Authors: Stuart Slade
“Much
more importantly, we’ve already figured out how to keep her, and others like
her, safe and sound from any further interference.”
Randi
cocked his head curiously. “And what’s that?”
“Well,
James, the signal in question isn’t that much different from an electromagnetic
pulse, you know that thing the scare stories have claimed would wipe out
electronics worldwide. We’ve known how to defend against that for decades and
the power levels are much lower here. So, building on that experience.” Bullman
grinned and pulled a shiny contraption from his lab coat. “A hat made of
aluminum foil.”
Recon
Team Tango One-Five, Wadi Haran, Western Iraq.
“Control,
we have baldricks, column advancing along the Pipeline Route. Estimated
battalion force with company-level harpy cover.”
“Very
good. Engage and harass.”
Lieutenant
Jade “Broomstick” Kim acknowledged, the transferred her attention back to the
mast-mounted sight on her AH-6J helicopter. A deft touch on the controls and
the aircraft rose slightly so that the ball of the sight just peaked over the
ridge. The picture hadn’t changed much, even though the column was mounted on
the rhinolobsters, they were moving slowly. Well, slowly by United States Army
standards, Broomstick guessed that by medieval standards they were fairly
galloping along. That was excruciatingly slow when compared with the way the
First Armored Division was moving up.
A
long rectangle of rhinolobsters, each with its rider and a small group out in
front. They’d have to be the command group. The primary subject of interest,
the cream of the crop in this target-rich environment. Eliminate the command
structure first, leave the combat elements floundering around without orders.
It was a process the United States Army called ‘shaping the battlefield’.
“Tango Leader to all Tango birds. Select Hellfire missiles, target the command
group in front, ripple fire both missiles.”
Spaced
out down the wadi, the three Little Birds gunner their engines slightly and
lifted up still further. The column ahead was oblivious to their existence,
even when the laser target designators locked into place. On her display,
Broomstick could even see the designated targets starting to shift and scratch
as the lasers irritated their skins. Then, a gentle squeeze on the firing
button and the first of the Hellfires streaked off across the desert. Off to
her left, a split second later, Tango-one-five-Bravo fired its first missile
with Tango-one-five-Charlie following an instant after that. Broomstick had
already selected her next target when she fired her second missile, as soon as
she saw the explosion from the first hit she swung the laser to her selected
victim and watched the Hellfire missile obediently switch targets. The
explosions four thousand yards away seemed an almost continuous rolling thunder
as the six missiles devastated the command group.
“All
Tango-One-Five elements, jobs done, let’s get out of here.”
“We
got a problem ell-tee.”
Broomstick
looked across at the burning patch of desert where the baldrick command group
had been. Above it the harpies were heading for the position of her three
Little Birds, coming in very, very fast.
“Bug
out, everybody bug out now. Max speed.” She rammed the throttles forward,
swinging her helicopter into its high-speed position, trying to get away from
the cloud of harpies that was closing on her.
“No
good ell-tee. They’re faster than us.”
Broomstick
didn’t acknowledge, she didn’t have to. The AH-6 could do about 180 miles per
hour flat out and the harpies were closing the range. She pulled back and swung
the nose round, flipping her armament selector switch to the pair of Stingers
mounted on the side of her cockpit. The annunciator tone was mixed, even in the
cold of a desert night, they were having difficulty locking on. It was no good,
whatever lock they had would have to do. She fired into the mass of harpies,
watching as one missile went through the formation without exploding, the other
struck home and she saw a harpy briefly outlined in fire as the Stinger tore
into it. There was another flare as well, but Broomstick had no time to
congratulate herself or anybody else. She was turning away, diving, obeying the
old rule, no matter how little height you have, trade height for speed. Out of
the corner of her eye she saw that Tango-one-five-Charlie had left it too late.
The Little Bird was engulfed in jets of fire from the harpies, its fuel tanks
exploded and the flaming wreckage fell out of the sky to earth.
She
was back in the wadi, heading away from the cloud of harpies, grimly aware they
were closing in on her. “Control, engaged baldricks, command group badly hit.
We are under attack by company-strength harpies, Charlie is already down. Two
harpies down. Issue is in doubt. Tell others, don’t close in on harpies.”
Duty
done, Broomstick spun her helicopter again and went straight at the formation
of harpies pursuing her, her two miniguns blazing a long, long burst. It
registered briefly that there were two piles of burning wreckage on the desert
floor now and that she was alone. Bravo had gone. So had at least two more
harpies, torn apart by the stream of bullets from her miniguns. Then, there was
a clank and silence, she’d run out of ammunition. The harpies were on her,
clinging to the airframe, tearing at it with their claws, kicking at the skin
with their hooves. One was clinging to the cockpit canopy, smashing at it with
its claws, trying to tear its way in. She could see the demented, screaming
hate on its face, she could smell the stink of jet fuel as the harpies tore
their way into the Little Bird’s structure. That was all she saw and smelt
because that was when Tango-one-five-Alpha exploded.
My
thanks to Surlethe for his work in writing the middle part of this section and
his most appreciated inspiration and encouragement.
Chapter
Seven
309th
Aerospace Maintenance and Regeneration Group, Davis-Monthan AFB, Arizona
She
was an old lady, put away in her retirement home like all too many aged family
members who were just too much trouble to look after. Her age showed in so many
ways, her wrinkled skin, shabby appearance, general neglect. Another few
months, a year or so at most, and she would have been gone, forgotten. Only now
times had changed and those who had written her off as a relic of the past now
found they needed The Gray Lady again.
“What
about this one?”
The
AMRG clerk looked at the tail number and turned to the page in the ledger.
“This one’s a good prospect Sir. She hasn’t been stripped or cannibalized yet
and she was in good condition when she arrived. I’d mark this one down as a
definite.”
