WINMX Assorted Textfiles/Ebooks.tar/Text - Compilations - The Library - Volume 08 - L to Q - 254 fiction ebooks (PDF HTM(L) RTF TXT DOC).zip.zip/Maloney, Mack - Wingman 1 - Wingman.txt

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PROLOGUE
He knew the airplane was coming.
It was an early spring day. The sun was shining.
The whole mountain was melting, coming to life again
after the long, cold winter.
The airplane was still some distance away, but the
sound was unmistakable. He closed his eyes and saw
it. Small engine, no more than 200 horse. It was a
Piper Cub-10, maybe 15 miles to the southeast. One
of the airplane's pistons was misfiring slightly.
He waited.
For two years, one month and six days he had lived
on the top of the New Hampshire Mountain. The
camp-nothing more than a shack with a bed and a wood stove-had belonged to his family years before.
He had visited there many times white growing up, so
he knew the isolated mountain area well. But two
years of trapping rabbits, opening cans and drilking
nothing but stream water or melted snow was no life
for a fighter pilot. He hadn't seen or talked to a soul
in all that time. And until he had heard this airplane
approaching, he wasn't sure that there was anything

Flying anywhere. He wasn't even sure if there were any
people left.
Two years-a long time to be alone. When he first
climbed the mountain, he was convinced it was to
escape the chaos he envisioned it would sweep the
country. Did it ever happen? Did America commit
national suicide after it lost World War III? Lost, not
on the battlefield, but by the actions of a Russian
mole who waited until America and its allies were
victorious before he showed his true colors? Would he
have felt differently if the traitor had been someone
other than the Vice President?
He waited another hour before the airplane came
into view. It was at the other end of the valley, flying
slowly, being buffeted by the mountain cross winds.
As it flew closer, he saw it was towing something-a
sign like those once used to carry advertisements.
Even with his extraordinary vision, it was still too far
away for him to read. How strange it would be, he
thought, if the first plane he had seen since the end of
the war was pulling a sign for suntan oil.
two years-it was a long time to thilk. That
Christmas Eve. He had just arrived at Cape
Canaveral to begin pilot training for the Space Shuttle. It was then he had heard of the Russian attack on
Western Europe. SCUD missiles. Tens of thousands
of them. Millions of Europeans dead-not by nuclear

holocaust, but by nerve gas. A massive invasion of
Western Europe had followed. Then China had been
nuked. The Free World had struck back. He had been
ordered to rejoin his unit, the 16th Tactical Fighter
Wing, known in peacetime as the famous Thunder-
birds acrobatic demonstration team. A day later they
had been in Rota, Spain, bombing up for their first
mission against the invading Red armies. War had
broken out all around the world. Any country who'd
had a dispute with its neighbor had decided to have it
out now. Great battles raged; the earth was in flame.
But nowhere had the horror compared with the Battle
for Western Europe. There had been everything from
hand-to-hand combat on the ground to killer laser
satellites dueling high above in deep space. His
squadron had been in the middle, flying above the
killing fields, battling anything and everything that
the Russians put into the air. For two months it had
gone on relentlessly. But finally, it had been in the air
that the battle had been won. The final pushes. Two
straight days. Thirty-seven straight sorties for him.
No sleep. No food. Living only on the adrenaline rush
one gets when his country is at stake. It had been the
largest air battle ever fought. More than 4000 aircraft,
jammed into less than 200 square miles of airspace. It
had been incredible. Even the soldiers on the ground
stopped fighting to watch. And in the end, it had been
the air forces of the Free World, led by the Americans,
which won the battle. But America had still lost the
war . . .
As the Piper flew even closer, he saw the tow sign's
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words were made up of letters of different styles and
uneven shapes. It was apparently cut from several
different types of airborne ads. The thing looked like
a flying ransom note.
Two years-it was a long time to spend on theories.
When did the Vice President decide it was time to
turn? Was it after the cease-fire had been agreed to?
Or after the armistice had been signed? Or had it
been after his henchmen assassinated the President
and his cabinet? No matter. When the battles were
over and America wasn't looking, he had turned off
the Star Wars defense just long enough for 150 Russian nuclear missiles to obliterate America's MX and
Titan ICBMs white they sat in their silos. The
surprise attack had blown away most of the country's
mid-section along with the nuclear deterrent. Another
sneak attack on America. Had it been the only way
the enemies of freedom could defeat her?
The Piper was now right in front of him, slow
enough so he could read the sign: HUNTER-RE-
PORT TO OTIS-JONES
It sounded crazy. Was the message for someone who
was out shooting deer and for some reason had to
report back to a guy named Otis at the request of Mr.
Jones? Who were they? Game wardens?
Then, as the plane flew on past, it hit him. Could
he be the "Hunter" they were looking for? Had he
been up on the mountain so long that he didn't even
recognize his own name? Otis had to mean Otis Air
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Force Base, out on Cape Cod. And that meant there
was only one Jones it could be-General Seth Jones,
hero of the European Theater. The man the allies had
followed into battle against the Russian Air Force.
The man who had almost single-handedly won the
war. The man on whose wing he had flown for two
years in peacetime with the Thunderbirds and two
months in wartime with the 16th. Jones was the man
who had nominated him for the space program. The
man who flew with his father in Viet-Nam. The man
who had watched over him since the day his parents'
plane crashed. The man who had named him his own
wingman the very first day he had climbed into his F-
16. And now Jones wanted him to report to Otis.
He was packed and gone by noon.

CHAPTER ONE
It took almost three weeks, but he finally reached
Otis. The cold morning fog was just lifting off the
cranberry bogs, but the warmth of the growing spring would soon be evident. The sun was coming up. The
base was starting to come alive. Smoke was pouring
out of what had to be the mess hall. He could see
lights in the barracks, smell the exhausts from trucks
being started, even hear an occasional voice.
But he hadn't yet heard that one sound he was
waiting for...
What was the general doing here? Could it be that
people finally came to their senses and realized that
the U.S. really did win the war? If not, what was the
state of the country these days? What country was it
these days? He had no idea...
He approached the base cautiously. He had spent
the night in the woods nearby, the last time he'd have
to sleep in a battered makeshift lean-to-or so he
hoped. Standing at the very edge of the base perimeter, he pressed against the chain lilk fence and peered
in. For all he knew, this could be a Russian base, or
that of some kind of Russian client's occupying army.
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Or was this a base camp of the army of The New
Order? What was The New Order? Hunter could
never really figure it out. Even before the dust had
settled from the Russian sneak attack on the American ICBM sites, the Vice President was issuing orders
to all military personnel still in the country to start
enforcing The New Order. Laws that said there would
no longer be 50 states, that America would be broken
up into a dozen small countries and a patchwork of
free territories. The traitor had said this was the
settlement he had reached with the Russian Peace
Committee to end the war-the war that everyone
conveniently forgot American forces had won. But the
swiftness that the new ruling came down smacked of
years of pre-planning. (God only knew how long ago
the Russian moles had infiltrated the American government!) There were so many questions: Why had
some in-country National Guard units immediately
started doing the Vice President's bidding-destroying military equipment, burning state capitol buildings, universities and libraries, blowing up TV and
radio transmitters? How long had these units been
compromised? The idea had been to complete the
isolation of the American citizen. Not to let the
ordinary Joe catch on that the Soviet Armed Forces
were lying in cinders scattered all over Europe and
Asia, decisively beaten by the Free World. It was the
Big Lie. Win the battle, lose the war.
Hunter cautiously made his way along the base
perimeter.  Had the sign-towing Piper been just a
12

ruse? Was the great General Seth Jones really dead,
buried on the European battlefield? Was Hunter
being set up? Logic again intervened. Crucial questions needed crucial answers. He needed proof.
He stayed close to the fence, passing through deep woods until he saw the main gate. He stayed hidden.
The gate was manned by a single sentry. One look at
the soldier and he knew things had changed.
The man was not standard military. His uniform
was a bright green and he was wearing a chrome
helmet, a headpiece usually reserved for parades and
ceremonies. Nor was the sentry carrying a standard
military firearm. Instead, he was armed with a cow-
boy-style pistol and holster, and a double-barrel,
sawed-off shotgun.
A bizarre flag was flying above the guardhouse. It
was a mishmash of green, blue and white, jumbled up
in a field of uneven stars, stripes and what looked like
dollar signs. Below the flag, attached to the roof of the
guardhouse was a sign that read: Flight Operations
Center-Armed Forces of the Northeast Economic
Zone. Well, at least it didn't sound communist. More
mysteries. More questions to be answered.
Then Hunter heard the sound he was waiting for.
Off in the distance, probably at the far reaches of the
base, came the distinctive rumble of a jet engine
warming up. The noise filled him. For the first time in
more than two years, he felt warm. He was ready for
anything now. "Just get me airborne again..."
He emerged from the woods. The chrome-helmeted
cowboy saw him coming and had his gun at the ready.
Hunter had forgotten that his appearance wasn't
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exactly-well, friendly-looking. His hair was beyond
shoulder-length and his beard covered nearly half his
chest. His clothes were threadbare. He was carrying
his meager belongings in an old laundry bag and he
had the M-16 and ammunition belt in full view.
Just as he was about to speak to the guard, he heard
a roar and instinctively looked in its direction. There
was a trait of smoke and an orange spit of light,
burning through the morning mist, but the outline
was unmistakable. He felt a surge run through him-
it was that feeling again. He watched as the fighter jet
quilkly disappeared into the low clouds.
The sentry raised his gun and cocked it.
Hunter smiled and raised his hand in the universal
sign of peace. "Major Hawker Hunter to see General
Jones," he said.
Five minutes later, the sentry led him into a small
office. Sitting behind a dilapidated desk was a man he
thought he'd never see again: General Seth Jones.
Hunter couldn't believe it. Jones actually looked
younger. He was trimmer, leaner and meaner looking.
His hair had grown out of its trademark military
whiffle, and the resulting locks with a tinge of gray
gave him a kind of professorial look.
The last time Hunter had seen him was at the
NATO base in Rota. The squadron had just got word
of the destruction of the American nuclear ICBM
arsenal and that their forces were to be disarmed.
Finnish Peace troops, the enforcers of the bogus
armistice, had arrived and started systematically destroying the 16th TFW aircraft, white the Americans
stood by helplessly, under orders from the Vice President. It was only later-when the VP started broad-
casting the Rules of the New Order from
Moscow-did they realize he was a traitor. When the
horrible destruction of the Wing's F-16s was completed, the Finns handcuffed Jones and drove him
away. Hunter was convinced he'd never see him again.
But here he was. And the general proved to be still
all-Jones Boy.
"What's this, corporal?" Jones said, putting on his
sternest military face. "Another veteran looking for a
handout?" Despite Hunter's long hair and beard,
Jones could still see his handsome, oddly hawk-like
features. Sloppy appearance or not, he knew the
young man was still the best fighter pilot in the world.
Hunter snapped to a mock attention.
"Major Hunter, reporting for duty, suh!"
"You're out of uniform, Major," the general said.
"So are you, sir," Hunter replied, eyeing the senior
officer's bright green, rather garish uniform. If the
sentry wasn't still present, Hunter thought he would
have probably embraced his old friend.
The general fingered his loud green coverall and
said, "Do I detect insolence in your voice, Major? I'll
have you know this is the standard uniform of the
Armed Forces of the Northeast Economic Zone Air
Patrol. I wear it proudly."
Hunter looked around the spare office, trying not to
laugh out loud. A desk, a chair, a lamp and a coffee
machine in the corner, and that was it. It was a far cry
from Jones's surroundings back in the Thunderbirds
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days when his office was jammed with hundreds of
mementos, including photos of just about every
fighter plane ever made, plus several computers, a
bank of telephones and telecommunications gear and
a well-stocked, top-shelf, wet bar.
"Where have you been, Major? Hibernating?"
"Worse than that, sir," Hunter replied, still standing ramrod straight at attention. "I've been contemplating my existence."
"Obviously, you're suffering from post-World War
III syndrome," the general said. "It's been going
around."
Hunter continued. "Got a bunch of books, went up
to a mountain and tried to find the meaning of life,
sir."
"Jesus, not that!"
" 'Fraid so, sir."
"And what conclusions did you reach, Major?"
Hunter paused a moment for effect, then replied,
"Well, sir, I discovered that every man has to believe
in something."
"And . . . ?"
"And," Hunter said, looking around the general's
empty office. "And, I believe I'll have a drilk, sir."
"Scotch?"
"Neat, sir."
With the wave of his hand, Jones dismissed the
properly impressed, if slightly confused sentry. He
walked around the desk and hugged Hunter.
"Good to see you, Hawk," he said.
"Same here, sir."
Jones locked the office door and broke out his
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emergency bottle.
"Had breakfast yet?" he asked.
Despite the early morning hour, they sat and ate
stale doughnuts, white mixing the no-brand whilkey
in with cups of steaming coffee. Then they talked.
"Well, Hawk," Jones said, swigging his laced coffee. "What the hell happened to you after Rota?"
"You really want to know?"
"Sure as hell," Jones said, smiting. "You tell me
your story and I'll tell you mine."
Hunter took a deep breath. It seemed like so long
ago. "Okay," he said. "Hang onto your hat."
Hunter began his story. After Jones had been led
away, everyone took for granted he was heading for a
firing squad. The members of the 16th scattered. But
Hunter was determined to get back to America, or
what was left of it. He knew there was an American
sub base up in Loch Lomond, Scotland, and figured it
was the only place where ships might be trying to get
back home. So he walked. Right through Spain,
through France and, after bribing a Frenchman to
take him across the Channel, right up through En-
gland. It took him more than two months to reach
Loch Lomond only to find the place filled with ex-GIs
who had had the same idea as he. There were at least
10,000 men trying to get on no more than a half dozen
Navy warships docked in the harbor. No one was in
charge. The base was in a state of utter chaos.
Then he got lucky. At one corner of the sprawling
base he found a battalion of Marines. They had set up
an orderly camp on a hill inside the base and were
grimly going about the task of staying civilized in the
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middle of all the disorder. Hunter fell in with them
after pulling rank on a couple of the camp's guards
and demanding to be taken to their commanding
officer. His name was Captain John "Bull" Dozer
and after a brief talk, he offered Hunter some grub
and a place to sleep.
Dozer's outfit was going by the curious name of the
7th Cavalry-odd because the Marine Corps had no
cavalry, per se. Over a pot of coffee, Dozer explained
to Hunter that his unit had been fighting in Turkey
when the last great battles of the war were raging. At
one point they were surrounded by four Soviet army
regiments near Ankara. Yet his Marines fought ferociously, and, unlike Custer's 7th Cavalry, caused the
enemy to back off the siege and rethilk the situation.
By the time Dozer got his troops to more defensible
ground, the war in Europe had been won and the
Russians had agreed to the cease-fire.
Dozer promised his men that if they stuck together,
he would get them home. He commandeered two
Turkish airliners at gunpoint and forced the pilots to
fly his 900 soldiers to England. His goal too was Loch
Lomond and they had arrived two weeks before.
When Hunter told him America was his goal too, they
shook hands and agreed to work toward it together.
By the second afternoon, the six ships in port were
overflowing with the survivors. One by one, they
disappeared over the horizon. Hunter knew their
chances of making it to America were nit.
two days later the enormous outline of an aircraft
carrier appeared off to the south. It was the John F.
Kennedy. The captain came ashore and word quilkly
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CHAPTER TWO
When the New Order came down and the general was led away by the Finns, Hunter had assumed that the old man would be thrown in prison at best, or worse, executed. Actually, the officer had a free ride to the French capital where his handlers inexplicably set him free. Once there, he met many other ex-military officers who were of the same mind as he: We won the war and we still got screwed. With nothing else to do, they proceeded to drilk the Paris nightclubs dry.
"It was great," Jones testified. "More booze than I've ever seen."
Paris was one of the major cities Hunter thought he was prudent in avoiding during his odyssey to Scotland. He had visions of deserted streets filled only with rotting corpses, its beautiful buildings in ruins, the curtains drawn on the proud French republic, finally defeated.
"You'd be surprised how good a shape the city was in," Jones told him. "Of course, considering that the largest battle ever fought in the history of mankind
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took place about 30 clilks away, and that half the people had either been gassed or had vamoosed before the first shot was even fired, the ones who stayed were great. Writers, politicians, musicians, artists, old bucks who had fought the Nazis. These people just kept on celebrating. They didn't give a shit who won. They didn't give a shit that the Russians-or what was left of them-were just over the next hill. They just wanted to get back to their food, booze and getting laid. Everything else was secondary to them.
"I was traveling around with a bunch of crazy Brits. RAF guys. We busted up the town pretty good. But after a few weeks, we realized that the city was getting real hot-real fast. We knew Ivan was just over the hill, lilking his wounds and getting ready to play the conquering heroes." He spat in disgust. "The filthy swine! We kilked their asses and they made like they just took over the world."
"They did," Hunter reminded him.
The general went on. A bunch of senators and government bozos were stuck in Paris after the armistice was signed. They had the Concorde-the famous SST-waiting at Orly Airport. Jones said a seat on that plane couldn't have been bought for a million dollars. The politicos were getting itchy to get out of Europe before it went Red. Trouble was, the pilot never showed up. Now they needed someone to fly it. Somehow, they knew Jones was in town.
"They got word to me white I was shitfaced, sleeping under a table in a bar on the Left Bank. Or was it the Right Bank? Anyway, they sobered me up and fed me. Then, we loaded the sucker up with French wines and chow, and it was oeuvrel"
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He clapped his hands in joy, just thilking about it. "You should have come to Paris, Hawk, my boy. We had a hell of the time there!"
He got up and started another pot of coffee brewing. Hunter was astounded at the general's ability to land on his feet. There he was, crossing the Atlantic lashed to a bulkhead on the JFK in the middle of a hurricane, and Jones made the trip supersonically, in three hours, drilking the best wine and eating the best food in the process.
"It was the last congressional boondoggle flight in history," the general continued. "We put down in Washington, because New York City looked too hot to handle. These guys didn't want any part of it. Half of them were on their way to Weather Mountain. You know, that place near DC where they have a fully stocked city right inside the mountain and all the big shots are supposed to go when the bomb was dropped?"
Hunter had heard of the place.
"Well, I don't know how many of them made it past the door, but they were telling me about the place. They had enough stuff hidden away to last them for years. The place is so big inside they even have a lake there. These guys claimed you could water ski on it. One senator said there was even a plan to round up all the best call girls in Washington right before the shit hit the fan and get them down there too. You know, just to give them all something to do white they waited for the dust to settle? Yeah, we had our share of great leaders, huh? They needed women to continue the human race with. Let their descendants crawl out of the cave and run things. You know, keep it in the
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family. But can you imagine what kind of a bastard is produced when a politician knocks up a hooker?"
The thought of it sent a shiver down Hunter's spine. He took a slug of his whilkey-laced coffee.
Jones did the same, lit up a cigar and went on with his story. Once he touched down at Andrews Air Force Base outside of Washington, the politicians bolted off the plane and were gone without so much as a thank you. Except for one of them.
"One guy did give me a bag of French francs," Jones said, blowing smoke rings. "Big deal, I thought at the time. They were probably worth all of twenty-five bucks, and that was in France! He thought he was doing me this big favor and all he cared about was that his ass was home, so he was in a generous mood. Typical politician. Well, I hung onto them Frenchies, a wise move, I found out later.
"Andrews was pretty much abandoned. There were a few creeps around. Left behind GIs, MPs. These screwball National Guard guys. People like that. All of them were armed to the teeth and looking for trouble. I ignored them, but they had their eye on the plane. I saw a bunch of aircraft that had been blown up by some good little soldiers. Some assholes following the New Order to the letter, I suppose. Air Force One was there, or what was left of it. Lot of F-15s, gone. Pieces of them scattered everywhere. It made me silk to look at them."
Jones became quiet for a moment. Hunter knew the general was thilking of the wasted, destroyed jets.
"I was beat and I had nowhere to go, so I slept for about two days right in the Concorde. Finished off the food and booze, then I realized that I could be
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sleeping in a real bed somewhere. I found some LC's office with a hideaway bed. I stayed there for two days, and you know, during the night some assholes sneaked down to the runway and blew up the SST? God, I'd heard of following orders, but some of these people carried it a bit too far."
Hunter nodded. Another example of a waste of technology. When would anyone get around to building a supersonic airliner again?
"I bummed around DC for a white," Jones said, stirring his coffee. "There were some people still left. All the restaurants were open. It was nearly business as usual, except they were practically giving the food away. Dollars were as valuable as used toilet paper, but I found out that people would take coins, including my francs. It didn't matter that quarters, dimes and nilkels were all clad coins with not enough silver to fill a tooth. These people treated them like they were pure through and through. There were even people running around with real silver and gold coins. So they loved to see me and my francs."
Jones soon took residence in an abandoned swank Georgetown townhouse. It was his home for three months.
"It was party time there too," he said. "All over DC. Food, booze and broads. I was out in a bar every night. It's great when you don't have to go to work. Met a lot of funny people. But unfortunately, I also met a lot of people carrying guns, and not just .32 caliber water pistols either. It started getting tense. Pretty soon there were shoot-outs every night. It was Dodge City. I figured it was just a matter of time before a stray bullet would catch my ass, so I started
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thilking about getting out.
"Then I heard some of these new little countries were starting navies, armies, militias, things like that and they needed military people to help. I talked to a guy, who knew another guy who had a friend who knew about this job. Commander of the Northwest Economic Zone's Air Patrol-'ZAP,' for short. A little bulky, but it sounded good to me. They had a little money to spend and they were lucky. Most of their National Guard units were never turned on by the disarmament weirdos, so there were still a few guys around who knew how to take an order. I tell you, troops like that are a rare commodity these days."
Jones had traveled to Boston and met with the leaders of the Northeast Economic Zone. They promised him almost complete freedom. Just as long as he paid lip service to the New Order rules.
"You know, no radios, no TV, no old uniforms, no Stars and Stripes." Jones's voice cracked slightly when he mentioned the ban on the American flag. "That's why we have these stupid pansy color uniforms on, and that's why that candyass, three-dollar-bill flag is flying over this place.
"But I've always liked the Cape, and they let me fly, so here I came. Been here about a year and a half."
But Hunter was confused. Fly? The last time he'd heard, one of the New Order's rules-the most important one in his eyes-was that all military aircraft had to be dismantled as part of the demilitarization agreement. But he had heard jets at the base. Then, as if on cue, the sound of a jet taking off filled the office, shaking the coffee pot slightly.
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Jones read his mind.
"We have a few planes here, Hawk," the general said, his smite looking like the cat that ate the canary.
"So I can hear," Hunter said. "But how'd you get around the demilitarization order?"
The general gave out a loud "Ha!" and waved his hand. "We were lucky, Hawk. And the traitors-our so-called Vice President and the rest of them-were stupid. Their New Order said 'dismantle all the combat aircraft' when it should have said 'destroy all combat aircraft.' so what do you thilk the smart people in Europe did? They just started taking the planes apart, cataloging the numbers and packing them away. And who the hell was going to stop them? The UN? The Finns? The Russians? No way. So these enterprising sorts packed all the pieces away, put it on ships and sent the ships everywhere and anywhere, just before the commies moved in."
"Every war has its profiteers,' Hunter said.
"You get the idea," the general said, pouring him another cup of coffee and adding a dash of booze. "Now, don't get me wrong. A lot of planes were destroyed. I mean, look what happened to us."
Hunter well remembered the day when the Finnish observers arrived and systematically blew up the squadron's 12 remaining F-16s.
"Yeah, nice guys, those Finns," the general said, digressing for a moment. "They live in the armpit country of Europe and spend most of their time sucking up to the Russians."
Hunter felt a surge of rage flow through him. What a waste of money and technology?
"Anyway," Jones continued, lighting up a massive
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cigar. "The New Order boys also screwed up by not including other military aircraft like cargo planes and tankers. Copters. And they didn't mention anything about de-commissioned aircraft either."
Hunter's vision of a flightless world was happily coming to an end.
"You've been to Wright-Patterson," Jones said in a puff of smoke. "You know how many planes were in mothballs there?"
"Hundreds, It would imagine," Hunter said, adding some hooch to his own coffee. Wright-Patterson Field in Ohio, Hunter knew, was the location of the Air Force's surplus aircraft storage area. It was like an elephant's graveyard for old planes; especially the sophisticated ones that had some years behind them but were too damned expensive to send to the scrap heap. So instead of shit canning them, the Air Force just plugged all the holes, drained the tanks and had them sit out at Wright-Patterson to use in case of an emergency.
"Thousands," Jones corrected him. "And most of them just needed the screws tightened and the oil changed and they were ready to fly,"
A tinge of panic took a swipe at him. "But, what is Ohio these days? Who's running things there?"
"No one, which is fine with us," Jones hauled out a map that was so new it looked as if the ilk still wasn't dry. It was the first time Hunter had seen the new countries and territories of America. "Ohio is now a Free State. In other words, it's an open area. No government. At least for the time being. A couple of guys out there realized they were sitting on a bonanza and opened up shop. All these little countries or
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regions or states-or whatever they are-came running because everyone wanted to start their own air force. It's an airplane supermarket. We've got a couple of guys out there right now, bidding on some planes."
Hunter instantly wanted to see the place.
"What are you shopping for?" he asked.
"Mostly small stuff, fighters, attack craft. They've got everything. A lot of heavy bomber merchandise. B-58s, B-47s, even a couple B-36s." The general rose and poured himself a third cup of joe and added the mandatory splash of whilkey. "But we can't fool around with the heavies. We can't afford them and the runway here won't take a lot of it. Way too short. And where would we put them?"
"And what would you do with them?"
"Exactly," Jones replied with satisfaction. "The people running all these little air forces thilk the bigger the better. Now, I'm sure a lot of them are thilking of converting their B-47 into a cargo plane and, in some cases it will work.
"But you can be sure that some of these clowns are thilking differently. Some of these states are being run by the typical crooked and/or stupid politician who suddenly woke up and found he was a king. Hell, this so-called Vice President-what's his name again, Benedict Arnold?-appointed half of them. God knows what deals he made before he traded in his stars and bars for a hammer and silkle.
"Well, what happens when someone in the country next door doesn't want to pay a flyover tax? Or money at the tolls? Or starts fishing in the other guy's river? How much will it take before one of these pisspots in
32

control gets mad enough and orders his B-36s to go and flatten the other guy's capital? It's already happening! They've been having a hell of a misunderstanding down near Florida and Alabama. Blowing the shit out of each other. Using gasoline bombs, napalm, terrible stuff."
"Napalm?" Hunter said, stirring his coffee with a pencil. "You can get napalm these days?"
"Oh yeah," Jones said, relighting his stogie. "Anyone who wants it can get 'palm from the Mid-Aks."
"Mid-who?"
"Mid-Aks. The Middle Atlantic Conference States, Everything from Delaware and Pennsylvania down to Georgia. New Jersey doesn't count. The 'Aks. They're real dangerous, Hawk. They were sitting on a lot of military hardware when the balloon went up and they must have either hid ninety percent of the shit when the New Order came in, or made a deal to keep it all because they still have a lot of it. I mean these guys are armed to the teeth and then some with tanks, PCs, howitzers. And they have a lot of men in uniform too. Lot of scumbags living down there even before the war. Now, at least, they're employed."
He let out a snort and took a healthy swig from his coffee mug.
"We'll be fighting them here next," he said, a touch of nervous caution in his voice. "They're already making noise. They took over several little territories around Kentucky and Tennessee. Just rolled over them. Sherman-to-the-sea type stuff. They have Fort Knox and made themselves rich. Now they want to talk to my bosses about 'Mutual Defense Treaties' and all this happy horseshit. It's a joke! They have a
33

bunch of crooks running the show and they can use a whole army as enforcers. I'd like to kilk their asses."
"How are your . . . bosses?" Hunter asked.
"Ah, they're okay," Jones said. "They were smart enough to know that if you can't have a big army, you'd better have a good air force. Especially with all the coastline they have to protect. From old New Hampshire, to Boston Harbor, the whole Cape out here, right down to Long Island. They'll probably get Maine someday, too. Right now, that's a no-man's-land.
"They pretty much leave us alone down there. They give me money and I pay everyone and what's ever left over, I invest in spare parts and start saving for some more airplanes. We fly up to Boston every few days, buzz the city, just to let them know we're around. The people up there like it. They like to thilk someone's watching over them."
Jones returned to the map again. "We fly out to the Berkshires, go up around Mt. Washington, skirt down around Connecticut. That's about the range of our patrols. We could fly right over New York City if we wanted to, but the place is so heavy, you never know what they'll shoot up at you. You thilk it was bad when you were there? It's incredible down there now. Everyone has a gun, a missile, or a tank. And all they do is fight each other for the right to call this block or that apartment house 'their turf.' They enjoy it. Every man's a king and the fighting never stops. And it's a great cover for what really goes on down there, and I mean all kinds of smuggling. Guns, drugs, women, missiles, explosives, gasoline, booze-you name it. Enough parts to build your own goddamn B-52, if you
34

have the gold or the silver or whatever to pay for it. I'd I know for a fact the Mid-Aks run most of the runs into New York City and trade them for protection-a free rein in smuggling stuff in and out."
Hunter's thoughts suddenly flashed back to Dozer and the heroic 7th Cavalry. Who knows what ever happened to them?
"We've seen a little action, mostly pirate ships and stuff," Jones said, helping himself to his fourth pilk-up of the morning. "We've had some strange doings lately though."
He drained his mug and stood up.
"Come on," he said, pulling on his jacket. "I'll show you what we're flying these days."
Hunter thought he'd never ask.
35

CHAPTER THREE
Walking out into the brilk morning air, Jones began to show Hunter around the base.
The place was more runway than anything else. There were three of them to be exact, two which ran parallel to the ocean nearby, the third intersecting them at a 70-degree angle. The entire base was probably a square mite in size. There were six lonely buildings scattered about-two of them big, Quonset-hut style hangars, two others served as housing for the base's occupants. The flight ops building had the base's control tower sitting beside it. The sixth building was next door, a catch-all mess hall, which he would soon find out, served as the well-patronized base saloon.
The base was surrounded by a chain lilk fence and guard towers every 500 yards or so. Soldiers walked the perimeter in pairs. He could see some rudimentary 20mm anti-aircraft gun positions ringing the perimeter, with a few mobile SAM launchers and even a couple of old Hawk anti-aircraft systems thrown in.
But the only aircraft sitting on the flight line was the Piper Cub that Hunter had seen towing the sign a
36

few weeks before.
"I knew you were probably alive," Jones said matter-of-factly. "And, if you had made it back from Europe, that you were probably hiding out somewhere, waiting for the fall of civilization."
"I'm still waiting," Hunter said with a laugh.
"Me, too," Jones replied. "But I figured you would return to where your roots were. The mountains in New Hampshire seemed like a good bet, although I had that Cub flying all over the state before you spotted it."
They walked right over one of the runways. Hunter could see that although there were weeds popping up through the asphalt, there were also some tire skid marks, indicating that something besides a Piper Cub had landed there recently. Where were the other planes?
"Don't ask just yet," Jones told him, reading his thoughts again.
They walked in silence for a few moments, over the second runway and approached the beach.
"We lost twenty million people, Hawk," the general said, the bitterness evident in his voice. "When the double-cross went down and that Quisling left a hole in the Star Wars shield, the Russian ICBMs just kept on coming, all of them landing on or around our sitos. Talk about overkitl! They just about blew the country into two parts. From North Dakota on down, it looks like the moon. Craters as big as cities, forest fires that will take years to burn out. Even some of the rivers are on fire, who knows why."
"What about radiation?" Hunter asked, sniffing the air for effect. "Nothing seems to be glowing."
37

"Most of the bombs that fell were 'clean,' " Jones said with noticeable relief. "Thank God for that. There is some low-level radiation, not much though. But those bastards also sent over nerve gas, germ bombs, even some hallucinogetic stuff. It's scattered everywhere. They must have launched everything but the kitchen silk at us, and we didn't so much as fire a popgun at them."
"So much for nuclear deterrence," Hunter said.
"It used to be beautiful country out there, Hawk," Jones continued. "The Dakotas. Nebraska. Kansas. I was raised out there. I know. Now it looks like another planet. It's a no-man's-land out there. I've flown over it. It gave me the creeps. It's downright spooky and it's going to stay like that for a long time."
Hunter nodded, then said: "I know it sounds terrible, but twenty million dead isn't so bad, considering what could have happened if they had nuked our big cities," Hunter said.
"You're right," Jones said, stopping to light his cigar in the brilk, ocean breeze. "But they wanted something left for them to take over. This 'No Occupation' section of the treaty is a bunch of yabanza. You know and I know that as soon as those ugly, crude bastards get their hammers and silkles straight, they'll be over here, eating our food, fishing our rivers, screwing ourtwomen. They'll be able to take the Queen Mary over here, who the hell's going to stop them?"
Hawk felt the bulge of the folded American flag in his back pocket. "We'll stop them," he said, matter-of-factly.
Jones looked at him and laughed, but didn't say
38

anything for a couple of moments. "You could . . ." the general said, finally, thilking of Hunter's expertise in the air. He was widely known as the best fighter pilot ever. "You could probably shoot 'em all down singlehandedly."
Hunter steered clear of the subject.
"What's with this 'New Order' business," he asked. "Do people really give a damn?"
"No, not really," Jones answered. "It's a case of malignant neglect. That traitor Vice President set himself up as the New Order Commissioner, or some such thing, and then took his entourage of faggots and weirdos and Russians and went to Bermuda or Moscow or someplace to play house. Before he left, he set up a bunch of rules. All of them are designed to stop people from talking, or even thilking, about the old ways."
"I know it's 'itlegal' to fly the Stars and Stripes," Hunter said. "What else did they come up with?"
"You can't even say the name of the country-the name before all this shit happened, that is," Jones said. "Not even thetword, America. Now it's just The Continent. No more national anthem, no more newspapers, TV, radio. They even banned sporting events. But the Texans told them to go screw themselves on that one."
"And some people choose to follow these rules?"
"Well, yes and no. It's more like you can avoid a lot of trouble if you just keep your mouth shut."
"That was true in Germany in the 1930s," Hunter said.
"I know," Jones sighed. "But I look at it this way. If I start mouthing off, my bosses get upset. They get
39

upset because they have to deal with the New Order flunkies who are running around in Boston, looking 1 over everyone's shoulder, collecting their 10-percent tax, off the top. I make too much noise, a New Order clown gets wind of it and tells my bosses to can me. They can my ass, I ain't got a job, money or a place to hang my helmet. What'stworse, I can't fly. If I can't fly, I might as well die. You know that."
Hunter nodded again. "Me, too."
"So I play their little game. We've got a good thing going here. We can build it into a really good thing. The Northeast Economic Zone is just anothertword for 'We're making money.' They have good airport facitities in Boston. A lot of traffic goes through there. All the major convoys to the Coast go out of Boston and Montreal. It's big, big money. Real silver. Real gold. They pay a tax to that jerk-off in Bermuda. He keeps the Russians happy by sucking up to the Politburo. It all evens out. No one wants to jinx it by talk of the old days."
The general was quiet for a white.
"We're mercenaries here, Hawk," he said finally. "We're not soldiers fighting for a flag or a cause. We're fighting for a paycheck. We're guarding their investment. They're getting rich and putting people totwork. Peopletwork, have food, they stay happy and quiet. Look, I have permission to raise an army here, train 'em, make a special forces unit out of them. The Leaders Councit in Boston-they're my bosses-will give me just about what I need. In return, I protect their asses. I watch over their convoy routes. I make sure there ain't no pirates in their airspace. But if something big broke out, I mean like a war between
40

the Zone and the 'Aks, I'm gone. And my people are gone too. It ain't like the old days. It ain'ttworth losing your life over."
Hunter let it all silk in.
"What's it like in the big cities these days?" he asked as they approached the beach on the other side of the runway. "I mean, I know New York City is like Beirut. But how about LA? Chicago?"
"Well, they're empty, most of them," Jones answered. "They figure that more than half-that's half-the Americans moved out of the country in the past two years. Didn't want to live here, simple as that. Of the one hundred million that left, most went north to Canada, and some went south to Mexico. There are huge resettlement camps up around Toronto, Quebec, Montreal, places like that. The Canucks were good enough to take our people in. They didn't get burnt so bad in the rumble. Mexico is another story, from what I hear. Lots of trouble down there. The Mex still remember we kilked their asses back in 1836. Lot of those people have moved back into the ROT."
"ROT?" Hunter asked.
Jones laughed. "Shouldn't call it that I guess. 'Republic of Texas.' Those crazy bastards finally got their with. They are their own country now. Got a hell of an army, too, so I hear."
Hunter wasn't too surprised to hear the Texans were adapting.
"Shit, you don't thilk a little thing like World War IIItwould stop those people, do you?" Jones said. "Let me tell you something: after the armistice was signed, the Texans took about a day and a half off to
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change the colors on their flag and adjust their college football schedule. Then they went back totwork.
"They knew that no matter what happened, peopletwould always need three things: heating oil, gasoline and jet fuel. So they fired up their refineries and concentrated on just those three products. Since then, the world-such as it is-has beat a path to their door. Of course, the stuff goes at premium prices. Gasoline istworth about twenty-five old dollars a gallon these days. I forget how much that is in real silver. But that's why everyone just about stays put these days. No more jumping in the car to see Grandma. And there aren't that many carstworking anyway.
"The heating oil is cheaper and a little easier to get. But still, these days you have two, three, maybe four famities sharing what used to be one-family houses. That's how people are surviving. It's the buddy system. It's a lucky man who has a job-and he gets paid whatever is avaitable. Food, clothes, heating oil, sometimes money, I guess. There's no such thing as a regular paycheck out there anymore. It's catch as catch can. That's why so many people are joining the army. Pretty soon, I thilk, everyone will be in the army in some capacity. For many of the little countries, it's the only secure job there is. Now, like I said, people here in the Northeast have it better than most. That's what we are protecting. The 'Aks cream their jeans thilking about what we have going here."
He relit his cigar.
"Of course, it's the jet fuel I'm most concerned about. We aretworthless if we don't have the juice to fly. I can deal with Texans, or I can deal with some of
42

