Wingmen (9781310207280) (34 page)

I could kill you now, you
bastard
, he thought.
I could splatter your lousy guts for a hundred
yards
. His trigger finger hovered over the button. But he
was moving too fast—and his mind could not let him kill an innocent
man, as the crewman down there with CAG surely was. He hurtled over
the waving, shouting figures, recognizing both. He was relieved and
ashamed that he could think of killing them.
But you’ve cost me two good
pilots
, he thought,
and one was very important to me
.

If you make it back and he
doesn’t, I won’t forget it. By God, you bastard, I won’t forget
it
.

“Strip down to your
skivvy shorts, Ensign.”

The doctor had
his back to Fred and had not even turned around when he came in. He
appeared to be writing in a personnel jacket, but Fred couldn’t be
sure.

He began taking
off his clothes—his crusty flight suit and soiled underwear. He
laid it all on the end of the examination table. The compartment
was small and crowded; there was a desk, a table, filing cabinets,
and equipment lockers suspended from the overhead. A bright
fluorescent lighted the space with a harsh, greenish glare. A
little shakily, Fred took off his socks and placed them on top of
his other clothes. He was still weak from the sleepless night spent
aboard the submarine and the jarring, rough handling by the
destroyer and breeches buoy. His ankle was swollen and very, very
painful.

“You ditched,
did you?” asked the doctor, still not looking at Fred.

“Yes, sir,”
said Fred. He pulled himself up and sat on the edge of the
examination table. He was so fatigued that he felt he would never
get to sleep.

“What
happened?” The doctor finished writing and slapped the personnel
jacket closed. Stepping up to Fred, he pulled a small flashlight
from a top pocket of his white lab coat and began to peer into one
of Fred’s eyes.

“I caught fire.
I crashed. Ditched. The sub picked me up.” He shut his eyes as a
sudden, vivid picture of Brogan’s Hellcat smashing into the beach
flooded his consciousness.

“Open your
eyes,” the doctor ordered. There was a knock on the door and
someone entered. The doctor glanced up briefly, then looked back at
Fred’s eyes. He finished and put the flashlight back into his
pocket. “Lay down,” he said.

Fred pulled his
feet up onto the table and scooted down into a prone position. He
looked up and saw who had entered. It was the skipper, standing
opposite the table, leaning against the desk, his arms crossed in
front of him. He said nothing.

The doctor
gathered up Fred’s clothes and tossed them into a chair. He ignored
Jack as though he were a piece of furniture and continued to work
on Fred.

“Did this
happen in the crash?” The doctor probed a large, bluish bruise on
the outside of Fred’s left thigh.

“I don’t know.
I guess so.”

“And this?” He
picked up Fred’s swollen ankle, squeezed it, rotated it, so that
Fred sucked in his breath and clawed the table cover with pain.

“Climbing up
the cargo net from the sub to the can. It was dark. I couldn’t see
very well.” The doctor laid the ankle down.

“Tell me if
anything hurts.” Starting with the feet and working up, the doctor
bent or rotated each of Fred’s joints. Aside from the ankle, none
of them hurt. As the doctor worked, Fred watched the skipper out of
the corner of his eye. It was strange, lying there almost naked in
front of the skipper. He thought he caught a glimpse of his face,
imagined he saw the brow furrowed in deep thought (or perhaps
consternation), but couldn’t really be sure. He couldn’t bring
himself to look right at him.

“Tell me if
anything hurts.” Now the doctor began to probe Fred’s abdomen and
ribs with stiff fingers, pulled down his shorts to feel his
testicles. Fred closed his eyes. A cold stethoscope came down on
his chest, hesitated, moved to another spot, hesitated, moved
again. “Breathe deeply.” Fred did so. “Roll over on your side.”
Fred did, and the stethoscope moved between his shoulder blades.
“Okay.” The doctor seemed satisfied. He turned to the desk, began
writing in the personnel jacket. “You can get dressed now.” Fred
sat up slowly and swung his legs down.

“Excuse me,”
the doctor said to Jack, who moved so he could open a large drawer
in the desk. He pulled out a bottle of liquor and a stack of paper
cups, poured a cupful for Fred, and handed it to him. “Drink this,
then get some rest.” He put the bottle away. Fred took a short sip
of the liquor, a poor quality brandy, and shuddered.

“Drink up,”
said the doctor. Turning to Jack, he said, “He’s grounded for a
week. No flying, no calisthenics, light duty only as necessary.”
Finished now, the doctor picked up the personnel jacket, placed the
pen in his pocket beside the flashlight, and left the compartment.
The door closed.

Jack and Fred
were alone.

Fred spoke
first. “Brogan…?”

Jack looked
into Fred’s eyes. His own eyes softened. He shook his head, looked
away.

Fred lifted the
cup of brandy, drained it, and swallowed heavily. He set the empty
cup beside him on the examination table and lowered himself
carefully to the deck. “I guess I’ll turn in,” he said. He moved
toward the chair where his clothes were, hobbling slightly.

“Can you make
it?” asked Jack. He stood immobile at the desk.

“Yes, sir,”
said Fred. He picked up his socks and sat down on top of his other
things to pull them on. “I’ll be all right. I’m just tired.”

“Okay,” said
Jack. He breathed deeply—it was almost a sigh—and turned to go.
“You’re sure you don’t need any help?”

