The Edge of Honor (74 page)

Rocky, mousetrapped, had no answer for that, other than his fervent hope that, if nothing else, greed would rule: There would be no way that Rocky could make Bullet give the money back. For a long minute, the line had been silent.

“OK, man. I do it. Where that key again?” Rocky had told him and then thanked him warmly.

“I owe you, man.”

“Sixty-forty?” Bullet had asked slyly.

“Yeah. Fuck yeah. It’ll be worth it.”

Rocky looked at his watch again. Anytime now. Any fucking time now.

“That must be a damn interesting message,” said Garuda as Brian snapped awake. “You been readin’ it for three minutes now.” Garuda was grinning and holding out a fresh mug of coffee. Brian shook his head again, put the message down, and reached for the coffee. He looked at his watch: 0230. Christ. Three and a half hours to go.

Garuda sat back down at his console, keeping one hand on his coffee mug to prevent it from rolling onto the deck plates.

“Tanker inbound to BARCAP,” reported the AIC.

“I’m gonna hold ‘em at the southern end, hook ‘em up, and then tank ‘em in the northerly direction.”

“SWIC, aye.”

“Let’s do a trial missile designation on the tanker,” Brian said.

“SWIC, aye. AIC, call your tanker and tell him we need to shine on him with fire control for a test.”

“AIC, aye.”

The AIC spoke briefly to both the BARCAP pilots and the tanker driver, then gave a thumbs-up to the SWIC, who fired off an engagement designation to weapons module, following it up with the announcement that this was a drill. The chief, who had heard Brian’s order, leaned forward and processed the designation; the directors rumbled into action. They had a lock-on in fifteen seconds with both systems.

“Give’emcwi.”

“CWI shining.”

“AIC, get an alert report.”

“Tanker has SAM warning lights, and so do the BARCAP.”

“Down CWI.”

“CWI is down.”

“Break track; break engage; centerline your systems.

Good track.”

“FCSC, aye. Warren says they landed right in the gate.

He didn’t have to do anything.”

“Tell him well done,” Brian said. “Guy’s been catching some shit lately.”

“I heard some of the badasses been picking on him,” said Garuda.

“Yeah. That and all this extra training. He’s a good kid, but I’ll be glad when we get some replacements for the three shitbirds. At least the systems are seeing well tonight.”

“Given this atmosphere, I’m not surprised,” said Garuda.

“I haven’t seen it this clear all cruise.”

They watched the symbol of the tanker merge with the symbols of the BARCAP Phantoms, and then the AIC reported laconically that he had them hooked up. Brian thought about what that brief report meant: One hundred and twenty miles away, at 42,000 feet in the icy dark, the two Phantom pilots had pulled astern of the tanker aircraft, an A-6 with fuel tanks strapped under the wings, found the twin refueling booms, and driven their fueling probes into the cones, where they would stay mated to the tanker for twenty minutes while refueling. The AIC had effected the rendezvous at the southern end of the BARCAP barrier line and was now bringing the mated trio up the line toward Red Crown.

“Tanker is sweet,” reported the AIC, announcing that both Phantoms were able to connect and draw fuel.

Sometimes one or the other would not be able to get fuel; in that case, the tanker would be reported as sour.

“The big event for the night,” Brian said, sighing.

“That’s as big as we want it; anything else that goes down at this hour of the morning is by definition bad, and I’m too old for bad on a midwatch,” replied Garuda, reaching for the umpteenth cigarette.

Down in the after officers’ head, Martinez and Jackson waited to see what would happen. They had been waiting almost an hour, and Martinez was beginning to have some doubts. Like every head in the ship, this one had inadequate ventilation and stank of running seawater and more noxious things. The chiefs had backed out two screws in the joiner bulkhead between the head and the passageway. The resulting peepholes were tiny but gave a direct view of the locker across the passageway.

“We could be here all goddamn night,” Martinez grumped. “Man’s got until reveille to get his ass up here.”

“Keep it down. And I don’t think so,” Jackson said.

“He’ll come before the watch change at 0345; too many people up and walking around after that.” He peered through the screw hole in the door again. “Speaking of the devil,” he said softly.

The boatswain leaned down to look through his own peephole. Bullet was bent over the door to the Lucky Bag, working the key. He got it opened, looked both ways up and down the passageway, stepped inside, and closed the door. Jackson had been holding his breath and released it now that Bullet was out of earshot.

“Okay,” he said. “Now we wait.”