“Do
it, we’ll get a team down here to work on her. The draft notices are going out
this morning.” For once in its life, the U.S. Government was beginning to move
fast. The re-institution of the draft had been authorized late the previous
night with the highest priority being to get the maintenance and technical
support personnel who had left the services over the last few years back into
uniform. In a strange way, it was almost like the job being done here,
inspecting the veterans and getting them back into service. The B-52G in front
of them looked like an early candidate for a return to the colors.
“How
many does that make?” Colonel Degan was in charge of this particular effort, a
few hundred yards away, another team was going through the short line of eleven
B-1Bs parked in storage. That team wasn’t doing well at all, the Bones here
were in a hell of a mess. It was very doubtful if any of them could be
repaired. The B-52s, that was another matter. Still, there had been some
pleasant surprises, tucked away in one corner of the airfield had been a B-52H
along with four B-1Bs and one of the surviving B-1As, all in perfect condition.
What the latter was doing there was something of a minor mystery but it had
been rumored for years that more B-1As had been built than the official records
showed.
“There
are 43 B-52s in repairable status Sir. Of those, 20 require a medium level of
remedial repairs, the remainder, well, they’re a real mess. Take months if not
years to fix them up. Shortage of engines is the main problem, they’ve all been
stripped of those. Mind you. We’re not short of spare parts.”
That
was true enough, Degan thought. There were 45 more B-52s in the Boneyard but
they’d been scrapped. The wreckage was still here though, the wings shorn from
the fuselage, the tails chopped off. “I don’t suppose there’s any chance of
fixing the wrecks?”
“No
Sir,” the technical officer was quite firm on that point. “The wing spar’s been
chopped and the forge to make new ones was scrapped decades ago. Those birds
are gone, at best they’re spare parts for the rest.” Degan grimaced. Those
planes were badly needed. The technical officer saw the expression and
sympathized. “Good news though Sir, the tactical boys have been through the
line of F-111s, there’s 169 of them here and they reckon we can salvage enough
to equip a group, fifty or sixty if we’re lucky. And the transport guys did
even better, Lockheed-Martin are coming down to refurbish all twenty of the
C-5s we have here.” In some cases that would mean almost a new aircraft, it was
an old joke, ‘repairing” an aircraft meant lifting up its registration number
and sliding a new aircraft underneath.
“Any
word from the Rhino drivers?” There were literally hundreds of surplus F-4
Phantoms here and several teams were working their way through them, trying to
find how many could be brought back into service. Not many, was one guess but
times were desperate and at least F-4 components were still in production. That
was the second batch of draft notices going out, by tomorrow a lot of airline
pilots were going to be trying on their old Air Force and Navy uniforms again.
The
technical officer shook his head. Those teams had a lot of work to do and it
would be days before they finished. He scratched his head, the Arizona sun was
beating down hard and the aluminum foil lining his baseball cap was getting
uncomfortably hot. Still it was better than having some baldrick invading his
mind and turning his thoughts to jelly. “OK Sir, I think we’re done with the
bombers. You want to have a look at the KC-135s? See if any of those are
fixable?”
“Lead
on.” Degan looked back at the B-52 behind them. Already, people were starting
to go over her in detail, listing all the fixes needed. There were 84 B-52s in
USAF service and another 9 in the Air Force Reserve, if they could bring that
up to 120 with the aircraft salvaged from here, it would be a decisive step
forward.
Oval
Office, The White House, Washington D.C.
“Did
it pass Dick?”
“It
did indeed. 99 in favor, one against, you can guess who that was. Effective as
of 1800 Washington Time, the United States of America has formally declared war
on Hell. Unconditional declaration, first time we’ve had one of those for
decades. We’ve issued a conditional ultimatum to Heaven as well. Unless they
open the gates and surrender those who closed them for trial within 72 hours, a
state of war will exist there as well. Civilian mobilization bill is through,
reserves mobilization bill is through, first issue of war bonds will be
released tomorrow.
“Next
stage is to mobilize industry, we’re making plans for that now. We’ve got the
leaders of our major defense contractors up all night, working out what they
need and how we can ramp up production. At the moment we’re concentrating on
getting ammunition supplies increased, we’re expecting to use up our stocks of
Hellfire and AMRAAM missiles pretty fast at the rate we’re going, as for
aircraft we’re hoping Davis-Monthan will bridge the gap until upped production
rates start to fill the gap. Ships can wait for the time being, tanks and
armored vehicles will be more important, at least in the short term.
“Mister
President?” Condoleezza Rice was punctilious about using the President’s formal
title when other people were around.
“Condi.”
President Bush turned around, taking quick note of the Secretary Rice’s
headgear. “Nice hat.”
Rice
smiled in appreciation, she’d been on the telephone to Donna Karan to have her
aluminum foil hat designed professionally. After she’d been appointed Secretary
of State, one of the satirists had said that her appointment marked the first
time in its history when the United States had a Secretary of State who looked
good naked. She thought that was a little over the top but at least she’d
always taken pride in her wardrobe.
“Good
news Sir. The Indian Ambassador has just told us that the Indian Air Force are
sending a combat wing to Iraq. A squadron of Su-30MKIs interceptors, two of
Jaguar ground attack aircraft. Even better, the new Iranian Government is
opening up its airfields to us. That gives us some badly needed depth. General
Petraeus was worried about how close our airfields in Iraq are to the invasion.
Word from the Israelis, they’re moving up from the east now, their F-15s will
be available to give top cover when we need them.”
The
President nodded, one of the problems in this situation was that the bulk of
America’s F-15 fleet was grounded with structural problems. That left the
country short of heavy fighters, privately he wondered if that was a
coincidence or not. Just how long had the enemy been planning this assault?