“Yes, sir.”
Fred pulled a sock over the sprained ankle and tried to ignore the
pain shooting up his leg.

“Okay.” Jack
opened the door and left.

Fred stopped
dressing for a moment, feeling the brandy begin its work on his
empty stomach. Things were just as they had been before. Brogan was
gone. He wasn’t sure how he felt about that. He didn’t know how he
was supposed to feel about anything now. He was just very
tired.

He finished
dressing, resolutely straightened his uniform, even laced and tied
his boots. Then he painfully limped the length of the ship and one
deck up to his stateroom, took his clothes off again, and passed
out in his bunk.

6 October 1943
: En route
Pearl Harbor Naval Station. VF-20 has been officially credited with
the destruction of seven enemy aircraft following two days of
strikes on the island of Wake. Operational Missions on this the
second, and last, day of strikes, were limited to high cover and
ground attack roles, no enemy aerial activity being in evidence.
Three strikes totaling twenty-six sorties were flown. No aircraft
were lost, although aircraft number forty-one flown by Lt. (j.g.)
Heckman has been classified as scrap after receiving severe engine
and fuselage damage from enemy gunfire. Squadron effective strength
on this date totals thirty pilots and thirty-one aircraft,
including one pilot, Ensign Trusteau, temporarily grounded due to
minor injuries suffered during ditching procedures on 5
October.

7 October 1943
: VF-20
today flew sixteen sorties, all routine Combat Air Patrol with no
unusual activity or losses. Inclement weather conditions forced
cancellation of all flight operations after 1400 hours. At 1300
hours squadron members attended a short memorial service for those
pilots and crewmen lost during the preceding days of action. VF-20
pilots officially listed as killed in action are Ensign David
Bigelow and Lieutenant Hanson T. Brogan. Their loss is keenly felt
by members of the squadron….

Duane Higgins
stretched luxuriously and settled into his chair near the rear of
the ready room, where he could watch the other pilots. They were
unusually animated today, he thought, probably due to the bad
weather, which was allowing them an unexpected day off from flying.
Despite their two times in action, they were still an inexperienced
lot. Duane thought about the first eighteen months of war, when the
few carriers had operated for the most part independently, which
had meant continuous CAP duty for the fighter squadrons embarked.
Now, in a six-carrier force, CAP duty could be rotated from ship to
ship, giving the other air groups a chance to catch up on
much-needed rest and training. At Midway, he and Jack had flown one
CAP on the morning of June fourth, then participated in the big
strike which sank the three enemy carriers and lasted a marathon
six hours of continuous flying. They had landed in the afternoon,
flew the dusk CAP, slept like inanimate objects, and then did
essentially the same thing the next day. Although he never bragged
about it, Duane knew it was generally conceded that there was more
experience between him and the Skipper than in the rest of the
squadron put together. That made Duane feel good.

There was a
commotion in the forward part of the compartment as three pilots
came in. All were in nonflying uniform. Duane opened his eyes only
enough to see who they were. Lieutenants Bradley and Schuster were
leading one of the new men, Ensign Patrick, and talking earnestly
about souvenirs. Duane listened in for a few seconds and knew
immediately what they were up to.

“Wait till you
see this, Patrick,” said Bradley.

“You won’t
believe it,” said Schuster.

“What is it?”
asked Patrick.

The three
pilots reached the far corner of the room from Duane and rummaged
in a pile of flight gear. Bradley came up with a leather flight
helmet and put his hand inside. “You ought to send this to your
girl friend back home,” he said. “Then she’ll get an idea of what
we’re up against out here.”

“Yeah,” said
Schuster. “Quite a man filled this baby.”

“What is it?”
asked Patrick, leaning closer, eyes wide with wonder. Bradley was
slowly pulling an enormous rubber condom from the helmet.

“Look,” said
Schuster, “I got one of our own so you can compare the sizes.” He
pulled another, smaller condom from his pocket and held it up
beside the big one. The difference was striking. The big rubber was
fourteen inches long and as big around as the business end of a
baseball bat.

“Geez,” said
Patrick. “Look at the size of that thing.” He touched it gingerly
but Bradley quickly pushed it back into the helmet, looking around
furtively and tucking the headpiece under his arm to hide it.

“Don’t want
anyone else to know we got one of these.”

“Yeah,” said
Schuster. “They’re pretty rare, you know.”

“How’d you get
it?”

“Intelligence
Officer who owed me a favor took it off the body of a Jap pilot
they pulled from the drink the other day. One of the Emperor’s
hand-picked boys.”

“That’s how
they pick the pilots for the Emperor’s squadron,” said Schuster.
“They gotta be good, you know, really top aces. And they gotta be
really
big
men.”

“Not more than
a dozen or so like this in the whole world,” said Bradley.

“Really?”
Patrick was buying the story. Duane grinned to himself at the
half-truth they were plying him with. The rubber
had
come off the body of a
Japanese pilot, but all Japanese Army pilots carried them. Two or
three each, in fact. They used the rubbers to protect survival
equipment from saltwater, in the event of ditching. He guessed they
would ask Patrick for at least twenty bucks for it. And Patrick
would probably pay it.

“Thirty bucks,”
said Bradley, “and it’s yours. That’s pretty cheap, you know, but
you’re a member of the squadron and all. We try to take care of our
own.”

“That’s kind of
high,” said Patrick uncertainly.