Wingmen (9781310207280) (53 page)

Fred stopped
firing, thinking for a horrible second that he could see the
outline of a man in one of the ports, but it was only his
imagination. He checked his altitude and decided to break off. The
bomber torched hugely in the dark; then it rolled over as the
flying surfaces lost their aerodynamic qualities and twisted toward
the water below.

“Scratch one
Betty.” It was CAG.

Fred pulled
back on the stick and increased throttle to climb. He was relieved
a moment later to see the two other members of Bat Team One cross
in front of him. He eased up to the wing of the Avenger and slipped
into his position.

“Good shooting,
Trusty.” Jack’s voice crackled into Fred’s earphones.

“Thanks.” Fred
had to clutch at his throat mike to activate it; his hands were
shaking like leaves in the wind.

“We could use
another vector there, Rooster Base,” said CAG. “We’re just starting
to warm up.”

The teletype
chattered to life in the front of the ready room, and Duane got up
wearily to see what it was. The other pilots sat in their chairs,
nervous, smoking, talking infrequently.

“Lookouts
report plane going in bearing zero four five relative, range six
miles.” Duane tore off the paper and handed it to another pilot to
pass around. He lowered himself to his seat, suddenly very tired.
He never should have gotten involved in the game tonight. Now it
looked as if he would lead the dawn sweep over Roi-Namur after all.
It was almost two. Reveille would have been held at 0400, launch a
little after five. Maybe he could catch a few winks here in the
ready room. He leaned his head back, closed his eyes.

The address
system came on with a rush of static. Startled, Duane opened his
eyes and sat forward, immediately recognizing the call signs and
terminology of the circuit controlling the bat team. Someone had
patched the circuit into the address system leading to the ready
rooms. Under other circumstances he would have been grateful; right
now all it did was interfere with his sleep.

“…good
shooting,” said a tinny voice that could have been Jack Hardigan’s.
“Thanks.” That had to be Trusteau. The pilots of VF-20 sat with
forgotten cigarettes dropping ashes to the deck and listened to the
sounds of combat in the night sky over them.

“Keep it close,
gents. Coming to three zero zero. Turning now. Rooster Base, we’re
waiting.”

“Hold your
horses, Bat One. We have a big bogey forming up at ten miles. Stand
by for vector.”

“Ready and
waiting.”

“We got flares
over the group at this time, Bat One, can you see—”

“Damn right we
can see them, Rooster. Give us a vector. We’re hot for it.”

“Vector two six
niner, Bat One. Try angels four.”

“On our way,
Rooster.”

“You should
show bogey on your scope in three minutes, Bat One.”

“Roger Doger,
Rooster. We’re balls to the wall.”

There was a
moment of silence during which the teletype began to run. Duane
heaved himself up once more to see what it had to say. As the
crooked letters inched their way up the yellow paper, he made out
weather data for the morning’s strike—wind direction and velocity,
barometric pressure, cloud formations. He left the machine
clattering away and went back to his chair.

“Lookouts
confirm your last kill, Bat One,” said the FDO.

“That’s nice,
Rooster. Tell ’em to keep their eyes peeled. They’ll see a lot more
before we’re finished.”

“Bogey is
circling on vector two six niner, Bat One. Seems like a whole bunch
of them and more all the time.”

“Think they’d
mind if we join the party?”

“Why don’t you
ask them?”

“Number three
pull it in a little. If we have more than one bandit up here, we’ll
have to play it by ear. Break on my signal only.”

“Okay,” said
Trusteau. “You still there, Skipper?”

“Bigger’n
life,” said Jack. “Good luck, Trusty.”

“Same to you,
Skipper.” The two fighter pilots’ voices came into the ready room
softly, almost playfully.

“Okay, two and
three. We got the first one on our scopes—wait a sec—we got two,
no, three, no, two again. They’re all over the place. Take your
pick. Break, gentlemen, and good hunting.”

CAG quit
talking, and a moment of silence stretched into one, then two
minutes. Duane leaned forward and sat on the edge of his seat,
wishing now for some word on how it was going.

“Lookouts
report a flamer going in, Bat One,” said the FDO. There was more
silence on the circuit. Static crackled in. A microphone was keyed
and everyone listened hard for the report, but none came.

“Bat One, what
is your status?” asked the FDO.

“Goddammit, I
can’t—” It was CAG.

“Bat One, what
is your status?”

“Christ
Almighty, there’s too many.”

“Bat One, bogey
is scattering. Suggest you try to rendezvous.” There was another
minute of silence on the circuit.

“Skipper, you
still with us?” It was Trusteau.

“Far as I can
tell, Trusty.”

“I think maybe
we should break off.”

“I think that’s
a pretty good idea. You know where the turkey is?”

“Beats me.”

Duane sank back
into his chair, curious now about how many kills, if any, they had
got. Trusteau had had three going into that fight tonight. One more
and he would be up with Duane. Two more and he’d be an ace before
him, and Duane Higgins would find that very hard to live with.

Jack pushed his
goggles up and wiped the puddles of sweat from his eyes with his
hand. He looked hard all around him for signs of other aircraft,
but there was only the night sky, the stars, the quarter-moon. He
tried unsuccessfully to slow his breathing, quiet his pounding
heart.

