The Intruders (6 page)

“Hey, my man! Is this mean green killing machine safe to fly?” Flap. He
came around the nose of the plane and lowered the BN’s boarding ladder.

“We’ll find out, won’t we?”

“It’s an embarrassing question to have to ask, I know, yet the dynamics
of the moment and the precarious state of my existence here in space and
time impel me to ponder my karma and your competence. No offense, but I
am growing attached to my ass and don’t want to part with it. What I’m
getting at, Ace, is, are you man enough to handle the program ?”

The pilot slapped the fuselage. “This relic from the Mongolian Air
Force is going off the pointy end of this boat in about fifteen minutes
with your manly physique in it. That’s the only fact I have access to.
Will your ass stay attached?

Will sweet, innocent Suzy Kiss-me succumb to the blandishments of the
evil pervert, Mortimer Fuck-butt? Stay tuned to this channel and find
out right after these words from our sponsors.” He turned his back on
Flap Le Beau.

“I have no doubt this thing will go off this scow, but can you get it
back aboard all in one piece?”

Jake Grafton shouted back over his shoulder “We’ll fly together or die
together, Le Beau. None of that macho male bonding crap for hairy studs
like US.”

Me bmun—he didn’t have to say that. And it was a beautiful day, the
sun glinting on the swells, the high, open sky, the gentle motion of the
ship …

The plane would feel good in his hands, would do just as he Wanted. She
would respond so sweetly to the throttles and soon, would come down the
groove into the Wind and honest …

As the sea wind played with his hair the pilot found himself feeling
better.

WINGS SPREAD AND LOCKED, FLAPS AND SLATS TO TAKEOFF* Roger the
weight-board–4t all came back without conscious thought as Jake
followed the taxi director’s hand signals and moved the warplane toward
the port bow catapult, Cat Two.

Flap didn’t help-he didn’t say or do anything after geting the inertial
aligned and flipping the radar switch to standby.

He merely sat and watched Jake.

“Takeoff checklist,” Jake Prompted.

“I thought you said you could fly this thing, Ace. Jake ran through the
items on his own as he eased the plane the last few feet into the
catapult shuttle and the holdback bar dropped into place.

The yellow-shirt taxi director gave him the “release brakes” signal with
one hand and with the other made a sweeping motion below his waist. This
was the signal to the catapult operator to ease the shuttle forward with
a hydraulic Piston, taking all the &lack out of the nose-wheel
towlaunching mechanism. Jake felt the thunk as he released the brakes
and pushed both throttles forward to the stops.

The engines came up rucely. RPM, exhaust gas temperatures, fuel
flow-the tapes ran up the dials as the engines wound up.

The Intruder vibrated like a living thing as the engines sucked in
rivers of air and slammed it out the exhausts.

“You ready?” Jake asked the bombardier as he wrapped the fingers of his
left hand around the catapult grip while he braced the heel of the hand
against the throttles.

“Onward and upward, Ace.”

The taxi director was pointing to the catapult officer, who was ten feet
farther up the deck. The shooter was twirling his fingers and looking
at Jake, waiting.

Oil pressure both engines–fine. Hydraulic&–okay. Jake waggled the
stick and checked the movement of the stabilator in his left-side
rearview mirror on the canopy rail. Then he saluted the cat officer
with his right hand. The shooter returned it and glanced up the cat
track toward the bow as Jake put his head back into the headrest and
placed his right hand behind the stick.

Now the cat officer lunged forward and touched the deck with his right
hand.

One heartbeat, two, then the catapult fired. The acceleration was
vicious.

Yeeeaaaahl and it was over, in about two and a half seconds. The edge
of the bow swept under the nose and the plane was over the glittering
sea.

Jake let the trim rotate the nose to eight degrees nose up as he reached
for the gear handle. He slapped it up and swept his eyes across the
instrument panel, taking in the attitude reference on the vertical
display indicator-the VDI, the altimeter-eighty feet and going up, the
rate of climb-positive, the airspeed-150 knots and accelerating, all
warning lights out. He took in all these bits of information without
conscious thought, just noted them somewhere in his subconscious, and
put it all together as the airplane accelerated and climbed away from
the ship.