the Arabs that are still alive and pumping crude. It's way cheaper with the Texans and more reliable, too. You can imagine what is going down in the Arab World these days! But with the Texans, they insist on a fighter escort for the ship, round-trip, no less. There are a lot of people out there who haven't the sweet deal we have here and who'd love to get their hands on a tanker filled with JP-8 fuel. And theytwouldn't mind slitting your throat to get it."
"Things are that bad?" Hunter asked, feeling he'd missed a chapter of history during his exite on the mountain.
"They'retworse," Jones said with a grim laugh. "Besides here and out on the Coast, and maybe in Texas, it's as if all the rest of the decent people were either kitled in the war or are in hiding. Out there, only the scum survived. The seas are filled with pirates-and so are the skies."
"Air pirates?"
"They're everywhere, Hawk," Jones said, waving his hand at the sky.
They had reached the beach by this time. Hunter looked at the waves, crashing on the shore a few hundred feet away. Cape Cod, he thought. No place like it. A bunch of seabirds scattered as they approached a beat-up picnic table. Jones produced a small flask and with a mock toast, took a healthy slug. Passing the container to Hunter, the general pulled the table around to face the ocean, then sat down and closed his eyes, letting the early spring sunshine soak through his body. Hunter took a swig- it was ginger brandy-and sat down beside him.
"Well," Jones said, looking out on the shoreline,
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"at least I have myself some beachfront property/'
They both took another belt. Then the general continued his story:
"The West Coast was lucky. They didn't get screwed up too much, so they got their act together real early in the game. Now, we here on the East Coast are in almost the same position. Besides the airport, we still have some kind of industrial base, plus our ports can handle anything coming across the Atlantic-oil from the Arabs, food from Africa and so on. The West Coasters know this, so we do a lot of trading with them. They have stuff we want and vice versa.
"The problem is getting the goods back and forth. The Panama Canal went blooey in the first wave the Red slime sent over. The trip around South America takes way too long, although a lot of ships are doing it. And there's no way you can drive through what's left of the middle of the country."
"How come?" Hunter asked. "Highway system destroyed?"
Jones nodded. "Not only are there no reliable roads, but like I said, there are some really bad characters living out in the middle of the country- and there are more than a few of them."
There was a distinct chitl in the general's voice.
"They're all crazy, Hawk," the senior officer said. "They'll blow your head off just as soon as look at you. They live in fitth and squalor. They steal everything they can get and get it any way they can."
It sounded to Hunter like New York City. "Who are these people? Why did they turn so-anti-social, so quilkly?" he asked.
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Jones removed his baseball hat and ran his hands through his hair. "Who knows? ICBM shell-shock? Or exposure to nerve gas? Or maybe this hallucinogen gas the Reds sent over. Maybe this is what a man becomes when there is anarchy, I don't know. A guy in Boston told me there were a couple big prisons in Kansas that were busted open when the bombs started falling. He said it was done on purpose, by persons unknown, just to disrupt the recovery. Other people say that the wardens were just giving the prisoners a chance to save themselves. Whatever, a lot of them survived and some banded together and decided that the best way to make it in this brave, newtworld was to take what you want and kitl if you had to get it.
"It's a treacherous place, these days, Hawk, my boy. That's why they call it the Badlands."
The Badlands. Hunter fited the term away in his memory, to be recalled many, many times.
"You mentioned 'air pirates,' " he said.
"Can you believe it?" the general said, taking a belt from the flask. "They're everywhere! That's what makes me believe that these people in the Badlands aren't just escaped cons or shell-shocked victims. The pirates got air bases out there! They are at least peacefully co-existing with the creeps. They have aircraft and they have to be getting fuel to be flying the stuff. That shows there's some kind of intelligencetworking. I mean, it takes more than a driveling idiot to fly a plane."
"Or fix one," Hunter added.
"Right," Jones nodded. "Well, however they're doing it, the skies are very dangerous. And not just over the Badlands, either, although that's^here it's
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thetworst. These guys are flying all over the continent and out at sea."
"What are they flying?" Hunter wanted to know.
Jones had to laugh. "Anything and everything, Hawk. Youtwouldn't believe what's still around. First, the pirates started showing up in old shilkilker jets like F-80s, F-84s, even a few F-94s, from what I hear."
Hunter immediately recognized the planes. They were Korean War vintage and early 1950's models. Sub-sonic stuff.
"And that's just the beginning," Jones continued. "Lately the bastards have been seen flying more advanced stuff-F-lOls, F-104s, F-106s, lots of F-100s."
"Interceptors!"
"Right, they must have gotten into some Air National Guard bases, or something. Maybe even Wright-Patterson sold them the hardware. Who knows? That stuff might be old, but it's still very effective."
Hunter thought for a moment. F-80s, '84s, 94s, really anything in the double digits was slow, buitt before the sound barrier was broken. The F-100 Super Sabre was the first mass-produced jet to do it. Then anything made after that-the F-101 "Voodoo," the F-102 "Delta Dagger," the F-104 "Starfighter," the F-105 "Thunderchief," the F-106 "Delta Dart"-were all supersonic fighters. The Thunderchief, which pilots in 'Nam called "Thud," was one tough fighter-bomber. The others were quilk, rocket-firing planes buitt when the threat from Russia was thought to be through a bomber attack, air raid sirens, the whole
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bit. Before ICBMs became the rage. And the Navy had a whole different family of planes, carrier attack craft like A-4s. Most of these jets had made their mark in Southeast Asia. American ingenuity had turned planes originally buitt to protect the North American skies and seas into camouflaged birds of death, a horror in the skies above the rice paddies.
"But," Hunter said, "if the pirates have some Air National Guard bases, they must also have some later stuff. A-lOs and the like."
"They probably do, Hawk," Jones confirmed. "But as you know, those planes are for ground-support. Tank busting, that sort of thing. The pirates are more interested in catching you in the air. They jump you and either you land where they say, or they shoot you down. You can try and get away, but they fly intwolfpacks, just like the Luftwaffe did. It's hard to outrun a dozen or so fighters. That's why it's so hard to move materiel back and forth to the Coasts."
"So, how do you do it?" Hunter asked. "You said something about 'convoys?' "
"Yep. Convoys." Jones answered. "The Northeast is the major trading partner with the Coasters. We both assembled a lot of airliners. Boeing 707s, DC-10s, DC-9s, 727s. Anything big and aitworthy. They ripped out the seats where they had to and made cargo carriers out of them. That's how ninety percent of the goods get delivered. We have a big convoy that leaves Logan Airport in Boston every three days. The time changes for security reasons, but anyone hanging around can tell when a convoy is getting ready to leave. I mean, it's hard to hide getting forty, fifty airliners getting ready to fly."
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"And the pirates have spies, I assume," Hunter said.
"You assume right there, Major," Jones said. "They know when we're coming and they attack just about every convoy we send out. They get a few planes every time. Mostly, they shoot them down. But sometimes they can place a rocket or a cannon burst in just the right spot, enough to disable it. If the pilot brings the plane down relatively softly, there may be something left over for the pirates to take as booty. So if a plane is disabled, or if they catch a plane trying to make it alone, the pilot knows they'd just as soon shoot him down, so he is more inclined to land the thing and take his chances."
"And you have to fly over their territory to save fuel?"
"Right again. We can't waste a drop, even at the expense of losing a few birds."
"Well, I know it's hard in a plane like an airliner," Hunter said. "But why don't the pilots just bait out?"
"Because they'll shoot you anyway. Always remember that. They've shot at parachutes. Christ! That's chitd play for them. They hijacked a plane about a year ago. This was when people actually flew from coast to coast. The pirates forced the pilot to land at one of their bases, the airport in Tulsa. They put a gun to his head and told him they just wanted the plane and that theytwould let the people go. He really had no choice but to believe them, and as it turned out, he was the first one to get it. Then they lined up the men and shot 'em all, right on the runway. They kitled off all the oldtwomen, and the young ones they could screw, they did. It was a massacre. That ended
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regular pastenger service for a white."
"That's just plain terrorism," Hunter said. "What's the point of it?"
"That's just it, Hawk," Jones said, anger creeping into his voice. "There is no point, other than to destabitize the country, which, if you haven't noticed, is already pretty unstable.
"Some people say 'It's their turf.' It gets into that old territorial thing. But I don't buy it. There's something behind it. Something-or someone-is controlling it. It's too coordinated to be so random, but they try like hell to make it appear that way."
"Whotwould be behind it?" Hunter asked. "These Mid-Aks?"
Jones was sitent for a moment. He looked out to sea. "Maybe," he said finally. "They are crazy. They'retworse than the pirates in a lot of ways. I have no doubt that the pirates get fuel and stuff from them. But airplanes? I just don't know. The Mid-Aks aren't big on air power. They're more concerned with who's got the biggest army. In fact, they've got the biggest goddamn army on the continent already."
"Who else could it be?"
"Well, there are some screwballs running things in Chicago," Jones said, shaking the flask and taking a drilk. "The Famity, they call themselves."
"Religious zealots?" Hunter asked, taking the flask from the general.
Jones laughed, "No, although we've too many of those running around too. The Famity is nothing more than the crooks who were running things in Chicago behind the scenes when the war started, come out in the open. They didn't miss a beat. They
49

were out collecting 'taxes' the day the New Order came down. They've also buitt up a large army, some airpower, too."
The older man thought for a second, pulling on the end of his unlit cigar. "But Chi-town's pretty close to the Badlands, so I thilk they'd just as soon leave the pirates alone," he said.
They were both sitent for a few moments. Hunter letting all the new information be absorbed; Jones trying to untangle all the seemingly loose ends of the destabitization that was sweeping the continent.
"I just don't know," Jones said finally. "The pirates, the goonies in Chicago, even the 'Aks are getting support and-I thilk guidance, if not direct orders-from somewhere. I just don't know where. I do know it's gettingtworse. A big convoy left Boston last week. More than seventy planes in all, including escorts. The pirates knew they were coming. Chopped them up something terrible. Shot down thirty big planes. What a horror show."
Onetword sparked in Hunter's mind. "Escorts?" he asked, looking out on the nearly empty base.
Jones immediately read his thoughts. "Patience, my boy," he said, taking the last swig from the flask. "No, we're not in the escort business. That's a job for free-lancers. And they can have it."
"Free-lancers?"
"That's right. Free-lance fighter pilots. It's the latest rage. Get yourself an airplane and get hired out to ride shotgun for the air convoys. Good money. Trouble is, you rarely live long enough to spend it."
"How come?" Hunter was fascinated.
"Because, you're the first one the pirates go for,"
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Jones said coolly. "You can be flying an F-14 with Sparrow missiles up the ying-yang, but if twenty F-80s jump you, it's just a matter of time."
"Unless . . ." Hunter said slowly. "Unless you're good enough."
Jones looked at him. "That's right, Major," he said. "And you're the best pilot ever to sit behind the controls-better than anything I%'e ever seen or heard about. And there isn't a person left standing who knows airplanes whotwould disagree with me if I said you could probably be the richest man in this continent within a year. You'd be in demand. Leading convoys of seventy-five, shit-one hundred planes or just some rich cat who needs his diamonds moved via a Piper. You'd be the man they'd want riding shotgun.
"But I don't thilk you're that greedy. I don't thilk it's in your make-up. Free-lancers will shoot for anybody-for the highest bidder. Half of themtwould sell out to the pirates for the right price. And it's happened. A convoy flying along all of a sudden loses its escorts? Next thing you know, booml jumped by the bad guys.
"No. Not you, Hawk. Maybe if you had to earn a quilk buck someday, youtwould do it. But you're the type of man who has to fight for a flag. Fight for something to believe in. For a cause."
With that, the general lifted the rim of his cap and shielded his eyes against the morning sun. He was looking for something, far out on the ocean on the eastern horizon. It was nearly a cloudless day and the sun was bouncing off the sea, forming a huge field of sparkling, floating jewels.
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The general was still, his eyes squinting. Suddenly, Hunter realized how quiet it was. There was no wind. The symphony of seagulls' squawks and other sea fowl squeals was sitent. Even the waves seemed to have temporarity halted their relentless crashing against the shore.
.Then he felt it.
He didn't close his eyes for this one. He wanted to see it first. An excitement started to shake him. Slowly, a distant roar, getting louder. More intense. Angry. Powerful. An almost heroic sound.
It was a sound he knew well . . .
Then he saw them. Five specks just above the horizon, each traiting a thin, gray, wisp of smoke. They were getting louder by the second. He knew ittwould soon be unbearably loud, but he waited for it with glee.
Closer and closer, the specks grew bigger, their forms taking shape. They were no more than 25 feet above the waves and flying in a perfect chevron formation. About a half mite out, Hunter began to recognize wings, and tail sections and air intakes and engine noise. He managed to steal a quilk glance at Jones. The general had a smite a mite wide.
Instantly, the jets were right over them. Head up at a 90-degree angle, Hunter took a mental snapshot of the five fighters as they were right above him. They seemed to hang in the air. He felt a thritl shoot from his head to his heart down to his toes and up again. These muthas were flying I
The leader was flying an F-4 Phantom. A Viet Nam-era fighter-bomber, the F-4 looked like someone had shut the hangar doors on it before it made it all
52