“Not too fuckin’ long,” growled the boatswain.

Brian looked at his watch again: 0245. Wow, fifteen whole minutes had elapsed. Wasn’t the time just thundering by.

He put his finger in his coffee cup. Time for a reheat. The intercom spoke.

“SWIC, Track Supe.”

“SWIG, aye.”

“Track Supe, my forty operator reports a clobbered sector on the forty.”

“Jamming? You gotta be shitting me.”

“That’s what he says. I’m lopkin’ at it, and there’s something definitely fucked up with it.”

Garuda switched over to the SPS-40 display while Brian watched over his shoulder. In place of the clear display of a half hour ago, there was now what looked like a cloud of snow over the landmass of North Vietnam.

“Supe, that does look like jamming. The forty operator got ECCM fixes in?” asked Garuda.

“Track Supe, and that’s a negative. That’s a clean screen.”

“Fixes?” asked Brian.

“Yes, sir, the forty operator can put antijamming fixes into the system to clear it up. That sure as shit does look like jamming, though. One way to prove it.”

“Put the fixes in, you mean.”

“Roger that. If it’s not jamming, the fixes don’t do shit. Supe.”

“Track Supe.”

“Enter fixes, serial order.”

“Supe.”

Garuda looked over his shoulder. “You better report this to the Old Man.

I’d call Austin, too. Jamming is news. Wish the E-two was still up. I’ll get the Cave to encode a jamming report and get it down to the carriers.”

Brian went over to the evaluator’s desk, grabbed the bat phone, and held the buzzer down. He stared at the 40 radar presentation over Garuda’s shoulder and saw what appeared to be differences in the scope presentation as the operator back in the Cave put in one fix at a time to see which one might work. He buzzed the phone again, but there was still no reply. “Send someone down,” the captain had said.

“Surface,” he yelled across D and D. “Surface, aye,” replied the supervisor, RD1 Rock heart.

“Send a guy down to the captain’s cabin, wake the Old Man up, and ask him to call D and D on the bat phone. I can’t wake him up.”

“Surface, aye.”

Brian hung up the bat phone and called Austin’s number on the admin phone. Austin answered after three rings; Brian told him what they had.

Austin expressed his disbelief but said he would be right up. Brian hung up and saw the 40 radar presentation go suddenly clear.

“Whoa, Supe. That did it,” Garuda said.

“Track Supe, affirma-hotchee. That’s the antijitter fix.

Means some Commie is definitely fuckin’ with us.”

“And every other forty in the Gulf should have seen it, too,” muttered Garuda. “There shoulda been some other reports of this.” He switched down to the sixty mile scale to see if it made any difference.

“There would be if Green was up, but everyone else’s in the same boat—they have to encode the report first before going out on clear HF nets. Just like us.”

Garuda shook his head wonderingly. “But why the forty? Bad guys gotta know we use the forty-eight as primary, not the fucking forty.”

“You’re not looking at the forty-eight right now, are you?” observed Brian, a sudden tingling apprehension beginning to intrude at the edge of his mind.

“Oh, fuck me,” whispered Garuda, switching back to the forty-eight just as a chorus of late-detect alerts began to sound on the consoles in the Cave. There, at the very edge of the screen, just off the coast of North Vietnam, were four bright pips of light moving in from the edge of the screen—right at them. As Brian stared in growing horror, the first unknown symbols popped up on top of the incoming video.

Garuda didn’t hesitate. He smashed some buttons and made all four unknowns hostiles, then sent the first engagement orders over to FCSC.

“This is a no-shitter, everybody,” he yelled his voice rising. “Bandits, inbound, taking with birds! We have a fucking raid"

Brian leaned over the evaluator’s desk and pushed the bat phone’s buzzer down, mashing it down in groups of three, the agreed-upon panic signal.

With the other hand, he grabbed the 1MC microphone and shouted into it.

“Captain to D and D. I say again, Captain to D and D!

We have an inbound air raid. All hands prepare for multiple-missile launch. Officer of the Deck, come right to three-zero-zero, speed twenty—NOW!”

“SWIC, FCSC. System One is locked on; having a problem with System Two.

Range to bogey one is forty seven miles and closing. Launcher is loading. Request batteries released when ready.”

Garuda twisted around in his chair and looked at Brian, who nodded vigorously while repeating his announcement over the 1MC.

“SWIC, Track Supe, Alfa Whiskey is asking in the clear if hostile tracks are—”

“Tell him they better Hong Kong fucking believe it, and we are taking with birds!”