He had been in
hazardous situations before, but never one like the melee he had
just survived. They had collided with the Japanese formation at
nearly three hundred knots and gone in with all guns blazing. There
had been no time to talk. Suddenly the sky seemed filled with
twin-engine Bettys that popped up in front of his fighter in all
attitudes. At least one, he was sure, had gone in because of his
shooting. At various times during the fight he had seen two or
three other flamers hit the water. Before they were through, the
Bettys were firing wildly at everything in the sky and scattering
to the four winds. He had the vague feeling that the interception
was a success, but he didn’t really care. What he wanted most right
now was to find Fred and make sure he was all right. He pressed his
throat mike. “Number three, do you have any idea where you
are?”

“Not the
slightest,” came the calm reply.

“I’m at angels
five on zero niner zero. What about yourself?”

“The same. How
about that?”

“When was the
last time you saw the Bat Leader?”

“Just before
the mix-up.”

“Rooster base,
any thoughts on the matter?”

“That’s a
negative, number two.”

A flash on the
horizon to his left caught Jack’s attention, and he banked that way
to get a better look. As soon as he could see better, the single
flash grew into many, and a ship was outlined by dim muzzle blasts.
High in the air above her, a plane burst into red flames, twisted
crazily downward, and smacked into the water.

“You see that,
Trusty?”

“Affirmative,
Skipper. To my left, maybe one mile.”

“We’re close,
Trusty. I just don’t see you.”

“I concur,
Skipper.”

“Number two,
number three, Boozer Boy just splashed a bogey without IFF. Suggest
you join up and find the roost asap.”

Jack tried hard
to remember who Boozer Boy was. It was obviously a ship in the
screen; by the looks of the muzzle flashes, it was one of the
battleships, or maybe the
Oakland
. Rooster’s idea seemed eminently
appropriate.

“I don’t know
about you, Skipper,” said Fred from somewhere in the darkness, “but
no one’s going to get me to turn on my lights.”

“Acknowledged,
number three. Keep thinking like that and they’ll give you a
squadron like mine.”

“I wouldn’t
take it if they did.”

Despite the
danger, Jack laughed. Just knowing that Fred was all right made him
feel better. The knots in his stomach eased. He requested a vector
to the
Constitution
, received it, and groped his way
home.

He came aboard
in the predawn dark at three-thirty, Fred only minutes behind him.
They stood on the flight deck for half an hour watching the
spotting of the dawn strike, waiting for CAG. But Commander Buster
Jennings never returned.

At 0500 the
dawn launch went off as scheduled. It was led by Duane Higgins.

Duane was tired, so
very tired. He knew his flying was unbearably sloppy, but he
couldn’t help it. Periodically, heavy fatigue would pull his
eyelids down; then he would wrench them open to discover he had
wandered a few degrees off course or that he was off a hundred feet
in altitude. Three times Bagley had asked him if everything was all
right, the last time even offering to take over the flight. But
stubborn pride—and fear—kept him going.

He was afraid,
terrified, of what the skipper would say when Duane got back to
Ironsides
with five Hellcats that should have been eight. His own wingman,
Hill, had spiraled in wrapped in flames, not ten seconds after the
Zekes jumped them. And he had seen another parachute which he
thought might have been Frank Hammerstein. But he couldn’t be sure;
it had all happened so fast.

One minute they
were high, the way they were supposed to be, covering the bombers
and four Hellcats under Schuster below. The tiny double island of
Roi-Namur appeared through the clouds right on time; then the
bombers and the four Hellcats under Schuster went in while Duane
and his divisions circled high. Someone started talking then,
saying that the airfield was alive with Nip lighters taking off,
though it looked like they’d been caught with their pants down.

Without waiting
for orders, Hill peeled off and headed down, intent on getting
himself a kill. Groggy, indecisive, Duane pushed it over and
followed him down. The other six Hellcats tagged along in
confusion, jamming the circuit with questions and objections. No
sooner had they passed through ten thousand feet than ten—no, a
dozen—green-and-brown Zekes slashed through their formation and
killed Hill—and probably Frank Hammerstein. And someone else, too,
although he couldn’t yet tell who it was. He hadn’t checked with
the others and no one volunteered the information. No one said
anything. Except Bagley.

“Mister
Higgins, you want me to take over the flight? You don’t look well
at all.”

“I’m fine,
goddammit. Don’t ask again.” He hammered his fist on the side of
the canopy, slapped his face savagely to keep awake. He was so
furious with himself he didn’t know what to do.

The rest of the
flight went the same way. Before arriving, he opened the canopy
completely and let the cold air rush over him, but it didn’t help
much. They found the task group without difficulty, but Duane led
the five fighters over the wrong carrier on the first approach. He
discovered his error in time and they found the
Constitution
, steaming into
the wind and ready to take them aboard. He brought it in on the
first pass, ignoring a last-second wave-off from the LSO. When the
Hellcat lurched to a stop near the deck edge elevator, he was
filled with a nearly overwhelming sense of relief. He stepped down
from the wing roots backwards, turned and ran smack into Jack
Hardigan. The look on the Skipper’s face told him everything was
not all right.

“What
happened?” asked Jack. His voice was hard.