the way out. Its wings were cranked upward on their ends, white the rear stabitizers were bent downward. There were reasons for the bizarre shape: air down-wash, lateral stability, dthedral angles. It was an ugliness that only a pilot could love. The plane, though decades old, had a lot of guts in its day-it could fly at 1450 mph-and was always a favorite of flyboys. It was the only thing the Air Force and the Navy ever agreed oh. Both services flew them. Hunter could see a 20-mm cannon on each wing, with two Sidewinders and an old Bullpup missile hanging underneath. The Phantom was was loaded for bear.
The leader's wingman was flying an F-8E Crusader, a plane nearly 40 years old, yet still deadly looking. It was the first aircraft carrier-launched plane to break 1000 mph, and saw a lot of action in Viet Nam. Its entire wing could titt upward by about seven degrees, giving it a humpbacked look, but making it easier to set the baby down on a bouncing carrier. The jet was armed with two 20-mm and what looked like about 2000 pounds of bombs. It had been ages since Hunter had seen one and he couldn't imagine where the general's people had found it.
On the leader's port wing there was an A-7 Corsair that looked to be carrying a Seapup missile as well as some anti-personnel bombs. Strangely, the smallish plane was just a more recent, down-sized version of the F-8 Crusader. The Navy used them during the early '80s and some of them saw action in Grenada and over Beirut. An odd little plane-this one was a two-seater and looked like a trainer-Hunter had never flown one, but knew there were a lot of them in Air National Guard units at the outbreak of the war.
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The two remaining planes were T-38 trainers. A simplified, stripped-down version of the kilk-ass F-20 Tigershark, it was the type of plane Hunter flew at NASA for training purposes. In fact, he was sure he recognized these two particular jets as NASA property. Each plane carried an Exocet missile, jury-rigged to its fuselage.
It was an odd menagerie of aircraft, representing different eras of flight, different services and different missions. Each one was painted in the same green color as the general's suit, and it looked like someone had done the job with a paintbrush.
The planes streaked overhead, and pulled up as one, staying in formation, and angling up 80-degrees. The after-noise hit as did the wash from the low-flying jets. Hunter felt the wind and the smoke and exhaust mixed with the spray kilked off the ocean from the powerful machines hit him right in the face. It felt beautiful.
He looked at Jones. The older man's smite hadn't dulled an iota. "Dawn flight," he said, producing a new cigar and ritually spitting off the end, "That was our Air Patrol."
The planes peeled off and, in sequence, began their landing approach. Five minutes later the fighters were taxiing up to a hangar where Hunter and the general were waiting.
The canopies opened, a ground crew appeared and placed a ladder beneath each cockpit of the still whining jets. The first three pilots to emerge Hunter had never seen before. And he didn't recognize the other two until they were down from their planes and had removed their flight helmets. Suddenly he real-
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zed he was looking at two smiting, famitiar faces.
Captain J. T. Toomey. Lieutenant Ben Wa. two pilots from the old Thunderbirds team.
It was good to see them. They had performed together for a year before the war and had been tight-just like all of the T-Bird teams over the years. Then they went to war together. Never did Hunter thilk he'd see them again. But here they were.
"Hey, flyboy," J. T. "Socket" Toomey started off. "What do you thilk, that the world stops turning because you go off and live on some mountain like a yogi?" Toomey was the designated Mister Cool of the group. He was ruggedly handsome, with a face that looked like an ad for an aftershave.
Ben Wa, the crazy hula-hula boy from Maui, gave a deep, solemn bow. When he was made a member of the team, people scoffed that the Air Force was including him as a token Oriental. That was before these people had seen him fly. Wa let his wings do the talking.
"Good to see you, Hawk," the diminutive Wa said, smiting. "Can't do any trilks without The Wingman."
"I only see five planes," Hunter countered, with a laugh. "What am I going to fly?"
At that moment, hetwould have flown the Piper Cub.
Toomey and Wa loooked at the general.
Jones only smiled. Relighting his cigar, he motioned to the group to grab Hunter and lead him toward the back of the hangar. Even members of the ground crew had stopped attending to the jets and followed the group of pilots to the last bay in the
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building.
It was covered floor to ceiting with a white drop cloth. The only thing Hunter could see inside the shroud was the glare of two powerful lights, throwing weird shadows around the inside of the structure.
Without fanfare or suspense, Jones drew the curtain back and revealed what was behind.
Hunter felt a lump immediately form in his throat.
Sitting before him was the most beautiful F-16 ever buitt.
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CHAPTER FOUR
It was his old airplane-the F-16 he had flown when he was a member of the Air Force Aerial Demonstration Squadron, as the Thunderbirds were officially called. He had last seen it just before reporting for his NASA shuttle training.
It was painted in the traditional colors of the Thunderbirds. Its snout was wrapped in red, white and blue stripes, as were the tips of its wings. The tail section had a webbed design of blue bordering four large stars and eleven smaller ones on a field of white. Centered on the tail was the unit's symbol-an American Indian-style drawing of the mythical Thunder-bird, a circle on its breast which contained a white star. Inside the white star were the sithouettes of four jets.
The jet looked to be in excellent condition-he could tell that it had just been recently overhauled, and given a fresh coat of paint. But for all its authenticity, the '16 still looked different to Hunter. Something was missing.
Then it hit him: All of the plane's Air Force markings had been removed.
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"It's the 'law,' Hawk," Jones said, reading his thoughts again. "Like we were talking about, no references to the old days allowed."
"But I thought you said, no one cared about these bogus laws?" Hunter just felt the jet wasn't complete without its old markings.
"In this case, it can get mighty dangerous, real quilk," Jones told him. "The New Order will pay any pilot one-hundred-thousand dollars in real silver for shooting down any plane flying with the old USAF markings. All they have to do is produce the evidence. That's a lot of money these days, and there are a lot of free-lancers out there whotwould gun you down for it. Christ, the New Ordertwould even pay an air pirate."
"Screw the New Order," Hunter spat out.
"Thilk you can still handle her?" Jones asked him, knowing the reply.
"I suppose I could give it a try," Hunter said, at that moment, the happiest he'd been in nearly three years.
Ten minutes later, he was taxiing down the runway.
The F-16 was a pilot's dream come true.
It was buitt light-nearly 80-percent of its frame was aluminum, and only 11-percent was the heavier steel. The designers wanted it that way-the lighter the better. The reason? Because they outfitted the thing with a kilk-ass GE turbofan engine that could boot 27,000 pounds of thrust on demand. The combination made for a highly aerodynamically superior thrust-to-weight ratio. In othertwords, the engine thrust power was nearly twice the weight of the entire
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airplane. Throw in the forebody strakes for vortex control; a wing blended to the body for greater overall lift; a variable wing camber for automatic leading edge steering flaps; one hundred and fifty more examples of state-of-the-art aerodynamics and a dash of American ingenuity and what came out was simply the best maneuvering fighter plane ever buitt.
The cockpit was a video game come to life. It was crammed with science fiction-type avionics: a "heads-up display" which projected up on an invisible TV street right in front of the pilot all of the critical control data needed to fly the plane. The pilot could keep an eye on the controls, know where he was going, know what his weapons status was and who he was shooting at-all without ever looking down at the control boards.
But the HUD capability was just the beginning. The plane carried its own video recorder and playback for mission analysis-everything done during a sortie could be recorded and brought back ready for broadcast. The video capability also allowed the pilot to pre-record mission elements for playback during his flight. Seeing this in the cockpit, Hunter had totwonder whether anyone had TVs anymore.
The F-16 had an autopilot that could do just about everything an average human pilot could-some claimed more. But it took more than an average person to understand the alphabet soup of subsystems inside the plane's cockpit: INS, TACAN, TF, IFF/ SIF, AAI, ILS, JMC, JVC, ADF UHF, BIT, DMT, ENG, PROG, TGT, HSI, and on and on. It was at once brilliant and bewildering. To the casual observer-and way back when to the uninformed Senate
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appropriations committee member-the cockpit looked impossibly confused, as if a mad scientist had had a hand in its design. Some pilots believed that was accurate.
The plane was completely "fly-by-wire;" its flight control system was fully electronic. Unlike other planes, the control stilk was not between the pilot's legs. Rather it was off to his right side. By using the stilk, the pilot had at his fingertips his weapon release, display control, engine trim switch and gun trigger.
The side-stilk controller always gave Hunter the feeling that he was flying the plane from an armchair-in fact the F-16 had a recliner seat, titted upward by 27 degrees. Both were essential to flying such an advanced supersonic fighter and that the F-16 was. Wide open-at "full military"-it could haul ass at nearly three times the speed of sound.
Of course, Hunter knew the reason to fly that fast and accurately was to get where you're going and shoot at something once you got there. Again, the F-16 came out on top. It was a technological schizo. Whether its mission was to dogfight an enemy-a match it almost alwaystwon, thanks to its M-16 20mm rapid fire cannon and four air-to-air missiles-or blast him on the ground, the plane could do both, no problem. It could maneuver like a fighter but carry enough ordnance-conventional free-fall bombs, dispenser weapons, napalm, you name it-to be a bomber. And with the fire control system up on the "heads up display," with everything else, the pilot never had to take his eyes off the target.
And with multiple accuracy,   "track-white-scan"
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high-velocity search, and quilk-reaction, fingertip weapons firing additions, the plane was quilk on the draw. If the pilot launched an air-to-air missile, the opponent usually had only seconds to live. It was that simple. Challenged to a duel, the F-16 was unquestionably the quilkest gun in the West.
If the mission was to bomb-tanks, troops or other airfields-then all the pilottwould do is switch on the Doppler beam, sharpen the baby to 64:1, add the ground target indication/tracker and push the button. Anything targeted, moving or not, was instantly blown to smithereens.
And it was good on gas . . .
The F-16 was just under 50 feet long; its wingspan just a hair under 33. The tail rose 17 feet from the ground. It was deceptively small-a direct contradiction to the idea "bigger is better." In the world of the jet fighter, small is better. It means you're hard to detect, either on a radar scope or to the eye. Hard to see means hard to hit. Hard to hit extended a pilot's expectancy by a few minutes, or hours or even years. Notwonder they all loved the '16.
The plane could climb, dive and turn on a dime- and pull 9gs white it was doing it. Even better yet, it could do it on a full tank-other planes in its class had a hard time doing 7gs and that was only possible with less than a full fuel load.
But a plane is only as good as its pilot. And Hunter was unquestionably the best. So the F-16 fit him like a glove. A match made in heaven.
His favorite thing about the '16 was that no aircraft was quilker off the ground. Unlike other jets, which required a ground crew to get them cranked up, the F-
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16 had an automatic starting system. Just like turning the key in a car, the enginetwould fire up and be capable of lifting off 51 seconds later. Also eliminated was the 20 minutes or more start-up time that pilots of other planes needed to program their on-board computer. The F-16's computers were churning in less than a minute. All the pilot had to do was pre-record the flight data onto a computer cartridge then load it into the aircraft's computer system. Jones, knowing his wingmantwould be anxious to get airborne, had already pre-recorded such a cartridge for Hunter.
So, because of the plane's quilk reaction capability, Hunter was able to strap into the cockpit, have the plane towed out of the hangar and, just a few minutes later, be sitting at the end of the runway, giving his instruments the final check-over.
Thistwould be a solo flight-like someone seeing an old lover for the first time in a white, Hunter wanted no company. Ittwould be him and the bird alone. It was something his fellow Thunderbird pilots could understand.
He waited for clearance to take off. The base's control tower, in a far cry from its heyday, now only needed a single traffic controller, but he was still the only person who could give a pilot permission to take off. So Hunter waited.
His hands felt good on the controls again. The engine purred like a kitten. The plane had been obviously well-maintained. His thoughts went to the story Jones told him of how he managed to get it: The general had made a convoy run a year before and intentionally stopped at Nellis Air Force Base in Las Vegas on the way back east. The place, once the home
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base for the Thunderbirds, was now abandoned-and off limits-shut down by the New Order, Jones had set down there anyway, and saw nearly 100 planes lying destroyed on the runways, courtesy of the New Order fanatics. But this didn't prevent him from poking around. He happened upon one of the unit's old supply hangars, busted the lock off with a crowbar and when he swung the door open . . .
"There she was," he had said. "Sitting there like the day you left her. Why those clowns didn't bust her up like all the other planes on the base, we'll never know."
The next convoy west, Jones clandestinely hired a C-130 cargo plane out to Nellis, along with a ground crew, who, over the next several days, secretly took the plane apart, packed it and shipped it east. If they had been caught, it could have meant his losing his job at the least; execution by the New Order at thetworst. But they didn't get caught. And once Jones had the F-16, he knew it was time to lure Hunter out of retirement.
Suddenly, the radio crackled and a voice gave him the go-ahead to take-off. He remembered Jones' only request. That was to stay away from the mainland. He didn't particularly want anyone-including his bosses-knowing that the unit had a sophisticated F-16 at the base, not right now anyway.
He scanned his instruments once more and took a deep breath and waited . . .
Then it came to him. "The Feeling." It was always there every time he took off. He became disembodied. In a higher state of mind. The mechanics of flight became as simple as the wilk of an eye. It was this-
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this instantaneous osmosis-which set him apart from other stilk jockeys. It was indescribable. Other pilots strap in, do the checklist, prepare to take off. Fight the nervous energy that always creeps in. Huntertwould melt into the machinery. His brain lilked with the onboard computer. His hands and feet became extensions of the flaps and stabitizers. His eyes became the radar; his ears the radio. Other pilots flew with their brains; Hunter flew with his heart. For him to fly an F-16-or any plane for that matter-was as easy and as natural as it was to walk. And that was what set him apart from the others. "The Feeling." It always came to him. It was there the first time his father let him take the controls of the Cessna when he was barely 11. He had never told a soul about it. He couldn't. It was beyond description. Yet, he always recognized it and let it wash through him. From that moment on, he was the plane.
Instantly, he lifted the air brakes and was moving forward, gathering speed. 100 knots, 120, 150. His heart was pounding-a promise he had made to himself was coming true. Up on the mountain he had vowed to fly again, somehow, some time. Now, he was doing it. He pulled back on the control stilk and the F-16 lifted off the ground.
A tantalizing thritl ran through him. He was certain he could feel his heart pounding against his flight suit, the excitement was so intense. Like a fish back to water-or more accurately, a bird back to wing-he was again where he should be-flying.
His colleagues on the ground watched as the red,
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white and blue fighter tore down the runway and lifted off in a flash, a bright cone of fire pouring from the tail. They followed the plane as Hunter stood the '16 straight up on its tail and climbed. And climbed. And climbed. The fighter went straight up into the cloudless sky until it was out of sight. The former Thunder-bird pilots shook their heads.
"two years away from it," Toomey observed. "And the boy is still the best since Orvitle and Witbur."
Hunter let the g-force flow through him as the plane climbed higher. It was rejuvenating. The further he got from the ground, the better he felt. It was a classic battle between him and the law of gravity, and, when he was flying, he was winning. He never wanted to come down.
Stitl the F-16 climbed. 25,000 feet. 30,000. 35,000. Up to 40,000. He was in ecstasy. 45,000. 50,000! 60,000! He could see the dark edge of the stratosphere above him. Was it alltworth it? The time spent on the mountain, in a cocoon, waiting. At 70,000 feet-14 miles high and nearing 1200 mph-he let out a whoop! Goddamn! It wastworth it, he decided at that moment. He had been reborn.
He turned the plane over in a backward loop and started down. Straight down. The gs increasing, the engine roaring, the ground getting close, real fast. His colleagues on the ground saw him coming, fast and true, like an arrow shot from heaven. No one had the control, the coolness of their friend Hunter. They admired him and, not so secretly, envied him.
He pulled up smoothly, barely 100 feet above the runway. Jones had wisely ordered the airspace above the field to be cleared, a standard procedure when the
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team flew their exhibitions. Work had stopped completely at the base astword that Hunter, "the greatest pilot ever born," was putting on a show. When the Thunderbirds performed in the old days, Huntertwould do a solo spot, and it was always the crowd pleaser. As the entire base-pilots to sentries-had their eyes upward, it was clear that nothing had changed.
He ran through all the old stunts like he'd never stopped performing. Loops. Eights. One point star-burst. Upside down crossover. Controlled stall. Four point turns. Eight point turns. He ended the exhibition with a blistering low altitude buzz of the base. Even the seasoned pilots on hand had to let out gasps of admiration. The boy was born to fly.
Then, it was over. Time to come home. He set the plane down softly. The '16 had performed superbly. With a couple of squadrons of these, he thought, he and his friends could clear the skies of any opponent. He was itching for the chance. Hungry for action. He rolled the plane up to the hangar and shut it down. There, a ground crew appeared and helped him unstrap. He climbed down to the tarmac where Jones was waiting for him.
"Fair," the general said, coolly lighting a cigar to camouflage his smite. "Just keep your nose up and don't be so much of a hot dog and you'll make it."
"Yes, sir," Hunter replied, knowing he deserved some ribbing. "Thank you, sir. How many more of these you got?"
Jones suddenly turned serious. "That's the bad news, Hawk."
Hunter waited.
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"We've looked all over, asked around, offered good money," Jones said slowly. "Couldn't find a single one, next to this one."
"You mean . . . ?" Hunter said, fearing thetworst.
"You're right on top of it, Hawk," Jones said, looking at the F-16. "The New Order got to all of them. Pranged them. The incredible fools."
Hunter closed his eyes.
"As far as we know," Jones said, "this is the last F-16 left."
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CHAPTER FIVE
Later on that night, after chow and before the bourbon was broken out, Hunter and Jones sat in the pilot's lounge smoking cigars. The room was small and cramped, but homey, thanks to the half dozen overstuffed chairs that were jammed into it. Its walls were covered with snapshots of the Thunderbirds in action in the old days. In the corner, a VCR-the only TV avaitable these days-cranked away, displaying a porn movie on a jumpy black and white street. Hunter avoided watching it for fear he'd burst a seam. He couldn't remember the last time he'd made love to atwoman. Was it in France?
It had been one hell of a day for Hunter-his reunion with the general and the Thunderbirds, Jones' updating him on the radical changes across the continent, the exhitarating flight, the shock of knowing that there was probably but one F-16 left in the world. It was hard for Hunter to believe that less than 48 hours before, he was still cooped up in the cabin on the mountain.
"Well," Jones said, finishing off a cup of coffee. "Do you want a job or don't you?"
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"Job?" Hunter asked.
"Yes, Major. That's what one gets when one has to earn a living. It's a totally alien subject to you?"
It was true, from his chitdhood, through M.I.T., through the Air Force Academy and into the service, he had never held a regular job.
"Look," Jones said, leaning forward in his chair. "It's not much pay. Just enough to keep some silver- some real stuff-jingling in your pocket. But these days, what's to buy? Booze. Women. Cheap cigars.
"But I'll guarantee you all the flying time we can manage to give you fuel for. And, it's your '16 if you want it."
"I accept," Hunter said quilkly.
"Now wait a minute," Jones said, holding up his hand in caution. "Let me explain the job. We are talking about routine stuff. Escorting tanker deliveries, border patrol, training new guys if we get them planes to fly. Chasing pirates if they break our airspace is about the only action I can promise you. At least, for a white."
"I accept," Hunter said again.
"Will you wait a goddamn minute? You had better lay out your options, Hawk. Like I said, you could make a fortune as a free-lancer, doing trans-continen-tals. There's a company, right up in Boston. Head-hunters, always looking for flyboys for convoy duty. They'll pay you more in a week than I can give you in a year."
"But I accept your offer," Hunter repeated.
"Will you cool your goddamn jets?"
"Look, will I betworking with you and the guys?" Hunter asked.
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"Yes,"  Jones  said,   with  a  wave  of  his  cigar.
½T>     .    ╗J
But . . .
"And will I be flying that '16 out there?"
"Of course, but . . ."
"Then, I accept your offer," he said with a smite.
"All right, wise ass," Jones said in exasperation. "You're hired. Now, will you listen to me?"
"Go ahead. Boss."
"I'll kilk your butt," Jones said, reaching for a label-less bottle of bourbon. "You listen to me you hot dog . . ."
The general stopped for a moment, looked around for a glass, settled on an old styrofoam coffee cup and poured himself a stiff double. Hunter realized that whatever Jones had to tell him wasn't a laughing matter.
Jones took a deep belt from the coffee cup. The stuff was rot-gut; but moonshine's biggest asset was that it was avaitable. In the old days, youtwouldn't give it to yourtworst enemy.
"There's going to be war," the older men said deliberately.
Hunter was puzzled. "There's already been a big one. I thought it was 4the war to end all wars.' "
Jones sighed and shook his head. "No, I mean right here, on the East Coast. With the Mid-Atlantic Division."
"The Mid-Aks?" Hunter asked, looking out for a cup for himself.
"You got it. Things started to smell a few months ago. Little things. Here and there. Nothing that could stand on its own. But when you add them up ..."
"Things like what?" Hunter asked, after locating a
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chipped and cloudy tea cup and pouring himself a drilk.
"Well, the boys in Boston have never got along with Mid-Atlantic. They feel they're just a little too cute for them. I mean, seeing them raise an army that could kilk-ass on half the continent, that's nothing to be taken lightly."
"Especially when you have them for neighbors," Hunter added.
"Check. There ain't nothing between us and them except what's left in New York City. Boston figured that if they wanted to put people totwork, like a People's Army, building roads, repairing things, then, what the hell?"
"People's Army sounds a little too famitiar," Hunter said.
"I agree. It's Russian to the gonads. But still, Boston didn't mind all that much. I mean, there are eleven other countries out there now, and several free zones and unclaimed territories .
"And the Badlands. And the pirates."
"Right. Who can blame them for starting an army? There's a lot of kookaboos running loose."
Hunter nodded in agreement, refilled Jones's cup and put a head on his own.
The general took a swig. "But it started with this shit at Fort Knox. I mean, they kitled some people down there. Locals. People who just happened to live near the place, and who had some guns and squatted on it, using a little of the gold at a time.
"But you see, it was the way the Mid-Aks did it. They didn't attack these folks right away. In fact, they did business with them. Then, they entered into a
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'mutual cooperation pact' or something with these people, who were actually no more than four o^ five hundred, and calling themselves Kentucky Free State.
"Next thing you know, just when the Kentuckians thought they could do business with Mid-Atlantic- boom!-the Mid-Aks accuse them of some such nonsense, and they attack them. Wipe 'em out. It took all of an afternoon. Five hundred or more dead. The Mid-Aks sitting on top of a pite of gold. Who's going to say a thing?"
"Well, is it common knowledge about what happened?'" Hunter wanted to know.
"Maybe," Jones replied. "There ain't no more newspapers, Hawker. We used to complain about the press doing this and that. You know how much I hated sucking up to those bastards during the Thun-derbirds' days. Now that they're gone, no one knows what the hell is happening on the other side of the mountain or in the next town over. We have one hundred million people still living on this continent, but ninety-nine point nine million of them aretwoefully uninformed."
"What did the New Order Commissioner and his goons do?"
"Not a thing. And they knew about the Fort Knox thing. That I know for a fact. I've some good contacts up in Boston. Guys I've done favors for. They keep their cars to the ground and they keep me informed. The New Order heard about the Gold War within days of it happening. Did nothing."
"Go on," Hunter said.
"Well, the Mid-Aks used the gold to build an even bigger army and that's when they went after the
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Florida-Alabama Union. But it was the same style. First, they played it cozy with them, opening up trading centers on their borders. Letting people travel back and forth without much hassle. Then again with this 'mutual pact' shit. Course, these Florida-'Bama Unionist guys didn't exactly know what went down in Kentucky. Then the 'Aks proposed that the two regions 'merge,' to use their term."
"Right," Hunter said. "Just like when Hitler 'merged' with Poland."
"You're catching on, Hawk. But this time, the Mid-Aks didn't even wait for an answer."
"You mean they just walked in and took over?" Hunter asked.
"Just about," Jones said. "But first they started a
diversion. Now, remember, not many people know
this is really what happened. It was real early one
morning. A couple of ships saited in from nowhere,
anchored off Miami and opened up on the city with
big guns. Then they started offloading troops!  In
landing craft, yet! These guys, armed to the teeth and
.all dressed in black,   start splashing  ashore.  The
Union guys don't know what the fungoo is going on.
phese troops could be from Cuba, for all they know.
So they stop 'em on the beach. Cut them up bad and
bloody. But white they're doing that, the 'Aks hit
them from the north. Poured in like ants.
"It took a little longer this time. There are some tough sons of bitches down Florida and Alabama way. I mean, Roll, Tide. They weren't like a bunch of hitlbitlies sitting on six bitlion dollars in gold. They fought back. Man, they had tanks, howitzers, a few choppers.
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"But they had no money. And no money meant no air cover. And no air cover meant it was just a matter of time before the bigger armytwon. The Mid-Akº finally squashed them. Took about a month. It was a bloodbath. And from what I hear, the Mid-Aks didn't take kindly to the conquered population. Kitled kids, oldtwomen. Sold the good lookingtwomen. Shit like that."
"And, again, the brave New Order was on the sidelines?"
"With their fingers up their whatzis. I mean, this happened practically right next door to them. Florida's not that far from Bermuda. They're either scared shitless of Mid-Atlantic ..."
"Or . . .?" Hunter asked.
"Or they're in bed together," Jones said,tworry crossing his face.
Hunter ran his fingers through his long hair. It sure didn't take the world very long to get screwed up.
"You said, you've smelled other things?" he asked Jones.
"Oh yes," the general replied. "You see, most of the people on the continent want nothing tp do with Atlantic. I mean, wetwon't trade with them, anc neither will the Coasters. The Texans demand real coin, up front from them, but that's not a problem, since they locked up the gold supply."
"Then the Mid-Aks are probably the richest of the countries," Hunter said. "But are they the strongest?"
"Not yet," Jones replied. "Right now, in the pecking order, with all things considered, we here in the Northwest are probably the strongest this side of the
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Badlands, and that's in good part because we're lucky. We have some airplanes and pilots. The Boston Army is strictly paid soldiers, but they seem loyal. Small, but good. When I get through with the training of the Special Force here, we'll be better. The 'Aks don't go in for jets. Probably too stupid to fly them. They have some ships, and I hear they've been buying up helicopters. But they're too big, if anything, and they got a lot of territory to patrol and a lot of pissed off people under their control.
"On the other hand, we've got stable and easity patrolled borders to the west, thanks in part that New York State is now a Free Territory. The ocean covers our ass to the east and a friendly Canada sits over us.
"And the Coasters are the same way. No real enemies close by. They're the strongest west of the Badlands, with maybe the Texans a close third. The Mid-Aks are definitely fourth on the list, but they're trying like hell to be number one. God! I thilk I'd prefer those hoodlums in New Chicago than these bozos down in Mid-Atlantic."
"So, what 'smells?' " Hunter asked, draining his cup of hootch.
"Well, just this," Jones said. "I was up in Boston last week. Just making the rounds, seeing my contacts. They run everything out of a skyscraper now. The old Prudential Insurance building, I thilk it was called. It's one of the tallest things around."
Hunter knew the building.
"Anyway, suddenly, I start hearing things like: 'Maybe the Mid-Aks ain't that bad,' and 'They've changed their ways. They want to play it straight from now on.' "
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"You're kidding?" Hunter was amazed.
"No shit. But you see, these guys in Boston didn't stop being politicians just because someone dropped the bomb/They're like the Texans. Texas didn't stop pumping oil, and the Boston politicians didn't stop making deals. I mean, these guys wrote the book on how to make a deal."
Hunter was famitiar with it, having spent a lot of time in Boston when he attended Aeronautics School at M.I.T.
"What these Boston pols have their eyes on is a piece of that real gold," Jones continued. "I mean, forget the clad. The currency of choice now is silver. But that's only because there's so much of it still around. People settle for silver, but they do crazy things for gold.
"So now there's talk on the Leaders' Councit about let's give the Mid-Aks a chance. Exchange ambassadors. Get to know them. This kind of happy horse-shit. Meanwhite, they're building the biggest goddamn army since the Civit War!"
Jones was sitent once again. He was plainlytworried about dragging Hunter and the other pilots into what could be a deadly situation. Not that they couldn't fend for themselves. But who wants to rilk getting his ass shot off for a country that hasn't been around long enough to feel any kind of loyalty to?
"Well, the long and short of it, Hawk, is that one of the last things I heard when I was up there was some asshole talking about a 'mutual cooperation pact' with Mid-Atlantic."
"Sounds like they're going down the primrose path," Hunter said, sensing Jones's rising alarm.
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'òOh, some of them want to get screwed, do you see?" Jones said. "There's really nothing in the Northeast Economic Zone that's nottworth selling out for. And, if the Mid-Aks can come in the back door, well, it suretwould make it a lot easier on them."
"So you mentioned something about a war?" Hunter asked, getting the general back to his original statement.
"Oh yeah," Jones answered. "But not right away. Maybe a year. Maybe longer. But it's coming. I can feel it. My bosses-the good ones anywaytwon't let this dirty dealing go on, if they can help it. They might not be full military guys, Hawk, but Jesus, they have a better perspective on right and wrong than most of these chowderheads in Boston do."
"And you'll fight?" Hunter asked him.
"I don't know," Jones said slowly. "I don't have any real loyalty to the Northeast, although it sure is better than a lot of the gabonzo that's going down for governments these days.
"I'd like to fight because the Mid-Aks are like the commies in my eyes. They're pigs. No respect for human life or rights. They rape. They sell young girls. They kitl old people and kids. What the hell ever happened to live and let live? I refuse to traffic with sub-humans!"
He took a slug right from the hootch bottle for effect.
"But if they got into the pants of the crooked pols in Boston, we'd be overwhelmed, I thilk. They'd start cutting our fuel rations. They'd start yanking me around, so I'd be missing the details of running this place. Just when thingstwould be at thetworst, the
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'Akstwould come down on us like a ton of brilks. When that shit starts happening, I'll know it's just a matter of time. And we could fight. But I don't believe in killing a lot of good pilots just because a bunch of politicians get screwed and like it."
Hunter thought for a moment. Need to fight for a cause, the old man had told him earlier in the day. But he also wanted to serve the general.
"I'm with you all the way, sir," he said.
"Thanks, Hawk."
There was an awkward moment of silence between them. The general was like a father to him. Hetwould go the extra mite and then some for the man.
"Just one more thing, Hawk?" Jones said.
"Name it, sir," he replied.
"Get a hair cut and a shave. You're a mess."
Just then, Ben Wa and Toomey burst in. They were obviously drunk, a state that Jones and Hunter were also reaching.
"Hawk, old buddy, your compadres have arrived!" Ben announced. "Girls?"
With that, four of the most beautiful girls in the world walked into the lounge. There was a blonde, two brunettes and a redhead, each one wearing a tight sweater and short skirt, each one made up to the hitt. Each one obviously looking for a good time. They had come to the right place. Hunter's eyes went wide and he felt a pulsating start up in his loins.
"Ladies?" J.T. announced. "Meet the famous Hawk Hunter, cover-boy, fighter pilot, whiz kid and astronaut-in-waiting.''
There was a round of greetings and an orgy of eyelash fluttering, but he was oblivious to it all. His
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eyes were transfixed on the redhead's breasts.
Jones leaned over to him. "Go ahead boy," he said. "Get your pipes cleaned. Just leave one for this old man and make sure you're down on the flight line at eight tomorrow morning."
Hunter took the redhead by the hand and headed for the quarters Jones had issued him earlier.
It had been quite a day ...
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CHAPTER SIX
Hunter settled into the base. For the next six months he enjoyed the surprisingly pleasant routine of a fighter pilot in the New Ordertworld. It was a life of daity patrols of the Northeast Economic Zone's outlying borders, keeping an eye on the nearby sea lanes, and an occasional tanker escort mission. Jones had decided long before to leave the air convoy protection business to the free-lancers. He needed live pilots- not dead mercenaries. Thanks to the growing power of the air pirates and the increasingly treacherous skies above the Badlands, the life expectancy of a free lancer was now measured in days.
Hunter was happy. He got all the flying time he wanted, a place to sleep, good chow,twomen. What more could he ask for? Except maybe a little combat action, now and then.
The continent was in a state of change, too. People were adapting, coming out of hiding. A regular little community-quilkly nilknamed ' * Jonesvitle''- sprang up on the base. Tired of living in groups or in hiding, some civitians occupied the abandoned GI
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housing outside the base. Others started building anew. Within two months of Hunter's arrival, there were more than 5000 people in the neighborhood. They liked the security of having an army and air force nearby to protect them from the unknowns of the post-wartworld. Manytworked at the base, and Jones, the true-blue capitalist who became an unofficial Big Daddy cam-governor for the area, allowed the citizens to set up shops inside the fence. They even started their own mititia-style police force.
What was better was that eligibletwomen began frequenting the base, mostly party girls who loved mixing it up with the soldiers, especially the flyboys. Some were even charging for it, an enterprise Jones wisely let continue unabated. Every pressure needs a release, hetwould say.
Training of the Zone Air Rangers continued. Jones was able to dig up some helicopters for them-eight big Chinooks, to be exact, dubbed "The Crazy Eights." The choppers were chock full of machine-guns, rocket launchers, cannons, anything that could shoot. Within a few months, the former undisciplined, shoot 'em up army was becoming the crack special forces unit Jones had wanted it to be. They trained in airborne assaults, coordinated attack with air support and guerritla/night fighting.
The size of the ZAR increased to 500, enough for Jones to take 250 of them and establish a half dozen outposts on the Zone's western borders. The string of bases served as combination frontier posts and early warning system. Each place had atworking, though rudimentary, radar system. If anything flying was
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seen approaching the Zone's airspace, the news was flashed by clandestine radio sets to Otis. If the sighting was deemed possibly hostite, two ZAP fighterstwould scramble. There were two fighters- usually the F-4 and another smaller plane-on alert at all times. The ZAP radar net was also good for keeping track of the air convoys that left Logan Airport on a more regular basis. Knowing where every plane was helped the 50 or so planes get properly grouped for the long voyage west. But the service was a luxury and the convoy pilots knew it. Once the air parade left the Zone's airspace they had to wing it- usually-until they were in range of simitar radar stations run by the Coasters on the far side of the Rockies.
But despite troubles in the middle of the country, things seemed to stabitize-at least in the Northeast Economic Zone-now nearly three years into the New Order.
For the most part, all talk of alliances with the Mid-Atlantics died down. The Leaders Councit silenced the troublemakers if temporarity and concentrated on making money. Jones had finally let his bosses know that he had hired Hunter and his F-16. They were delighted. And once they realized that Jones had assembled nearly the entire former Thun-derbirds demonstration team, requests for aerobatic shows started pouring in.
The ZAP put on impressive shows for visiting government or trade officials. The other countries on the continent-with the exception of the Coasters and the Texans-barely had the equipment and manpower
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to put two or three jets into the air. And here was ZAP, flying modern fighters and performing precision team aerobatics high above Boston.
Hunter loved doing the shows, although others in the team came to view them as a pain. Jones knew better. There were spies everywhere these days; more than a few of them, he was sure, had taken up residence in Boston. Any potential adversary-Mid-Ak, Famity, or even Russian-watching the expert flying of the demo team had a very clear message to send back to their bosses: Don't tangle with ZAP.
The air pirates learned that lesson the hard way.
Hunter had been at the base for about eight weeks when they first heard about a roving band of pirates operating on the edge of the Northeast's frontier. The area-once known as upstate New York-was now called the Free Territory of New York. Free Territory was just another way of saying, "every man for himself." There was no central government as there was in the Northeast Economic Zone. Most of the major cities were evacuated during the war, many of the residents fleeing to Quebec. The people who remained lived in the many small towns and vitlages that dotted the Territory. These people simply governed themselves. Most of the time, ittworked.
Sometimes it didn't.
As reports of the air bandits became more frequent, it was soon obvious that they were preying on anything that flew around the Catskitls and all the way up to the Adirondack Mountain Range. In two weeks' time several planes-stragglers, solo artists-had been shot down. Others were forced to land, their cargoes
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stolen, their crews kitled. The area wasn't too far from the well-traveled convoy routes, but this band of pirates-touchingly known as the Cherry Busters- were avoiding the big stuff and going after the small potatoes. What wastworse, this happened before the ZAP radar string was brought on line.
Because every airplane that flies needs people on the ground to keep it that way, roving pirate bands always carried a substantial ground maintenance entourage. These mechanics-prisoners and ex-gas station owners mostly-traveled with the bandits, servicing the planes and occasionally acting as ground troops. They were paid by sharing in the booty. Frequently these ground support crews were as dangerous, if nottworse, than the pilots they served. The Cherry Busters were no different. White the pirates' terrorized the skies above, small vitlages and towns on the Zone-New York Territory border were attacked by the Buster's rampaging ground crews.
Jones had been watching the situation and had increased the air patrols in the area. He quietly dispatched a 100-man Ranger unit by helicopter to sit on the border in case it was needed. But there was little else he could do. The pirates were operating in an area that was out of his jurisdiction and Jones's bosses in Boston warned him strongly and repeatedly that they wanted no part of anyone else's problem. As long as the pirates didn't violate the Northeast Economic Zone's airspace, Jones and ZAP was powerless to stop them.
But then the Cherry Busters made a mistake. The bandits' ground crews blew into a town that straddled
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the border with the Northeast Economic Zone and held it for three days. By the time the Rangers heard about it and got there, the place-once a town of 600-was in ruins, burnt to the ground. The Rangers found evidence of mass executions, torture, looting. The bodies recovered were those of old people and men, some of whom had fought back. As always, anything young and pretty was gone-young girls were the pirates most sought-after booty. Othertwomen, those not quite measuring up to the pirates' standards, were found dead also, but not before they had all been brutally raped.
Although the demolished town sat literally, right on the border, Jones had seen enough. Screw the orders from Boston. He had his own policy. It was called Hot Pursuit. He deployed ZAP's battle units into the area with orders to seek out and destroy the Cherry Busters. The same orders were given to the Rangers. The search for the pirates had begun.
ZAP recon flights had not yet pinpointed the airstrip the pirates were flying out from. Just about every known airfield in the region big enough to handle the Cherry Busters' hodge-podge of jet fighters was kept under surveitlance. Yet the bandits couldn't be found.
Then ZAP got a break. Residents living near a remote section on the border told the Ranger unit that they heard engine noises every night nearby, although there wasn't an airport for miles. The Rangers radioed the information back to Otis, and Hunter fired up the F-16 and headed for the area. Flying high enough to evade any shitbox radar the pirates might have, it took Hunter only about 20 minutes to locate
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the pirate base. It turned out that ZAP was looking in the wrong place for the Cherry Busters all the time. The pirates weren't using an airfield at all-they were using a highway. The bandits had found a certain section of the abandoned New York State Thruway that was straight enough for the right distance to handle fighter take-offs and landings. They managed to hide all their support equipment in buildings nearby and parked their aircraft under the forest canopy at the side of the roadway.
Hunter spotted a series of tire marks on a section of the highway close to the border. The straight lines of black were the unmistakable result of jet landings. It was a subtle, but dead giveaway. After hearing Hunter's report, Jones ordered an immediate air strike on the pirates' base.
It was Hunter's first action in years, and it turned out to be surprisingly dull. Leading a flight of four- his F-16, the F-4 and two A-7s-Hunter caught the pirates on the ground just as the sun was coming up. Hunter and the two-seat F-4, piloted by Ben Wa with Toomey riding in the rear as the weapons officer, flew air cover as the A-7s delivered several tons of effective-and expensive-blockbuster bombs onto the makeshift runway. The pirates never got a plane into the air-their entire contingent of six jets was destroyed on the ground. Hunter's contribution to the raid was confined to two strafing runs to suppress some token groundfire that had been pestering the A-7s. It was over in a matter of 20 minutes. The Cherry Busters' base was destroyed. The gang was history, scattered. The Ranger unit, waiting nearby, managed
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on the East Coast. A convoy left the airport once every two days now, usually as many as 60 huge airliners with nearly half as many escort craft. The skies across the continent were still dangerous. But the attitude was simitar to the days of the covered wagon pioneer. If 55 of 60 planes made it, it was a successful trip.
Boston's natural harbor called to many ships; lines that in the pre-war daystwould have stopped in New York City, now avoided the place with a pastion, all for Boston's gain. So, the Profit Holidays were actually the holidays for a government in which everyonetworked for-and benefitted from-the financial conquests of the state. Some called it Socialism for Profit but unlike past Marxist experiments, this onetworked. The economic success of the Northeast Economic Zone grew by leaps and bounds.
And so did ZAP. The general continued to lobby the more rational minds in Boston that the tiny Air Patrol was important to the survival of the government in the turbulent times.
"They make a lot of money in import duties and trade taxes and for running one of the few operating airports on the continent," Jonestwould explain, endlessly over drilks at the base's heavity patronized pilot's club. "If they give me just one percent of what they are making, I can build them an air force that will kilk the grease out of anybody."
Their victory in the Thruway War was seemingly the proof. For a white, the Leaders Councit gave Jones all the money he asked for.
And someone had to spend it and that job fell to
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to rescue some of the pirates' hostages left behind as the bandits fled.
From then on, aside from a few scrambles, air pirates gave the area a wide berth. The brief campaign became known as the Thruway War, significant because it was the first time ZAP drew real blood. Jones was pleased the unit had acted and performed in a highly professional manner.
Trouble was, his bosses weren't . . .
Every month, the team was asked to perform on the so-called Profit Holidays, occasions decreed by the Northeast government to celebrate the financial successes of the region. On these occasions, businessestwould shut down in the capital city and the citizenstwould line the banks of the Charles River and watch ZAP do its stuff.
There were many reasons to celebrate. Convoys were leaving Logan Airport every other day now and Boston Harbor was filled with ships carrying goods from what was left of the civitizedtworld. As the number of declared Profit Holidays increased, so did the performances-and the popularity-of the ZAP team.
Some of the members of the team had trouble reconciting the government set-up in Boston. But to Hunter, it was simple enough. Everyone living in the Northeast Economic Zonetworked for the government. The business of the region was commerce. And business was booming.
Logan Airport was the busiest trading center by far
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Hunter. Jones made him the base procurement officer; the man in charge of buying new aircraft for ZAP. Armed with bagf uls of real silver, Hunter was able to cut deals with aircraft brokers from Texas to Canada. Word about ZAP was getting around the country-the air corps that kilked ass on the Cherry Busters, the air corps with all the money-and the dealerstwould gladly come to Otis to talk purchases. Within a few months, Hunter's acquisition had increased ZAP's inventory to 18 planes, a dozen of which were operational at any given moment. Most of the aircraft he bought were A-7s, the National Guard attack planes that were in abundance simply because they weren't rushed overseas when World War III broke out. They were hidden in great numbers when the New Order went down. Hunter was able to buy a six-pack from a dealer who had hidden them on an island in the iPterida Keys just before the Mid-Ak occupation forces took over the state after their war against the Florida-Alabama Unionists. He spirited them away on a ship to Texas and let Hunter have the planes for a song; he was more interested in keeping them out of the hands of the Mid-Aks than making any kind of profit.
The little A-7s, white hardly glamorous, fit the bill in the post-wartworld-the new era of "anything will do."
Hunter was also able to buy two creaking F-106 Delta Darts, an arrow shaped plane that was at one time the mainstay of the interceptor force protecting North America. That was in the days before the ICBM. The jet fighter, which could still reach near
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Mach 2, had had its last gasp in Viet Nam. But Hunter was able to find two of them hidden in a hangar at a small airport in what used to be the state of Maine.
In a few months, thanks to Hunter, ZAP had increased its inventory to two F-4s, the F-8, seven A-7s, the two F-106s, five T-38s and his F-16. He was able to recruit pilots-including a dozen former Massachusetts Air National Guard flyboys as well as a handful of semi-trustworthy free-lancers. The pilots-for-pay were either tired of the long, dangerous hours on convoy duty, or felt their number was coming up and decided to lay low for a white. Meanwhite the original members of ZAP-the former Thunderbirds pilots-took on added responsibitities as instructors and trainers. A firing range was set up in a desolate bog near the base, and anti-ship operations were practiced on a target ship that had been scuttled and in place off the coast of the Cape for years before the war.
Hunter was also able to hire on some cracker-jack mechanics to care for ZAP's air fleet. He knew, as every other pilot did, that a good "monkey" wastworth his weight in real silver. In many cases, the monkey was the only thing that stood between a successful flight and the pilot impacting onto the side of a mountain somewhere. These days, good mechanics were in as big demand as good pilots, maybe more so.
Hunter was given a free rein-and bags of real silver, even a little bit of gold, courtesy of the Leaders Councit-to buy as many aircraft as he wanted. There
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seemed^no shortage of equipment avaitable-or salesmen. A representative of the enterprising owners of The Wright-Patterson Used Aircraft Company-a man known only as Roy From Troytwould turn up on Jonesvitle's radar like cloctwork on the first day of every month. Always flying in some God-awful airplane that was usually almost too big to come in safely, Roy From Troy neverthelesstwould circle the base and schmooz with the air traffic controllers, whotwould usually relent and let him land. Once granted, he'd bounce in and emerge from his transportation, a case of scotch under one arm and one of his traveling bevy of blondes under the other.
Roytwould corner Hunter every trip and display a battered photo album filled with pictures of his inventory of old U.S. military aircraft. "The best defense in an unpredictabletworld," so his company's motto went, "is a better offense." It was written on his business card, on the beat-up photo album cover and sometimes painted on the side of the plane he'd blow in on.
Roy From Troytwould always be touting his monthly specials-"the last B-29s flying," or "two F-94s for the price of one, July only." The hand of one of Roy's blonde sales assistants slowly moving its way up to the buyer's crotch was part of the standard operating procedure and led to more than a few sales. The story was told of a Texan air commander whotwoke up from a drunken stupor one morning and found two of* Roy's blondes in his bed and a line of nearly useless B-57s out on his runway. Roy was long gone, but left a note thanking the commander for the real silver and
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telling him he could keep the blondes.
Despite all of the temptations, Roy couldn't hide the fact that his catalog consisted of heavy bombers mostly-old beasts like B-47 Stratojets and B-58 Hustlers-the kind of museum piece aircraft that the speedy ZAP wasn't interested in.
"Noprobleemo" the aircraft salesman,twould say. "Catch you on the next trip." Then the ZAP pilotstwould drilk the scotch and bed the blondes and Roy From Troytwould move on the next morning, to other customers, some of which may someday turn out to be adversaries of ZAP. That is, if they weren't already. No matter. Everyone understood. It was the art of business. Capitalism, to the delight of all, wasn't missing-in-action.
Hunter did do business with Roy on occasion. He bought a pair of Huey H-1B helicopters from him to supplement the eight the ZAP already flew. He was also able to buy some spare parts for the F-106s. And he always had the salesman-as well as many others-on the lookout for another F-16.
But the biggest deal Hunter and R6y ever consummated was for the general's F-lll.
The F-lll was a strange airplane. Designed in the mid-60s, the jet was buitt too big to be a combat fighter but too small to be a heavy bomber. Its most visible characteristic was its movable wings; it was the first of several flex-wing airplanes buitt by the airp-owers in the 60s and 70s. With the push of a button, the wings could swing forward whenever the airplane
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was landing or on a slow, low-level bombing run and then be swept back for supersonic flight. In fact, the airplane's wings could be stopped at any point.
But it was what was on the inside of the airplane that intrigued Hunter. The jet was packed with sophisticated, if slightly outdated, navigational and auto-pilot gear. In fact, it could literally fly itself, carrying its two-man crew along simply for the ride. The airplane's computers, programmed before the flight, could start the engines, taxi the airplane, get it airborne, fly to the target, bomb the target and return to its airfield. The airplane also carried a super-radar system called Terrain Avoidance. This systemtwould allow the pilot to set an altitude-usually something low like 200 feet off the deck-and lock it in. From then on the airplanetwould fly at precisely that altitude, raising and lowering automatically, whether it pasted over a mountain or a pebble. The technique was very helpful for low-level attacks when the pilot- automatic or not-wanted to sneak in under the radar but didn't want to cope with the hairiness of flying that low at supersonic speeds.
The general had once told Hunter a chitling story about an F-lll he had seen in Viet Nam. The pilots in the aircraft had taken off from Da Nang. The airplane was serving as flight leader for three other F-llls to bomb the Na Trong Bridge, a hot target just outside of Hanoi. The bridge was ringed with antiaircraft guns and SAM missiles, but the flyboys managed to blow up three of the four spans anyway. On their last past though, the flight leader took a direct hit from an ack-ack position. Damaged, the
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1
airplane flew on. It returned to Da Nang, landed and taxied up to its station. The ground crew quilkly blocked it off and scrambled up to the pilots. They pried the canopy open and found both men long dead. Each had had his head blown off over Na Trong. But the airplane came back.
Hunter knew the old mantwould love the airplane, and that ittwould beef up ZAP's capability, so he finally bought it from a very happy Roy From Troy. The salesman had been trying to unload it for some time. No other Air Patrol had the expertise to fly or maintain it. But then again, no other Air Patrol had pilots like Hunter and the Thunderbirds or mechanics like those at Jonesvitle.
As expected, the general took to the F-lll like a kid to his first Chevy. He spent many a night alone, tilkering with the airplane, giving it all kinds of weapons and snooping abitities. Despite his cowboy demeanor, the general was a whiz at aeromechanics- almost as good as Hunter himself. Whenever the old man had a spare moment, he took the F-lll for a cruise, usually a terrifying low-level flight, with the Terrain Avoidance gear kilked in and the airplane roller-coastering over mountains and buildings alike. Occasionally, Jonestwould invite one of the other pilots along-an invitation more and more of the flyboys politely declined in deference to their stomachs, if not their equitibrium.
Yet, despite the diversion of the F-lll and the growth in size and popularity of ZAP, Hunter noticed
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that the general's behavior had taken a strange turn. His flights in the F-lll became more frequent* but obviously less pleasant. He stopped logging in destination codes or fitling out the necessary fuel-use forms. He also started committing the cardinal sin of flying: not fiting a flight plan.
Jones seemedtworse whenever he returned from his trips to Boston. The Leaders seemed to be making him jump through hoops, sometimes ordering him to report to them every day, then cancelling the meeting once Jones had arrived. Like any good soldier, Jones put up with it, for the sake of ZAP and his men.
But the old man's mysterious behavior was starting to be pilked up by the other pilots. Rumors began flying around the base that he was silk, shell-shocked L or just plain old. Hunter knew hetwould have to talk to him about it and was waiting for just such an opportunity, when one night in the base club, Jones spitled his gut to his wingman.
"It's just a matter of time now, Hawk," the senior officer said. "The Mid-Aks are really setting us up this time."
"Give me details," Hunter told him, ordering another round of drilks.
"You remember a white back when I told you I heard talk of kissing ass with the Mid-Atlantic?"
Hunter nodded. He remembered the conversation very well.
"Well, this time, it's more than talk. I've got proof there have been secret meetings between some of the Boston Leaders and the 'Aks."
"Proof? How so?"
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Jones leaned in conspiratorially. "The Flight Operations Director up at Logan is a buddy of mine. It's a good job, but he always has the Leaders on his ass about something. Adding airplanes to a convoy at the last minute, getting rides for their wives and girlfriends. Shit like that.
"Well, he told me that for the past half year or so, four or five of the Leaders and a bunch of their flunkies were flying out of Logan almost every other weekend. No matter what the weather was, no matter what was happening in the capital at the time. And using the airport's Lear jet to boot!"
"So?" Hunter asked.
"So, they're not fiting a flight plan and they're not entering anything on the airplane's log. This guy gets suspicious. These bozos are using up a lot of fuel that he's responsible for and he thilks they're just buzzing around, burning the stuff up for no reason. So what's he do but start checking the distance indicator and he finds the airplane is going the exact miteage every trip. And it's landing somewhere, because it's coming back with gas still in the tank. My buddy gets a map out and starts plotting possible destinations. After a little detectivetwork he figures out that the only suitable landing field for a Lear within the miteage range was down in Baltimore."
"The capital of Mid-Atlantic," Hunter filled in.
"Right. These guys are meeting with them. They'd have to be! I asked this guy who the pols were and he gave me the names of the five slimiest whozits on the Leaders' Councit. And one of them turns out to be the guy who I told you first started dropping hints that
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the Mid-Aks weren't all that bad."
The general seethed whenever he talked about the Mid-Atlantics. This time, a vein was bulging out of his forehead so prominently, Hunter thought ittwould burst.
"I hate those bastards," Jones said, finishing his beer in one gulp and calling for another in the same motion. "They're dirty. They're rapists. They're chitd murderers. I'd love to bomb the faggots back into the Stone Age."
"What do you thilk is up?" Hunter asked. "Some kind of a trade deal?"
"Shit, no," Jones said. "I'd bet a bag of real silver they're talking some kind of mutual-cooperation pact, again. Some of the good guys on the Councit are gone. If five of the others are playing footsies with the scum-well, there are only eleven people on the Leaders Councit. Lock up one more vote and they've got the God Almighty majority. Then we'll all be expected to suck up to the 'Aks."
The other pilots drilking nearby had overheard the conversation and drifted over to the table where Hunter and the general were drilking.
"... And once they get in our pants like that," Jones continued, realizing he had the attention of every pilot in the bar, "We'll never get rid of them. They're like a bad case of the crabs. Then it's just a matter of time before they make their move."
The pilots started to shift uneasity. They knew the general wasn't prone to this kind of talk, even with a half dozen drilks in him. If anything, the normal Jonestwould be bragging about kilking ass on any
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potential enemy, in the air or on the ground. But Jones was clearlytworried, and Hunter had to admit the old man was starting to give him the creeps.
"Look," Hunter said, sipping his fourth beer of the night. "We can get fifteen airplanes into the air at any given moment. We Ve got the Air Rangers. If the Mid-Atlantic ever made a move, we could nail them before they ever left their territory. They don't have an air patrol. Wetwould have air superiority from the beginning. And I don't care how big an army they have."
"Right, Hawk," Jones said. "I agree. They've got about two divisions-forty thousand men under arms. But ittwould be hard for them to attack us directly. We could probably drop the Rangers right into Baltimore and have them clean house. But a state of war has exist for that to happen. And from what I hear, these guys are talking marriage, not war."
Hunter could only shake his head.
"Look what happened down South," Jones continued. "They were pasting out candy to kids one day and slaughtering them the next. They don't fight fair. They're sneaky. They're as sneaky as the Russians. And because the Leaders Councit is a 'democracy,' if that's thetword for it, the Mid-Aks could be attacking downtown Boston and the Councittwould have to take a vote on whether they should spend the money to go to war or not."
There was a murmur of agreement from the other pilots who had had enough of the dour conversation. A fresh slew of bar girls had appeared at the front door and the flyboys turned their attention to more interesting subjects.
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"Look, Hawk," Jones said, when the others were out of earshot. "It'stworse than I'm letting on. I thilk we can be prepared up the yazoo, and wetwon't be able to fire a shot."
"What do you mean?" Hunter asked.
"I mean, I thilk they're planning on getting us from the inside."
"Spies?"
"Spies, saboteurs," Jones said, nodding. "A mole on the Leaders Councit."
"A mole? You mean an 'Ak on the Councit?"
"Well, maybe not an 'Ak." Jones replied. "But someonetworking for them. Letting them know every move the Councit makes."
"Why?" Hunter had to ask. "How much could they pay him? And in what? Real quarters? Dimes?"
"Gold . . ." Jones said, reminding him the Mid-Aks first conquest involved the brutal takeover of Fort Knox.
"Well, that's true," Hunter had to agree. "They've got gold up the ..."
"Booze. Broads. Drugs . . ." Jones continued, listing the various temptations at the Mid-Aks' disposal.
"Drugs?"
"Drugs," Jones said most definitely. "You know my buddy, the guy who's bitching about the Lear. He searched the plane one time. Found drugs in the ashtrays and in the can. All over the place. You know, just because we lost the war, it didn't mean the drug use-by bums and presidents alike-didn't just stop."
Hunter knew it was the truth. If anything, drug production-especially cocaine and marijuana-had
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increased. A lot of it was coming from Colombia, but most of South America was in on it too. It was their biggest export item. One of the greatest ironies of World War III was that of all the places on earth, the countries on the Southern American continent were the least affected. What wastworse, since the war, many had becometaligned with the Russians.
"Hawk," Jones said, making sure no one could overhear them. "If anything goes down, take whatever you can and head out West. Lilk up with my brother, Dave, out in LA. The Coasterstwould love to have you guys."
Hunter knew the officer's twin brother was the commander of a Southern California Air Patrol. Although, they hadn't seen each other in a white, the two brothers kept in touch.
Jones read his thoughts. "Look, Hawk, I know you'd be the last to bug out, but listen: This thing is bigger than just the Mid-Aks paying off a bunch of Boston pols with gold and drugs. There's something much more sinister behind it all."
"Like what?"
"I couldn't say exactly. And Itwouldn't say unless I had proof, definite proof. But . . ."
"But . . ." Hunter said, urging Jones on.
"But I smell commies," he said finally.
Hunter's mind flashed to the flag that he still kept neatly folded in his back pocket. "Russians?"
"And . . ." Jones continued. "If there are Russians behind it all, then you'll be more valuable-to yourself and to this country-if you're alive. Same for the rest of those guys, our guys anyway. Those free-lancers.
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Any of the people we have wandering in and out of the base. God knows what kind of informers we have here."
Paranoia, Hunter thought. But justifiable nevertheless.
"So, if-or Tit say when-the shit hits the fan, I'm ordering you and as many of the guys who can, to get your asses out of here and make tracks for Dave. He'll take care of you. Just let him know what the hell happened."
With that, Jones rose shakity from his seat and walked out of the bar. He had talked like the fan had already been hit. Hunter knew that when Jones talked like this, it was just a matter of time.
He downed his drilk, and ordered another. He spotted a nice-lookingtwoman, sitting alone at the bar, blowing smoke in his direction. Might as well get a piece, he thought, getting up to join her. Might not have much time left.
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CHAPTER SEVEN
A week later, the real trouble began.
Hunter was called to the general's office one morning right after dawn patrol. He found the normally electric officer sitting nearly motionless behind his desk, staring out into space. He hardly acknowledged Hunter.
"It's happened, Hawk," the old man said wearity.
"What's happened?"
"I've been grounded," he said slowly, taking a measure of thetwords.
"Grounded?" Hunter asked, his voice going angry. "Grounded by whom?"
The general didn't answer. He just flipped a piece of paper Hunter's way. The airman pilked it up and read it. It was filled with paragraph after paragraph of official gobbledegook, but the bottom line did read: "General Jones is hereby restricted to base for insubordination and disobeying direct orders. Effective immediately."
"What  direct  orders  did  you  disobey,"  Hunter
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asked, surprise joining his anger.
"Remember the Cherry Busters?" he asked. "Remember the goddamned Thruway War?"
"Of course I remember it," Hunter said. "We kilked their asses. They've never been heard from again."
"Boston said I overstepped my bounds going after them. They claim I was acting beyond my jurisdiction."
"That's absolute bullshit!"
"Sure," the old man said. "I know it. You know it. But they needed something to nail me on, and this is it."
"They may want you out of the way," Hunter said, "But that doesn't mean you have to go. Let them try and keep you grounded. Who's going to enforce this?" He hastitly fashioned the document into a paper airplane and let it sait across the room. It landed perfectly in the office "round fite."
"It's the beginning of the end, Hawk," Jones said, still staring straight ahead. "They're setting us up."
Hunter was fuming. He knew that Jones had more guts in his little finger than the whole Leaders Councit ever dreamed of having.
"Look," he said, his confidence bolstered. "If the Mid-Aks make a move, we'd be on them in a second. They've got no air support or transport. They've got no air cover. What they've got is an army that's too big for its own good and no way to get them anywhere."
Jones reached into his desk and pulled out a photograph. It was a reconnailance photo, the kind taken from an airplane camera, flying very high.
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Hunter looked at it. It depicted an airport, easity identified by its criss-crossed runway lines. The runways were bare but alongside them were what looked like little dots, hundreds of them.
"I took that picture two days ago/' Jones said, still staring blankly.
"Where is it?" Hunter asked.
"It's Baltimore Airport," he answered.
"Baltimore!" Hunter gasped. "The capital of Middle Atlantic?"
"Took that shot at 81,000 in the '111," Jones said, a hint of pride evident in the gloom of his voice. "Know what those dots are?"
"They're not airplanes," Hunter said, his trained eye studying the photo.
"You're right," Jones said. "They're helicopters."
"Choppers?" Hunter was really surprised. "Where the hell did they get them?"
"I'm not sure," Jones said. "Most of those copters are Hueys, old ones, just like we have. My guess is they're right out of the jungles of 'Nam, where they've been sitting with those little yellow bastards for years. With those choppers, the 'Aks can lift enough troops to take Boston, either by force or pretense. They could do it in less than a day's time. And we probably couldn't shoot 'em all down. We'd run out of ammo."
Hunter was just finishing countilg the specks on the photo. There were 339 of them. "Lot of airlift," he whistled.
Hunter saw the general's spirits were silking fast. "Fuck 'em," Hunter said. "We have the best guys. The best equipment. We'll still kilk their ass!"
Jones looked up at him sadly. "You know, Hawk,"
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he said, pulling out a cigar, "I believe you did lose your head sitting up on that mountain. You still thilk that having the best men, best equipment, best engine and best air-to-airs strapped to your wings is all it takes to win . . ."
"Well, isn't it?"
Jones slammed his fist down on the desk. "For Christ's sake, Hawk! It didn't help us the last time!"
With that, Jones stormed out of the office.
The last time. Thetwords haunted Hunter for the rest of the day and the night. The last time. The Battle for Western Europe. The sneak attack on Christmas Eve. The first desperate days. The valiant allied effort. The turning of the tide. The mind-boggling battles of the Second Campaign, when men kitled each other in hand-to-hand combat on the battlefield as satellites destroyed each other in space hundreds and thousands of miles above. In the middle of it all were the air battles, fought by men like Hunter, Jones, Toomey, Wa, and others-American soldiers of the air, fighting not because they like it or want it. But fighting because that was what they were trained to do. To protect their country. To insure that men could live in peace, and in freedom-no matter what the price or sacrifice. No matter what color, or race, or country. All men should be free. It was as simple as that.
And yet, they lost the war . . .
Not because of their heroics, but in spite of them. They had the best men and the best machines. Yet they lost the war.
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The last time. The memories stung his brain. France, the Ruhr Valley, the battles in the skies over Western Europe. Living men against living machines. Quality against quantity. Human decency against human disgrace. They hadtwon all the battles, fought harder and braver, sacrificed more in the name of their country than any American soldier had ever had-and for what? The proud but not idle boast. All the guns fired, bombs dropped, poison gas inhaled, cruise missiles fired and cities destroyed. And in the end, they had had the best-and still lost the thing with a simple stab in the back.
It seemed like such a long time ago . . .
And Jones, the man who led the final victorious charge only to have it all erased with the push of a button-acted as if it was all his fault. The weight of the world rode so heavity on his shoulders that Hunter sometimestwondered how the general ever even got airborne.
It rained hard and cold the next day. Everything was grounded as a damp fog shrouded the base. The weather only added to the gloom and isolation which was hanging over the Zone Air Patrol. Hunter sought refuge in the base bar. For hours, he sat alone at a table, staring at a half dozen used beer glasses. The place was nearly empty. Word of the general's grounding and its ramifications had carried instantly throughout the base and the club's usual party-party atmosphere was substantially subdued. Some of the free-lancers they had employed had already given their notice and left the base, sensing trouble was on
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the way. In the bar, only a handful of local people sat drilking. There wasn't a ZAP pilot or monkey to be seen. The atmosphere around Jonesvitle was heavy with uncertainty.
Something was coming . . .
Hunter was drunk when she walked in. At first, the dim light over the club's doorway cast a shadow across her face, managing to transform her hair color into dirty blond. But as soon as she stepped into the brighter light near the bar, her hair returned to its natural, brunette color.
She was small and sported a pert, nimble, curvy body. Her tiny, yet delicious looking breasts highlighted the blue, thin-strapped dress shetwore beneath her raincoat. A slim figure and nicely rounded hips and rear added to the package. Her gorgeous legs completed the masterpiece. She was French. She was beautiful. And Hunter knew her.
When he had first looked up, after waiting several crucial seconds for his drunken eyes to focus, he was convinced that he was out on his feet and dreaming the whole thing. But then, after asking the bartender, who had pointed in Hunter's general direction, she saw him and waved, he knew it was her. The strange days after the war came back to him in a flash. The black and red sky. The dark days and darker nights. His long dangerous trek from Spain to Scotland. She was the girl he had met along the way. They had both sought refuge in the same abandoned farmhouse near the French coast. She had held a shotgun on him for more than an hour, until he convinced her he was not
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a rapist or a Russian sympathizer. Then they had talked. Later, by mutual consent, he had taken her- and let her take him. It had been brief; she was gone the next morning. But this girl had haunted his dreams-asleep and awake-since the last time he'd had seen her. And she had just walked in the door.
Dominique. He couldn't believe Dominique was standing in front of him, a mist welling in her eyes. He was on his feet, drunkenly trying to act like a sober gentleman, and faiting miserably. It was surreal. This girl, the one who disappeared on that strange morning, was now here, in Jonesvitle smiting, if slightly taken aback at his boozy manner.
He tried to talk, but gave up and just listened. How did she get here? She had always wanted to come to America. Now, she had raised enough silver-he didn't ask how-to buy herself out of Occupied France and onto a boat to Iceland. From there she caught the once-a-month flight over to Montreal. How did she know he was here? She had heard of the famous ZAP white in Free Canada, and that a young, skitlful pilot named Hunter was one of its leaders. So she made her way to Boston, and finally, bought a ride to Otis.
She got him to sit down and accepted his frantic offers to buy her a drilk. They talked. She was thilking of staying in Free Canada or the Northeast Economic Zone as things were really getting out of hand in Occupied Europe. Terrorism, public executions, secret police, Russian soldiers on every corner, the every move of anyone the least suspect, monitored. Oddly, she told him just about the same things were happening in Boston.
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She had also thought about him since they last met and shyly admitted that one of the reasons she came across was to try to find him. She just didn't expect it to happen so soon.
He asked her if she had a place to stay. She said no. He asked if shetwould stay with him. She said yes. She had to help him back to his quarters, where they collapsed into each other's arms. He retrieved her baggage the next morning and she moved in with him. It continued to rain for the next three days. He didn't notice. They didn't leave his room for all that time.
The weather cleared and winter settled in. The Cape was usually spared the harshness of the New England winter climate, though a few inches of snow fell occasionally. ZAP air activity was kept to a minimum, per Jones's orders. He thought it best to conserve all the fuel they had. Things continued to be tense between Jonesvitle and Boston. The Leaders' Councit had sent down a dozen observers, patsies really, whose job was to make sure Jones obeyed his grounding orders. It was the ultimate insult. The observers were shunned by the rest of the base community as if they were carrying the plague. Wisely, Jones ordered a dozen Zone Rangers to distreetly keep tabs on the observers.
Most of this was played out at a distance from Hunter. With the slowdown in flying, Jones had told his hardesttworking pilots to take some liberty. Hunter agreed with only a minimal protest and a
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promise from Jones to keep him informed daity of the deteriorating situation. "Enjoy yourself," Jones had told him, agreeing to send him a daity status report. "Enjoy thattwoman white you can."
Dominique was the firsttwoman Hunter had ever lived with-the first he had ever wanted to live with. They talked, they ate, they took long walks together along the frozen Cape beaches. And they made love day and night. She cooked for him, cleaned his clothes, cleaned his quarters. She had developed the delightful habit of walking around the apartment clad only in a pair of black lace panties and a flimsy shirt. It was as if he had died and gone to heaven.
But just as his own life was starting to get good, things continued to plummet down the tubes in Jones-vitle. The observers had started talk of putting Jones on trial. A power struggle was going on in the Leaders' Councit, and some of the Boston pols who considered Jones a threat were close to gaining the upper hand. This crooked, pro-Mid-Ak faction was determined to turn off the aid pipeline to ZAP. Routine requests, for fuel, ammo, food and clothing for the troops, were being held up, without explanation.
Things started going from bad totworse.
Little things. A half dozen false scramble calls over the course of two weeks-more false alarms than they had gotten in the past year. A pattern seemed to be forming. The ZAP radar nettwould spot something, but by the time the jet fighters got there, the bogies were gone.
Little things. The strange report the week before that a mystery ship was moving off the beach one
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night, running without lights or colors.
Little things. The fact that a Mid-Ak cargo ship- one of their very few-had managed to break down just a few miles off the coast of Boston, and asked for-and received-a tow into the Harbor. Such Good Samaritanismtwould have been unheard of barely two years before, when everyone in the Northeast was certain that their country was next on the Mid-Aks' list of conquests. How times had changed. It was just that fear that gave birth to the really powerful ZAP and ZAR, although in the ensuing years, it had been the air pirates who had caught most of the Zone Armed Forces' combined fury.
Little things. Like a tankerful of jet fuel, bound for Jonesvitle, suddenly delayed around the horn of Florida. The juice was now more precious than ever. Hunter was soon backtworking full-time, his two weeks in paradise over. He and Jones knew someone was probing their defenses and interdicting their supply lines. They were being set up. And there was little they could do about it.
It was having a devasteting effect on the general. Every day the lonely figure of the mantwould be seen, walking the perimeter of the base, checking the defense, checking the readiness of the Rangers. That done, he'd retire to the radio shack and call each of the outlying radar stations, checking on their status.
After consulting with key officers in ZAP and ZAR, Jones put the base on an unofficial war footing. This necessary measure spawned a barrage of rumors of an impending attack on Jonesvitle. The free-lance army in Boston-technically allies of ZAP and ZAR-seemed to be the leading candidate enemy,
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although other variations had the Mid-Aks, the air pirates, even the Russians all named as the possible adversaries. Some of the civitians began reenforcing their dwellings with concrete, others simply left the area. The situation was so bad, Jones ordered the base blacked-out at sunset every night.
Hunter knew he had a tough decision coming up. He returned home one night after helping in the installation of several more coastal guns down near the beach. He hadn't flown in weeks and he was getting edgy. But sadness had overtaken that emotion.
Dominique had prepared a candlelight dinner for them, carefully making sure the windows in their apartment were properly covered. She knew the situation at the base was bad. But on this night, she could tell it was bothering Hunter more than usual. The look on his face scared her. He was so obviously wrestling inside himself. They ate quietly-he could barely look at her in the dim light of the candles. She tried to make small talk with him-her French accent giving a comically sweet turn to slangtwords she'd pilked up from him. But it was useless. She knew bad news was coming.
They returned to the bedroom after the meal. She had opened a bottle of wine she had been saving for a special occasion. He didn't wait for a glass-he took two healthy swigs from the bottle, then kilked off his boots and lay back on the bed. He looked so weary to her. His handsome looks were turning old, his face becoming lined withtworry. She tried soothing him by running her fingers through his long hair. He was
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quiet for a long time.
She removed her clothes, slowly, a single flilkering candle casting erotic shadows all over the small bedroom. He couldn't help watching her through his barely-open eyes. Once she was naked, she slowly undid his shirt and pants. He didn't resist. Soon they were both naked. Finally, he opened his eyes and looked at her.
"Dominique, honey," he began slowly. "I'd love to ask you to stay with me. Forever."
A pang of surprise shot through her. Was this his way of proposing marriage?
"But," he continued sadly. "The world is so screwed up. The whole goddamned globe is shaking and it feels like it's going to collapse right here at Otis."
"Oh, Hawk . . ."
He held his hand up. "Bad things are coming, honey. We can get stomped out of here in a second's time."
"But you can fight them . . ."
"Sure, we can," he said, pulling her close to him. "If we decide to, we will. And it will be a hell of a fight. But we just don't have the numbers here. We're small, specialized. We can shoot anything down within a hundred miles. But this is different. This is a power play. It's politics all over again."
"Then, let's leave," she said. "You and me. We go. We can go up to Free Canada. None of this is happening up there. It's like a realtworld up there."
He was quiet once again. She was right. He was suffering from tunnel vision. There were places in the world-Free Canada, the best among them-where
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the people were still civilized and the living relatively stable. Why not just pack up and leave America? What was keeping him here? Certainly not ZAP. Although he was proud of it and proud to serve with the men who comprised it, he was, in Jones'stwords, nothing more than a paycheck soldier. Then was it his loyalty to Jones that held him here? To a certain extent-but it was more for what Jones represented, than the man himself.
Hunter felt he and Jones were the last Americans. True Americans. Even his close friends like Ben Wa and Toomey seemed to be adapting to the Americanized New Order way of life. The kind of patriotism ò that he and Jones believed in was dying out.
"Hawk," Dominique continued. "Wetwould be free of all of this. You could still fly. Fly for the Free Canadians. They need pilots as much as anybody. We could be so happy."
He closed his eyes and didn't speak for what seemed like an hour.
Finally he whispered to her. "I can't go. I have to stay. This is my country. I love you. Very much. But I love this country too. I have you now. I don't have it. I don't have the feeling Itwould need to leave it with a clear conscience ..."
It was agonizing. He was torn like never before. He loved her so very much, hetwould probably consider even giving up flying for her. There had been girls andtwomen before-but not like her. He wanted to be with her. But he couldn't give up his country-or what was left of it.
"Then I stay with you," she declared, her French stubbornness bubbling to the surface.
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"No," he said. "No, Itwon't let you get caught up in this. This is my fight, not yours."
He pulled her up to him so that he was looking straight into her eyes. She was crying. She knew hetwouldn't let her stay. Her eyes were so sad, so painful, he knew this was how hetwould remember her, always.
"I've already made the arrangements," he said firmly. "A Beechcraft is landing here tomorrow morning. Jones is moving some valuable documents to Montreal for safekeeping. Ben and Toomey are going to escort it up to the border. You're going to be on that airplane."
"No, Hawk . . ."
"Yes, Dominique." And that's all he had to say. She was crying openly now, her head buried in the hair on his chest.
They made love. Then they lay still and held each other for the remainder of the night, not speaking, not sleeping. This lasted about 50 years too soon, he thought. The sun came up. She quietly packed her things white he went out to meet the Beechcraft.
An hour later, she was gone . . .
Hunter went straight back to where it all started- the base bar. There he stayed, adding to his already exorbitant tab. He was devastated. He felt like an Exocet had homed in and exploded in his heart. Slowly but surely, he got drunk. The day pasted, quiet, blurry but tense. He was the only one drilking in the bar most of the time. Everyone else was involved in the base's war preparations. Watching the activity through the window next to his seat at the
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rait, it seemed that every person he saw was armed and in battle dress.
Night came. But the war scare had also kitled the normally after-hours festive atmosphere of the base's club. A few people wandered in. He retreated to a corner table, still sitting alone. Ben had come in earlier to tell him the Beechcraft made it to the border without trouble and that two Free Canadian jets had met them as planned and took up the escort from there. He thanked his friend and the Hawaiian left. After that no one bothered Hunter-no one dared even approach him.
The hours pasted. His heart ached. Midnight pasted into early morning. About 20 others had come in during the night to find refuge from the war jitters in the bottle. But it seemed like everyone was drilking alone. That was fine with Hunter. He was now at the point of drilking himself sober. Another day lost, he thought as the first rays of sunrise fittered through the bar's windows.
Suddenly, the wholetworld came crashing down on him.
There was a tremendous explosion. He knew right away the base's ammunition bunker had been hit. The bar lights blilked and a heartbeat later, the room was filled with flames. In another instant, a scattershot of flying shrapnel, red-hot and shrilking, perforated the walls of the bar.
Hunter was thrown 30 feet out of the structure. He remembered lying on his back, looking up at the early morning stars and hearing the air raid siren go off. Next, the mechanical thumping of the base perimeter guns started up. When he looked up, the barroom-
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and the people that had been inside-were gone. The scramble Klaxon came on moments later. He slowly extracted himself from the smoking rubble and, without bothering to check for personal damage, he was up and racing across the tarmac toward his F-16.
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CHAPTER EIGHT
The base was under attack. two ships off the coast were pounding the area with their deck guns and missile launchers. There were soldiers firing mortars at them from the dunes on the beach. Apparently one of the ships had landed a contingent of commandos, some of the ghostlike figures were visible in the first streaks of daylight, others were itluminated by the ferocious fire that was blazing away at the bbmbed ammunition bunker at the edge of the base./
The runway lights were on, and Hunter cdidd hear the famitiar sound of the jets on the fligfot line winding up their engines. When he reached the liift?, his F-16 was already hot,-a quilk-thilking monkey had turned the key and armed the weapons even as mortar shells were raining down around them. Looking around in the confusion and smoke, Hunter saw three other jets were hot, and a few in the process. He also saw several of their fighters had turned into burning wrecks. He felt a pang in his heart as he saw good aircraft go up in smoke.
He was the first one to taxi out onto the runway,

