Dale Brown - Dale Brown's Dreamland 04 - Piranha(and Jim DeFelice)(2003) (16 page)

 
          
“Roger
that,” replied Bree. “Keep broadcasting. Evasive maneuvers. Tinsel. ECMs. Keep
the assholes off us, Torbin.”

 
          
“Roger
that,” said Torbin.

 
          
Zen
spun Hawk One back north, directly over the area where the Chinese interceptor
had hit the water. There was no sign of the plane. The churning waves looked a
bit darker than the surrounding ocean, though that might have been Zen’s
imagination.

 
          
“Homers
in the air. Jamming-geez, they’re persistent buggers,” complained Torbin.

 
          
“AA-8
Aphids—way out of range,” said Chris.

 
          
The
Russian-made antiaircraft missiles were IR homers whose design dated back to
the late 1960s and early 1970s. Designed for extremely close-range work, they
were generally ineffective at anything over a mile. They were, however, highly
maneuverable, and when one managed to stick on Hawk One’s tail, Zen found he
had to twist to less than fifty feet over the waves before the missiles gave up
on him. It skipped into the water like a rock flung by a schoolboy across a
lake; the warhead separated and bounced several times before disappearing into
a swell nearly a mile from the original point of impact.

 
          
By
then, Zen had climbed back toward the spot where the Sukhois had gone in. A
thin ooze had appeared on the surface; the camera caught twists of metal,
plastic, and fabric as he flashed by.

 
          
The
poor son of a bitch.

 
          
The
poor stupid son of a bitch.

 
          
“Gun
battery on the lead destroyer is firing!” warned Collins, his voice cracking.
“I don’t know what the hell at; we’re about five miles out of range.”

 
          
The
Chinese destroyer, a member of the
Jianghu
III class,
began peppering the air with rounds from its 37mm
antiair
gun. Quickly, two other escorts joined in. their shells arced far away from the
American planes, undoubtedly more an expression of frustration than a serious
attempt to shoot down anything. Either because of the gunfire, or perhaps
because they were running low on fuel, the first two Sukhois headed back toward
the carrier. The plane that lost its
wingmate
also
circled back toward the surface ships.

 
          
The
two freshly launched Sukhois pushed menacingly toward the rear of the
Megafortress. Zen’s long-range video scan showed the planes had launched with
only thin heat-seekers on their wings.

 
          
“Stinger
radar is tracking,” said Chris. “They’re just out of range.”

 
          
“Still
not responding?” Bree asked.

 
          
“Negative.”

 
          
“Jeff,
what do you think?”

 
          
“Sooner
or later they’re going to hit something,” he told her. “But I think we can hold
these two off, then hope they get a
helo
over the
wreckage,” he added. Zen had worked with Bree long enough to know he was just
reinforcing her own thinking. “Then we resume our patrol.”

 
          
“I
concur. Collins—you getting all the transmissions?”

 
          
“Oh,
yes, ma’am. They’re going to love his back at the Puzzle Palace,” he added,
referring to the NSA’s analysis section. Dreamland’s mission orders included
provisions for forwarding intercept data to the spy agency, which would use
them to update estimates of the Chinese military and its hardware.

 
          
Hawk
Two was flying two miles north of the orbiting Megafortress, sitting between
Quicksilver and the two Chinese planes. Zen told the computer to keep Hawk One
in an orbit over the wreckage bobbing to the surface, then jumped back into
Hawk Two. He nudged back on his speed, tilting his wing slightly to let the
bandit on the left catch up. The Chinese pilot pulled up cautiously—a hopeful
sign, since he could have angled for a shot.

 
          
Zen
tried broadcasting himself, “spinning” the radio so that it scanned through the
frequencies the Chinese were known to use. When he got no response, he went
onto the Guard band, the international distress frequency that, at least in
theory, all aircraft monitored.

 
          
“Hawk
Leader to Chinese Su-33. If you can hear me, please acknowledge in some form. I
understand you may not speak English. One of your aircraft ditched and I have
the location marked for you.”

 
          
Nothing,
not even a click on the mike. At the same time, the Chinese seemed to
understand that the American planes were not being aggressive; the Sukhois
pilot made no move to close on the Megafortress, or the Flighthawk for that
matter, which would have been vulnerable to a close-quarters gun attack.

 
          
For
about a third of a second.

 
          
“I
have the coordinates for your aircraft,” Zen said. He read out the exact
longitude and latitude where the aircraft went in. “He went into a high-speed
spin at low altitude and hit the water,” said Zen.

 
          
“Liar!
You shot him down.”

 
          
The
voice was sharp in Zen’s ears. It had come from one of the Chinese pilots, but
when Zen asked them to repeat as if he hadn’t heard, there wasn’t even static
in response. He repeated the information from before, then began turning with
Quicksilver, watching the Sukhois carefully.

 
          
Neither
made a move. Quicksilver’s sophisticated eavesdropping gear picked up
transmission between the planes and the carrier. The code was in the clear,
making it relatively easy for Collins to process. Locked on the frequency, he
fed the voice stream into the automated translator, which produced readable
text that could be tagged, corrected, and augmented at his station. He then
piped it on the fly to the copilot, who was also getting a feed of the radar
data Torbin processed. It was almost like sitting in the enemy’s control room.

