

“Three, 6’s out, over.”

He heard Three’s deep sigh. “Copy, tango, Trojan One, over.”

“Two and Four, report SAM status,” he asked the rest of his pack.

“Mofo still on me, over.” Four replied.

“Lost mine. Tailing Four’s nasty, over,” Trojan Two said.

Good. “Copy, Two. Carry on, over.”

Then he saw a gnat appear in the horizon again, right in front of him, a fuselage of gray in profile. He saw it turn, facing him.

This was HIS gnat. Death staring him in the face.

“One, defending 6. Defending 6,” he calmly said.

He rolled out, made a series of high-level Gs and released his decoys, chaffing to confuse the radar signal of the missile. He hoped the fucker would follow the decoy instead of his ass. But that was wishing for ice-cream in the middle of the desert.

He had to lose this shithead, make it overshoot or burn out airspeed, whatever, as long as it didn’t touch his 30-million dollar bird. He climbed higher.
 

One of the reasons the Raptors were not used in the Gulf Wars was it would be the laughingstock of the entire aviation history if it got killed by a mere gnat. Not that the Raptor won’t swat the gnat easy while lazing about in the sky, but gnats were tenacious and the ISIL had plenty of the fuckers. It could happen.

The RWR calmed down except for the symbols of Triple As being launched all over Lima Sierra. The entire oilfield was a nest of SAMs. It would be very hard to release the Mavericks from a very high altitude. It may land in Raqqa.

He didn’t want more innocent body count on his conscience.

What he’d give to be a Rusky on a fucking MiG right this minute, just drop the shit all over the place and go back to base. They didn’t need to engage in this merry chase with the SAMs.
 

Yeah, since Richard was born, his conscience was pretty active, giving him stupid thoughts like mercy when gnats were trying to blow him out of the sky.

He had to go below five thousand feet. Into another orgy with gnats called SA-3. Low-altitude missiles.

“Trojan One, lost the 6. Trojan Two and Four, report, over.” They didn’t scream May Day so they must be okay.

“Four, still locked on by the 6. Over.”

Shit, they were fucking up their time table big time. They should have rained the Mavericks already and gotten out of there ten minutes ago.

“Trojan One going down 3K to engage Target 1. We gotta be outta here in five mikes. Four, lure the fucker higher so the Raptors can take care of it. Two and Three, cover me. Over.”

They replied in affirmative.

He barreled down to 3,500 feet. A pair of SA-3s went off the ground, both of them were most probably after his butt as he was the one flying the lowest. The 6 doesn’t dwell much on this altitude so he was relatively safe from that fucker for now. He hoped! But the Triple As were shooting up like it was fourth of July. These were little cannons controlled by radar, too, not as damaging as a missile but he didn’t want any variety of gnats touching his plane.

“Two and Three, take care of the 3s, over.”

They both copied.

The RWR was freaking out again but he focused on his task while keeping eye on the 3’s proximity and movements. Fortunately, Two and Three were eye-balling the 3s while he did his job. Hopefully the 3s were infrareds (heat-seeking missiles) and would be after all of their asses, not only his.

He released his counter-measures, nonetheless. It was literally hell to be aiming at his target while evading 3s and dodging a barrage of cannons.

The Targeting Pod displayed a clear visual. He locked on Target 1. He keyed in the weapons display and called in the Mavs. He aimed on the circle on the screen, the exact loc of the target and holding his breath, unleashed a Maverick.

He felt the slight vibration of the plane as the missile kicked out from confinement.

He saw the target explode seconds later.

Locking on Target 2, he popped another Mav, rolling over just as Triple As zoomed by, missing his left wing by a hair.

Shit. He rolled over several times, evading more Triple As. This altitude was their playground.

Two shouted. “6 in the air! Heads up, Trojan One! Right behind you. Close!”

“You gotta be shitting me, buddy,” he muttered under his breath but the RWR was spitting mad, confirming Two’s warning. Dammit, the mother of the gnat bitches found him again!

I rolled to the right, dropped lower then climbed, then rolled over again and again, trying to break the radar coordinates locked on me so Two and Three could shoot down the fucker.

“Two, how close?!”

“He’s kissing your ass, Trojan One! Go higher! Over!”

Shit, shit, shit!

He released several decoys, chaffed like mad, but it was still on him based on the RWRs screeching.

He quickly glanced at Andi and Richard’s picture taped on the dashboard to his left. For the first time in his decorated military career, he prayed for his life in the middle of action. He had always been ready to go anytime. But now…
God, please...

He dropped altitude abruptly, made loops that defied G-force and made his insides churn madly, then surged up. “Two, posit of 6? Over!”

“Still after your ass, One! I’m locking on it, over!”