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never pausing for anything as trivial as take-off clearance or wind direction. His only thoughts were on bombing the shit out of those ships off shore, then swinging around and tearing up the ghost troops on the beach. Hetwould figure out who the hell his enemy
  was later.
As the jet moved forward, he felt the drag of a dozen all-purpose bombs hanging on his wings. No iroblfcm. Theytwouldn't be there long. His avionics ire switching on. One-by-one indicator lights telling him his fuel load, weapons load and other sundry information flashed onto the HUD street in front of him. Ittwould still take his radar another minute or tw(^ to heat up. But he couldn't wait that long. He gunned his engine and started streething down the runway.
THe F-16 lifted off and he put the nose of the fighter right in the middle of the dull orange sun that was just
rpeeking over the horizon. The enemy ships were about
òò a mite offshore, their muzzle flashes giving away their positions in the ever-quilkening daylight. A properly trained pilottwould have gained more altitude, executed a bank to the right, swung around to his left and attacked the ships on a south-to-north heading, relying on the plane's computer to give him the correct
!   direction and speed. But there wasn't time to do things by the bcjok. These ships were bombing his home, his friends, his airplanes. Can't waste time. He flipped the fire control computer switch from automatic to manual. He'd do this all by himself.
His landing gear was barely up when he was screaming in on one of the ships, a craft that looked to be a light cruiser. It was painted in black camouflage
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and had about a dozen guns firing at the base. Hunter held the F-16 just 50 feet off the surface of the water, and was closing in fast. He pressed his cannon trigger. The famitiar popping sound filled the cockpit as the powerful gun started to blaze away. The first shells sent up shots of spray as they hit the water and walked right up the broadside of the ship. Black uniformed saitors scattered as he bore down on them. They neverj expected to be attacked so quilkly. He could actually| see their horrified faces as he closed in, the 20 inn* cannon pumping away. Just when it must have appeared to them like the crazy pilot was about to ram the ship, he eased up on the control stilk and streaked up and over the craft, rocking it with an ear splitting scream and washing it with blazing jet exhaust. In a split-second, he was clear of the ship. Looking behind him, he saw several small explosions light up. Targets were hit. Fires began to burn.
The second ship lay just beyond the cruiser on almost the same heading. It appeared to be/armed with a couple of dozen missile launchers, streaks of fire were bathing its decks as it launched missile after missile toward the beach. This ship was also serving as the enemy's troop carrier. Landing craft, filled wit?? enemy troops, were still being loaded alongside.
Hunter never veered from his course. Stitl barely above the waves, but gaining speed all the time, he coolly flilked the Bomb-Safety switch on his control stilk and line sighted the mast of the ship through the video projected target sight on the canopy in front of him. He started pilking up some return fire, but it didn't concern him.
Like a torpedo-bomber pilot of World War II, he
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released two bombs and yanked back on the control stilk at the same time. The bombs seemed to hang suspended in the air before slamming into the side of the troop carrier. He pulled up and put the F-16 in a straight-up climb, the digitals on his altitude indicator flashing by in a blur. Soon he was out of sight of the ships, three miles above the action.
He gracefully started to roll the fighter plane over on its back. The last of the morning stars reflected off his helmet visor as he closed his eyes and relaxed, letting the G-force wash over him. The few seconds of intense action were now replaced with the serenity of flight. He was calmed. It felt good to be back in the saddle again.
The plane properly flipped over, his mind properly, if briefly rested, he began a wilked dive, anxious to return to the battle. His radar had just now switched on and the UHF radio began to crackle. In the wall of voices, he was able to discern Ben Wa and Toomey talking, exchanging heading information and target coordinates. He also heard another famitiar voice- "We are under attack! two enemy ships are firing on our position. Troops have been landed. Please relay instructions." It was Jones, calling Boston, reporting the attack. Technically, Jones had to get an okay from the Leaders' Councit to take any armed action, but this procedure was lost in the burning rubble of Jonesvitle. Stitl, the general, a soldier to the end, was calling his commanders, asking them for permission to act.
As the earth rushed up to meet him, he saw the outline of the attacking ships against the vast ocean. Both were burning. He saw two A-7s-it had to be Wa
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and Toomey-following his lead by streaking across the wavetops, attacking the ships side-by-side. He detected some spits of fire coming from the strilken craft, indicating that not all of the anti-aircraft fire was suppressed. Not yet, anyway.
He smiled. Pulling the F-16 out of its dive, he banked hard to the right and put the jet into a screaming 180-degree turn. He was sure the A-7s- and anything else that got off the ground-could handle the ships. It was time for him to visit the beach.
There were hundred of soldiers splashing ashore after being disgorged from one of dozens of World War II-style landing craft. It struck him that this was a fairly elaborate seaborne invasion. But who was the enemy? He pondered the question only for an instant. The answertwould come later. Now, the first order of business was to destroy this mysterious invader.
He checked his bomb load and confirmed he had ten 500-pounders left. He put the jet into another 180 and lined up with the shoreline. He could see soldiers scampering as they heard him approach. He opened with the cannon and flipped the Bomb-Ready switch. Four pushes of the button and four bombs fell in a neatly timed sequence, one right after the other. The four explosions ripped through the groups of soldiers as they vainly tried to find cover. Soon, the frozen sands on the beach near Jonesvitle ran red with the blood of the unknown attackers.
He executed another loop and bore down on the beachhead again. He could see a T-38 and an F-106 strafing the beach ahead of him. He didn't even thilk to call them on the radio. The pilots and planes of
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ZAP were just doing their thing. Quilkly, but not quietly blowing the shit out of anything that moved.
Suddenly, an indicator light and buzzer told him a shoulder-launched missile, fired from a position hidden in the dunes, was homing in on him. He calmly dropped four more bombs in sequence, and then, using a maneuver from his Thunderbirds days, rolled the plane six times in quilk succession. The trilk baffled the anti-aircraft missile and it slammed into the side of a sand dune, exploding harmlessly.
He pointed the F-16 straight up, once again and flipped it over on its back. Only the F-16 could handle all this maneuvering white still carrying a full fuel and bomb load. "What a plane!" he yelled, banging the console with an appreciative fist. "What a fucking plane!"
He set his sights on two landing craft that were just reaching the beach. The soldiers on board never had a chance as Hunter placed a 500-pounder in each craft. The bomb, more suitable for taking out hardened gun positions and the like, simply obliterated the two small ships. Looking back, he saw bodies, and parts of bodies, flying witdly through the air. They looked like busted-up, blown-up dolls. Whoever they were, they, like the guys on the ships, just succeeded in getting themselves kitled. Sorry guys, he thought. You just got yourselves hooked up with the wrong customer.
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CHAPTER NINE
Hunter made two more pastes over the beach, using up the rest of his cannon ammunition. The A-7s did the same. It didn't appear to make much difference- the beach and the shoreline were covered with the bodies of the black-uniformed attackers. He could see the Rangers, who had immediately met the invaders on the first line of sand dunes, now start to emerge from their positions and pilk over the dead soldiers. The situation on the beach seemed to be in hand.
He rolled right, out to sea. Offshore, the two ships were burning fiercely. The secondary explosions that were continually rocking the vessels told him that theretwouldn't be very many survivors left on board. The cruisers was going down bow first. The missile launcher/troop ship looked no better. He doubted ittwould stay afloat long enough for them to inspect it and look for evidence as to who had attacked them and why.
He streaked over the base and saw the destruction the attack had wrought. A half dozen airplanes were destroyed and several buildings-including the ammo bunker and the club-were in flames. All the white,
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he could still hear the base radio operator repeatedly trying to raise Boston to tell them of the attack.
As Hunter made his final turn for landing, he was filled with a strange mix of confusion and elation. ZAP and the Rangers had stopped the invaders before they even reached the high water line. And, in all, the action had lasted only a half hour. Yet, some valuable men and equipment were lost in the surprise attack. And for what? Mercenaries killing other mercenaries? But that seemed to be the accepted norm in these days of the New Order.
He brought the F-16 in right on the tail of the A-7s, rolled it up to its station point and leaped from the cockpit. Monkeys quilkly surrounded the plane and started to re-arm it. There was no way to be sure whether this was just a first of several attacks on Otis. Hunter, like the rest of the pilots, wanted to be ready, just in case.
The base was a scene of controlled pandemonium. Several fires were burning out of control, and the ammo bunker was still exploding. Rescue vehicles were speeding about, sirens blaring, lights flashing. Rangers were double-timing it to the beach to set up a defense line. Several jets went hot and took off to provide the base with air cover, should another attack occur. Hunter could see that a couple of civitian houses had also taken hits, and the base fire crews were battling those blazes. Everywhere there was smoke and the smell of spent ammunition.
Hunter was in full sprint, heading for the communications shack. He knew he'd find the general there. In fact, when he reached the front door, Jones was running out.
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"The beach is secure, Hawk," Jones, clad in a combat uniform and carrying an M-16, yelled back over his shoulder to Hunter. "Let's find out who these bastards are!"
The two men ran across the runway to the scene of the battles, neatly dodging the pieces of flaming debris and rescue vehicles that were speeding about. They pasted the wreckage of two planes on the way: one of the F-106s had bought it. So had a T-38. White the damagetwould hurt, Hunter considered them "acceptable losses." "Unacceptable"twould have been if the F-4 or the F-lll went up. The destroyed ammo dumptwould be another story.
They reached the beach just as the Rangers were through mopping up. Not one of the invaders survived. The Rangers counted about 350 on the beach in all, with many bodies floating offshore. Each corpse was dressed in the same black, overall-style uniform. The beach was awash in blood from the carnage. At least a dozen landing craft were burning in the water; many others had sunk beneath the waves, carrying their troops with them. It had been a massacre. The invading soldiers never had a chance.
A Ranger lieutenant told Jones and Hunter that none of the attackers carried identification-no dogtags or papers, just a variety of weapons. Many M-16s, a few Stens and even a dozen old BAR automatics were found among the bodies.
But the Jonesvitle defenders had had another ally in the action; the attackers had pilked the verytworst time to attempt an amphibious landing: high tide. The waves were three to four footers and the wind was coming in off the water.
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Hunter walked down the water's edge with Jones and watched the waves roll the bodies of the attackers in and out at will. Even the ocean water was running red, as if some huge fish had just been gutted.
"This was insanity!" Jones said, looking at the hundreds of broken bodies. "What kind of a commandertwould order an attack like this? At high tide, on a cold day, with no air cover? They walked right into our fields of fire!"
Hunter could only shake his head.
"This looks like a bad version of what happened in Miami a white back," Jones said, spitting the bad taste out of his mouth.
"You never did raise Boston?" Hunter asked, reading the general's thoughts.
"No," Jones said, kilking over the body of one of the dead soldiers. The man's mouth was filled with sand and his body was already starting to bloat. "But I just assumed that it was because no one was awake this time of day."
Jones knelt beside the body and took a good look at his face. Everything about him-the uniform, his belt gear, his sunburned face-pointed to one thing. "This guy's either a Mid-Ak or someone they've bought to do this," Jones said. "Either way, I see the Mid-Atlantic's hand in this. I can smell them a mite away."
"A distraction," Hunter said.
"Or just a screw-up in timing," Jones said, wiping his brow. "These guys might have just arrived a little too early. The main attack might be on the way."
"Could be, but from where?"
"At this point, anywhere," Jones said. He looked out at the bodies, rolling in the red suds of the surf.
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"This isn't war, Hawk. This is greed."
The general didn't wait to hear his reply; he was already running back toward the radio shack.
"Christ," Hunter whispered as he took off after the general.
They sprinted back across the runway, pasting the obliterated ammo dump as they ran.
"What the hell do you thilk that was?" Jones yelled to him, "a lucky shot?"
Hunter looked at the smoking building as the base fire fighting unit poured water onto the already hopeless structure.
"Inside job?" Hunter yelled to Jones.
"You bet your ass!" Jones screamed back. "You thilk some gunboat deck jockey could shoot like that without help? I'll bet you a bag of real silver that none of those 'observers' are anywhere to be found."
The thought ran a chitl up and down Hunter's spine. Even with all their precautions, there had still been spies in their midst.
They reached the radio shack just as Wa and Toomey were arriving from the other direction, after helping fight one of the runway fires.
Jones yelled inside the radio shack: "Sparky! Any answer yet?"
"No, sir!" a voice from within answered.
That was all Jones needed. He physically collared Toomey and said: "J.T. Get a warm jet and scoot up to Boston. Fly around. Check it out. Stay over the downtown. But be cool. Fly high or low, but don't slow down enough to be recognized unless I tell you to. We've been calling the bastards since the first blast and no one's pilking up the phone. Maintain radio
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silence. I'll call you if I have to. Bring a wingman and make sure you're armed."
"Will do, General," Toomey said with a sharp salute. He turned on his heel and ran toward the line of the T-38s.
The general turned to Wa. "Ben. Get the Phantom. You zoom up to Logan. Tell me what's going on up there. Stay high and out of sight. Jam 'em if you have to. And stay off the radio unless it's big. Lilk up with J.T. later."
"You got it," Wa said, already running in the direction of the F-4's station point.
Jones and Hunter entered the communications control building. A harried Ranger communications specialist was repeatedly broadcasting the same message, over and over.
"Boston. Boston. This is Otis. We have been attacked by hostite force from the sea. Initial wave repulsed. Need instructions."
Each broadcast was followed by a second or two of silence before the operatortwould repeat the message.
Jones scribbled something on a piece of paper and handed it to the radio operator.
"Here," the general said, "Add this to the message."
The sparky looked at the scrawled sentence and hesitated a second, then began broadcasting the revised message.
"Boston. Boston," the radioman called, "This is Otis. We have been attacked by hostite force from the sea. Initial wave repulsed. Seek permission to carry out retaliatory air strike against Mid-Atlantic States military sites. Need instructions."
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Jones looked at Hunter and gave him a grim wilk.
"That should get them off their asses," the old man said.
Sure enough, the radio crackled to life.
"Otis. Boston calling," a wavering, broken voice began. "Do not-Repeat-Do not launch any aircraft until you receive specific orders to do so. Otis. Please acknowledge."
Jones looked out of the single story building's only window, just as Toomey's two-ship flight was lifting off from the base's one remaining active runway.
"Acknowledge, my ass!" Jones said, grabbing the microphone. "This is General Seth Jones, Commander of the Northeast Economic Zone' Armed Forces and Air Patrol. To whom am I speaking?"
"This is Corporal Buford Smith ..."
Neither Hunter or Jones recognized the name.
"Well, Corporal Smithy" Jones said. "I suggest you put someone with some authority on ... immediately! We've been attacked. We have positively identified who originated the attack. We are obligated to the people we lost and to the free people of the Economic Zone to retaliate. Against the Mid-Atlantic States, immediately and with as much force as we can muster."
There was the sound of microphone changing hands on the other end then a long silence.
"Otis," a different voice began. "This is a direct order. Do not engage in any reprisal strikes. Do not to launch any aircraft."
Huntertwould have bet that Jonestwould blow his top. But he was surprised with the coolness the general displayed in taking the microphone in hand
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and asking: "To whom am I speaking now?"
Another silence, followed by ...
"Captain Bobby Joe Spencer," the voice said, with more than a trace of arrogance. "Communications brigade, Special Marine Battalion, Mid-Atlantic Forces."
The declaration stunned but didn't necessarity surprise Jones and Hunter. The radio operator finally managed to speak:
"Sir! A Mid-Ak at the phone in Boston?"
Jones took off his trademark baseball cap and ran his hand through his short cropped hair.
"I'm afraid so, son," Jones said. In the distance Hunter could hear Ben Wa firing up the F-4.
"Captain," Jones said, calmly into the microphone. "Am I to assume that your forces are now in control of the government for the Northeast?"
Again, a short silence.
"You assume correctly, General," Spencer declared over the crackling frequency. "There has been a coup d'etat. Our special forces were ... requested ... to help restore order and control the situation at the Government House."
"And who invited ypu, Captain?"
"Chairman Turkson," Spencer answered. "First Minister of the Revolutionary Councit of the Northeast Economic Zone."
Hunter recognized the name in the middle of the mouthful. Turkson was the Councit member whom Jones had tagged as most likely to set up a dictatorship and screw up a good thing. He above others was the one who at first tried to gain control of ZAP, then, faiting that, tried to destroy it.
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"But, Captain," Jones said, the anger beginning to betray his voice. "The Northeast Economic Zone is a democracy, a form of government that you are obviously not famitiar with. There is no Chairman and there is no Revolutionary Councit."
"Well," Spencer answered in a voice with a more evident Southern tone, "There is now."
Jones turned to Hunter. "Turkson has taken over," he said. "He was the one who was winging down to Baltimore playing footsies with the 'Aks."
The general turned his attention back to the microphone.
"Captain. Your 'special force.' Was it stationed on the disabled freighter which was given port in Boston a few days ago?"
"Listen, General," the Mid-Ak captain began. "Senator Turkson told us you were a pain in the ass. Fighting for democracy, people free to do what they want. All that bullshit. Well, now that's over, Jones.
"Your kind went out with World War HI. Democracy? Ha! When will you and your flag-waving fly-boys wake up? This is The New Order. Survival of the fittest. And to the highest bidder. Anyone who's eating, got clothes on his ass and a roof over his head had better thank the people in power, the people who are running things. Money is power, Jones. Because without it-or us-nine-tenths of the peopletwouldn't know where to take a leak!"
"And you sound quite qualified to teach them that, Captain," Jones said, not resisting a grim smite. He wilked at Hunter, then half-whispered to the radio operator to raise Toomey in the T-38.
"Captain," Jones continued, "then can I assume
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that your forces are now running things in the Northeast?"
"That's affirmative, Jones," the arrogant reply came back. "And let me tell you something else. We're here to stay. This part of the country was making too much money to be handled-doled out- to the citizens. Now, it will be in the hands of people who know what to do with it."
"Captain," Jones said. "What's to prevent me from launching an air strike right now, against Government House, and putting an end to your little game?"
"Try it, Jones," Spencer answered. "And you'll kitl hundreds of those citizens you find so precious. We thought you might pull something like that. So we've rounded up a bunch of the plebs. Women, Jones. And kids. And they're at the Government House right now. Under guard. 'So, c'mon up, Jones, you and your God-Almighty air force. Napalm thetwomen and kids. Do us the favor. Then wetwon't have to freed them.
"And what about my hitting Logan?" Jones asked Spencer. Hunter could feel the general stalling for time.
There was a laugh at the other end of the line. "Do it Jones! Nuke the fucking place. And then you'll be cutting the throats of even more of your innocent civitians. Bomb the airport and you've got no air convoys. No convoys means no money, Jones. No money means no food. No food means no lousy citizens, 'cause when it gets tight, theretwon't be enough to go around."
They were over a barrel. Jones knew it. Hunter knew it. Suddenly, the control tower room felt very
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small, as if it was closing in on them. Hunter withed he had the Mid-Ak-any Mid-Ak-in front of him. Hetwould choke the life out of him. Next to him, the radio operator had been using a separate channel to contact Toomey's T-38s.
Jones kept his cool.
"Captain, maybe we can make a deal. I'm assuming that you are broadcasting from the Government House radio station/9
"Right again, Jones." Spencer answered. "And it's a great view!"
Jones smiled. Caught. The fish took the bait. Hunter knew it. Jones knew it. Even the radio operator knew it.
"Let's talk, Captain," Jones said using all the false politeness he could muster. Quilkly taking another microphone from the sparky, the general was soon talking to Toomey's two-ship of armed T-38s. They were streaking in low over the water, less than a minute flying time from downtown Boston.
"J. T.," Jones began. "Here it is in a nutshell. The government has been overthrown by the Mid-Aks. We'll soon have our asses to the wall. Do me a favor will you?"
"Name it, sir," Toomey answered, after an appropriate pause long enough to let the news silk in.
"You know the Government House, right downtown, the old Prudential Insurance Building?"
"Yes, sir," came Toomey's crisp reply.
"On top, there's a communications shack. You can tell it because of all the antennas stilking out of the roof."
"Yes sir?"
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"Take it out," Jones ordered. "Just the shack. There are civitian hostages being held in the building itself."
"Roger. . ."
"Come in low, J. T.," Jones counseled. "And stay over the water as long as possible. The radar in that city is kid's stuff so you'll be able to get in okay. Ice the shack and then get the hell out of there. Code Red two."
"Code Red two, sir?" Toomey asked.
"That's a roger. Good luck, J. T."
Code Red two. Hunter knew the term, but hoped he'd never hear it. It meant the shit had hit the fan. The unit was ordered to disperse.
"Thank you, sir . . ." Toomey's voice traited off.
"Good luck, sir," said a transmission from Toomey's wingman.
Jones was sitent for a moment, then said into the microphone: "Are you still there, Captain Spencer?"
"Yes, sir," came the reply.
"Not for long . . ." Jones said.
The radio speaker crackled as the sound of a jet engine became evident in the background. Thumping and bumping followed, then a few moments of confusion as the sound of the approaching jet got louder. Shouts were heard. Then, came a loud explosion and the speaker went dead.
"Goodbye 'Ak," Jones said.
"That's one," Hunter said. "But how many others are there?"
The answer came an instant later.
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"Blue Leader to Otis Base," the radio crackled. It was Ben Wa.
"Go ahead, Blue Leader," the radio operator said, adjusting the radio's dials for better reception.
"General?" Wa asked.
"Here, Ben," Jones said again grabbing the mike.
"General, this is too big for me not to break radio silence. I am looking at an unbelievable sight, sir."
"Go ahead, Ben."
"There are hundreds of them . . ." a voice, probably Wa's weapons officer in the rear seat of the Phantom said. Their voices were fading in and out.
Jones gave Hunter atworried look.
"Go ahead, Ben," Jones urged. "What's going on?"
"Sir, I am observing a large airborne force, heading two-seven-niner, due south," Wa said, the normally ice-cool pilot's voice shaking.
"Airborne?" Jones asked, the crackling in the transmission becoming more ilksome.
"Hundreds of them, sir!" Wa said, his voice sounding weak and far away. "Heading your way."
"Hundreds of what, Ben!?" Jones yelled into the mike.
"Helicopters!" Wa finally said.
"Christ!" Jones exclaimed. He turned to the radio operator and said: "Son, get to the ops building and tell the commander to get that air raid siren going. Tell him to expect an airborne attack at any minute. Tell him I said to evacuate any civitians left on base and to order a Class Red Alert. Then get your ass in a safe place."
The radio man, a young Ranger, snapped a salute
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and hurried out. "Good luck, sir!" he said on leaving.
Jones turned to Hunter. "Well, they succeeded in moving all those choppers up to Boston. Now they're heading this way."
Hunter took the mike from Jones. "Ben," he said. "What kind of choppers?"
"Everything, Hawk," Wa reported, his voice sounding fainter by the moment. "Hueys, Chinooks, Cobras, Apaches. Most of them look to be carrying troops."
"What's your position, Ben?" Hunter asked, reaching for a map.
"I'm orbiting at twenty-four thousand," came the reply. "Fm about ten miles off Logan at three hundred knots."
"Can you slow 'em down, Ben?" Jones asked.
"I can sure try," Wa answered immediately.
"Okay, Ben." Jones said. "J.T. and his wingman are in your area. Get on his frequency and lilk up. Make a few pastes, then Code Red it out of there."
"Code Red, sir?" Wa asked. "That's serious . . ."
"Ben," Jones said. "You know I've always said that we are just paycheck soldiers. This isn't our fight. The government of the Northeast Economic Zone has been overthrown. That means our pay checks have stopped coming. That means it's time for us to go. We're joining the ranks of the unemployed."
"Any suggestions, sir?" It was J.T, who had finished off the communications shack on top of the Government Tower and had been monitoring Jones' orders to Wa.
"Try to make Canada," Jones told them. "They're
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the closest friendlies. Lay low and wait until things cool off. Remember, you guys are celebrities. The 'Aks might just put a price on your heads.
"Now, just mix it up with those guys a little, and buy us some time to get the civitians out of Otis."
"Roger, sir," Wa replied.
"See you soon," J.T. radioed, his two T-38s falling in behind Wa's F-4.
"Let's go for the Chinooks," Wa said as the three planes closed to within a mite of the massive helicopter formation. "They'll be carrying the grunts."
"That's a roger," Toomey answered.
The three ship formation rolled out one at a time and, with the sun at their backs, dove into the mass of helicopters.
Wa went in first. His back-seat weapons officer fired the first shot, unleashing two Sidewinder air-to-air missiles simultaneously. The heat-seeking rockets found a couple of heavy, troop-laden Chinook helicopters, flying side-by-side at the head of the formation and homed in on each craft's hot engine exhausts. The missiles hit instantaneously. Chopper number one got it in the mid-section, splitting it neatly in half. Wa could see troops falling from the Chinook and into the ocean more than a mite below. The other chopper, its main rotor destroyed, flipped over witdly, taking out a Huey gunship flying to its left. Together the two Mid-Ak craft plunged into the sea, as the rest of the chopper formation scattered.
Toomey went in next. Armed with dual M-61 cannons, he sought out another Chinook. He pulled his trigger and riddled the aircraft with a 100-shpt blast that took less than two seconds. He pulled up
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and through the choppers who were now witdly scattered across the sky. He found a Huey in his sights and squeezed off another 100 rounds. The enemy chopper exploded instantly. He rolled to avoid the flying debris and found a Cobra gunship at two o'clock. Another squeeze, another dead chopper.
With only another squeeze or two left, he climbed out and looped back into the maze of helicopters that were attempting to get back into a loose formation. The main chopper force was now completely spread out over the ocean. It was then he noticed that one .of the helicopters bringing up the rear wasn't of a famitiar design. He'd seen the type of craft before, but in the confusion of the battle, it didn't register.
He sighted the mystery chopper and let go his final rounds, hitting the craft's tail section and immediately igniting its fuel tanks. The helicopter fell out of the sky traiting a long stream of black smoke down to the water below. Ittwould much later until Toomeytwould realize that he had fought a historic engagement- that he was the first pilot since the end of the war to down a Sot;fef-buitt Hind gunship.
Toomey's wingman, a free-lancer named Charlie Waters, was the last of the pilots to take on the wave of choppers. By this time, the helicopter pilots were starting to fire back. Gunners in the waists of the Hueys and the Chinooks were drawing a bead on Waters as he started his first past. He was met with a wall of machinegun fire as he made his way through the wall of helicopters, hard as it was for a chopper gunner to follow the jet fighter in close quarters. Waters' first burst of cannon fire neatly took out a Huey, but his plane caught a few lucky slugs from a retaliating Apache gunship.
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Suddenly, the t-38 was spinning witdly.  The bullets had ripped away his flaperon control and Waters realized he was disabled. Unable to steer the plane, he fired off one last long burst,twounding a couple of choppers in the process. That done, he hit the eject button, clearing the T-38 just as it slammed into yet another Chinook.
Waters floated down, but to his terror, saw an Apache double back and move in his direction. Dangling helpss beneath the parachute, Waters could only watch as the swift little chopper approached.  About 100 years out, it opened fire. The rounds from the copter riddled the helpless pilot shaking him like an out-of-control marionette.  Waters' bleeding, battered body immediately went limp and floated down into the sea about two miles off Boston.  There it was quilkly fed on by bloodlusting sharks.
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CHAPTER TEN
Back at Otis, the Code Red evacuation was already underway. It was what they had been expecting short of a direct attack. This way, they had a chance to get out in one piece.
"They used to call it a bug-out in the old days," Jones said, addressing the base over the field loudspeaker system. "These days it's called 'a turnover in employment.' In othertwords, we've gotten our pilk slips. Good luck and we'll see you out on the West Coast!"
The remaining jets of ZAP were being hurriedly warmed up. The air patrol's C-130 Hercules was already out on the edge of the runway, its four big propellers whirling, its engines kilking up a lot of noise and dust. Already, 18 ZAP pilots-mostly the loyal Air National Guard flyboys and the trusted freelancers who had remained but had no jets to fly-were aboard. The planetwould wait until the monkeys finished getting the remaining jets in flying order. Then the mechanicstwould get on board and the big Herculestwould fly all of them out of harm's way.
At the other end of the base, the 250 Zone Air
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Jones had already made arrangements with the local mititia to provide protection and transportation for the civitians living on and near Otis. They, too,twould have to evacuate the area. It burned his ass that he had to leave the people behind. It was a no-win decision. There was an outside chance that the Mid-Akstwould leave them be and it was for this reason that Jones had made an important decision. That was, not to leave the base's various defense systems- the Gatlings, the SAM sites-on automatic, programmed to hit anything flying once ZAP pulled out. Leaving boobytraps was also verboten. He didn't want to enrage the Mid-Aks any more than he had to because the civitians fleeing the areatwould be the only group the 'Aks could take revenge on. Visions of the Russians strafing helpless refugees in the last war had made a vivid impression in his mind.
But this didn't mean that the military equipmenttwould be left behind intact. Instead, the plan was that everythingtwould be destroyed . . .
Among the last to leavetwould be the base MPs who were given the duty of destroying everything and anything that might be of help to the Mid-Aks once they landed. "Scorched Earth" they called it in wars past; don't leave anything for your enemy that could be exploited by him. The "everything and anything" included the Gatlings, the SAMs, the radar system, the precious fuel supply and whatever was left of the ammunition. Even the base's three auxitiary runwaystwould be purposely damaged. Then-and only thentwould Hunter and Jones take-off, drop one blockbuster bomb apiece on the base's last usable runway, then quilkly get the hell out of the area.
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"I'd give anything to see the look on the 'Ak commander's face when he gets here and finds the place empty." Jones told Hunter as they approached the flight line.
"Empty and useless," Hunter added as he watched the MPs detonate explosives on one of the base's perimeter radar towers. He looked out to sea where the attackers' ship was still burning. Although it had only been a few hours ago that they had repulsed the amphibious assault, it seemed to him like years. So much had happened. Once again, his wholetworld was crashing down upon him. Time for change anyway, he kept telling himself.
Jones also turned his attention to the beach where the early morning battle-and slaughter-had occurred.
"What a bunch of suckers," he said, spitting on the runway for emphasis. "The 'Aks probably hired them-free-lance infantry-to stage the raid. Just like in Miami. Probably promised them air support, too."
"Either it was a diversion," Hunter surmised, "Or, they figured that white we were chopping them up on the beach, they'd hit us from the rear with a million chopper troops."
"Whatever, leave it to the Mid-Aks to screw up an invasion," Jones said with a rare laugh. "As we know, timing is everything."
"Yeah," Hunter agreed. "Someone's sundial was off."
They reached his F-16 just as a pair of A-7s were taking off. Overhead, the first of the Crazy Eight helicopters was up and turning toward the west. More explosions were heard as the MPs continued dynamit-
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ing the base's defense system.
Hunter figured the Mid-Ak airborne force was probably 15 minutes away. He watched as the second to last paired planes-the surviving F-106 and one of the T-38s-pulled away from the flight line and headed for the runway. The plan called for these planes to escort the C-130 during the trip west. The attending monkeys quilkly climbed aboard two jeeps and sped away toward the waiting evac plane. The local mititia had arrived and were carrying the last civitians out in a fleet of ancient National Guard deuces. The base was shutting down like a plant in twitight, just as Jones had planned. Within 10 minutes, Hunter knew, there'd be no one left. Time for a change.
Hunter told his monkeys to beat it, and they gratefully bid him goodbye, climbed on a jeep and headed for the C-130. Hunter loved his ground crew- they were the best on the base and had always felt it a privitege totwork on the Thunderbird-adorned plane. Now Hunter, like the other pilots flying the ZAP fighters,twould have to either find competent and trustworthy free-lance monkeys across the country- or fix whatever aited their fighters themselves.
He climbed into the F-16, inserted the program tape and brought the engine up to trim. He was loaded with four Sidewinders, the blockbuster bomb, and a full load of cannon ammunition. Fuel conservation prevented him from taking anything else. The only clothes he had were the ones on his back. He managed to jam his M-16 into the F-16's cockpit, along with some ammunition. The only other personal item he carried was the threadbare flag he'd
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taken from the body of Saul Wackerman.
Beside him, the general was strapping into the F-111, his mechanics having already departed. Being a much larger plane, the F-lll could carry about three times the bomb load of Hunter's plane. The general had carefully hung straps of small bombs along the flexible wing, as well as the blockbuster scheduled for the base runway. The plane also had an internal bombbay, but Hunter was sure the general left it empty-so much better for the F-111 to conserve fuel.
A jeep full of MPs rolled up to the two planes and gave them the thumbs-up signal. Jones waved back and the jeep sped off. The C-130 was already moving slowly down the runway, the MPs being the last of the base personnel to jump on. Once they were on, the C-130 pilot gunned his engines and the flyingtworkhorse rumbled down the runway and into the air. Immediately going into a steep climb, it was soon joined by its escort fighters and together, the three planes took off in a southwesterly direction.
Hunter and Jones taxied their jets to the end of the runway and began cross-checking their instruments. As with all of the evacuating ZAP aircraft, radio silencetwould be strictly maintained, astwould a reluctance to use their onboard radar unless absolutely necessary. A hot radar provides an easy homing target for many surface-to-air or air-to-air missiles. The Mid-Aks, although not operating any jet fighters of their own, probably had a few free-lancers in their employ with standing orders to shoot down any Zone aircraft they encountered in return for a handsome bounty for confirmed kitls. It was important to keep the movements of the ZAP aircraft as secret as
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possible for as long as possible.
Just as they started their take-off roll, they could hear the radio chatter of the approaching chopper force. Once airborne, they could see it. The hundreds of approaching helicopters had swung out over the ocean and now were coming in from the east. The assault force looked for all the world like a swarm of angry bees out on the horizon. Hunter felt a temptation rise up inside of him-a temptation to meet the approaching swarm, cannons blazing. But he knew ittwould serve no good purpose-not now anyway. He was convinced that hetwould meet up with the Mid-Aks again someday. Then hetwould have his revenge.
Jones expertly put his plane into a roll, pulled back on the throttle and streaked over the now-abandoned base. He deposited his blockbuster bomb smack center in the main runway, causing a miniature mushroom cloud to blanket the landing strip. As he pulled the F-lll up, Hunter put his F-16 into a dive. Screaming low over the base, he pulled his weapons release lever just at the end of the runway. The bomb hit perfectly, taking out the last quarter of the strip, thus preventing the 'Aks from landing anything big at the base any time soon. Turning in his cockpit, he had to smite as he saw another mini-mushroom cloud rise above the base.
He lilked up with Jones who was loitering nearby and together they went full afterburner. Hunter took one last look back. The first Mid-Ak choppers were just appearing over the base, their pilots confused not so much by the smoke and explosions as by the lack of groundfire. Ittwould take the 'Aks a little white to catch onto what was happening. Then, and only then,
147twould they realize they'd been hoodwilked by the last official  act of  ZAP.   Time for  a  change,   Hunter thought as he turned to the west. And California, here I come.
They had been airborne only about 20 minutes when he lost sight of the general. As usual, he was riding on the general's right wing when they began to climb up to a safe altitude. At about 40,000, he followed Jones into a monstrous cumulous cloud. When he emerged, barely a half minute later, the general was nowhere to be seen.
At first, he was tempted to break radio silence, but he resisted. The day was otherwise very clear. He twisted in his seat looking out the bubble-top, searching the sky for the F-lll. Nothing.
He climbed up to 45,000 feet-then 50,000. Stitl nothing. He dove down to 30,000, then 25,000 then 20,000. Stitl, there was no sign of Jones.
He took a chance and switched on his radar. Just as it went hot, he saw the barest of blips at the edge of his street. The profite indicator read out that the blip was large enough to be an F-lll, but the plane's direction was due south. He and Jones had been on a heading of due west.
He thought it out for an instant and decided to double back and follow the blip. It was so unlike Jones to deviate from an agreed-upon plan that he wastworried enough to take the rilk. Something peculiar was going on. He could feel it in his bones.
He booted the F-16 in an effort to catch up with the blip. Traveling at close to 1300 mph, he knew that by
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die time he could make a visual sighting, he and the mystery planetwould be close to crossing over into Mid-Ak airspace. Stitl, he pressed on.
He continued to track the blip and finally got a visual sighting a few minutes later. There was no doubt about it. It was Jones. He had dropped his plane down to barely 10,000 feet and was still dropping when Hunter caught up to within five miles of him. They pasted into Mid-Ak territory seconds later.
Suddenly, Hunter saw two more blips appear on the street. They were smaller, faster craft and both were heading directly at Jones. If the general had followed his own orders, Hunter thought, he'd have his radar off andtwould be unaware of the other two planes.
Hunter wasn't taking any chances. He immediately armed his Sidewinders and floored the plane to full military speed to intercept the two planes. They came within visual sighting in seconds. two F-101 Voodoos, mean-looking supersonic fighters that were the favorite of free-lancers and pirates alike. Both planes were painted in an evit-looking black and red trim color scheme, indicating a fighter-for-hire team.
All the white, the F-lll had been losing altitude, and Hunter strained to keep it in sight white streaking to intercept the Voodoos, Jones had slowed considerably and Hunter could see he had his flex wings spread out as far as possible, almost perpendicular to the plane's body. It was the configuration for a low-level bombing attack. By the time Hunter was within a mite of him, he had figured out what the general was up to.
Jones was leading a one-man bombing mission against the Mid-Aks. Hunter couldn't believe it,
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especially after Jones had convinced them all that he was pure mercenary. But Hunter had no time totwonder about the senior officer's motives. He'd have the two Voodoos to deal with first.
He knew the two pilots didn't see him to the last second. Either they were flying without radars or didn't have them turned on. Either way, it was a fatal mistake for them. Just as the first one rolled out to pounce on Jones' plane far below, Hunter fired a Sidewinder. The Voodoo pilot never knew what hit him. The air-to-air missile went right where it should have gone: up the exhaust pipe of the F-101. The plane exploded in mid-air. When the smoke cleared, there was nothing left.
The second Voodoo pilot had already started his attack dive when he realized his partner was gone. He started to take evasive action, but again, Hunter was quilker to the draw. A second Sidewinder flashed from under his wing. It met the Voodoo at about 15,000 feet, just as the pilot had managed to pull up out of his attack dive. The missile clipped the F-101's wing, shearing it completely off from the jet's fuselage. Spinning witdly, the Voodoo continued to plunge. It impacted into the side of a mountain, a ball of flame instantly erupting from it.
Hunter rolled out and started to dive of his own to catch up with Jones. He had no idea where he was. He had7 pasted over a city that may have been old Phitadelphia, but the only thing he was sure about was that, by this time, they were deep in Mid-Ak territory. Breaking through some clouds at 10,000 feet, he pilked up the F-lll again. It was streaking barely 150 feet off the ground, coming on under any
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radar that might be around and heading toward what looked like a major city. Hunter could see the outline of the coast and the bustling harbor. Only then did he realize that city was Baltimore. Jones had decided to attack the very heart of the Mid-Aks' evit empire.
He watched as Jones made his approach. Even though Hunter knew they were both in "deep sierra," he had to admire the general's coolness. He knew there'was nothing he could do to stop Jones from carrying out his bombing run. He wasn't even sure if he wanted to. He decided the best he could do was help now, and hope they were both around to discuss the matter later.
About five miles out from the city's limits, Jones started to pilk up groundfire. Hunter was right on his tail at the moment, and Jones wiggled his wings to acknowledge his wingman's presence. The F-lll sped on, dodging several small, shoulder-fired missiles launched by troops on the ground, the plane's outstanding terrain-hugging feature lifting it up and down as dictated by the contour of the ground below.
They started pilking up some heavy flak about two miles out. Hunter could see hundreds of Mid-Ak troops scrambling below as the two jets pasted over barely 100 feet above the deck. Hunter's target acquisition equipment pilked up a couple of fortified gun posts ahead and he put several bursts from the M-61 into both of them. But there were more guns than he could shoot at, and he knew the F-lll wasn't equipped with a cannon or any kind of gun to shoot back with. Hunter knew he'd have to ride shotgun for Jones for the whole bombing run.
About a mite out, the air was filled with flak,
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missiles, and bullets from rifles of the troops below. It seemed like everyone on the ground was armed and shooting at them. Hunter saw the F-lll shudder from taking a few hits, but it never wavered from its course. He kept his F-16 continually rolling from side to side, its cannon flashing, stirring up columns of earth as the M-61 shells hit the ground or human targets.
Then, a missile-it looked like a Stinger-hit the F-111 midship. The big plane shook violently and began to lose altitude. But just as quilkly, it stabitized and regained its heading, though traiting some bad-looking black smoke.
Within seconds they were right on the city itself, the F-lll neatly lifting itself above the on-coming skyscrapers. Hunter saw the plane's bomb bay doors open and knew Jones was preparing to drop whatever he had concealed inside the body of his plane.
All the groundfire had stopped by this time as they were directly over the heart of the city. Hunter was going slowly enough to see people scattering on the streets below. Because the Mid-Aks had no fighter jets of their own, their citizens were unaccustomed to seeing such aircraft above their city. Hunter also imagined that the city's air raid siren was cranking full blast.
When he saw Jones wiggle his wings again, he knew the general was coming to the end of the bombing run. All the white the smoke from the F-lll was gettingtworse. They had pasted over the city and were coming up on its airport, which was located a few miles outside its limits. The airport was now a bristling Mid-Ak military base and training center. Hugging the waters of Chesapeake Bay, it gave the
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Middle Atlantic states an easity defended outlet to the sea, as well as a place to launch their seaborne invasions from. Jones was out to put an end to that.
They started pilking up some more groundfire as they approached the airport, but it made no difference. Jones had wiggled his wings a third time then pulled back on his stilk and put the F-lll into a screaming climb. Hunter followed suit, guessing that Jones must have planned to drop something big. They had climbed to 20,000 when he saw a single, chubby bomb drop from the smoking F-lll. The plane then stood on its tail and with its wings swept back, was kilked into afterburner. Now Hunter knew why Jones was getting them high and out of there quilk.
The bomb he dropped was a nuclear one . . .
They were at 40,000 when the blast went off. Hunter rolled to get a better look and was astonished to see a mushroom cloud-this one very authentic- rising up from the airport. The blast wave hit his plane a few seconds later, rocking it and causing his instruments to blilk. He knew that whatever-and whoever-was on the base was now vaporized. When or how Jones had managed to get hold of a nuclear bomb, he couldn't imagine. He was still awestruck by the size of the blast and the growing mushroom cloud rising over the airport base.
He should have figured that Jonestwouldn't have let the Mid-Aks off so easity. Nortwould he have involved the rest of the squadron in nuking the Middle Atlantic's main base. It was technically a one-plane mission, and that's how Jones had planned it all along.
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The paycheck soldier talk was a cover. His hate for the Mid-Aks-their murderous, barbaric ways-had become personal a long time ago. With the constraints of the ZAP out of the way, Jones decided the time was right to deliver his own personal message of protest to the Middle Atlantic States. It was his way of avenging all the deaths and human misery the 'Aks had caused.
Mesmerized by the ever-growing mushroom cloud, Hunter concluded that the Mid-Aks had made a mistake a long time ago by making General Seth Jones their number one enemy. "You don't fuck around with General Jones," the saying used to go, and once again, the adage was proved correct.
The general's smoking plane had leveled off at 55,000 and had made a wide turn out over the Bay and headed due north. Hunter, realizing that after the nuking of the airport, something like maintaining radio silence seemed unimportant. He attempted to raise the general.
But he got no reply ...
He followed the disabled F^lll as it flew out over the Atlantic and steaked off to the north. Off the coast of the old state of Connecticut, the plane started to drift to a course back over the land. All the time, Hunter was trying to raise Jones on both his VHP and UHF frequencies, but still got no response.
He pulled up beside the fighter-bomber several times and used hand and wing signals, again to no response. The F-lll's canopy windows were tinted in such a way as to make it hard to see the pilot inside. Hunter dropped back to survey the damage to the general's plane and noted that white the jet was still flying, the hole in its sidetwould soon force it down.
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He figured the plane's radio might have been knocked out by groundfire, but it was spooky that Jonestwould not acknowledge his wing or hand signals.
And why the hell was he heading north?
Soon they had pasted over into the Zone's airspace and still the F-lll flew north. Hunter could tell the plane was slowing down, gradually losing altitude. He pulled up beside it again, trying to get some response to his hand and wing signals, but it was to no avait.
After flying this way for 20 minutes, the landing gear on the F-lll came down. This further slowed the jet. Hunter surveyed the ground below and quilkly calculated that they were somewhere over the forests of the area once known as Vermont. When the F-lll wings swept out and it banked to the left, Hunter knew ittwould soon be landing somewhere. He felt he had no choice but to follow suit.
Sure enough, as they broke through the low mists of the Vermont Green Mountains, an airport, carved out of thetwoods, came into view. The F-lll dropped down even further and began a final turn for landing. Hunter could see that white the strip,twould be able to handle the short-landing F-lll easity, ittwould be a squeeze for the F-16.
After watching the F-lll set down to a perfect, three-point landing, he slowed his F-16, and lowered its gear. The striptwould prove a trilky landing for the average pilot, but trilky landings and take-offs were one of Hunter's specialties. He coolly set the F-16 down, and immediately reversed the engine for a quilk, if bumpy stop.
He couldn't help but thilk of the amazing events that had transpired in this single day-the explosion
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at the base club, the attack from the sea, bugging out of Otis, nuking Baltimore's airport and now, with the sun finally setting, his landing somewhere in Vermont. He felt it was time for a change, but this was getting bizarre.
He climbed out from the F-16 and looked around. Except for the F-lll, the place was deserted. The only building was a small hangar, which looked like it was sealed up and locked tight as a drum. The general's plane stood at the far end of the runway, slightly off-kitter, its exhaust andtwounded side still smoking. Hunter ran to the airplane, hoping to see the canopy popped up and a tired but triumphant Jones sitting on its wing.
But it was not to be. He clambered up onto the wing and crawled along the top of the fuselage to reach the cockpit. It was closed. He reached down with his foot and was able to trip the release handle. The canopy hissed once, then slowly opened. Inside, still strapped down, helmet on and sitting perfectly rigid, was General Jones.
He was dead, of course. Shrapnel from the missile hit had punctured his chest and he had bled to death probably somewhere over the middle of Baltimore. The plane, with its famous sophisticated computer-controlled flight systems, had completed the mission Jones had programmed it to, then flew him to this remote base. The spookiness of it all made Hunter shudder. Suddenly, he was very cold.
He pulled the general out and lowered the body to the ground with the help of the parachute straps. He took one long last look. Here was a truly gallant man; hero in Viet Nam, leader of the Thunderbirds, the
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soldier, who probably more than any other, turned the tide in the Battle for Western Europe. An officer who respected his men as pilots and as human beings, who felt that to fight for a just cause was the ultimate human experience. Now to have that life end here, on a wind-swept and desolate airstrip in the middle of the mountains seemed not at all appropriate. The man should be written up in history books. If there were any history books. He should have been accorded a full military funeral-a horse-drawn caisson, a flag on his casket, a 21-gun salute. But it was not to be.
Hunter felt like a huge part of his life had just been cut out, destroyed, vanished. Gone. For the first time in a long time, he felt utterly alone. Not at all like the solitude of his mountain retreat of a few years back. This was the emptiness one felt upon losing a member of his family. The frank realization that a person you knew, spent part of your life with and loved, was gone. Forever.
He knew hetwould never be the same again.
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CHAPTER ELEVEN
He didn't even have a shovel to dig a proper grave for Jones. He felt lost. And stranded. He had very little fuel left in the '16.
It was getting late and a light snow began to fall. He covered the general's body with the parachute and hoisted it back up onto the wing of the F-l 11 to keep it from any hungry animals. Hunter knew hetwould be spending the night at the airstrip and that he had to find shelter and damned quilk. The airport's hangar seemed the likely place.
He tried to force the office door open, but it was nailed shut from the inside. The windows were brilked over-again from the inside. He hadn't expected it to be so difficult. Finally, taking a wrench from the F-lll, he began totwork on the lock that tightly held the building's large sliding doors.
He had no idea why Jones had programmed the F-111 to fly to this place. It looked to be an old remote strip, possibly used by the Vermont Air National Guard, or maybe an airborne forest fire fighting unit. It was in the damndest place. The area, white technically within the territory of the Northeast Economic
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Zone, had been vacated long before, its residents among the first to flee to Canada when the New Order came down. It was on the side of a mountain that was surrounded by larger mountains, each covered with snow, despite the month being late Aprit. It was utterly desolate; there probably wasn't a human around for 50 or even 100 miles in any direction. Yet, judging by the tire marks and fuel stains on the runway, it was apparent that the airstrip had been used frequently in the last few months.
He finally managed to bust open the lock and move the doors of the hangar. It was dark by this time, and his flashlight was in his Personal Survival Kit, back in the F-16. He got inside and, after wheeling the big doors closed, wandered around, looking for a light switch that he knewtwould probably nevertwork. He finally found a bank of them, and started flipping. Nothing happened . . . until the 15th switch. Suddenly, there was a crackle of electricity and two dozen high powered arc lamps hanging from the ceiting burst into life.
Strangely, he had assumed all along that the hangartwould be empty, but he was never so wrong in his life. His jaw nearly fell to his chest as he looked around the building. "Holy Christ!" was all he could say. Over and over. "Jesus H. Christ, I don't believe it ..."
It was Jones's last card to play and it came up the ace of spades. The hangar was filled-literally to the rafter-with enough bombs, guns, missiles, fuel and spare parts to outfit a small air force.
It was all packed away in stacks oftwooden crates marked in stencit with signs like "Dangerous-Explosives" and "Napalm-Handle With Care." He saw at
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least 50 M-61 cannons, just like the one he carried in his F-16, plus miles of ammunition belts hanging from the main beam across the ceiting. Hundreds, maybe a couple of thousand bombs-clusters to big blockbusters, frags to anti-personnel-were neatly stacked, in pyramids against one wall. There were probably a couple of hundred air-to-air missiles-Sidewinders mostly-each individually wrapped in a separate protective shroud, and carrying a tag for arming instructions.
At the rear of the building, there were hundreds of barrels of JP-8, the jet fuel that was the lifeblood of a pilot. He checked to make sure it wasn't contaminated-a touch to his tongue told him it wasn't. Neither were the barrels of lubricating oil stacked neatly beside the jet fuel.
He was glad he didn't smoke. One match in the wrong place in this building and the resulting explosiontwould make Mount St. Helen's look like a pesky landslide.
In another part of the hangar he found a treasure of spare parts-from extra tires to crucial nuts and bolts-all appropriately marked. Hanging on the wall near the parts was a clipboard holding receipts for all the merchandise. Each form held Jones's typically scrawled initials at the bottom and each form carried the name of the same company: "The Wright Patter-son Used Aircraft Company, Parts and Ordnance Division." So Roy From Troy's employers had diversified. Big planes weren't enough for them; they had to start moving the small stuff. Well, he thought, it was probably easier these days to sell an anti-personnel bomb than a B-58 Hustler. Somehow, Jones had
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bought all the stuff, little-by-little, as the receipts told it, and established a healthy reserve. He had beaten their system after all. If it ever came to war-real war-with the 'Aks, or the pirates or anybody, Jones had guaranteed that hetwould be sitting on top of enough material to make it very difficult to defeat him. Or, very hard to be victorious. Hunter realized that Jonestwould have made a perfect air guerritla-a Robin Hood of the skies.
On examining the parts, he found that although they were manufactured for use on many different aircraft, they all had one thing in common: They could be used on an F-16. One of the beauties of the plane was that nearly 75-percent of its parts were used on other jet aircraft. From that point on he knew that white he might have the last remaining F-16 in the world, hetwould never have totworry about spare parts for it. That was, if he could always get back to this place. He quilkly began to appreciate the desolation of the airstrip.
He pored over the stuff for the next two hours, but finally he nearly collapsed of exhaustion. He shut off the lights-which were powered by a silver cadmium battery-and using a Sidewinder shroud as a blanket, lay on a crate of napalm bombs and immediately went to sleep.
The deadly material proved to be an apt resting place for his dreams to emerge from. In them, he replayed the action of the battles the strange day before. Fighting them over and over. And through it all, there was Jones, baseball hat in place, cigar
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firmly in teeth, laughing, joking, flying as usual.
He twoke in the middle of the night, a single moonbeam shining through the only crack in the hangar's ceiting. Outside the wind was howling loud enough to be a blizzard. It sounded like a bad night on top of another mountain. It seemed like centuries ago that he lived on top of the mountain in New Hampshire. He was so sure back then that something was coming that he had spent whole months, doing nothing, waiting for it. It had come. Now, it was gone. Over. Complete. It was the general's last hurrah. He was glad he was part of it. But now, what was left for him to do? All they had fought for-one of the last places on the continent or even on earth that a man could be relatively free-was gone. Eaten up by the gluttons.
He fell back into an uneasy sleep.
Hetwoke up a second time-an instant, a minute, an hour, maybe two hours-after he had drifted off. The wind was still howling and the old building was rattling. Maybe it was time to climb up on top of another mountain and wait it out again, he thought. Perhaps this mountain. He could hunt for food and make clothes out of the Sidewinder shrouds. He could read all the technical manuals in the place and drilk napalm juice for breakfast. He could wait for the world to get fucked up to the max once more, then get shaken out. Live up here and wait and watch the world go by. Maybe that's what was in the cards dealt when he followed Jones here. Led by a ghost, what more symbolism could a man want?
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But this time, he was sure, he'd be waiting a lot longer than two years before he came down from the summit. That is, if he ever came down. At that point, he didn't care. Screw it. Let the world rot. It wasn'ttworth it. Everything was gone. Everyone-the general, ZAP, Dominique-gone. He was gone. And no one cared. So why should he?
He decided. Hetwould stay and live on the mountain. Live there forever, if he had to. He was retiring. He couldn't care less, he told himself, if he never got into an airplane again. This was his home now. He closed his eyes. Again, he thought of the general. Again, he fell off into a fitful sleep.
Hetwoke a third time, and the first thing he was conscious of was the folded piece of cloth stuffed into his back pocket. It was the flag, Saul Wackerman's flag. He reached down and touched it ... Suddenly he was hit with an intense light. Not from the outside but from within him. Everything instantly became very clear. His muddled thoughts of living-hiding out was more like it-on top of the mountain were washed away. Now, only one thought was in his head:
Give up? No fucking way.
There were many reasons. The general's death could not go without some small measure of revenge. Some small reminder that you might be able to kitl a man's body, but it's hard to kitl a man's soul or his spirit. And, he-Hawk Hunter, the greatest fighter pilot ever-could not just hang up the wings and hide. That justtwouldn't be the answer this time.
Now it was time to fight. Work and fight and fight
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some more. If he was the last person on the continent who still believed in what was once called the American Way, then screw 'em all, because he'd go down in flames defending it. Anywhere. Anytime. Anyplace. He'd do it for the guys who died in Western Europe. He'd do it for the guys at Otis. For Dominique, wherever she was. For Saul Wackerman. For Jones
Inside, he felt a part of Major Hawker Hunter die and another part be born. He closed his eyes and dreamed he saw an immense "W" written across the sky. It was miles long and wide and as solid-looking as a cloud. He didn't know what it meant, but he was sure the answertwould come to him soon. For the third time that night, he fell back to sleep.
It was a different man who twoke the next morning . . .
The dawn was cold and clear. He found a shovel and buried the general in an unmarked grave. That done, he drained the F-lll's fuel tanks into his own then attached two full external tanks filled with fuel from the hangar to his wings.
He still had two Sidewinders left, and he attached two more from the hidden arms cache. His cannon was nearly empty when he landed. Now he filled it once more. He attached an anti-runway ordnance dispenser to the '16's belly and filled it to capacity with hundreds of deadly little globe-like bombs.
Using the F-16 like a tow truck, he pulled the F-lll to the cliff at the edge of the runway and nudged it. The plane pitched forward and tumbled off the moun-
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tain into the deep valley below, exploding on impact. No onetwould see the wreckage until late spring-if at all. Anyone curious to take a second looktwould have to surmise the plane crashed and thattwould be the end of it. Thus, the last chapter of the general's lifetwould die with him. Only Huntertwould know what really happened.
two hours later he was airborne again. He circled the mountainside base, watching. Waiting.
" ... 3 ... 2 ... 1 ... Now!"
Right on schedule, sixteen delayed reaction fuses ignited and exploded right down the center of the runway. Eight more bombs went off on the tree line next to the runway causing eight big oaks to crash down onto the strip. He had set the charges so theytwould destroy and cover the landing strip, but leave the hangar unscathed. He didn't want any curious flyboys or pirates landing at the base and stumbling over the technological treasure. Even a helicoptertwould have a hard time putting down on the cratered and blocked runway. As one last bit of insurance, he had hung a sign he'd found outside the hangar door. "Danger-Radioactivity" it read. In this day and age, people tended to take that kind of sign seriously.
Less than an hour later he was flying high over the recently occupied base once known as Jonesvitle. . . .
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CHAPTER TWELVE
Using the F-16's ultra-sensitive High Resolution Radar, he was able to project a detailed, three-dimensional map showing the activity of the base on his cockpit video street. It was like looking down an invisible scope extended 50,000 feet to the ground. He could "see" the Mid-Aks had taken full possession of the place. The hundred of helicopters that had carried out the assault on the base the day before were foolishly lined up in neat rows along the cratered runways. A few warships were close by offshore. Several buildings were still burning. He could even discern the Mid-Ak flag flying over the place.
He made a gruesome discovery in a cranberry bog next to the base. Bodies, hundreds of them, were scattered throughout the marsh. These had to be civitians, the former residents of Jonesvitle. The 'Aks had caught them and slaughtered them. But he could also see the executions were still going on. The radar showed figures, some moving, some standing in lines at the edge of the marsh. Trucks filled with more people waited nearby. The 'Aks were systematically killing anyone they could find who was remotely
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connected to the former Zone Armed Forces.
He wasn't surprised. Disgusted maybe, but not surprised. It was the Mid-Ak way of doing things. Kitl whatever stands in the way. The barbaric policy served two purposes: it eliminated bothersome mouths to feed and it served as a fear factor which demoralized any civitian who came in contact with them. It's easier to bring someone under your heel if they are convinced that it is useless for them to fight back.
Hunter intended to change that . . .
He made two more pastes, taking note of the half dozen anti-aircraft sites the 'Aks had already beguntwork on. These didn't bother him and he was pleased to see no sign of anytworkable radar systems installed. He peeled off and was soon out over the ocean. One last check of his weapons revealed everything was in perfecttworking order. Turning, he positioned the F-16 between the sun and the occupied base nearly eight miles below. Ittwould be one, long, screaming dive. Theytwould never know what hit them . . .
two officers were overseeing the Mid-Ak firing squad. The execution, going on since early that morning, had become dull and routine. Using helicopters equipped with heat-sensitive tracking devices, coordinating with mobite units on the ground, their troops had been rounding up citizens since early the night before. The civitianstwould be captured, held for transport to the marsh, then lined up, 20 to 30 at a time, before the firing squad. Only the young girlstwould be spared. They were transported directly to the base commander, whotwould past them out as
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rewards to his best officers. The firing squad officers knew if they completed this job quilkly and cleanly, they tootwould be in line to get a fuckable young girl.
One officer was wiping his brow in the unusually warm, winter morning, when he heard the strange noise above him. Like a whistle, getting louder, fiercer by the instant. He looked at his comrade, who had heard the noise too. Instinctively, they both turned in the direction of the sound, and found themselves shielding their eyes against the sun. It was getting louder and closer, an awesome noise, that was beginning to panic the hundred or so people in the bog- civitian prisoners and executioners alike.
Next thing they knew, the F-16 was right in front of them. It had arrived so quilkly, they never had time to move. One officer could see the face of the man flying the jet. Even with a helmet on and an oxygen mask attached, the 'Ak could discern hate in the pilot's eyes. In the instant before death that seems to last an eternity, the Mid-Ak officer thought it was strange to see such an oddly painted jet fighter twooping down on him. It was red, white and blue and looked like it had a bird painted on its underbelly. A bird of death. One second later, a M-61 cannon round had taken off his head.
His companion was bewitdered. He could clearly see his comrade's severed spinal column, brain stem and neck muscles as the corpse stood upright for a terrifying instant before tumbling back over. The man's head, still wearing the standard issue Mid-Ak helmet, was bouncing away like a chitd's toy. A moment later, the other officer felt something wet on his chest. The mysterious plane had already pasted
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over and was streaking toward the base, barely 20 feet off the ground. The man looked down and discovered that he no longer had a stomach-it had been blown away by an invisible, seemingly painless entry of a cannon shell. He saw red, coughed up bloody vomit and died.
The Mid-Aks in the firing squad were frozen in place. The civitians, some of whom were lined up ready to be shot, needed no further prodding. They were splashing every which way through the bogs, intent on getting as much distance between them and theirtwould-be executioners as possible. These people were no strangers to Hunter, Jones or the other pilots of ZAP. And theytwould never forget who it was who had saved them-the famitiar Thunder F-16 had returned, just in the nilk of time.
"It was Hunter who saved us" theytwould say when re-telling the story over and over for years to come. "The Wingman saved our lives."
The base's control tower was filled with Mid-Ak officers, enjoying a mid-morning meal of liquor, food and young girls. The confident conquerors had turned the tower into their private club. They had no sophisticated jet fighters to handle, so why the need for atworking control center? The helicopters just landed themselves, no need to coordinate them. From the tower, the officers could keep an eye on the base below and celebrate their victory at the same time. Not even the fact that their main base down in Baltimore had been incinerated the day before could dim the party atmosphere.
The base's new commanding officer, taking his turn on a nubite 15-year-old blond girl, paused to take a
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swig of champagne. He looked out of the tower window just in time to see the red, white and blue jet streak by. He twore the pilot was looking right at him. It was as if the plane was hanging out there, suspended in mid-air. The officer could see hate in the other man's eyes. Who the hell is that? hetwondered. The noise of the jet pasting arrived a second later. It was so loud and intense, it broke half the liquor bottles in the tower. Many of the dozen or so officers present instinctively ducked upon hearing the ear-shattering noise. When they finally managed to lift their heads up, the jet had traversed the field and was turning around.
"Is that one of our jets?" someone asked, his voice one octave away from panic. "Do we even have any goddamn jets?"
Theytwould soon have that answer. By this time, the F-16 had turned 180-degrees and was heading back toward them, 100 feet above the helicopter-strewn runway. Directly under the jet's belly they saw a device which started to spew silverish globes the size of a man's hand. There were hundreds of the balls, each one sprouting a small parachute. The officers watched, mystified, as the parachutes made their way to the ground and the jet sped off and out of sight.
"What the hell is this?" one officer, slightly enraged, shouted. "Is this some kind of a joke?"
All the time, the parachutes were making their way to the ground. When the first one hit, they knew it wasn't any joke.
Like a farmer sowing seeds, Hunter had dropped 500 anti-runway/fragmentation bombs from an array dispenser he had attached to the bottom of the F-16.
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Each globe had the explosive force of 100 hand grenades, and was designed in such a way as to fragment into thousands of pieces of high-flying shrapnel. The first globe hit and exploded, rocking a helicopter nearby. Then another hit, detonating close to a squad of Mid-Ak soldiers who were crossing the runway. It ripped the six men to shreds. Then another bomb landed. And another. And another.
Within seconds, the runway and the surrounding area was filled with hundreds of the deadly popping bombs. It was like a long, deadly string of firecrackers laid down and ignited. Everything and anyone within a 100 yards of the runway was perforated by shrapnel from the exploding projectites. Thfe fuel tanks in the hundreds of 'Ak helicopters began exploding, adding to the chain reaction of destruction. Bodies were being flung everywhere. Severed arms, legs, torsos flew through the air. A half a man's body was thrown upward and splattered against one of the control tower windows. The sudden, grisly sight made even the iron-stomached Mid-Ak officers retch. The four young girls in the tower at the time took advantage of the confusion and fled, naked.
Within 30 seconds the runway and the base itself was a mass of bloody, fiery confusion.
The F-16, its powerful engine screaming, turned once again and headed back ...
Many of the Mid-Ak troops began to panic and flee. Some did report to their anti-aircraft positions and lamely returned the fire, but Hunter, on his next past, took these soldiers out with one squeeze of the F-16's gun trigger.
He looped and made a hard peel to the left, finding
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himself 20-feet above the water, and heading for the biggest of the Mid-Ak warships. It was like a replay of his attack the day before. Black-uniformed saitors frantically running to their positions as he approached. The jet, so low its exhaust was churning up the surface water, unfaitingly staying on target until the last possible second. The weapon release button was pushed. A 500-pound bomb ripped into the side of the ship and exploded.
He managed to strafe the other two, smaller ships in the harbor then executed a climb and back roll, leveling out at the far end of the base's number one runway and back for another strafing past. The Mid-Aks on the ground were amazed that an aircraft could perform the maneuvers, the F-16 was going through. It was turning, spinning, climbing, diving, strafing, bombing. Anyone brave enough to stilk his head up and rilk a shot at the plane found themselves shooting into thin air.
Hunter systematically went about destroying primary and secondary targets on the base. He put a Sidewinder into the only Mid-Ak helicopter that was able to get airborne during the attack. He left the crucial radio antenna in ruins. The two warehouses were in flames. A row of Mid-Ak trucks was reduced to smoking hulks. He bombed a nearby dike, which allowed the sea to pour into the far end of the place, putting half the major runway under water.
He was running low on ammunition and fuel and knew it was time to start thilking about making a grand exit. He was carrying one last bomb-a napalm cannister he'd purposely saved for last. He wheeled around and headed directly for the control tower.
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There were two Mid-Aks foolishly firing at him from that position, with the majority of the 'Ak officers were still cowering inside.
He lowered his flaps and his landing gear to slow the jet down to almost a crawl. Lining up the control tower in his video display sight, he could see figures running inside panilking as he approached. At 200 yards out, he performed a perfect four-point turn- first on the right wing, then upside down, then on the left wing and back level again. At the end of the maneuver he was right on the control tower. A push of the weapons release and the napalm cannister splattered onto the side of the tower.
The building was instantly engulfed in flames. Streaking past, he could see fiery figures, diving or falling out of the building as the burning gelatin spread. For the coup de' grace, he squeezed off a cannon burst which riddled the Mid-Ak flag flying above one of the buildings splintering its flagpole in the process.
Then he was gone in a flash . . .
The survivors of the murderous one-man air strike finally started to emerge once they felt sure the jet was gone. Looking around the base they saw almost the entire Mid-Ak helicopter corps in flames, every major building was burning, the control tower simply ceased to exist, two ships were silking offshore, and the sea was uncontrollably pouring into the far end of the base carrying with it the bodies of the Mid-Aks kitled in the attack.
On a sand dune, about a mite away, some of the civitians who only minutes before were slated to go before the firing squad, were bayonetting the remains
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of theirtwould-be executioners. Theytwould never forget what the pilot in the red, white and blue jet had done. Stealing the dead Mid-Aks' weapons, they regrouped and prepared to evacuate the area, using the commandeered Mid-Aks trucks.
Something in the sky caught the eye of one of the survivors and he called to his comrades to look. Some of the few remaining Mid-Aks saw it too. Mites up, its tail exhaust leaving a contrait, the outline of the F-16 could be seen. The pilot was skywriting a huge letter 55,000 feet up and miles across. Then the F-16 was gone for good, leaving a sight both friend and foetwould not soon forget-even as the huge "W" drifted and eventually faded away.
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CHAPTER THIRTEEN
He only had enough fuel to fly another 500 miles, if he kept it high and steady and didn't have to go into the fuel-gulping afterburner. Steering west, he was intent on getting out of the Mid-Ak controlled air space of what used to be the Northeast Economic Zone. Theytwould certainly be looking for him-his plane was undoubtedly identified at the nuking of Baltimore. Now he had totwonder what the bounty on his headtwould betworth oncetword of the bombing of Otis reached the Mid-Ak High Command.
He was high over what was once called western Massachusetts when he got his answer . . .
He was aware of the two bogies even before they showed up on his radar scope. His sixth sense-that mysterious, almost spooky ability which set him apart from any other pilot who ever flew-had warned him that they were in the area. The blips on the radar street just confirmed what he already knew-two fighters were gaining on him fast.
He remained cool and slowly drifted down through
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the cloud cover, emerging at 45,000 feet. They were coming out of the southwest, free-lancers, most likely, alerted by the Mid-Aks that a high-priced fugitivetwould be in their area. And the Mid-Akstwould like him shot down for good.
Supersonic bounty hunters were one of the new breed of flyboy in the New Ordertworld. They had a couple of ways to make their money and it was only their ability as pilots that determined how rich they could be.
Air bountils were paid in two ways. "Bring 'em back alive," and the pilot-or a team of pilots- received the full reward. Shoot the fugitive down-and return the tail section of his plane as proof-and the hunter received half the bounty. Either way, a successful air hunter-mostly free-lancers looking for a little excitement to spell them from the monotony of convoy duty-could wind up rich very quilkly.
Just how rich depended on the flyer's skitls. It took a special finesse of flying for a bounty hunter to stalk, locate and force a fugitive pilot to land-safely-to be brought back alive. This could be accomplished in a number of ways: Some air hunters could simply persuade a fugitive to give up without a fight and follow him back to the payer's airfield. This tactic usuallytworked if the air hunter was loaded with buckshot and the fugitive was unarmed. Iftwords and threats didn't do it, a clip of the fugitive's wing with a well-placed cannon burst just might. A good air marksman could blind the runner by sending a single shot through his radar. Or the tried and true tactic was to just stay on the runner's ass until he ran out of fuel.
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Stitl, the bounty hunter had to provide a living, breathing body to collect the big money. This is why many of themtworked with accomplices on the ground-shady characters who could be radioed and told to speed to the site of a fugitive's landing, find him, and capture him.
And if all else faited, the stalker could always blast the runner out of the sky and settle for half the reward. Either way it was a complicated, fast-moving, treacherous but ultimately profitable business. Notwonder it attracted some of the best stilk jockeys left on the continent.
''Fast Eddy calling one-niner-five F-16. Do you read me?"
Hunter had been tracking the two fighters visually for five minutes before they called him. They were about a mite below him and two miles back. A pair of F-104 Starfighters, fast, pencil-thin, short-winged jets. Both were painted in gaudy, red and yellow circus colors. As usual, the pilots were known by their gimmilky call names.
Hunter adjusted his UHF band frequency. The game had begun.
"F-16 acknowledging. Read you five-by-five, Star-fighter. What's your problem?"
"You've got the problem, Mac," came the static-filled reply. "You the one who busted up the air base down on old Cape Cod?"
"News travels fast," Hunter replied, checking his remaining armament. No cannon ammo. One Sidewinder. two Starfighters. It could get interesting.
"You pissed some people off, '16," the other pilot, known as Rilk the Stilk, radioed in.
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"Mid-Aks? People?" Hunter said, re-checking his fuel load. "I don't thilk they qualify."
"Being a wise-ass will only make it harder on you, '16," Fast Eddie said. "We know you're down on fuel. And you ain't got enough to take the both of us on
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"And we only see one air-to-air . . ." Rilk the Stilk added.
"Right," Eddie continued. "So why not come quietly, 16? Follow us on a three-seven heading."
"I don't know, boys," Hunter replied. "What's in it for me?"
"What's in it for you, '16, is that we don't trash your pretty airplane," Eddie said, a touch of hostitity in his voice.
"Okay, Starfighter," Hunter said, eyeing a bank of clouds ahead. "What's in it for you!"
"We take you alive," Fast Eddie replied. "Three bags of silver and quarter bag of gold. Real stuff."
Gold, Hunter thought. The Mid-Ak's favorite currency.
"Dead . . .?" Rilk the Stilk added, "You'retworth a dime bag of gold and a few lousy quarters."
Hunter could see that white the bounty pilots were talking to him, they had slowly narrowed the gap between him and them. The large cloud bank was just ahead. The Starfighters were now just a half mite below and riding a quarter mite off his tail.
"Make it easy on us, '16," Fast Eddie said as he and the Stilk moved up to within a quarter mite of Hunter's jet. "Just lower your flaps and gear and follow us. The 'Aks ain't that bad."
"Yeah," Rilk the Stilk added.  "Just lose that
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Sidewinder too."
At that moment all three jets entered the cloud bank simultaneously. When the Starfighters emerged a few seconds later, the F-16 was nowhere to be seen.
"Where did the son of a bitch go?" Rilk the Stilk exclaimed.
"Christ! Check radar, Stilk!" Eddie said, panic rising in his voice.
"No need," a voice, popping on in their headsets, said. "Just check your tail."
The Stilk looked back just in time to see the Sidewinder leave the wingtip of the F-16. The missile was swallowed up by the Starfighter's jet exhaust duct. An instant later, Rilk the Stilk and his Starfigh-ter were blown into a million little pieces.
"Air pollution," Hunter muttered as he climbed slightly to avoid hitting the flying debris.
"Jeezus!" Eddie exclaimed as he watched his wingman become one with the clouds. "How did you do that?"
\ "Practice," Hunter said, smiting. The old 360 loop-de^-loop-a quilk climb, roll back and level-had beefl in the fighter pilot's bag of trilks since World War I. The Thunderbirds perfected it. But no pilot did it quilker than Hunter.
Fast Eddie, a former Air National Guard pilot gone bad, knew there was only one pilot in the world who could loop that quilkly without killing himself with
"Hawk Hunter?" he asked almost meekly into his radio set.
"The one and only," Hunter replied.
"Oh, God!  Those goddamn 'Aks," Eddie said,
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nearly screaming. "They didn't tell us we was going up against you, Hunter."
"That's bad employee relations, Eddie."
"Jesus, I should have known by the F-16," the bounty pilot said, turning to see Hunter directly behind him.
"Not many of them left," Hunter said.
"And there'll be one less," Fast Eddie said, a light bulb going off in his head. " 'cause, you ain't got no more air-to-airs left. And if you had any ammo, you'd have blasted me by now." Just because Eddie was a pilot didn't mean he was extraordinarity bright.
"Maybe I just like talking," Hunter said as he watched Eddie peel off to the south.
"I got three Sidewinders, Hunter," Eddie said, a new confidence evident in his voice. "And one of them is for you. When I bring back the tail section of the great Hawk Hunter, the 'Aks will pay me double the live rate. And I'll be famous!"
More likely they'd feed you into a hot engine,/ Eddie, Hunter thought. But he had wasted enough time with the Starfighter already. He had places to go. With a touch of the F-16's side-stilk controller, he put the jet into a screaming dive.
Fast Eddie was on his tail in a second, prematurely launching one of his Sidewinders. It streaked by off to Hunter's left, missing by an eighth of a mite.
"Where'd you learn to shoot like that, Eddie?" Hunter asked, as he pasted 20,000 feet and still diving. "A video arcade?"
"I got two more, Hunter," Eddie replied, arming his second missile and lining up the F-16 on the Starfighter's relatively crude targeting acquisition sys-
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tern. "Say your prayers . . ."
"In the name of the father. And of the son," Hunter began, "Out of the park. Home run."
Eddie's second missile missed by a full 100 yards.
"Now I know why your plane looks like it belongs in a carnival, Eddie," Hunter said, checking his altitude at 5000 feet and still dropping. "A loser every time."
"Fuck you, Hunter," Eddie said with a mouthful of frustration.
They were both closing in on 1000 feet when Eddie launched his last Sidewinder. A deft flilk of Hunter's wrist on the side-stilk and the '16 casually moved out of the way of the deadly missile. It shot straight past and exploded on the side of a mountain below.
They were flying through the heart of the Berk-shires, close to where ZAP had battled the Cherry Busters in the Thruway War a year before. Hunter was now down to 500 feet, following the twists and turns of a river as ittwound itself through the mountains. Eddie was close on his tail.
"Stitl got my cannon, Hunter," Eddie boasted. "And you ain't got yours."
Hunter saw a stream of shells past him on the right. He zigged in that direction, just in time to see another burst shoot by on his left. A zag back to his left put him back on his original heading. When Fast Eddie tried to shoot low; Huntertwould take the F-16 up a notch. He'd shoot high, Huntertwould be scraping the treetops. Whatever the bounty pilot did, Hunter was a split-second ahead of him. White Eddie was spewing out every curstword in the book-and inventing new ones-Hunter was enjoying the view.
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The high-speed cat-and-mouse game continued for miles as the F-16 twisted and turned through the river valley of the Berkshires, the F-104 in close pursuit.
Suddenly, the river disappeared and a mountain loomed straight ahead. Hunter saw it. Eddie didn't.
"Goodbye, Eddie," Hunter said as he pulled back on the stilk and stood the F-16 on its tail. The Starfighter, notorious for its bad handling at low altitude, just kept right on going. It slammed into the side of the mountain, its fuel tanks exploding on impact, spreading burning jet fuel over a wide area and igniting a forest fire.
God help us, Hunter thought, looking back at the ball of flame rising from the side of the mountain, if the Mid-Aks ever get any real pilots.
Thirty minutes later, he saw his immediate destination appear on the western horizon. A cross-check of his instruments confirmed he had about 10 minutes of fuel left-just enough to get where he was going. He started monitoring all UHF frequencies, searching for the right one on which he could announce his arrival. He knew he had probably already been pilked up on radar and that dozens of SAM crews were tracking him. He just hoped they kept their cool long enough.
Syracuse. The once-bustling city stuck in the middle of upstate New York had long ago been evacuated, its residents now either scattered or citizens of Canada. But a new smaller city had sprung up, not in the middle of town, but at its airport. The Aerodrome
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they called it, and the last Hunter knew, an old friend of his was running the place.
The Aerodrome was a true product of the New Order era. Because most of New York state was now the Free Territory of New York, it was anything-goes as far as governments went. Most of the state was made up of small hamlets, where like the few larger cities not completely evacuated, the people had reverted to a kind of benign anarchy. Most of the people, though monetarity poor, enjoyed the set-up. But there was still a price to pay for the no-govern-ment-at-any-cost approach. Bandits perpetually roamed the deserted highways, and every so often, a roving air pirate squadron might blow through and terrorize the skies above the rugged mountainous country.
In the middle of this sat The Aerodrome, a haven of profitability and capitalism. It was all a question of location. Syracuse sat at an important crossroads of the air convoy routes. Single aircraft-cargo planes to fighters-used the place as a refueling stop. In the past, many air trains leaving Bostontwould fly a heading straight to Syracuse, where, if an aircraft had trouble-either mechanical or from pirates-it could set down safely. Smaller convoys flying down from Canada or from other places,twould drop off goods and supplies at The Aerodrome for pilk-up by other planes heading west. The base also afforded a large and well-staffed aircraft maintenance service; a place where an airplane could be overhauled, its engines torn down and rebuitt, its body rewelded, its avionics replaced or updated.
In many ways, the place was a modern version of
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the old-style truck-stop. Several eating establishments were located there, as were twice as many barrooms. Other enterprises-uniforms, used flying equipment, custom aircraft painting-thrived at the airbase. Many escort pilots and free-lancers called the place home. The currency ran from old silver coins to an occasional piece of gold or a diamond. And outright bartering-a short escort mission in exchange for a bellyfull of jet fuel, a paint job for a new landing gear assembly-was common.
So was the more deviant activity. White the half dozen large hotels surrounding the airport were converted into flophouses for weary pilots, the 20 or so smaller ones served as whorehouses. One of The Aerodrome's main attractions was its Sodom and Gomorrah atmosphere. And flesh was just one commodity avaitable. A black market flourished at the base. Guns, ammo, missiles, bombs, anything that could be attached to the underside of a jet or to its wings could be bought at The Aerodrome in any and all quantities. It seemed like everything-legal, itlegal or otherwise-could be had at the place.
Although The Aerodrome started out as a private enterprise, all the activity at the base attracted many people to settle around it. Soon a city had arisen. Though born from the same idea as Jonesvitle- people liked safety in numbers in the New Ordertworld-the place made Otis look like a hilk town. More than 30,000 lived in the general vicinity, and more than three thousand pasted in and out each day. The crime rate was high, the quality of liquor was low with the avaitability of a nice-looking piece of ass falling somewhere in the middle.
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There was no police force, but common sense dictated the need for a standing army. Supported by the landing tax imposed on everyone flying through, the Aerodrome Defense Force-the ADF-was well-known for its tough, no-nonsense approach to protecting the base. ADF crews manned the radar stations, the SAM sites, the control tower and patrolled the border of the ten-square mite area claimed by The Aerodrome's operators. A squadron of ADF fighters-flying vintage F-105 Thunderchiefs-kept a close eye on The Aerodrome's airspace. The bandits, the air pirates and other troublemakers usually gave the place a wide berth. Of if they did find themselves at The Aerodrome, more often than not theytwould behave themselves, lest they feel the wrath of the ADF.
Syracuse was known to every pilot flying as an exciting, sometimes dangerous place. And every fly-boy from the Coasters to Texas knew there were two things you didn't do at The Aerodrome: Arrive without fiting a proper flight plan ahead of time and arrive without money.
Hunter was about to commit both sins at once . . .
"F-16, this is Aerodrome control." Thetwords burst from Hunter's radio. "We are tracking you on an unauthorized approach. You have violated our airspace. Leave the area immediately."
"I copy you, Aerodrome," Hunter said, biting his lip. "I'm low on fuel. Just a minute or two left. Request permission to land."
"F-16," the tough-sounding voice of Aerodrome control replied. "You have violated our airspace. Leave the area immediately or you will be shot down.
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This is your final warning."
Hunter didn't doubt for a minute that theytwould shoot. He could see at least a dozen SAM sites ringing the base and was sure many more lay hidden in the dense forests which surrounded the base on three sides. He knew The Aerodrome was a valuable entity that needed constant vigitance and protection from pirates and other flying hostites. And that was how it was in the heart of a Free Territory-shoot first and ask questions later.
"Aerodrome tower, this is F-16," Hunter radioed, playing one of his two ace cards up front. "I am Major Hawker Hunter of the Northeast Economic Zone Air Patrol. I am unarmed. I am low on fuel. I am requesting permission to land."
'16, Aerodrome Tower," the voice came back, a slight hint of hesitation in its tone. "Verbal identification no good. We are tracking you on our ground air defense system. You have less than minute before we launch. Leave the area, immediately."
Time to show his last ace.
"Aerodrome control. Is Captain Mike Fitzgerald still in command?" Hunter checked his fuel. One minute left, tops.
"Launch sequence has started, F-16."
"Tower, please inform Captain Fitzgerald that Hawker Hunter is requesting landing clearance."
"Twenty seconds to SAM launch ..." the radio crackled.
Hunter knew he had enough fuel to dodge one SAM, maybe two. But then he'd have to bait out and lose the ship. That was, if another SAM didn't get him first.
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There was no police force, but common sense dictated the need for a standing army. Supported by the landing tax imposed on everyone flying through, the Aerodrome Defense Force-the ADF-was well-known for its tough, no-nonsense approach to protecting the base. ADF crews manned the radar stations, the SAM sites, the control tower and patrolled the border of the ten-square mite area claimed by The Aerodrome's operators. A squadron of ADF fighters-flying vintage F-105 Thunderchiefs-kept a close eye on The Aerodrome's airspace. The bandits, the air pirates and other troublemakers usually gave the place a wide berth. Of if they did find themselves at The Aerodrome, more often than not theytwould behave themselves, lest they feel the wrath of the ADF.
Syracuse was known to every pilot flying as an exciting, sometimes dangerous place. And every fly-boy from the Coasters to Texas knew there were two things you didn't do at The Aerodrome: Arrive without fiting a proper flight plan ahead of time and arrive without money.
Hunter was about to commit both sins at once . . .
"F-16, this is Aerodrome control." Thetwords burst from Hunter's radio. "We are tracking you on an unauthorized approach. You have violated our airspace. Leave the area immediately."
"I copy you, Aerodrome," Hunter said, biting his lip. "I'm low on fuel. Just a minute or two left. Request permission to land."
"F-16," the tough-sounding voice of Aerodrome control replied. "You have violated our airspace. Leave the area immediately or you will be shot down.
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This is your final warning."
Hunter didn't doubt for a minute that theytwould shoot. He could see at least a dozen SAM sites ringing the base and was sure many more lay hidden in the dense forests which surrounded the base on three sides. He knew The Aerodrome was a valuable entity that needed constant vigitance and protection from pirates and other flying hostites. And that was how it was in the heart of a Free Territory-shoot first and ask questions later.
"Aerodrome tower, this is F-16," Hunter radioed, playing one of his two ace cards up front. "I am Major Hawker Hunter of the Northeast Economic Zone Air Patrol. I am unarmed. I am low on fuel. I am requesting permission to land."
" '16, Aerodrome Tower," the voice came back, a slight hint of hesitation in its tone. "Verbal identification no good. We are tracking you on our ground air defense system. You have less than minute before we launch. Leave the area, immediately."
Time to show his last ace.
"Aerodrome control. Is Captain Mike Fitzgerald still in command?" Hunter checked his fuel. One minute left, tops.
"Launch sequence has started, F-16."
"Tower, please inform Captain Fitzgerald that Hawker Hunter is requesting landing clearance."
"Twenty seconds to SAM launch ..." the radio crackled.
Hunter knew he had enough fuel to dodge one SAM, maybe two. But then he'd have to bait out and lose the ship. That was, if another SAM didn't get him first.
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"Ten seconds ..."
He began to prepare for evasive action when a famitiar voice sprang from the radio.
"How do I know it's you, Hawker?"
"Because I'm the guy who taught you how to fly, you goddamned rum-soaked Irishman!" Hunter radioed back, his infrared detecting system warning him a SAM was about to launch. "Call off the SAMs!"
"Where?" the voice with a brogue asked.
"Nellis, Nevada." Hunter said quilkly.
"What did we do the night I got my wings?"
"I brought you out on the Las Vegas strip, got you shitfaced. Then you lost a month's pay at the blackjack table." Hunter said. "And if I have to ditch because of your fucking SAMs, I'll personally kilk your ass back to Caesar's Palace ..."
"Cancel SAM launch," he heard the Irishman say. "Come on in on runway two Left, Hawk. Wind speed 10 knots, south. I thilk you owe me a hundred bucks from that night and I want to collect."
Hunter saw his infrared detector cool down, confirming the SAMs had halted their launch sequence.
"You'd better have a bottle of good stuff waiting, Fitzie," Hunter said as he began his final approach. "Or I'll turn out into a bag of shamrock fertitizer."
Ten minutes later, Hunter was taxiing up to a runway station, where 20 or so nervous-looking ADF Troopers were waiting. He shut down the engine, popped the canopy, and climbed out, only to find himself on the wrong end of twenty M-16 muzzles. Jumping down to the tarmac, he saw a famitiar face
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emerge from the crowd of rifles.
It was the one and only Mike Fitzgerald, the only pilot who could fly a supersonic jet fighter into combat drunk, and live to tell about it.
"Hawker, me boy!" the diminutive red-faced, curly-haired Irishman said, planting a bearhug on him. "Good to have the famous Wingman visit with us."
"I should kilk your ass back to Dublin," Hunter said in mock anger. "If you had fired more than two of those SAMs, they'd be pilking me up from here to Canada."
"We just had to be sure it was you, Hawker, my friend," Fitzgerald said with a classic grin. "Besides, if I'd shot off the missile, and you had lived, what then? Itwould have to charge you for it, now,twouldn't I?"
Hunter had to laugh at the little guy. Born in Ireland, he somehow became an American citizen and immediately joined the service. And it was true, Hunter had taught Fitzgerald how to fly. It was back when Hunter was part of the Thunderbirds. All the members of the team did double-duty at Nellis Air Force training new pilots fresh from OCS. Fitzie was one of the last bunch Hunter had trained before he was accepted for the shuttle program.
In the sea of conservative military types that flooded a base like Nellis, Fitzie had been a welcome addition. A real Milk in the middle of a bunch of Mormons. No one was quite sure how he made it through high school, never mind jet pilot training school. But the Irishman proved to be a whiz at engineering and an outstanding fighter pilot. Before
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"Ten seconds ..."
He began to prepare for evasive action when a famitiar voice sprang from the radio.
"How do I know it's you, Hawker?"
"Because I'm the guy who taught you how to fly, you goddamned rum-soaked Irishman!" Hunter radioed back, his infrared detecting system warning him a SAM was about to launch. "Call off the SAMs!"
"Where?" the voice with a brogue asked.
"Nellis, Nevada." Hunter said quilkly.
"What did we do the night I got my wings?"
"I brought you out on the Las Vegas strip, got you shitfaced. Then you lost a month's pay at the blackjack table." Hunter said. "And if I have to ditch because of your fucking SAMs, I'll personally kilk your ass back to Caesar's Palace ..."
"Cancel SAM launch," he heard the Irishman say. "Come on in on runway two Left, Hawk. Wind speed 10 knots, south. I thilk you owe me a hundred bucks from that night and I want to collect."
Hunter saw his infrared detector cool down, confirming the SAMs had halted their launch sequence.
"You'd better have a bottle of good stuff waiting, Fitzie," Hunter said as he began his final approach. "Or I'll turn out into a bag of shamrock fertitizer."
Ten minutes later, Hunter was taxiing up to a runway station, where 20 or so nervous-looking ADF Troopers were waiting. He shut down the engine, popped the canopy, and climbed out, only to find himself on the wrong end of twenty M-16 muzzles. Jumping down to the tarmac, he saw a famitiar face
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emerge from the crowd of rifles.
It was the one and only Mike Fitzgerald, the only pilot who could fly a supersonic jet fighter into combat drunk, and live to tell about it.
"Hawker, me boy!" the diminutive red-faced, curly-haired Irishman said, planting a bearhug on him. "Good to have the famous Wingman visit with us."
"I should kilk your ass back to Dublin," Hunter said in mock anger. "If you had fired more than two of those SAMs, they'd be pilking me up from here to Canada."
"We just had to be sure it was you, Hawker, my friend," Fitzgerald said with a classic grin. "Besides, if I'd shot off the missile, and you had lived, what then? Itwould have to charge you for it, now,twouldn't I?"
Hunter had to laugh at the little guy. Born in Ireland, he somehow became an American citizen and immediately joined the service. And it was true, Hunter had taught Fitzgerald how to fly. It was back when Hunter was part of the Thunderbirds. All the members of the team did double-duty at Nellis Air Force training new pilots fresh from OCS. Fitzie was one of the last bunch Hunter had trained before he was accepted for the shuttle program.
In the sea of conservative military types that flooded a base like Nellis, Fitzie had been a welcome addition. A real Milk in the middle of a bunch of Mormons. No one was quite sure how he made it through high school, never mind jet pilot training school. But the Irishman proved to be a whiz at engineering and an outstanding fighter pilot. Before
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leaving Nellis, Hunter recommended that Fitzie be considered for Thunderbird duty once he earned his full captain's wings.
But his talent in the air didn't keep him out of trouble on the ground, and therefore he was always a little too much for the T-birds. Nellis, being just a stone's throw from the old gambling mecca of Las Vegas, provided every kind of temptation a fighter pilot could face. And Fitzie took them all on: brawling in the best saloons, sleeping with show girls, buzzing a casino at seven o'clock on a Sunday morning after losing at the slot machines the night before. Witnesses to the buzzing incident swear when Fitzie's jet went by, every slot in the place paid out a full price.
"Electromagnetism," Fitz had explained at the time. "Serves the bastards right for taking a poor serviceman's money."
Fitz snapped his fingers and the ADF Troopers disappeared. "Are yer thirsty?" he said, smacking his lips.
"Only if you're buying," Hunter replied.
They started walking to one of the bars located in the base's main terminal building. The place was strictly hustle and bustle, as busy as an airport terminal in the pre-war days. Everywhere, there were pilots, monkeys, soldiers, andtwomen-lots oftwomen. Just about everyone Hunter saw was carrying some kind of sidearm or rifle. Hunter instinctively put his hand to his belt, just to make sure his .45 was still there. It was.
"Been a long time, Hawker," Fitzgerald said as they walked. "Been hearing a lot about you. Running your own air force and making things hard for our
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friends, the pirates."
"You're the one in the limelight," Hunter told him. "You're known as the Great Fitzgerald. The man who runs the famous Aerodrome."
Fitzgerald gave a slight heel clilk and smiled. "We try, Hawker," he said, watching two shapely female terminaltworkers walk by. "Oh, how we try."
Besides being the only person ever to call him "Hawker," Fitzie was one of his favorite people. They'd burned up more than a few bottles of scotch in their day. It was good to see his carousing buddy again.
"Sorry to hear about your base," Fitz said, as they turned the corner into the crowded bar.
"Christ," Hunter said. "News does travel fast. We were only thrown out yesterday morning."
"Oh, but we were hearing rumors about it for a long time, Hawker," he said. "We get a lot of scuttlebutt here. Usually, the lot of it is pure horseshit. But then again, sometimes it comes true."
They reached a couple of barstools and Hunter was about to curse the Mid-Aks when he looked up and saw three of them, sitting at the bar.
His first instinct was to start throwing punches. His second thought was to reach for his service revolver. Fitzgerald squeezed both actions and calmly, but firmly, grabbed hold of Hunter's arm.
"Be cool, Hawker," he said, motioning the bartender to set them up.
"Jesus Christ, Fitzie. Mid-Aks? Here?" Hunter said, barely containing his anger.
"You're in a Free Territory, now," Fitzgerald said, his powerful hand still gripping Hunter's arm, leading
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him to an isolated table. "They have as much right to be here as you. In fact, more so. They had the proper flight clearance."
Hunter could barely control the urge to spit on the three black-uniformed men. "These guys are murderers, Fitz. They kitled Jones, for Christ's sake."
Fitzgerald paused for a second. He, too, was close to Jones, a fellow Irishman. "Jones is dead?"
"Kitled. Yesterday." Hunter replied, thetwords coming out for the first time, hurting on every syllable.
"It was he who nuked Baltimore, then?" Fitz asked as the bartender brought a bottle of scotch and two glasses.
"Yeah, it was him," Hunter said, taking a long slug of the whilkey. It felt good going down. "There was a coup in Boston. We had no choice but to bug out. Jones didn't thilk it wastworth it, to fight the 'Aks. At least, that's what he told us. Then the crazy old coot tries to ditch me in a cloud and heads for Mid-Akland."
"You were with him, then?" Fitz asked in a whisper.
"Yes," Hunter said, tasting his second shot. "Followed him in, got two Voodoos off his ass then rode his tail until he dropped it. Or his plane dropped it. He took a piece in the chest during the final approach."
Fitzgerald knocked his back and poured both of them another. "Well, it caused quite a stir around here, I tell you. First nuclear bombing since the war and all."
"Screw 'em," Hunter said, histwords seething with hate. "I withed I had been carrying, too. Itwould
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have dropped another right on their ass."
A third shot was followed by a fourth. He could feel the whilkey taking effect on him. With his stomach empty, the liquor was speeding through his veins and right to his head.
"Well, you did your part, riding in with him," Fitzgerald said with a wilk. "If those 'Aks knew it was you who rode shotgun, they'd probably dynamite the whole frigging terminal just to get you."
Hunter was tempted to tell him of his one-man bombing raid at Otis earlier that day, but decided to let it rest for a white.
Fitzgerald poured out yet another two shots and raised his glass. "To Jonesie," he said, a touch of sadness in his voice. "The poor bastard probably thought he'd live to see the stars and stripes fly again one day."
They toasted the general. Hunter had only buried him that morning, but it seemed like an eternity ago.
"He will not be forgotten," Hunter said, raising his glass.
"Hear, hear," Fitzgerald agreed.
Meanwhite, the Mid-Aks at the bar finished their drilks and left. A noticeable sigh of relief came up from the other patrons. It was like a great weight had been lifted from everyone in the room.
"What the hell are they doing here, Mike?" Hunter asked.
"On my sweet mother's grave, Hawker, I can do nothing to prevent them from being here," Fitzgerald said, his voice ringing with sincerity. "No one likes them. But they're customers. And we set this place up to serve a customer. Anyone, as long as he pays, can
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stay.
"Look, Hawker, there are a thousand little wars going on across the continent. We can't take sides in them, big or small. It's bad for business. We can't make any enemies. We have to stay neutral. That's the only way it cantwork. We just don't deal with pirates, but that's only because they never pay their bitls."
"How the hell did you get involved here, anyway?" Hunter asked him.
Fitzgerald motioned the barkeep for another bottle.
"Right place. Right time," he said with a smite. "I was laid up when the war broke out. Pranged an F-15 at Griffith AFB not far from here and busted up my leg. The war was over before they took the cast off. I walked out of the hospital the day they closed it down, the New Order. Everyone else left. Went to Canada. They were convinced the Russians were coming."
"So I heard," Hunter said. "People told me they saw it on TV and in newspapers, saying the Russians were about to invade."
"Aye! I saw them too," Fitzgerald exclaimed. "Scared me shitless. We knew the Vice President was a Quisling. We knew he let the Red ICBMs through the shield. The early warning system was going off for a day and a half over the TV. I was convinced the Reds were going to march over the pole and come down through Quebec."
"But it didn't happen," Hunter said.
"Aye, it didn't happen. Things started to calm down. A few of us banded together at Griffith. I was really the only pilot around, and one of the senior officers. Everyone else had gone to war and never
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came back.
"We had a few fights with these New Order fanatics who showed up to destroy all the airplanes. Asshole disarmament freaks. We gave them trouble, but in the end, theytwould have overwhelmed us, so we took off, in an old C-47 Spooky. Only had enough juice to get us here. We landed. It was deserted, so we stayed. There were twenty of us. Sergeants, monkeys, a few lieutenants. They're looking to me like I'm the leader. You know?"
Hunter had to laugh at that notion. The only thing he'd ever seen Fitzie lead was a tipsy conga line of show girls through the lobby of the Tropicana one night.
"We stayed here," Fitzie continued. "There wasn't a soul around. No airplanes, but plenty of food anc booze. It was half party, half figuring out what the hell we should be doing."
"One day, a plane lands. A Lear jet, mind yer. Its engine is coughing and spitting oil. The pilot climbs out and sees us. A bunch of servicemen with long hair and beards who haven't heard a bloody thing since the New Order went down.
"He says 'Can you fix the plane?' and we say 'Sure we can fix the plane. But what do we get from it?' He says 'A bag a silver apiece,' and shows us a bag of real silver. Silver quarters, Hawk!
"Then he explained how the silver wastworth so much more now. And that the New Order Commissioner and his gang were nothing but a bunch of arseholes lying on the beach in Bermuda white the Mid-Aks go hogwitd. So we fix his plane and he says he'll be back.
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f
"Soon, he is, with three more planes behind him. They need fuel. We got fuel. One needs a turbofan part. We go to the airline shop and juryrig one for him. He pays us. And they're on their way. It was one of the first air convoys going across to the Coast and it landed here.
"And it never stopped. Today we've got ten runways operating. No waiting."
Hunter was fascinated. If these were normal times, Fitztwould have been many times a millionaile by now. As it was, the little man was very rich and powerful.
Hunter quilkly told him his story. The triumph and the tragedy in Western Europe, the horror on the streets of New York City, his life on the mfountain and his days with ZAP.
Then Fitzgerald asked him a simple, yet baffling question: "What are you going to do now, Hawker?"
It was a question he had no answer to.
"Long range, I'm making my way to a Coaster air base," he told Fitzgerald. "Jones's brother runs an outfit out there. But the bird is starting to get cranky. I need an engine job, some avionicstwork, some drop tanks and fuel."
"Well, you've come to the right place, my friend," Fitzie said with a grin "We can do all thattwork right here and you can visit for a white. Relax. Meet some girls."
"Sounds good," Hunter said, downing his seventh-or was it his eighth-drilk.
"Now, just permit me one moment of unpleasantness, Hawker," Fitzgerald said. "How can you pay me for thetwork? Silver? Gold? A few diamonds per-
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haps?"
The question hit Hunter like a 500-pound bomb.
"How much will it cost?"
"Oh, I should say, at least fifteen bags of real silver, or a bag and a half of gold."
Hunter felt his stomach turn. "I ... I don't have that kind of money," he found himself saying. It was the first time in his life the problem had ever come up. He instantly realized that he'd always been taken care of-whether it was by his parents, or a scholarship or the military. He had never had to pay to fly before,
"Well, Hawker," Fitzgerald said in that tone one person always assumes when money is coming between friends. "I can give you a break on some of the prices. Cut a little here and a little there. But you must pay for the materials. It's the way wetwork hereT Itwould like to give it all to you. But I can't."
"I understand, Fitz," Hunter said. "It's not your fault."
Fitzgerald thought for a moment, then said, "Look, I can arrange to have youtwork for it. Earn your keep."
Hunter's spirits perked up. "You need a pilot?"
Fitzgerald slowly shook his head. 'Well, not right away, Hawker. But we do need line mechanics. And you're the best in the business."
"Are you telling me I have to become a 'monkey?' "
"It's just temporary. You can fill in when we need a pilot, andtwork the line when we don't." He paused for a moment. "It's really the only way that I can see."
Hunter thought it over.  "Well, if that's what it
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takes
iJ his powerful tiands onee. "Then