 
          
“Pair
of helos coming out from the ship,” reported Chris. “One off the carrier, one I
think from the cruiser. Uh, our library says these are Panthers, Aerospatiale
AS 565’s, performance similar to the Dauphin, Dolphin—looks like basically the
same aircraft here. French. Vectoring for the coordinates of the crash. Sukhois
are supposed to, uh, wait—no, excuse me, they’re supposed to watch us, that’s
all. Not engage.”

 
          
The
Panthers were, in fact, Chinese version of the sturdy French utility chopper.
They rode slowly toward the wreckage, skimming around the area three times
before settling into hovers above some of the flotsam. Two figures jumped from
one of the aircraft, undoubtedly divers recovering some of the wreckage.

 
          
“I
have a radar at two hundred miles south,” reported Torbin. “Uh, belongs to a
missile—SS-N-127. That’s wrong, but it’s definitely targeting.”

 
          
“Give
me a heading,” said Breanna. “Hawk Leader—”

 
          
“I’m
with you,” said Zen, pulling Hawk Two around and tucking tight to the EB-52 as
it began to accelerate south.

 
          
“Lost
it,” said Torbin.

 
          
“The
container ships,” reported Collins a few minutes later. “I have an SOS. Fire.
People in the water. Doesn’t look good.

 
          
Philippines Forward Operating Area

 
          
A
lifetime ago, American
Aircobra
P-39s had flown off
the hard-packed dirt beneath Danny’s feet. An unusual design for an American
aircraft, the original models were hopelessly outclassed and outnumbered by the
Japanese Mitsubishi A6M Zero-Sen, otherwise known as the “Zero,” one of the
best early design of the war. The
Aircobra
was
nonetheless a decent performer and a tough aircraft. Those that had flown from
his base had played an important role helping to mop up Japanese resistance and
provide air cover over a wide swath of the nearby Pacific.

 
          
Other
aircraft had used the base as well—P-38’s, some P-40’s, B-25’s, B-26’s, and on
several occasions B-29’s. but if the ghosts of old machines could be said to
haunt a place, it was the spirit of the P-39 that remained: tough, somewhat
misunderstood jungle fighters who spit 37mm bullets from their nose and drummed
through the air with a guttural hum.

 
          
Danny
Freah didn’t believe in ghosts—and yet he sensed something watched him now as
he trudged up the hillside. He slid his helmet visor down and clicked into IR
scan. The Computer’s shape-recognition program flashed a bright blue pinhole in
a brighter blue circle at the top right-hand corner, showing that it was
operating, but aside from a few
rodentlike
creatures
about fifty or sixty feet away, the jungle was empty. Danny held his new MP-5
in his right hand as he climbed up slowly, stepping gingerly. The wrap on his
knees held them tight, their thick band doing some of the muscles’ and
ligaments’ work holding the two halves of his legs together. The injury didn’t
bother him as he sidestepped down the hill; in fact, he thought it was easier
than working on the stair machine, which was part of his regular rehab
assignment.

 
          
Jemma
would be heading back home by now. He could see her
jaw set, her slight nod to the man asking if he could take her bags at the
hotel.

 
          
A
flicker of blue print at the right side of his
viewscreen
sharply brought back his attention. A yellow shape materialized from the foggy
green and black shadows.

 
          
“CAT”
said the legend below the small shape at the base of the tree.

 
          
Danny
switched from IR to magnified optical, popping the scene magnification to five
times. The computer was close—the Philippines leopard cat was roughly the size
of a house tabby, though it wasn’t likely to run up to Danny and ask for a bowl
of milk. It stared in his direction, peering curiously from between the rattan
and tree trunks. It curled its lip, hissing, then darted away.

 
          
Something
else moved, fifty yards farther down the slope. Danny flicked back to IR mode,
scanning slowly. A figure floated across his screen, ghostlike.

 
          
It
took a moment before he realized the figure was actually in the trees. The
computer, meanwhile, realized the figure was human. It didn’t note any weapons.

 
          
The
ghost began moving downward. The program now had measurements to work with;
just under five feet, one hundred pounds.

 
          
More
a kid than a man, and unarmed, Danny thought. He watched as the Filipino began
to move through the woods, pushing through the underbrush. He followed slowly,
as quietly as he could. There weren’t supposed to be people here.

 
          
Danny
hunkered down as he came to a narrow stream. It coursed down a run of odd
rocks; the far bank was exposed. He waited until the figure was no longer
visible, then picked his way across and continued downward in the direction the
figure had gone.

 
          
He
debated whether to try talking to the Filipino or not. He’d memorized a few
words on the way out; while it was likely the person would know English—a large
number of Filipinos used it as their second or even first language—Danny
reasoned that using the national language would at least show he was trying to
be friendly. The words for good morning—
magandang
umaga
po
—stuck in his head; he
couldn’t quite remember the combination for good afternoon, which was very
similar—
magandang
hapon
po
or something like that.

 
          
Hapon
, like
harpon
, only without
the R.