With the gear up and locked, he raised the flaps and slats.

Here they came. Still accelerating, he stopped the climb at five
hundred feet and ran the nose trim down. Two hundred and fifty knots,
300, 350 … still accelerating …

To his amusement he saw that Flap Le Beau was sitting upright in his
ejection seat with his hands folded on his lap, just inches from the
alternate ejection handle between his legs.

At 400 knots Jake eased the throttles back. Five miles coming up on the
DME … and the pilot pulled the nose up steeply and dropped the left
wing as he eased the throttles forward again. The plane leaped away
from the ocean in a climbing turn. Jake scanned the sky looking for the
plane that had preceded him on the cat by two minutes.

He had four thousand pounds of fuel-no, only three thousand now–4o burn
off before they called him down for his first landing, in about fifteen
minutes.

Better make it last, Jake. Don’t squander it. He pulled the throttles
back and coasted up to five thousand feet, where he leveled indicating
250 knots in a gentle turn that would allow him to orbit the ship on the
five-mile circle.

Flap sighed audibly over the intercom, the ICS, then said, “Acceptable
launch, Grafton. Acceptable. You obviously have done this once or
twice and haven’t forgotten how.

This pleases me. I get a warm fuzzy.”

There the major was, almost on the other side of the ship, level at this
altitude and turning on the five-mile arc. Jake steepened his turn to
cut across above the ship and rendezvous.

“I almost joined the Navy,” Flap confided, “but I came to my senses just
in time and joined the Corps. It’s a real fighting outfit, the best in
the world. The Navy … well , the best that can be said is that you
guys try. Most Of the time, anyway.

He talked on as Jake got on the major’s bearing line and eased in some
left rudder to lower the nose so he could see the major out the
right-side quarter panel. Rendezvousing an A-6 with its side-by-side
seating took some finesse when coming in on the lead’s left because the
pilot of the joining aircraft could easily lose sight of the lead plane.
If he let himself go just a little high, or if he let his plane fall a
little behind the bearing line–going sucked, they called it–and
attempted to pull back to the bearing, the lead would disappear under
the wingman’s nose and he would be closing blindly. This was not good,
a situation fraught with hazard for all concerned.

This morning Jake stayed glued to the bearing. If Flap noticed he gave
no indication. He was saying, the closest I ever came to being in the
Navy was the wife of some surface warrior I met at MCRUP-Marine Corps
Recruit Depot-“O Club on a Friday night. She rubbed her tits all over
my back and I told her she was going to give me zipper rash. She was
all hot and randy so I thought, Why not. We went over to her place .

When he was fifty feet away from the major’s plane Jake lowered the nose
and crossed behind and under. He surfaced into parade position on the
right side, the outside of the turn. The BN gave him a thumbs-up.

Jake’s BN talked on. I just put the ol’ cock to her … Pt After a
frequency shift that the major’s BN signaled and Jake had to dial in
because Flap wasnt helping at A they made two more turns in the circle,
then started down.

“She had those nipples that are like strawberries, you know what I mean?
All pulled up so nice and sweet and red and they’re just made for
sucking on? I like them the very best. Can’t understand why God didn’t
equip more women with ‘em. Only about one broad in ten has ‘em. Itts a
mystery.”

They were descending through patches of sunlight interspersed with
shadow. The occasional golden shafts played on the planes and made the
sea below glisten, when Jake could steal a second from holding position
on the lead plane and glance down.

tight and responsive.

His plane handled well. Slick and He contented himself with moving his
plane a few inches forward on the lead, then a few inches back, staying
in absolute control. When he felt comfortable he moved in on the
bearing line so that the wing tips overlapped. He stopped when he could
feel the downdraft off the lead’s wing and the tip was just two feet
from his canopy. He held it there for a moment or two to prove to
himself that he could still do it, then eased back out to where he
belonged.

Flying is the best that life offers, Jake Grafton thought.

And carrier flying is the best of the flying. These day traps and cat
shou are going to be terrific. He fought back the sense of euphoria
that suffused him.