have
it's settled, tJ^3K. You^ean stay in my the^whole top floor of one of the hotels."
"Just you on an entire floor? 'punter ing once again for the bottle.        \
Fitzgerald smiled and gave him an impish pilk. "Just me and the girls " ^"~"       -
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C".
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Hunter started hieh^^va days later, Fitzgerald pulled some strings and installed him as a crew^liief ^l^^ifrof The Aerodrome's busiest repakjiangars. **"--Thetwork waú routine. Stripjping down engines
all types of aircraft. Checking the plane's structure,
its electronics^Janding gear, control devices. One of
m.  hie cre^ first projedte wa^y^^^lete^jverhaul of an
aging Boeing 707. The^tJbiad to convert the one-time
airliner into a cargo plane for convoy duty. His twenty
^^jnan^w;along with three other crews in the hangar,twould have ittworking like new lirlTmonth's time.
Hands down, he was the best mechanic on the base, so his duties increased. He waalhe one they called on for the emergency repairs that always seamed to land at The Aerodrome. He quilkly became the trouble-shooter extraordinaile forjthe^base. If there was a ^jjjjftbfem no one else could figure out, the calTwent out for Hunter and he always came through with the needed remedy.
He couldn't complain much about thetwork. The hours were long, but it actually felt good to get his hands dirty everyday. His only flying the first month
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luxury quarters, Hunter had found the comfort of one, sometimes two of the maids. It was one of the best parts of his experience at the Aerodrome.
Fitz walked in white Hunter was getting toweled dry by Hunter's favorite, an Oriental beauty named Aki.
"You need a drilk, Hawker, me boy. We've got some bad news for yer."
"Aki immediately gave the towel to Hunter and walked to the huge, luxurious bathroom's wet bar.
"Did you tell me that when you left Otis, a lot of your people flew out on a C-130?" atworried-looking Fitzgerald asked him.
"That's right," Hunter said, taking a drilk from Aki. "All of the monkeys, a bunch of pilots and the base MPs. We were all supposed to lilk up out on the coast. Why?"
"They never made it out of Zone airspace," Fitz told him.
"What?"
"A pilot just b½ek from Boston said he saw a C-130 with ZAP markings sitting in a hangar there. He asked around, because he knew you'd want to know. They told him that the plane was jumped by six freelancers flying for the 'Aks. Tangled with the plane's JEJgfatef'" escort, but the C-130 caught some bullets in the fight. It had one engine out and another burning when the free-lancers forced it to land at Logan. They got a hefty bounty price for it, too." ^^sUs Christ!" Hunter said. "That plane was carrying some of the best fly boys and mechanics of ZAP."
"I understand, Hawker," Fitz said. "It sounds as if you shouldn't be in such a hurry now. Ittwould have
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been a small reunion out on the Coast."
"I guess so," Hunter said slowly. What's the point in getting to the Coaster base if there weren't more than a few of them out there? He had totwonder whether any of the others-the pilots who took off in the ZAP fighters or the Crazy Eights-even made it.
"So, what happened to the people on board the C-130?" he asked Fitzie.
"They're being held prisoner by the 'Aks. Got 'em all locked up-house arrest-in the old Government building in downtown Boston. Know where that is?"
"I sure do. When the 'Aks took over, they filled the place withtwomen and kids, so we couldn't launch an air strike against them there."
"Aye, Fitzgerald said, sipping a drilk. "The 'Aks are big on insurance."
"Fitz, do you realize that they are holding enough talent and experience to start an air force? And a damn good one?" Hunter said in frustration.
"I know, Hawker. But I can't imagine any of your boys turning, can you?"
"No, riot many. We had a few free-lancers who might. In fact, Jones was convinced that at least one of them was an 'Ak spy."
"Sounds like the Mid-Atlantics. Fookin' backstab-bers," Fitz spat out. "I hate them, too, Hawker. But I have no choice but to deal with them. If I don't they'll be on my ass, like they were on yours."
If he had learned anything in his month at The Aerodrome it was a sympathy for Fitzie's "If you pay, you stay" phitosophy. It was business, not politics. In fact, since the Mid-Aks took over Logan, business had increased at The Aerodrome. The Free Canadians,
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many of which were actually ex-patriate Americans, shared the almost universal hate of the Mid-Atlantic. They refused to deal with them, so had been rerouting their convoys away from Boston and through Syracuse, adding more landing fee money to Fitzie's already burgeoning coffers.
"Look, Hawker, this means you can stay here longer." Fitzgerald said. "Enjoy yourself. Why go off fighting wars that don't mean a pig's ass? These days, it's hired gun versus hired gun. There are no more issues. There are no more causes or flags to rally around. Why get kitled if you don't have to, just because you're on someone's payroll? It's a differenttworld out there, since you and I flew for the Air Force."
Hunter had heard it all before. It was the essence of the reason Jones bugged out of Otis. It was a mercenary'stworld. They were pawns in the new era of warfare-as-chess game. It was a game of bluffs and counter-bluffs. We've got more than you. We want your land. We've got ten thousand guns. You've got only five thousand. We've got a squadron of jets. You've got only a handful. Please vacate the premises. Go quietly. Find newtwork. We're the new bosses. Our countries have merged and you're out of a job. Argue and you die. And only the stupid mercenariestwound up dead.
Of course, personal disputes were common. The general's retaliatory strike on Baltimore was personal. So was his own leveling of Otis. The streets of The Aerodrome-especially on drunken Saturday nights- were the scene of many a personal knife fight, gun fight, even an occasional bazooka fight. That's why
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everybody-pilots to bartenders, monkeys to hookers-was armed.
It was Dodge City revisited. And more and more, pilots were choosing to settle arguments over girls, guns or money, not in the main street, where dueling wasn't permitted, but in dogfights. These aerial duels were fought high above a relatively unpopulated part of the Aerodrome's territory, known by everyone as "the OK Corral." The battles were photographed by gun cameras on chase planes and on the combatant's planes themselves, making it all the easier for the betting people in the saloons below to wager on the outcome.
And countries carried vendettas against each other occasionally. But the day of massive armies facing each other were probably gone for a white. No one wanted it. No country could expect it of their soldiers-for-hire. Not when it was so easy just to move on and find another job. And ittwould be bad for business.
"Hawker, me friend," Fitzgerald started again. "You can make a healthy living here. With notworries. You'll be rich. You have a reputation, boy. You could hire yourself out as the best escort flyer around, once you get your bird back together. Fly for me. No one will ever want to tangle with you. You can make it on your nametalone. You've earned it. We have thetwork. We have the booze. We have the girls! What more can you want, lad?"
Hunter could only shake his head. Who knows if anyone ever made it out to the Coast? Who cared if he made it out there or not? And what the hell were they going to do once they got out there? Fitzgerald's offer was tempting, to say the least.
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"Thilk about it, boy," Fitzgerald said on leaving.
Aki appeared carrying a freshly pressed pair of his coveralls. She took the towel from him and smiled. Her hand found itself lingering between his legs.
"Dress now?" she asked.
He looked at her beautiful Oriental features. Almond shaped eyes. Long black hair. Beautiful brown skin. Her lithe figure accented by the Fitzie-designed revealing maid uniforms.
"Dress? Now?" she asked him again, her hand stroking his upper thighs and more.
He drained his drilk. "Dress, later," he said, leading her to the bedroom. "Thilk, later," he said to himself.
Hunter decided to decide- about his trip only when his F-16 was back flying. When in doubt, procrastinate, he thought. One thing seemed certain: there was no longer any hurry. He had all the time in the world.
Or, so he thought . . .
It was early one morning, a month and a half into his new job, when he was told to expect a big job to land within the hour. The planetwould need a quilk radar controls replacement. It was carrying valuables and was overdue at its destination.
Hunter looked at the repair order, radioed in from the plane minutes before, and was surprised at one of the entries. It read the flight had originated in eastern Europe, via Boston. This majie him suspicious. Just like the Free Canadians who refused to do business with the Mid-Aks once they took over the Northeast Economic Zone, many of the companies flying in
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from Iceland had disdained landing at Logan, diverting to fields in Canada instead.
So it was a rare flight that came straight over from Europe to Boston. He checked its final destination and got another surprise: New Chicago. The city and territories controlled by the notorious organization known as The Famity.
From what Hunter knew of The Famity, he didn't like them. They sounded like a variation of the Mid-Aks; smaller, but just as treacherous; a good-sized army, but no air force that he knew of. The Famity made its money on heavity taxing its citizens, gun sales, drug running and selling young girls on the black market. Another enterprise was selling protection to the smaller territories surrounding the city's borders. Their lilks to the air pirates were widely-suspected.
Now a cargo plane was flying from eastern Europe, stopping off in Mid-Ak territory and continuing on to New Chicago. Hunter was very anxious to get a look at this mysterious aircraft.
An hour later, right on schedule, the plane appeared high above the field, circling white it received landing clearance. Hunter made sure that he was out on the tarmac when the plane came in.
He began to smell a rat when he saw the plane was not of usual manufacture. It was a huge Antonev AN-12 cargo jet, one of the largest planes in the world. It was carrying Czechoslavakian markings, the sight of which started a slow burn inside Hunter's stomach. The Czechs were allies of the Soviets, partners in the crime of the century. He had fought them in the skies over Western Europe. He had no use for them here in
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Syracuse.
The enormous airplane lumbered in, touched down and taxied to a deserted end of the runway. Its engines still turned but it was soon apparent that no one was getting off. Only a handful of ground service vehicles approached the plane.
Hunter intercepted his mechanics who were heading to fix the big plane's radar.
"You guys take ten," he told his monkeys. "I'll do this one myself."
They gratefully accepted and handed him the radar replacement parts. He jumped into a jeep and drove out to where the plane was parked.
The fuel truck was just pulling away when he arrived. The cargo bay door in the rear of the ship was open and a man in a brown uniform motioned for him to come aboard. This should be interesting, he thought.
And it was. He had to walk through the entire length of the aircraft, starting with its cargo hold. The plane was packed with crates clearly marked with itlustrations as containing rifles, bombs and missiles. The officer, though terse and unfriendly, made no attempt to prevent him from taking it all in as he walked through the two-tiered plane.
They reached a ladder and he climbed up and into the plane's cockpit. The flight crew looked at him indifferently as he undid the broken-down radar control module and replaced it with the new part. They/ spoke sparingly, but when they did, it was in some East European dialect. For the most part, the crew sat quietly white hetworked, smoking cigarettes and drilking coffee.
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The door to the pastenger hold remained closed most of the time. But just as he was about to leave, the plane's navigator opened the hatch, probably on his way to the can. It was then that Hunter was able to see the valuables the plane was carrying.
There were probably 200 pastengers aboard and every last one of them was a Mid-Ak officer.
He turned to the pilot and indicated the radartwould have to be tested. The pilot pushed the appropriate buttons and a display of digital lights came on and flashed. The radar wastworking. The pilot nodded his head and barked something to his crew. Hunter had an idea but he knew ittwould take quilk action.
He turned to the returning navigator and made a motion to his lips.
"Smoke?" he asked. "Can I bum a butt?"
It took a little more prompting, but finally the navigator nodded his head with understanding. He dug down into his coveralls pocket and came out with a pack of cigarettes. Hunter took one, then indicated his need for a match. The navigator, wearing a slightly put-out look, produced a small box oftwooden matches. Just then his pilot barked at him again, and in one of those strokes of luck that always seemed to bless Hunter, the man handed the entire box of matches to Hunter, then gave him the thumbs out al. The pilot was already running up the engines idle to taxi and it was evident that Hunter was only one holding things up.
He gratefully accepted the matches and climbed down the ladder. No escort this time; hetwould have to see himself to the door. The crewtwould pay dearly for
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this impoliteness.
Lighting the cigarette, he stuck the unlit end into the box of matches and then placed it in the straw packing atop one of the crates he was sure carried ammunition. Then he hurriedly left the plane, jumped into the jeep and cleared the area. The big plane was already moving before he was more than 100 yards away.
He was back at the hangar just as the big plane started its take-off. The cigarette had been burning for five minutes just as the plane got off the ground. His training had taught him an unsmoked cigarette will burn for six to seven minutes-it was one way a downed pilot could tell time. This time, the cigarette served as a fuse for a do-it-yourself time bomb.
The huge jet gained altitude and began its turn west when there was an explosion in the rear of the aircraft. It was followed by several others in quilk succession as the crates of bombs and missiles began to ignite. The big jet shuddered once and started to fall. With another, much greater explosion, the An-tonev plunged into a hitlside about five miles from the base.
The shock wave created by the crash rattled things at the base. Everyone stopped what they were doing and ran to see the source of the explosion. They stared and pointed at the hitlside, some of them not knowing it was the big plane that was burning fiercely fiv miles away. Some shook their heads at the sight of J tragedy.
Hunter, however, spat in the general direction of the crash. His bomb had done itstwork. He didn't care what anyone had said, this was war. He had no use for
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either Mid-Aks or Russian puppets, nor The Famity, whose arms and ammunition were still exploding at the crash site. Screw every last one of them.
The phone in his hangar rang several times before he answered it. He knew it was Fitzgerald. He knew that the base commander might take some flak from the 'Aks, or even The Famity, for the crash, though he also knew no one could ever prove it wasn't an accident. He was expecting anything from Fitzgerald-even a dismissal. But he got a surprise.
"Hawker," the Irishman began. "Those bone-heads. Did they pay you for that replaced radar part?"
Hunter almost laughed. "No, Fitz, sorry," he said. "All they had were Russian rubles."
"Oh, that is a shame," Fitzgerald replied. "And judging by that fire out there, it's going to be awfully hard to collect."
"Take it out of my pay," Hunter told him, as another explosion ripped through the wreckage of the. plane.
"I just might do that," Fitzgerald said hanging up.
The airport crash crew was just starting to react. Hunter had to laugh again as he saw the base fire trucks, sirens screaming, purposely driving toward the crash site with all the speed of a two-legged turtle. As truck drove past him, one of the fire crew looked way and gave him a mock yawn. Hunter gave him umbs up signal. At least Hunter knew he Snly wasn't alone in his dislike for Mid-Aks. Or ^ their allies.
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Over the next few weeks he oftentwondered what the mission of the crashed jet had been. East European arms and Mid-Aks advisors flying to New Chicago. It made for a dangerous, volatite combination. And at best, he knew his sabotage only delayed whatever the hell was in thetworks.
Strangely enough, Fitz never caught any grief from anyone concerning the crash. No one even bothered to contact him concerning recovering the bodies, not that there was much left. Hunter also found this to be suspicious. The plane's mission was obviously something that had started out as a well-kept secret-only to be done in by a busted radar control. And a saboteur disguised as a monkey.
Another month went by, and during that time, he knew of several other planes that pasted through the base, filled with Mid-Aks heading for Chicago. There was nothing he could do about them as he never got close enough to take any action. Nor did he want to put too much heat on Fitzgerald.
But as the weeks went on, he found himself getting restless. The situation in New Chicago, whatever it was, was probably building toward a climax. God only knew what the Mid-Aks were planning. And the Russian connection, though hard to prove, particularly bothered him. Besides, he did promise Jones that should anything ever go wrong, that he shoulij report to the general's twin brother out on the Coaj
But it was more than that. He was gettir comfortable. He was flying more andtworkir engines less. He had fine liquor, good food and beautifultwomen at his disposal. His jet's repairs and overhaul was almost paid for and ready for air trials.
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He increasingly felt the urge to move on.
The F-16 he unveited a few weeks later was a completely different airplane than the one he'd arrived in. He had modified the engines to carry even more weight, then attached a half dozen more ordnance points on the wings and belly. He installed five additional M-61 cannons, the plane now boasted three to a side. He rigged a system whereby he could carry the extra cartridge belts needed to feed the jet's six guns, and drop them once they were expended, just like a spare fuel drop tank. He disconnected his in-flight refueling capability-he doubted if he could find a KC-135 Air Force tanker flying around these days-and used the weight saved for more on-board fuel storage.
He personally went over the entire ship and tightened every bolt, nut and screw. He re-wired it and returned its avionics. He bought and repaired a discarded LANTIRN pod-the magic box of electronictwonder that gave any plane carrying it the ability to see, fly and fight on the darkest of nights or in thetworst of weather.
He cleaned every nook and cranny on the plane, inside and out. He repainted it, keeping the old Thunderbird design, but adding a streaking white "W" on its tail section. He wanted everyone to know who he was. The Wingman. He carried with him a reputation-he couldn't deny it. That reputation, white possibly enticing foolish bounty hunters or young, brash pilots looking for a part in New Order history,twould save him fuel and ammo wherever he went. Not manytwould want to mix it up with him. Theytwould see the near-extinct F-16 and the "W,"
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put two and two together and give him a wide berth. This way, he knew, his reputation wastworth something and that he could use it to his advantage. He also knew it was something that needed protecting.
He rolled the plane out, to the oohs and ahhs of ground personnel and pilots alike. It looked sleeker, quilker, deadlier. He, too, had changed. He was heavier, more muscular, his hair once again had grown out long. His features had always been described, ironically, as handsomely hawk-like. Now he looked like an eagle.
He expressed his thoughts to Fitzgerald, who white saddened that his friend had decided to move on, was understanding as to his reasons why. They both knew hetwouldn't be leaving just yet, however. Because, although the F-16 was back and flying, he still needed money-a good sum of money-to make his way across the continent. Fuel and ammo were expensive these days. So were landing rights. He couldn't go out wandering across the continent unarmed, whether it was in his gun barrels or his money bag.
He had asked Fitzie to look around for some more profitable jobs for him to do, and eventually, his friend got himtworking a few convoy missions. Hunter could make more in one day, riding shotgun on a convoy than he couldtworking a week in the maintenance hangar. It also gave him a chance to put the F-16 through its air trials.
He flew five missions in all-each one escorting five-plane convoys up to the Canadian border, where theytwould rendezvous with fighters from the Free Canada Armed Forces. The Canadianstwould the^ escort the ships for the remainder of the journey to
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Toronto. In all each missiontwould take under an hour. They didn't pay the big money that a cross-continent missiontwould, but he was happy just to be flying regularly again.
He had just returned from the fifth mission-which was, like the first four, pleasantly routine-when he got a message that Fitz wanted to meet him. He was curious about the site that Fitz selected, a little, dark hole of a barroom called The Broken Wing. Located out in a small hamlet on the very edge of The Aerodrome's territory, The Broken Wing was a place youtwould go when you didn't want to be seen or overheard.
A light, warm rain was falling when he arrived at the bar. It was in a fringe area, as out of the way as one could get from the bustling Aerodrome. It almost looked like an old western frontier town, and just as dangerous. He parked the jeep and walked across the street to the saloon. He could see a few figures hurry out of sight as he approached. Other eyes watched him from the shadows.
He walked in and found the place smoky but nearly empty. The bartender recognized him and pointed to a dark corner of the saloon. There, he found Fitz at a table sitting with a man he introduced only as Gus.
"It's my pleasure, Major Hunter," Gus said after shaking hands with him. "We . . . my employers . . . are great admirers of yours."
"Gus has a job you might be interested in," Fitz said, ordering a round of beer. Hunter detected a subtle nod from his friend, indicating that Gus could be trusted.
"Major Hunter, we have a shipment, an extremely
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valuable shipment, that has to be pilked up and delivered here at The Aerodrome," Gus said. "My employers, who are well aware of your talents, specifically requested that you be the man to do the job."
"What's the shipment?" Hunter asked, eyeing Fitzgerald. "Sidewinders? Real silver? Gold?"
Gus hesitated for a moment. He was a tall, thin, dark-skinned man, with quilk darting eyes. He was the type of person who, possibly unwitlingly, gave off a mysterious air. He looked at Fitz, who nodded again, then said, quietly: "Diamonds."
"Diamonds?" Hunter asked. "How many diamonds."
"A small bag, Major Hunter," Gus answered, keeping his hushed tone. "A little under two pounds."
"two pounds is a lot of diamonds," Hunter said sipping his beer. "What's the shipmenttworth."
Again, Gus was sitent for a moment, as if he were adding numbers up in his head. "In pre-war terms, about twenty million," he said, ratherly calmly.
"Twenty million?" Hunter asked, not hiding his surprise. "Twenty million do/fars?"
The figure even made Fitzie let out a long, low whistle, and he was probablytworth a couple of million himself.
"That's right," Gus answered.
"What's thattworth these days?" Hunter asked, taking a larger swig of his beer.
"That's hard to say, Major," Gus said, his calculator mind turned on once again. "Especially in these times of fluctuating currencies. But if I had to guess, I'd say upward of two-hundred million."
Fitz and Hunter looked at each other in disbelief.
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two hundred million dollars could buy half the countries on the continent, lock, stock and barrel.
The bartender wandered over and collected their empties, stopping the discussion momentarity. Fitz signalled him to bring another round. Once he was out of earshot, the hushed conversation continued.
"My employers are witling to pay you quite handsomely, Major, if you successfully retrieve the parcel," Gus told him.
Hunter looked at Fitz. "How much?" he asked.
"One hundred thousand dollars in real silver ," Gus said, matter-of-factly.
A lot of money, Hunter thought. More than enough to get him where he was going and then some.
"Where's the pilk-up?" he asked, definitely interested.
For the first time, Gus looked nervous. He bit his lip, then said, slowly, "Pittsburgh."
Hunter saw his vision of $100,000 take on a pair of wings and fly away.
"Pittsburgh?" He said. "You're moving two hundred million dollars in diamonds through Pittsburgh?"
Gus nodded.
Pittsburgh was a tough enough place before the war-nowadays, it wastworse. Most of the city had been evacuated, but, as in many cases, a community of sorts-bad sorts-had sprung up around the airport. The Pitts, as it was universally called now, was well-known as a haven for terrorists, murderers, drug dealers, slave traders and other assorted scum of the earth. The place was also roundly considered as the unofficial home of the eastern air pirates, only be-
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cause the airport controllers-shady characters themselves-allowed the airborne criminals to land and refuel there. Some claimed even men from the Badlands were sometimes spotted there.
"Why The Pitts?" Hunter asked.
"The diamonds are payment of a debt to my bosses," Gus said. "The payer insists that it be done this way."
"He's probably setting you up," Hunter said.
"Possibly," Gus acknowledged. "But with that much money at stake, my employers feel they have to take the chance."
"Then why don't you just hire a squadron of fighters and some chopper troops and go down there and get it?" Hunter wanted to know.
"No," Gus said, emphatically. "This has to be done quietly. As quietly as possible. That's why we have contacted you, Major."
Hunter thought for a moment. He was ready, anxious, almost itching, for a change. But flying into The Pitts might be a little more excitement than he needed.
Gus could tell he was tossing the job offer around in his mind.
"One hundred fifty thousand dollars, Major," he said.
Hunter glanced at Fitz, who was nodding, urging him to take the offer.
"I just don't know," Hunter said. "Just who are your employers?"
"I can't tell you that, Major," Gus said. "Not until you return with the diamonds."
"Well," Hunter said. "Can you tell me who they
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aren't! There are some people I justtwon'ttwork for."
Gus nodded.
"Are they Mid-Aks?" Hunter asked.
"No."
"The Famity?"
"Certainly not," Gus said, slightly upset.
Hunter thought for a moment. Who was left?
"The Russians?" he finally said.
For the first time, Gus stared him straight in the eye. He rolled up his shirt sleeve to reveal a famitiar-looking tattoo.
"Major," he began slowly, pointing to the eagle and globe drawing on his arm. "I was in the Marine Corps in the last war. I fought the Russians on the Yugoslav border. two straight weeks of combat. Night and day. Hand-to-hand. I saw brave men die, fighting for their country. Fighting those godless bastards and winning. Only to be stabbed in the back. The Russians, you ask? Itwould never traffic with those war criminals."
From then on, Hunter liked Gus.
"You've got yourself a pilot," Hunter said. "Now, what's the plan?"
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CHAPTER FIFTEEN
Forty-eight hours later, Hunter was wrestling the controls of an ancient C-47 Spooky cargo plane. It was a moonless, clear night, and the plane was heading due south, in the direction of The Pitts.
With him were two ADF pilots-Al and Zal- serving as co-pilot and navigator.
The C-47 was a two-enginedtworkhorse of a plane, buitt some twenty years before either of them were even born. It was like a bucking bronco to steer, and it was very noisy. But it was as inconspicuous as one could get. The plane, a puddle-jumper Fitzie used for" short flights and training, had lost its in-flight radio intercom long ago. It was also unarmed.
"I was in The Pitts once," Al, the tall, skinny redheaded co-pilot yelled to him, trying to be heard above the constant rumble of the engines. "I was coming . back from a cross continent convoy job, flying one*of the F-105s.
"I hit a bad storm and had to put down in The Pitts. Believe me, Itwould have rather ditched the Thunderchief and baited out, but I knew Fitztwould go nuts. So I put down there."
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Both Hunter and Zal had heard simitar stories of pilots visiting The Pitts-all too unwitlingly.
"What happened?" Hunter yelled back.
"Well, as soon as I set down,"Al continued. "I'm surrounded by a dozen goons with shotguns. It's storming. Terrible, thilk stuff. It's the middle of the night. The place is dark, spooky. But here are these guys, pointing their guns at me.
"I had to pay a landing tax, a taxiing tax and a parking tax. All before I even got out of the goddamn plane. Luckity Fitz gives us extra money for stuff like that, because I didn't have much money of my own."
Hunter reassuringly patted the bags of silver he had in the pockets of his flight jacket.
"I pay these guys and they disappear," Al said. "Of course, no monkeys are around, so I have to block off and shut down myself. I go into the terminal figuring I'd get a cup of joe and wait until the weather cleared. There's only one place open. They got no coffee, no food. Just beer. So I order a beer.
"The place is filled with creeps and the bartender is mean and the size of a B-52. But it was warm, so I figure, what the hell. I order another beer and drilk it and start to get another when the bartender says I have to pay for the first two. I ask how much. He says ten bucks. I say, ten bucks for two beers. He says no, ten bucks apiece for the two beers. Twenty bucks!
"I start to tell him to go fuck himself, when I see two bouncers start circling me. They got guns, and my .45 is back in the aircraft. I figure, screw it, I'll pay it and get out. But I got my money in my sock. So I bend down, take off my boot, put it on the bar and get the coins out of my sock. When I come back up,
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my boot is gone. The bartender says 'What boot?' His six buddies at the bar say 'What boot?' The bouncers say 'What boot?'
"Well, I know when I'm not wanted, so I just pay him the money and leave there, one boot and all. I swear, one of those guys must have eaten it. I figured I'll just go back to the plane and sit in it until the weather got straight.
"I go back to the place where I parked the Thud. No plane. I stop a couple monkeys-scuzzy-looking guys-and they say, 'What plane?' I call the tower on the phone and they say, 'What plane?'
"Well, I know that Fitz is going to go apeshit that I lost one of his Thunderchiefs. But I have to call him and tell him, so I do. He goes nuts, but then he calms down and says to just find the right person, bribe him and get the plane back.
"I say, great idea but I'm broke. He goes nuts again, but then says for me to sit tight, that he'll send another Thud pilot down with some money to get me out. I call the tower and they say that if I pay a take-off tax, they'll try to find the plane. It's a game. They know it. I know it. But what can you do?"
Hunter and Zal were enjoying Al's story. Many a pilot had faced the same kind of thing in The Pitts.
"So," Al continued. "Now I've got to wait for a couple hours for a Thud to fly down. So I go into the3 main terminal building to get some shut-eye. There's] more creeps there, sitting in the dark, playing with themselves. Terrible. But I stretch out and finally fall asleep.
"Next thing I know, the Thud pilot is shaking me awake. He's got the money and the plane is back
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where it was. He says to me, 'Where's your shoes?' I look at my feet and I can't believe it. White I was asleep, sure as shit, someone stole my other boot!"
They all had a good laugh at Al's tale, the last they'd have in a white. Up ahead, Hunter could see the faint outline of The Pitts' landing lights. He nodded to Al.
"Pittsburgh," Al said into the microphone. "C-47 Spooky requesting permission to land."
There was a silence, then the radio crackled to life. "Whadda ya want?" came the reply.
Hunter and Al looked at each other and shrugged.
"Spooky requesting landing clearance," Al said. "We are at ten miles out. One hundred thirty knots. From the north. Need your wind and weather."
"Fuck your wind and weather," the voice came back. "You got landing money?"
"Landing money, tower?" Al said, with a wilk.
"Fuck you, asshole," came the reply. "Half bag of silver when you touch down. Real stuff. If you ain't got it, then get the fuck out of the airspace before we knock you out."
"We got the money. Can we land?" Al asked.
"Sure," the voice said. "Give it a shot. And pay the man in the black hat when you get here."
They landed without incident although barely half the lights on the airport's only functioning runway weretworking. The sun was just coming up and in the early morning light they could see why every flyboy who could avoided The Pitts like the plague.
They had to wheel their way in and out of tons of junk that littered the airport's taxiing apron. There were pieces of tail sections, wings, landing gears
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scattered everywhere. Tools lying rusted where they'd been dropped probably years before. Jet fighters set up on blocks just like a farmer's old Chevy set on milk crates. Everywhere, the place looked like a slum; a slum in a perpetual state of chaos.
The main terminal building, which was designed like a saucer, with a half dozen spoke-like pastageways coming out of it, was dingy and rundown. Where huge plate-glass windows once stood, now there were makeshift barriers of plywood. The control tower, off to the left of the main terminal, was also in a state of decay. It was unpainted and sported more than a few boarded up windows. Several machine guns protruded from the deck surrounding the tower, though they were unmanned at the moment.
On the side of the tower, where there was once a sign reading, "Welcome to Pittsburgh International Airport," someone had appropriately scraped off most of the letters and now the sign just read: Pitts."
They rolled up to a station beside the saucer-shaped terminal building and cut the engines. So far, so good, Hunter thought. The two propellers on the C-47 had barely stopped turning when a man in a black hat drove up in a jeep and rapped on the side of the plane.
All three of them made their way back to the rear of the plane and Hunter popped the cargo door and threw out the step. The man in the black hat came aboard. Once Hunter got a good look at him, he realized he was looking at one of the ugliest individuals in the world.
The right side of the man's face looked as if someone had taken an acetylene torch to it. It was the color of boiling blood and it looked as if it was still
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The man spat a long, green line close to Hunter's boot.
"You calling us thieves?" he asked defiantly.
"Sure," Hunter said, coming within an inch of the man's deformed face. "Thieves like us . . ."
Hunter then produced another bag of coins, a quarter full this time. "No more questions?" he asked.
The man greedily accepted the bag and hastitly stuck it under his coat, not wanting any of his counterparts to see him. He's mine now, Hunter thought, Phase One of his plan was under way.
"We need someone to find our shipment," he told the man. "You interested?"
The man looked around quilkly, then said: "Got to know what I'm looking for."
"The crate came in from Florida, two days ago," Hunter told him. "It's marked destination is The Aerodrome. Find it."
"How much?" the man asked nervously.
Hunter produced another quarter bag. "You get this now, and another half when you deliver."
The man was salivating green at the prospect of all that money. Hunter was sure the typical bribe at The Pitts was half as much.
"Might take a white," the man said.
"Get it here by sunset," Hunter said in no uncertain terms. "Or we come and get you."
"If it's here," the man said, jingling the silver under his coat, "I'll find it."
He left the plane quilkly, got in his jeep and drove away.
"Do we trust a guy like that?" Zal asked. He and
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cooking. His left side had seven long deep scars running from eye to chin. The latest one was still stitched up, but a green, pus-like substance was oozing from it. He had no teeth and what looked to be only patches of hair. The man smelled rancid and his clothes-the hat, a full-length black coat and black boots, even his black wraparound sunglasses-all looked as though they'd hadn't been washed in years.
The man didn't introduce himself. Instead, he just said: "Got the money?"
His voice was barely a croak. Hunter couldn't be sure if he was armed or not; underneath the coattwould be a perfect hiding place for a shotgun. However, he was certain that more than a few guns were probably covering the man from the terminal building and the control tower.
"Got the money?" the man repeated, a green-oozy drool leaking out of the corners of his mouth.
Hunter produced a half bag of silver. The man took it and shook it once, as if he could tell it was real silver and the right amount just by listening to the coins jingle. He gave Hunter a curt nod and stuffed the bag of coins under his coat.
"What's your business here?" he croaked, more green drool coming from his mouth.
"We're nail drivers," Hunter told him. "Here to pilk up a load of nails. That is, if someone hasn't stolen them yet."
Nait drivers were pilots who carried loads of used nails from one location to another. White there was a slight rebirth of manufacturing in the days of the New Order, for some reason, no one was making nails, thus they were valuable items.
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The man spat a long, green line close to Hunter's boot.
"You calling us thieves?" he asked defiantly.
"Sure," Hunter said, coming within an inch of the man's deformed face. "Thieves like us . . ."
Hunter then produced another bag of coins, a quarter full this time. "No more questions?" he asked.
The man greedily accepted the bag and hastitly stuck it under his coat, not wanting any of his counterparts to see him. He's mine now, Hunter thought, Phase One of his plan was under way.
"We need someone to find our shipment," he told the man. "You interested?"
The man looked around quilkly, then said: "Got to know what I'm looking for."
"The crate came in from Florida, two days ago," Hunter told him. "It's marked destination is The Aerodrome. Find it."
"How much?" the man asked nervously.
Hunter produced another quarter bag. "You get this now, and another half when you deliver."
The man was salivating green at the prospect of all that money. Hunter was sure the typical bribe at The Pitts was half as much.
"Might take a white," the man said.
"Get it here by sunset," Hunter said in no uncertain terms. "Or we come and get you."
"If it's here," the man said, jingling the silver under his coat, "I'll find it."
He left the plane quilkly, got in his jeep and drove away.
"Do we trust a guy like that?" Zal asked. He and
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Al had been fingering their loaded .45s throughout the encounter.
"We really don't have a choice," Hunter said. "We're in his ballpark. We play by his rules. For now."
But Hunter had to laugh to himself. Entrusting a $200 million shipment of diamonds to a drooling idiottwould have been unthilkable a few years ago. Now it served as a good example of how business was done these days. Welcome to the New Order.
They returned to the cabin where Al broke out a deck of cards. They knew ittwould be a long, anxious wait.
They ½at and played cards and watched as a bewitdering array of aircraft came and went.
One airliner, an old Boeing 707, landed. Its smoking engine completely ignored by its pilots and the ground crew, they unloaded hundreds of crates marked: RIFLES. Another plane, an old P-3 Orion Navy aircraft with its markings painted over, touched down and was emptied of thousands of small bales plainly marked: "Marijuana. Panama People's Republic." Another 707 was loaded with boxes marked: DANGER EXPLOSIVES-TNT. Hunter couldn't help but notice that half the ground crew servicing the jet was smoking either cigarettes or joints. If the crates contained TNT and a spark found its way inside, the name Pittstwould take on a whole new meaning-that of a half-mite deep crater where an airfield used to be.
All the white, large and small planes-each painted in strange bright colors-landed, unloaded pasten-
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gers, turned around and flew off again. No two planes looked alike, but all of those disembarking were of the same ilk: Dirty-looking, shady characters. Each one scurried off their plane and to the main terminal building as quilkly as they could, as if they didn't want to present themselves as too good a target. Hunter kept a close watch on the arrivals. Everyone was armed. Everyone was watching everyone else.
Another airliner, a Boeing 727 that was painted a ghastly pilk, arrived and unloaded human cargo. Pulling right up next to the C-47, the rear door of the plane was lowered. Emerging from the inside were about fifty young girls, each naked to the waist and manacled and tied together with a long white rope. two mean-lookingtwomen herded the young girls out of the plane and into the terminal, laying a cat o' nine tails on the back of anyone who was not keeping up.
"A slave plane," Zal said, finally.
"That's a crime," Al said. "Tying up and selling young stuff like that."
"It's a business," Hunter said, his own distaste evident. "Everything nowadays is a goddamn business."
They went back to their card game but were disturbed once again, this time by the arrival of three fighter jets. They were ancient F-100 Super Sabres, each one painted a garish color or pattern. The jets taxied up to the terminal and the pilots climbed out, barking orders to obedient monkeys that were scurrying around the planes.
One jet, flown by the pilot who appeared to be the leader, was painted entirely in shiny black, with a hideous looking laughing shark's face on its snout.
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The second jet sported a bright yellow and green camouflage scheme, though Hunter had totwonder what the pilot was thilking of when he painted it. The colors alonetwould make the plane stilk out in a storm at night. The third jet was decorated in a white and red checkerboard pattern that covered the entire plane. All three planes were armed with cannons and Sidewinders.
Each of the pilots was dressed in leather from head to toe. Upon removing their flight helmets, they all revealed heads shaved bald. The insignia on the back of their coats read: "The Stukas."
Hunter realized that he was seeing, for the first time close up, some authentic air pirates. And these bandits were from The Stukas, a notorious pirate squadron that roamed the skies of western Pennsylvania and eastern Ohio.
The three men checked over their planes, then brazenly strolled into the terminal building and disappeared. Hunter noted that each one was carrying a sidearm and a rifle of some kind.
During the afternoon and on toward evening, more planes arrived, off-loading all kinds of deviant looking characters.
"There must be a party going on here tonight," Zal observed.
"Yeah," Hunter said. "And we're not invited."
But now, it was getting dark and there was still no sign of the man in the black hat. Hunter was getting more anxious by the minute. He had hoped to avoid going into the terminal and raising suspicions by looking for the nails himself. But he knew that ittwould be easier to look for the man in the black hat
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than ittwould be to look for the right crate. Hetwould give the man another two hours, then hetwould have to act.
Darkness fell and a few of the rundown airport's dingy lights flilkered on. By peering into the main terminal with binoculars, Hunter could see an event of some kind was about to take place inside. All of the characters who had flown in were gathering in the saucer shaped building. Soon a makeshift stage was set up and a spotlight of some kind rigged up.
That's when the first of the young girls was brought in. The crowd, many with bags of money in their hands, started shouting and waving their hands, much in the direction of another man, standing on stage with the young girl.
"A slave auction," Hunter said to Al, handing him the spyglass. "That's what the party is about."
After Zal had taken a look, Hunter peered through the glasses once again. Another young girl-a redhead-was up on the stage. Her hands tied above her head, the auctioneer, a crude looking man in a bright red suit, turned her around like a piece of merchandise, poking his barker's cane into her ass, between her legs and between her breasts.
The redhead was quilkly sold and another girl brought up on stage. This one, a blonde, was crying as the crowd yipped and yapped at her. Hunter could see the three pirates were as close to the stage as possible, bidding for the girl. The barker soon pointed to the pirates as the winners and the young girl was turned over to them. Laughing and guzzling liquor, they carried the weeping chitd off to the side of the auction stage where two held her and a third pro-
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ceeded to rape her, much to the delight of the crowd.
The auction continued, each girl sold one after the other. The crowd was getting drunker and rowdier and a few disappointed bidders started trouble at one point. But it all calmed down and the bidding started once more.
Suddenly the dusky air was split by the noise of a jet landing. As it taxied close to them, Hunter could see in the twitight that it was a two-seat, F-101 Voodoo. It carried the markings of the Free Canadian Armed Forces. Maybe this was the break he was looking for.
No monkeys appeared, so the back-seat pilot had to leap from the wing and block the plane off himself. That done, both pilots were on the tarmac quilkly checking the undercarriage of the jet fighter. Hunter could tell by their uniforms that these were Canadian Sky Marshals, airborne versions of the famous Royal Canadian Mounted Police. He could see they were intently studying the three pirate jets parked nearby.
Hunter told Al and Zal to stay alert, then he left the C-47 and went over to meet the Canadians. They eyed him suspiciously as he approached.
He was direct. "I'm Major Hawker Hunter," he told them. "Of ZAP."
They both shook their heads.
"You're the Hawker Hunter?" the pilot, a captain named Frost said, disbelievingly. "Of The Thunder-birds?"
"That's right," Hunter said, hoping they'd recognize his face.
The pilots looked around, as if searching for Hunter's F-16. He started throwing out a few names of higher ups he knew in the Free Canadian Air
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Corps. They stared at him for a few more moments then, apparently convinced he was the authentic item, asked almost in unison: "What the hell are you doing here?"
He knew he could trust the Canadians. Their air force had been closely allied with ZAP and helped keep the northern border clean of pirates. They carried with them an unblemished reputation of integrity and honesty. Like their counterparts in another time, they always got their man.
He told them the whole story. The diamonds. The Aerodrome. The man in the black hat. "Dangerous mission, Hunter," Captain Frost told him after hearing it all.
They were in The Pitts looking for a particular air bandit.
"Yesterday morning, he shot down an airliner over Lake Erie," Frost said. "Kitled one hundred thirty six people."
"It was a senseless act," the co-pilot, Lieutenant LaFleur said. "He used the airliner as target practice. Put a Sidewinder into the side and watched it go down."
The pilot of the doomed plane was able to radio a description of the attacker before the airliner hit the water. The Free Canadians matched the description with a known pirate by the name of Rocko. White they didn't expect the murderer to be in such a public place so soon, they did want to put thetword out that they-and about a hundred air bounty hunters-were looking for him.
Hunter then made them a promise. If they covered his ass in getting out of The Pitts with the diamonds,
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he promised to keep an eye out for the pirate named Rocko. They agreed.
Much relieved, Hunter walked back to the C-47.
As soon as the Sky Marshals entered the terminal, the bidding on the girls stopped. The Canadians had no jurisdiction in The Pitts, and it was not their style to go looking for trouble. But they did want to question the Stukas as Rocko had been seen on previous occasions flying with that particularly notorious group.
Hunter saw this as his chance to sneak into the terminal and search for the man with the black hat. He told Al to warm up the engines and be ready for a quilk getaway. Then he and Zal loaded up two M-16s, took two high-flash percussion grenades each and left the plane.
Hunter found an unlocked door on the side of one of the spokes and they entered the terminal. The noise of the crowd in the main building was dampened as he knew the Canadians were questioning some of the low-lifes attending the flesh-peddling event. He and Zal headed in the opposite direction. Soon they were into the far reaches of the sprawling terminal building-a bizarre area lit only by constant flilkering lights.
The place was a mess. Debris was strewn everywhere. Windows were smashed. Businesses, some of which appeared to have been opened even recently, were trashed. The walls were covered with vulgar graffiti and crude drawings. This part of the airport lived up to its nilkname quite nicely.
They walked slowly, carefully searching each room, waiting area and corridor they came to. Sometimes
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they could hear shouts and laughter in the distance. But the peculiar set up of the airport building made it difficult to determine-even for someone with acute senses like Hunter's-where the noise was coming from. It was eerie, and the further they walked into the building, the spookier it got. The only sound they heard, aside from the shouts, was the low, steady drone of the C-47's engines warming up in the distance.
Suddenly, the air was pierced by a long, high-pitched scream. Hunter and Zal froze in their tracks as the blood-curdling cry echoed through the empty pastageways. Hunter was able to pilk up a direction this time, and signalled Zal to check his weapon and follow him.
Ten minutes later, they found the man in the black hat ...
His hands and feet were bound and he was left sitting in a chair of one of the waiting areas, his hat sitting on his lap. His throat was slashed, a pool of blood splattering on the floor beneath his seat.
Hunter gingerly felt the body. It was still warm and gurgling. He was sure it was the man's scream they'd heard. He frilked the body and found the bags of silver he had given the man. This told him two things: the man had found the diamonds. And that his kitlers had taken them, leaving the relatively paltry sum of the coin bags behind and escaping with the jewels.
But they had left a trait. One of the murderers had stepped in the blood of his victim, and had left a set of bloody footprints. Hunter and Zal followed the trait and were soon outside a door marked: CONTROL ROOM-DO NOT ENTER.
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Hunter put his ear to the door and listened. He could pilk up six distinct voices. Not flyboys either. Pitots had their own way of talking and this wasn't it. He could hear thetwords "diamonds" and "asshole" dominate the conversation.
He motioned Zal to get on the other side of the door. Then, he reached for the percussion grenade and pulled the pin ...
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CHAPTER SIXTEEN
Captain Frost heard the grenade go off. In an instant, he and LaFleur had their ,45s drawn and were running toward the noise. The unsavory slave auction crowd obediently cleared a path for them, then laughed once the Sky Marshals were out of sight. Why get so excited over a little thing like a grenade going off? People yelled for the auction to resume. More young flesh was trotted out. More money changed hands. Just another day in The Pitts.
"Hunter said he expected trouble," Frost yelled to his lieutenant as the two Canadians sped through the empty, sometimes pitch black pastageways. "Sounds like he found it."
He had ...
The Sky Marshals turned left into a partially lit corridor only to see Hunter and Zal at the far end, running out of a darkened section of the hallway and toward them at full speed. Hunter was carrying a sack in one hand, and a hand grenade in the other. Zal had his M-16 cocked over his shoulder, firing blindly. The sound of many angry footsteps was right behind them in the darkness. Not missing a beat, Hunter pulled
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the pin and tossed the live grenade over his shoulder. It bounced once then rolled back down into the dark part of the corridor ...
4...3...2...1... Boom!
The grenade went off with a flash. A blinding light, brighter than a hundred flares, filled the corridor^ The explosion seemed to freeze everything and everyone in place. In that instant, Frost could see more than 50 gunmen were chasing the airmen. The itlumination grenade stopped the pursuers in their tracks as they instinctively put their hands up to protect their eyes. Then his eyes too were blinded by the intense flash. By the time Frost could see again, Hunter and Zal were racing by him.
"I got the diamonds! Let's get the hell out of here!" Hunter yelled as he raced past.
As if to emphasize his point, the corridor was suddenly filled with automatic fire. Bullets were whistling past them, ricocheting everywhere. The gunmen had recovered and were charging again, firing their rifles as they ran.
Frost looked at La Fleur, shrugged once, then both Canadians joined Hunter and Zal in the strategic retreat.
Led by Hunter and firing their weapons behind them, the four men raced through the maze of corridors until finally spitling out into the main terminal building where the slave auction was continuing. They were ignored by the crowd as they ran through the terminal and toward the door which led out to the runway. Outside, the C-47 waited, its engines turning anxiously. Hunter was the first to reach the escape door and he hesitated as the three others ran out. At
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that moment, the slightly bewitdered gunmen reached the terminal, causing a few heads to turn in the crowd.
Confusion. It's the best cover to use to get away. He took his two remaining grenades, pulled the pins and held the clips. Just as the first of the gunmen spotted him across the crowded room, he let the clip go, reeled back and threw the grenade up toward the high ceiting. Boom! It exploded as it reached the pinnacle of its flight, brightly itluminating the room, and showering it with a million sparks. Once again, the bright flash stunned the gunmen, most of whom by this time had two large blue spots hindering their vision. This time, the crowd scattered. The room became a pandemonium of fleeing slave buyers and screaming, naked young girls. Some people dove for cover as the gunmen began shooting randomly. For good measure, Hunter pulled the pin on his last grenade and rolled it toward the middle of the terminal.
It went off just as he turned and ran out the door. The C-47 was already rolling toward the runway. Searchlights were clilking on, targeting the escaping airplane. Somewhere, a siren was blowing. Shouts, screams, and gunfire could be heard all over. Suddenly, the dead, dingy airport was alive in light and noise. Zal had reached the taxiing C-47. The Canadians had climbed into their jet and were quilk-starting the engine. A searchlight on top of the control tower had the Voodoo in its beam and gunners in the tower started raking the jet with gunfire.
Hunter stopped, aimed and fired at the tower searchlight, knocking it out with his second burst.
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The gunners turned their attention to him, but he was already running again at full speed, managing to stay one step ahead of the bullets.
He could see Zal waiting at the open door of the C-47, reaching his hand out to help him on board. Just then, the gunmen burst out from the terminal building and onto the parking apron. He reached the rolling Spooky, bullets lilking his bootheels as Zal hauled him aboard. The Canadians were just backing the Voodoo away from the terminal when the gang of gunmen started charging the slowly moving C-47. Its engine screaming, Frost swung the F-101 around, and aiming it toward the pursuers, squeezed off a burst of cannon fire. The deadly stream chopped up the gunmen, killing some and causing the rest to hit the deck. Stitl moving, the Voodoo swung around and was soon right behind the C-47.
Both planes reached the end of the runway just as Hunter was settling into the pilot's seat of the Spooky. Every searchlight in the airport was pointing at them, and several rocket propelled grenades were being shot at them. Luckity for them, no one in the control tower thought to turn off the runway beacons. The two long intermittent lines of blue lights showed the way out for the two airplanes. Under a hait of bullets and rockets, Hunter started his take-off roll.
By this time, some of the surviving gunmen had recovered. They had commandeered an airport fire truck and now were speeding toward the airstrip. Zal was at the open cargo door, shooting at the truck as it approac'hed the rolling airplane. Out his window, Hunter could see the truck was quilkly gaining on them and knew he'd have to improvise the take-off.
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Guessing at the wind speed and direction, he gunned the old plane's twin engines and yanked the throttle back.
The truck was pulling just about even with the plane when Hunter suddenly hit 99 knots. He pulled up the gear and pulled back on the wheel. The C-47 leaped into the air, in about half the normal distance needed for a take-off.
Frost, behind him in the F-101 had to shake his head in admiration for Hunter. No other pilot that he knew of could get a ship like that airborne so quilkly. The fire truck full of gunmen now turned its attention to the Voodoo, but it was fruitless. The jet fighter streaked by them before they could even pull their triggers, leaving them in a trait of hot jet exhaust fumes.
Once airborne, the two planes circled the field once then headed north. "Just another day in The Pitts," Hunter said to Al and Zal.
But the chase was just beginning.
The plane's clock had just struck midnight and they had just broken out of the perpetual cloud cover which always seemed to hang over The Pitts. The moon was full. Hunter could see the Voodoo behind him, bringing up the rear. A famitiar feeling washed over him. He suddenly felt aware of the presence of other planes. Sure enough, the C-47's battered old radar scope showed three jets gaining on them
"We got company," he said, reaching for the microphone. "Voodoo, this is Spooky."
"Go Spooky," Frost replied.
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"Bogies to your six o'clock."
"We see them, Spooky. Do you still want to stilk to the plan?"
"Affirmative, Voodoo," Hunter replied.
"Roger, Spooky."
-~- Hunter knew the blips that were getting larger on tjie radar street were the three pirate Super Sabres they had seen at The Pitts. He was sure onetword was on the lips of everyone at the terminal, especially after the spectacular getaway.
Thattword was "diamonds."
The man in the black hat had found their shipment all right, Hunter theorized, but he had gotten greedy and foolishly told his superiors, the gunmen who controlled the airport. Instead of cutting him in on the action, they had cut his throat instead, then attempted to split the jewels among themselves. Hunter and Zal had arrived outside the Control Room door just as a fight broke out among the top gunmen inside. One flash grenade later, everyone in the room had been blinded and the next thing the gunmen knew, the diamonds were gone. An alarm had sounded and the chase was on.
Now, Hunter was sure, a desperate deal had been struck between the airport gunmen and the pirates. Get the jewels. We'll split later, 50-50. If the gunmen were foolish enough to deal with their erstwhite allies the pirates, the pirates were smart enough to know that if the jewels were recaptured theretwould be no dividing of the spoits.
Hunter checked the blips and saw the F-lOOs were gaining fast. Like most of the pirates' planes, the Super Sabres were equipped with night fighting
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equipment. Telling Al and Zal to hold on tight, he started evasive maneuvers, in an attempt to throw off the pursuers. But the jets stuck right with him.
"Spooky, this is Voodoo," Frost called. "Bogies gaining on you. Are you still roger on the plan?"
"Affirmative, Voodoo," Hunter said.
With that, Frost kilked in the Voodoo's afterburner and the jet fighter streaked by the lumbering G-47. He peeled off, taking one of the F-lOOs with him. The Voodoo was quilker and more agite than the Super Sabre. Frost put this to his advantage, executing a quilk loop which put the Voodoo on the Super Sabre's tail. LeFleur, the backseat weapons officer, pushed a button and a Sidewinder obliterated the F-100.
But the F-101 kept right on going. It headed north and soon it was little more than a faint red light on the horizon.
The two remaining Super Sabres were now right on the C-47. A voice crackled across the radio. "Okay, you piece of shit," the gruff voice said. "Your Canuck buddy has turned pussy. Follow us on a three-four heading, or we grease you right now."
Before Hunter could reply, one of the F-lOOs opened up, tearing his left wing with cannon fire and starting a major fuel leak.
"That's your warning shot," a voice on the radio laughed. "Now follow us white you're still breathing."
Hunter's left engine was now on fire, his fuel pouring out of the perforated left wing. One of the pirate jets pulled alongside him, the pilot dropping his flaps and landing gear to slow the supersonic airplane down to match the C-47's 150 knot speed.
"This is your last chance, Spooky," the pilot in the
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jet beside him radioed. "Airfield is three-four, ten miles. You can't last much longer. Put it down there."
Hunter knew the pirate was right. Even an extraordinary pilot like Hunter couldn't keep the old bird together for more than another two minutes before it broke up. And ittwould be suicidal if they parachuted out-the pirates were well-known for strafing chutists. Hetwould have to take his chances on the ground.
Now, all he had to do is find the pirates' air field . . .
They were somewhere high over western Pennsylvania. The terrain below him was black as coal and twice as rugged.
"There ain't nothing down there but trees and mountains," Al said, straining to look out the C-47's window at the ground below.
"Well, we'd better find something smooth real quilk," Hunter said, eyeing his fuel indicator. It had already pasted the empty mark.
The Spooky shuddered once, then started vibrating violently. The left wing was aflame, andtwould soon break off.
"Where the hell is their base?" Zal yelled, the anxiety evident in his voice.
"Maybe they're just trying to crash us, Major," Al said. "That's how they usuallytwork."
"Hang on," Hunter coolly reminded them. "Those '100s have to land somewhere. As long as we're flying, we still have a chance."
Just then, the left side propeller broke off and let go, taking most of the engine with it. The C-47 yawed witdly to the left.
"Christ!" Al yelled as the plane almost flipped
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over. Zal was tossed like a puppet around the cockpit. It was all Hunter could do to battle the controls and try bringing the old plane back to level. The Spooky was shuddering so badly, he thought every nut and bolt must be ready to come apart. He finally managed to get the airplane somewhat leveled off, but he knew they had about 30 seconds left, tops. They were simultaneously running out of fuel, altitude and time.
Suddenly, a mite up ahead, runway lights blilked on. An instant later, other lights-in buildings, hangars and anti-aircraft guns-came on. A control tower materialized out of nowhere. Searchlights went up. It was amazing. One moment he was looking out on a sea of darkness, and the next he was looking down at a good sized, one-runway airbase that just wasn't there moments before. The pirates had dug an airbase right out of the side of a mountain. It was perfectly camouflaged on three sides and almost impossible to see at night. He had to give them credit. If nothing else, the bandits were masters of disguise.
He had to fly straight in. The plane's controls were starting to fait. His left engine had completely broken away leaving the wing to flap away in the wind. The right engine was sputtering and choking out thilk black smoke. A lesser planetwould have disintegrated long ago. But Hunter knew the Spookytwould stay together until the last possible moment.
The two remaining F-lOOs, streaked past and went around again in order to land behind them. Below, he could see crowds of pirates had appeared along one side of the runway. Hetwould have an audience for the landing. Assuming that he and his crew survived the crash, hetwondered if theytwould survive the welcom-
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ing committee.
He came in wheels up, flaps down, floating along at 50 knots. Ten feet above the landing strip he cut the engine. Then, as softly as possible, he eased the Spooky down.
The flaming plane streethed as it touched the ground. It slid along the full length of the runway, the disabled wing and belly scraping the asphalt and sending up a shower of sparks. The left wing snapped off making the plane turn two complete 360s white still barrelling along the runway. Finally, as it neared the end of the strip, the C-47 went nose down and ground to a halt.
They were down. Now they had to get out. He, Al and Zal quilkly scrambled to the emergency hatch beneath the cockpit and squeezed through. Then they ran. Hunter could hear a distinctive hissing sound and knew an explosion was seconds away. Even the pirates nearby were hitting the deck.
"Down!" he yelled.
All three hit the hard surface and covered their heads. The plane blew up two seconds later, producing a fireball that leaped into the air and scattered pieces of debris all over them and the runway. The ground shook as two more explosions wracked the plane. Then there was only the crackling noise of fire.
The smoke cleared and the rain of sparkling debris stopped. They shook the pieces of airplane off their backs and tried to shake some sense back into their heads. Then they looked up. Standing around them were more than 100 men, all of them armed, all of them dressed in leather, all of them sporting shaved heads.
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"You fucked up our runway, boys," one of them said. "That makes us mad."
Not as mad as you're going to be, Hunter thought.
Hunter didn't have the diamonds; Captain Frost did. As planned, he had pasted them to the Sky Marshal during the hectic moments back at The Pitts. He knew the Canadiantwould deliver them safely to Fitz and Gus-in fact, the jewels were probably already in their possession. So, in essence, Hunter had completed the mission. Now, all he had to do was live long enough to collect the $150,000 from Gus.
They were hustled up and pushed at gunpoint by six pirate guards toward a building located at the far end of the base. As they walked along, Hunter could see that theirs was hardly the first plane to crash at the base. In fact, wreckage of other planes-dozens of them-littered the end and sides of the runway. Many a plane had been forced down at the hidden airfield, their cargoes looted, their crews done away with. Hunter knew the pirates planned to treat them no differently.
They were pushed into the small, one-room structure that served as the pirates' jait. It contained three chairs, a few empty oil drums, one window, and that was it. The pirate guards didn't speak atword as they roughly searched them, then tied them to the chairs. Hunter detected the smell of alcohol on them as they fastened him to thetwooden chair.
Once all three of them were secured, the guards checked the rope knots and left. Outside, Hunter
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could hear the pirate ground crew using a tow vehicle to hastitly drag what remained of the C-47 wreckage to one side of the runway. Once the strip was cleared, the two circling Super Sabres landed. Hunter heard one of them run out of fuel just as it touched down. He knew the pilottwould be particularly pissed off at them.
A short time later,.the door burst open and the two surviving pilots, followed by another phalanx of guards, trooped in.
"Where are the fucking diamonds!" the lead pirate screamed.
Hunter recognized him as the pirate flyer who had flown into The Pitts in the black F-100 sporting the laughing shark's mouth. He was a big, dirty, fat slob of a man; Hunter had a hard time believing the man could squeeze himself into the cockpit of a jet fighter. He could smell liquor on the man's breath; in fact, the whole group of piratestreeted of a boozy smell. They were far from a military unit, Hunter thought; these Stukas were little more than a band of two-bit murderers and thieves. And to thilk many of them were probably officers in the country's armed forces at one time made them more of a disgrace to Hunter's way of thilking,
"Diamonds?" Hunter said with a straight face. "What diamonds?"
Al almost burst out laughing. What boot? What plane? What diamonds? It all seemed to fit.
"Don't give me that shit, you lousy nail driver," the man screamed again. "I almost pranged my ass 'cause you fucked up the runway and now you're going to play wise-ass?"
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They obviously didn't recognize Hunter.
"Slice 'em, Jaws," one of the pirates told the screaming man. "Let 'em bleed and maybe the others will talk."
"They don't know where the jewels are," Hunter said. "But I do."
"So where are they, pretty boy?" Jaws demanded.
"Where they should be," he answered. "At The Aerodrome."
"He's lying, Jaws," the other pirate flyer said.
"Believe it, boys," Hunter told them. "I pasted them to the Canadians and they flew right to Syracuse. Why do you thilk he took off when you intercepted us? He could have probably knocked all three of you out of the sky if he and I didn't have an agreement beforehand."
The pirate named Jaws looked like he was about to blow a valve. A vein was bulging out of his head with such pressure, Hunter expected it to pop at any second.
"You son of a bitch," Jaws screamed. "You got a lot of balls, buddy. We know you had a deal to pilk up that shipment. If you were stupid enough to send that pisshead tax collector looking for it, then you ain't smart en6ugh to past them to that Canuck do-gooder."
Hunter looked the man in the eye. "You're a stupid fuck, aren't you?" he told him. "Do you thilk diamondstwould survive a crash like that?"
The pirate guards looked at Hunter in disbelief. Jaws was the top man at the pirate base, and no one- friend or enemy-talked to the top man like that- and lived very long.
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Jaws glared at Hunter. Then, oddly, enough, smiled. "I know you're lying. Jewels don't burn. They're out in that wreckage somewhere. If we don't find them by sunrise, you guys will help us look. You'll eat that wreckage if you have to. And as soon as we get what we want, you're dead meat. I'm gonna slice you up in a hundred little pieces."
"No. Burn 'em!" the other pirate flyer said, producing a bottle of brown liquor.
The pirate named Jaws grabbed the bottle from him, "Gimme that, asshole," he said, taking a long, sloppy guzzle.
"Yeh, that's a good idea, Mouse," Jaws said, wiping his mouth with this dirty leather flight suit's sleeve. "If we don't find the ice, I'll tie you to the exhaust nozzle of my '100 and start the engine real slow. Know what it's like to get a face full of engine exhaust?"
Jaws reached into his pocket and came out with a handful of pitls. Amphetamines, Hunter guessed. Taking a swig of the brown liquor, Jaws washed the drugs down, then pasted some out to his men.
"It will be dark for another four hours, nail driver," Jaws said, his eyes turning to glass as he spoke. "We're gonna go through that wreck out there. You'd better pray that we find those diamonds. Because if you guys have to help us look, you'll be begging for us to kitl you by the time you're through."
With that, the hopped-up pirates laughed and left the room, locking the bigtwooden door behind them. Hunter heard Jaws order two guards to stand outside.
He looked at Al and Zal, who were cool and calm. Hetwould have been surprised if they hadn't been,
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They were, after all, ADF fighter pilots, highly trained and disciplined.
"This guy isn't even making sense," Al whispered. "What's he thilk, we hid the jewels in a crash proof box?"
"He's got to talk like that in front of his men," Hunter said. "It's a tribal mentality. He's just missed taking in the biggest haul this outfit ever dreamed of. If he can't produce, then the number two man might get some ideas about taking over."
He was free of the bonds five minutes later. It was simple for someone who had been trained to eject from a jet fighter white flying at supersonic speed, usually in the middle of a dogfight, and battle with a tangled parachute and live to tell about it. Compared to that, a triple slip knot was no problem.
He freed Al and Zal and they carefully eased themselves up to the window. Outside, the far end of the runway was bathed in light. The pirates had brought up two searchlights and played them on the wreckage of the C-47. The pirate ground crews were sifting through the wreck as the ragtag crash crew nonchalantly doused the smoking metal with a firehose.
There were 11 jet fighters parked at the base, all F-100s and all painted in bizarre, swashbuckling colors. A flag bearing the Stukas emblem flew above the field. There was a barracks and three other hangars on the runway, as well as a number of smaller buildings. All of the structures were painted in pine green camouflaged patterns. The hangar closest to them houses a couple of two-engine cargo planes. Another hangar further down the line looked like a
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repair shop; a stripped down F-100 sat out front. Another building was at the far end of the base, partially hidden by the edge of the thilk forest. It was painted black, covered with netting and appeared locked up tight. Beside it was tied, of all things, a hot air balloon.
"What's with the balloon, Major," Al asked.
"Beats me," Hunter said. "Look at the long rope beside it. Maybe they don't fly it, but just let it up when they want to take a look around. Like an early warning system. They could see someone coming on the ground for miles away."
"They have radar," Zal said, noting the dish on top of the three-story control tower.
"Yeah," Hunter said, straining to take in as much as he could. "But it isn't spinning. A few ack-acks. But no big SAMs." He fited the bit of information away in his memory.
"They have transport," Al whispered, pointing to the ten two-and-a-halfs parked next to the maintenance hangar.
"That means there must be a way out of here on the ground," Hunter said. "They probably double their monkeys as ground troops and go on raids, like when supplies get low. There must be more than a hundred of them here, countilg their support people."
At the far end of the runway, they could see the skeletons of more planes, aircraft the pirates had forced to land at the base, then looted, stripped for parts and discarded. The crews were all dead, Hunter was sure. The pirates very rarely left any witnesses.
It was three hours past midnight, time for them to get totwork. They systematically began a search over
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the interior of the holding room looking for the jait's weak spot. A weak spot meant escape.
The small building was made of plywood and logs, lashed together with rope. Its floor was stained with oit, suggesting it was once used as a storage shed. The structure'stwood was sturdy but its ropes were rotten. They immediately set totwork quietly stripping away the hemp in the far corner of the hut.
It was a tedious job, but bytworking together, they were soon able to tear away enough of the rope to weaken the bond. Another hour pasted, and they were able to wiggle some of the logs loose. This, in turn, loosened the plywood enough to allow them to sneak out the back of the hut.
Occasionally, Huntertwould leave thetwork and press his ear to the door and listen to the guards left behind to watch them. He had heard them guzzling liquor earlier. Now he was sure they were pasted out. And from what Hunter could see, the rest of the pirate contingent was on hand at the crash site.
They slipped out of the back of the hut and into thetwoods with ease.
With most all of the pirates at the far end of the runway, Hunter considered stealing one of the bandit's trucks, but he didn't have a clue where the access road was. Stealing one of the jets was out, too. He might be able to hot start one, and get it airborne quilkly, but the fighters were all single-seaters. And the two-engine cargo planestwould be harder to start, taxi and take off in.
That left only the hot air balloon. And why not? It was far enough away from where the pirates were going over the C-47's wreckage. It looked unguarded
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andtwould be a quiet means of escape. He couldtworry about which way the wind was blowing later.
They easity made their way toward this dark end of the base. The pirates were terrible at security-they had no sentries, only one watchtower at the far end of the runway and not even a fence around the base. Lulled into a false sense of security by being isolated for so long, the pirates assumed no one could get in or out of their hidden base. But Hunter had been through enough to know that the first rule of any good soldier was "never assume anything."
They reached the black hangar and made for the balloon. It was filled and suspended five feet off the ground, tugging at its rope; theytwouldn't have to light its burner until they were airborne-if they got airborne. Al and Zal climbed in and made ready to lift-off. But Hunter held up his hand, telling them to hang on for a minute. He sensed something. It was coming from the mysterious hangar. He had to see what was inside.
He quilkly pilked the rudimentary padlock which held the doors closed and was soon inside the hangar. He felt a wave of deja vu wash over him. He flashed back to the time he was inside the hangar at the base in Vermont where the general had left behind the motherlode of materiel. He was surprised by what he found then.
This timetwould be no different.
It was pitch black inside the windowless building. But there were airplanes inside; he was sure of it. What kind of airplanes? Jet fighters. The smell of JP-8 jet fuel was strong. But hetwould have to actually touch one in order to identify it.
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He walked with his hands blindly in front of him, hoping the first thing he touched wasn't a face or a rifle barrel. He finally reached the pointed end of a plane. Running his hand along the fuselage, he could feel the long snout, the short, low wing and swept in rear quarter. two air intakes up front, two exhaust tubes in the back. A 110-degree tail. A T-38? Could be, but this plane felt shorter. An F-5 Freedom Fighter maybe? It was the sister plane to the T-38 so ittwould feel the same. But the F-5, besides being rare, was a single-engined, subsonic fighter.
Then it hit him-an F-20! It had to be. The F-20 Tigershark was a souped-up, bad-ass version of the F-5; the same design but years away in performance from the T-38. He felt a chitl run through him. The F-20 was his second most favorite airplane-next to the F-16, of course. How in hell did the pirates come to get possession of one? They were rarer than the F-5, probably as hard to find as an F-16.
But he did know why the bandits weren't flying them. It was simple. They were too stupid. They didn't have the know how. The F-20 was buitt 30 years after the pirates' F-lOOs were rolled out. The advances in avionics, computers and aerodynamics incorporated into the F-20 made the F-lOOs seem like a kids' toy. To fly one took more than just strapping in and taking off.
He walked along the hangar touching each plane, countilg 12 in all. God damn, with 12 of these F-20s in the air, the pirates could kilk ass on anybody. Yet, he could tell these planes had never been flown. They still smelled of fresh grease and their tail exhausts were practically brand new. Each plane may have
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been started once or twice for an engine test, but the birds had never left the ground. How they got there, he could not figure out, unless they were hauled up in trucks and assembled in the hangar. The fact that the place was locked up indicated the pirates knew the value of their treasure. But they were grounded by their ignorance.
He had to leave. He briefly flirted with the idea of leaving a fire whichtwould eventually destroy the hangar and the classic airplanes, but he couldn't bring himself to do it. If he had one weakness, it was a respect for the beauty of a flying machine. He'd do anything to avoid destroying one. And so ittwould be with the F-20s. He knew the piratestwould never learn to fly them.
And maybe he'd be back . . .
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CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
Hunter had never flown a balloon before, but got the hang of it very quilkly. Flying was in his blood. It came to him as naturally as breathing.
Hunter and Zal cut the ropes and slowly-silently-the balloon ascended. Above the black hangar. Above the nearby trees. Rising, free-like escaping from hell. Climbing above the bandit's mountain base. Above the skeletons of the raped airplanes. They quietly pasted over the remains of the C-47, looking down on the pirates who were still pilking through the wreckage.
Hunter knew if they were spotted the piratestwould try to pilk them off with their anti-craft guns, or, faiting that, scramble a couple jets to shoot them down. But he also knew ittwould be a white before their captors realized they were even gone. The bandits were too hopped up with drugs and jewel lust totworry about them. But eventually, the banditstwould check in on them, and then the shittwould hit the fan. The Stukastwould discover there were no diamonds,
254