“SWIC, FCSC, range to bogey one is forty miles.

Launcher is loaded and assigned. I have video in the gate, taking track two-one-seven-seven with two-bird salvo.”

“SWIC, aye, take in sequence. Where the fuck is System Two!”

FCSC’s reply was buried in the thunder of a Terrier missile blasting off the forecastle launcher, followed seconds later by a second missile. The ship began vibrating as the engines came up to twenty knots and heeling over to port as she came about to the northwest to give the missile directors a clearer field of tracking vision.

“System Two is back up, taking track two-one-seven nine with System Two.

Range is thirty-five miles. Bogeys inbound and low. Solid video in the gates!”

“SWIC, Track Supe, Alfa Whiskey says to verify that we are not engaging ghosts.”

Garuda had to think about that for a second, but then FCSC shouted a mark intercept on track 2177, video merge in the tracking gate, evaluate hit. One down, Brian thought. FCSC then redesignated System One to bogey three and assigned the launcher to System Two. Brian continued to buzz the captain’s cabin as sounds of people running up ladders became audible. Then there was the roar of another missile leaving the launcher, followed by its brother as System Two launched against bogey two.

Two engaged, two to go, and the flickers are already inside thirty miles, Brian thought frantically. Not enough directors! They’re too close! The ship’s hull was trembling now as the snipes, galvanized by the 1MC announcements and the roar of missile launches, poured on the fuel oil. Two of the AICs came crashing through the front door to Combat, puffing from the ladders.

“SWIC, Track Supe, Alfa Whiskey says they hold no video in our sector, but they do report jamming on their forty radars. Alfa Whiskey wants—”

“Fuck Alfa Whiskey!” shouted Garuda. “I’m fucking busy here!”

“SWIC, FCSC, System Two holding good track on hostile track two-one-seven-nine. Stand by for intercept —mark intercept, track two-oneseven-nine!”

The bitch box sounded off at that moment, reporting explosions visible off the port side on the horizon. Brian thought fast. Where the fuck was the captain? For that matter, where was the XO? Or Austin? Surely they had heard the word. At that moment, the door to Combat banged open again and Austin came through, wearing only khaki trousers, his sea boots, and a T-shirt. For once, he looked disheveled.

“SWIC, FCSC, assigning System Two to bogey four, track number two-one-five-six. This is gonna be a close motherfucker; these bastards are into eighteen miles!

Warren, calm down, now stay on it, just stay on it!”

“Get on that fucker!” yelled Garuda, switching down his range scale to stay with the picture. The pile of messages slid off the evaluator’s table as the ship bounded onto the new course. The AICs stood helpless at their console, the BARCAP still mated for refueling, which everyone realized now was no accident and the air around the bogeys filled with American SAMS. The CAP were out of the game.

“SWIC, FCSC, mark intercept, System One, evaluate bogey three hit.” A pause as the chief pressed his earphones to his head. Then he shook his head, an agonized expression on his face. “SWIC, System Two can’t get on, can’t get on. Warren’s taking it in manual. Range is ten miles!

Fuck, he’s gonna get in; he’s gonna get in!

Range is eight miles, System Two can’t—System Two is on!” The chief assigned the launcher, waited three seconds for the launcher-loaded light, and then mashed the firing key almost through the console and another Terrier left the rails as more people burst through the front door into Combat. The stink of booster smoke came through the air-conditioning vents as the ship turned across the wind.

“We’re fucked!” yelled FCSC. “He’s inside minimum range. He’s—”

Austin, who had been standing next to Brian, gave a cry of fear and bolted out of D and D toward the front door of CIC, knocking down two sailors who had just come through the door. Brian stared down at SWIC’s console and watched the final hostile symbol merge with then-own. The fourth bogey was inside the minimum range of the missile system and the ship’s radars.

There was a single instant of total silence and then came a thundering boom very close off the port side of the ship. The port-side bulkhead of Combat ballooned inward in a blast of torn aluminum plating, dust, and debris. Amid the noise of shrieking metal, a long black object crashed right through the electronic warfare NTDS console, obliterating the operator and a second man in a bloody cloud, and then smashed up against a second console before falling to the deck plates. The impact blew down ventilation ducts all over Combat, deforming the overhead of CIC enough to explode most of the fluorescent bulbs out of their holders, adding a cloud of phosphorus to the blizzard of debris flying around the space.