“… as close as I ever came to being in the Navy, I’ll tell you thatIt
If Flap would just shut up! But he won’t. So no sense necking a scene.

The two warplanes came up the ship’s wake at eight hundred feet glued
together. There were already two other planes in the pattern with their
gear and hooks down, two A-7 Corsairs, so the major delayed his break.
Then the BN kissed him off and the major dumped his left wing and
pulled. Jake watched the lead plane turn away as he counted to himself.
At the count of seven he slammed the stick sideways and Pulled as he
reached for the gear handle with his left hand and slapped it down. Then
the flaps.

Turning level, three G’s … gear coming, flaps and slats coming …
seven thousand pounds of fuel.

Stable on the downwind he toggled the main dump and let seven hundred He
wanted to cross the ramp of the ship with precisely six grand.

Prwis&O?L That’s what carrier flying is all about, That’s die challenge.
And the thrill.

“. - - just don’t see why anybody would want to Boat around in the
middle of the ocean on these bird farms.

Eight months of this fun. The Navy is full of happy masturbators …”

Hook up for the first pass, a touch-and-go Let the LSO get his look and
learn that I’m not suicidal Coming through the ninety, on speed, exactly
118 knots with a three-o’clock angle-of-attack … there’s the meatball
on the Fresnel lens. Cross the wake, roil out, coming in to the angled
deck, watch the lineupf There’s the burble from the island … power on
then off fast. Keep that ball in the center …

The wheels smacked into the deck and the nose came down hard as Jake
Grafton shoved the throttles to the stop and closed the, wing-tip speed
brakes with the throttle mounted switch. The Intruder shot up the
angled deck and ran off into the air. He brought the stick back and got
her Climbing.

“The amazing thing is that the Navy finds so many of you masturbators to
ride these floating aviaries. You wouldn’t think there were this many
jack-off artists in the whole world. Not if you just looked at the
world casually. I mean, most people like their sex with somebody else,
y’know? No doubt a lot of you guys are queer. Gotta be.”

On the downwind Jake lowered the book and checked that his harness was
locked. Normally he flew with it unlocked so that he could lean forward
if he wished or wiggle in the ejection seat.

He toggled the seat up a smidgen and adjusted the rheostat that
brightened the angle-of-attack indicator.

The interval between Jake and the major was good, and the major trapped
on his first pass as Jake was reducing power at the 180-degree position.
Down and turning, on speed, looking for the ball crossing the wake,
wings level and reducing power, now power on for the burble, watching
the lineup and flying that ball …

The Intruder swept across the ramp and slammed into the deck. As the
throttles went forward the tailhook caught a wire and dragged the plane
to a dead stop.

Then the plane began to roll backward. Jake jabbed the hook-up button
and added power to taxi out of the gear.

The director was giving him the come ahead as Flap said, “The whole
concept of having five thousand guys crammed together without women is
unnatural. Everybody horny, jacking off in the shower, into their
sheets-this boat is a floating semen factory! In nineteen
seventy-three! My God, haven’t we humans made any progress in
understanding man’s sexual needs in all these years of . - .”

Queued up waiting for Cat Two, checking the gear and flap settings, the
fuel, then following the yellow shirt’s signals as he brought the plane
into the shuttle-Jake was doing the things he knew how to do, the things
that made the hassles worthwhile.

Throttles up … the salut&-and wham, they were off to do it again.
This time Jake left the gear and flaps down. He flew straight ahead
upwind until the major passed him on the left going downwind.

Jake banked for the crosswind turn. The plane entered a shaft of
sunlight and the warmth played on his arms and legs. Inside his oxygen
mask Jake grinned broadly.

After four traps Jake was directed to fold his wings and stop near the
carrier’s island with the engines running while the plane was refueled,
a “hot” turnaround. He opened the canopy and took off his oxygen mask.
His face was wet with sweat. He swabbed away the moisture and watched
the planes making their approaches.

Flap Le Beau also sat watching, silent at last.

Heavenly silence. Except for the howl of jet engines at full power and
the slam of the catapult and an occasional terse radio message. The
flight deck of an aircraft carrier was the loudest place on earth, yet
oh so pleasant without Flap’s drivel.