no prisoners and that the hot air balloon was missing.
He knew ittwould be the end of the line for Jaws.
They drifted for a white, not caring which direction
were going in, just as long as they were traveling
'away from the Stukas' base. Eventually, he and Al
were able to get the burner going without much
trouble. Then it became a matter of letting air in to
climb higher, and letting it out to descend. Lucky
again, the wind was moving the balloon on a rough
north-by-northeasterly course.
Hunter's thoughts kept drifting back to the hangar
filled with Tigersharks. How ironic that he had been
able to touch the beautiful jets, yet not see them. It
was like a dream. Suddenly, he wanted atwoman. Anytwoman. Then he wanted a meal. Then he wanted to
be behind the controls of his F-16 again.
He didn't even thilk about the $150,000 ...
Glad to be free again, they spent their time hanging
over the side of the balloon's basket, taking in the pre-
dawn scenery below. The sun came up and the terrain
beneath flattened out from mountains to plains and
valleys. The balloon, obviously stolen from its original
owners by the bandits, was a bright red with yellow
stripes. They were flying low and sometimes, they
could see people watching them past over. Some of
them even waved.
At one point, they saw above them a huge air
convoy pasting over at about 35,000 feet. None of
them had ever seen a convoy from this perspective
before and it was a magnificent sight. The big air-
liners-turned-cargo planes-707s, 727s, DC-l0s and
even a couple of Jumbo Jets-flew in-three-point
255