Just then, Four chimed in. “Four on Target 3 over Lima Sierra, over.”

Thank fuck, Four was finally getting back in the action!

“Copy that, Four. Two and Three, cover Four. I can handle this 6, over!”

They did as told.

He climbed higher and did a complicated flight pattern to throw off the 6.

“This is Trojan One over Lima Sierra. Calling any Rogue in the area. Any Rogue in the area. Defending 6. Need assistance, over!”

A Raptor responded immediately. “This is Rogue Two, tally SAM deets, over.”

He relayed the 6’s details to Rogue Two. “Rogue Two locking on it, firing in ten secs, get out of the way, Trojan One.”

He kicked the afterburner and let Rogue Two handle the 6.

He swooped down to get back to Lima Sierra.

“Trojan One here. Four, target status, over?”

“Target 3, done, over,” Four replied.

“Firing 2 Mavs at Target 4,” Three said.

He saw smoke explode as Mavericks hit home one after the other.

They had two more remaining targets.

“Trojan One, this is Titan on Victor.” That was the AWACS pilot.

“Trojan One here, go,” he said.

“Comanche advised to abandon Lima Sierra now. I repeat, abandon Lima Sierra now. Over.”

Comanche was the one directing the mission from his office in Turkey, no doubt eating Shawarma and watching the action from a huge screen. His stomach growled at the thought of food. Shawarma wasn’t bad. “Roger that, Titan. Over and out.”

He told the pack to leave the area immediately. He heard a collective happy affirmatives. Weren’t they all glad to get out of this gnat-infested hellhole.

They shot out in formation, pumping the Gs, away from Lima Sierra.

At thirty thousand feet, he bingoed. Running out of fuel. Good thing the tankers were just nearby for refueling.

No 6 followed them anymore. Maybe the Muj didn’t want to waste too much SAMs on them. They knew another pack will arrive in a few hours to rain shit on their asses again.

We hit four valuable targets.

That was good enough for one session.

They will definitely be back.

——*****——

He was never the one to wax poetic
but he could really say now, the sound of her voice on the other line was music to his ears after hearing RWR beeps signaling his probable death the whole day. He participated in two air strikes in two regions of Syria today. They were both badasstic SAM and Triple Alpha parties. The ISIL were like amoeba. Cut them to pieces and they’d multiply still.

“Hey, are you okay?” was her first question.

“I’m fine, sugar. How’s the little one?”

“Sleeping with Bella now. Just finished nursing him.”

Silence.

He controlled his breathing as his heart was thumping like a gong against his rib cage. He was still in his flight suit.

“How are you?” he finally asked her.

“I’m good. So grateful Bella’s around. Auntie Frida sleeps here during the weekend when Bella needs to go home. Poor Gordon, abandoned by his wife and kids for two weeks now. Greta comes around a lot, too. Richard is everyone’s darling. I’m so jealous.”

He smiled. She was blabbering. Glad he was not the only one feeling like wings were flapping in his gut. “Poor baby.”

“Yeah. Hey, I watch the news all the time.”

“Which channel?” He hoped it was some showbiz oriented show she watched or shit like that.

“CNN and Al Jazeera.”

He sighed. “Baby, sometimes it’s not good to watch the news all the time.”

“When will it end?”

“I don’t know, baby.”

“Do you fly everyday?”

“Not everyday, but most of the week, yeah.”

“F-15s are tough planes, right?”

That made him smile. “You’ve been googling my plane.”

“Well, I’m bored when Richard’s sleeping. Those missiles cannot get to your plane because it’s so fast, right? Like supersonic fast? Faster than sound?”

He knew what she was trying to say. His chest ached. “No baby. No missile can outfly my plane. It’s twice faster than the speed of sound,” he said, to pacify her worries.

He heard her heavy sigh.

Silence.

“Craig?” came her little voice after a while.

“Hmm?”

“You will come back, right?”

That, he could never promise.

He inhaled deeply again to ease the tightness in his chest and the lump in his throat that was choking the breath out of him. He unzipped his flight suit down to his waist.

“You have to promise me you’ll come back.”

He closed his eyes.

“Richard needs you.”

God.

“I need you.”

He couldn’t stop them.

They fell down his cheeks. He bowed his head to hide his face from his comrades lounging nearby. Major Craig Walker, the War Thug, the scourge of the Muj, was crying like a sissy. Shaking in his balls like a yellow-ass.

“Craig?”

“I promise,” he forced the words out of his throat.

“Say it again.”

“I promise to come back to you and Richard.”

“Okay.”

Seconds ticked by again. He had so many things he wanted to tell her but he didn’t know how to articulate them. He was never good with words. He expressed better with actions.

It became too much to bear. “I gotta go, baby. I’ll call you again, soon, okay? Hug me for Richard.”