leaving an awesome white contrait pattern across the
blue sky. Mixed in amongst the big planes were the
smaller jets-fighters-weaving in and out of the
formations, escorting the convoy. The airplanes pro-
duced a tremendous rumbling roar as they flew over.
This group had probably taken off from Montreal and
was heading for the Coast. Hunter felt good to see the
jets. Finally, some evidence of sanity after the insanity
of his life in the past few days-The Pitts and the
Stukas' base. Life-and commerce-goes on, he
thought, despite the decadence that swirled around
the continent. He wanted to be with them-flying as
part of the convoy. Aiding the stability, keeping the
contacts to the Coasters open. He reached into his
back pocket and felt the reassuring folds of the flag he
always kept there. Maybe, someday ...
It was about two hours after sunrise when he knew
other jets were approaching. About 10 miles out,
coming at them from the north, there were three of
them, traiting smoke and flying just barely above their
present altitude of 2000 feetv
"I hope these guys are friendly," Zal said, watching
the planes approach.
"They could use us for target practice if they're
lot," Al said.
"Don'ttworry," Hunter said closing his eyes and
detecting the distinct sounds of an F-105 engine. It
vas the kind of plane the Aerodrome Defense Force
flew. "They're good guys."
The three jets were on them in a matter of seconds,
pasting them about a quarter mite out.
256
Thunderchiefs with the ADF markings. "That's my
plane!"
The jets made another past, one closer in so the
pilot could get a good look at the pastengers in the
balloon. Then all three jets wagged their wings and
continued south.
"It'll be good to be home," Hunter said,
An hour later a crowd appeared on the tarmac at
the Aerodrome to watch as the balloon descended
from out of the clouds. The jets had radioed that
Hunter, Al and Zal were safe and heading toward
Syracuse andtword had spread fast around the base.
They had all but been given up for dead.
The balloon landed and the first person to reach
them was Fitzgerald.
"Do you always have to make things difficult,
Hawker?" he said shaking Hunter's hand and wear-
ing a mite wide grin.
"Wouldn't have it any other way, Fitzie," Hunter
laughed. "Frost get here okay?"
"Sure did," Fitz said, with relief in his voice. "A
good guy, he is. Not many people you can expect to
carry two hundred million in diamonds for you these
days. He told us that the last he saw of you, you was
going down in the Spooky all aflame."
"That was the easy part," Hunter said.
"He wanted to bomb up here and fly back to look
for you," Fitz explained. "But we talked him out of it.
We sent those three Thuds you saw out for you
257

the pirate base-if we could find it, that is-the
bastardstwould probably have kitled you on the spot."
"You are right there, my friend." Hunter agreed.
Al and Zal had climbed out of the balloon and
crisply saluted Fitzgerald.
"I'm recommending these two for promotions,"
Hunter told him.
"Promotions?" Fitz said. "That witl cost me
money, Hawker."
"They'retworth it," Hunter said. "I couldn't have
done it without them."
Hunter turned to the two men and shook their
hands. He felt very close to them now. "I mean it
guys. Thanks."
"Anytime, Major," Zal said.
"Sure," Al added. "When you go back to get those
F-20s, let me know."
"It's a deal," Hunter told him.
"F-20s?" Fitzgerald asked excitedly. "What F-
20s?"
Hunter put his hand on his friend's shoulder. "It's
a long story, Fitz. Buy me a drilk and I'll tell you all
about it."
They drank and ate and drank some more. Then
Hunter retired to the penthouse for a bath and a
change of clothes. Aki was there, waiting to wash his
back. She stripped off his clothes and eased him into
the large sunken tub. As always, she climbed in with
him. He lay back and closed his eyes, letting the hot
258
water was over him. He heard her clap her hands and was aware that anothertwoman had joined them
in the tub. He drifted off into a half-sleep, feeling the
four handstwork all over his body, soothing histwounds, both physical and mental. It seemed like
he'd been gone for years, yet it had only been a couple
of days. Like a lot of his adventures, the days seemed
expanded-weeks of action compressed into a few
hours. It was the way he had always been. It was the
way he liked it.
Aki and her companion, another Oriental beauty
named Mio, lifted him from the bath and led him to
the bedroom. There, they made love to him and each
other, then they stayed and watched over him as she
slept for the next 24 hours.
He twoke from his deep sleep, well-rested and
refreshed. Aki carried a message to him. It instructed
him to meet Fitzie in his office as soon as he was able.
Hunter dressed quilkly, kissed Aki and Mio good-
bye, then set out for the Irishman's luxurious control
tower office.
When he got there, Fitz had the pite of diamonds
spread out before him on his desk. Gus was with him.
"Goodtwork, Major," Gus said, obviously pleased.
"My employers are very grateful to you."
"That's right, Hawker," Fitz said, examining each
diamond with careful interest. "You're in the chips
now."
Gus produced a strongbox that was held tight by a
pair of padlocks.
259

Here you are, Major," Gus said beaming as he unlocked the box to reveal hundreds of bright silver
coins. "Real silver,tworth two hundred thousand
dollars."
"two hundred thousand dollars?" Hunter asked,
staring at the coins. "I thought our agreement was for
one hundred fifty?"
"I said my employers were grateful, Major," Gus
said. "They suggested we sweeten the pot a little, as
they say."
"Well," Hunter said, slightly embarrassed as he
fingered the strongbox. "Please tell your employees
that I'm the one who is grateful."
Gus looked at Fitz, then back at Hunter.
"Would you like to tell them yourself, Major?" Gus
asked almost sheepishly. "Theytwould like to discuss
further employment with you."
Hunter was sitent for a moment.
"Go ahead, Hawker, me boy," Fitz said, taking his
attention away from the diamonds for a moment.
"They are rich men who need your help. And they'll
pay you for it. Go. Take your skitls and let them make
you a richer man."
Hunter looked at his friend, then back at the silver.
"It looks as if I'm already rich," he said. "I've got
enough here for fuel to fly the Coast and back ten
times."
"I said 'richer,' Hawker," Fitz said, almost chastis-
ing him. "There's plenty of money to be made, lad.
Go make it!"
"He's right," Gus interjected. "My employees are
very wealthy men. But with wealth, Major, come
260
problems.  Witl you help us?"
Hunter thought for a moment. "Well, first of all,
who the hell are your employers?"
"I can tell you now, of course," Gus said. "Have
you ever heard of Football City, Major?"
"Football City?" he thought for a moment. "The
big gambling city out in the Midwest?"
"St. Louis, Hawker." Fitz said, this time not both-
ering to look up from the gem he was examining.
"Formerly St. Louis," Gus said, correcting
Fitzgerald. "Football City is the enterprise my em-
ployers operate. It is a free territory that encompastes
all of the old city of St. Louis plus much more."
"But why 'Football' city?" Hunter was confused.
"Well, that is the major enterprise there, Major,"
Gus said. "Let me explain:
"We know you are famitiar with Las Vegas, having
been stationed there for two years. Well, Football City
pilked up where Las Vegas left off. You see, Major,
people love to gamble. Gamble on anything. It's a
relaxing yet exciting means of entertainment. In Foot-
ball City, gambling is the way of life, just as it was in
Las Vegas. But it is many times expanded. My
employers actually bought all thetworking equipment
left in Las Vegas after it was evacuated and shipped it
east to St. Louis in the first year of the New Order.
"They started slowly, like any business. But they
found out that just because the style of government
here in the country had changed, people's tastes-for
gambling and other things-were not diminished one
iota. Soon, people were flocking to St. Louis. To live.
My employers were able to give themtwork. To protect
261

them. We have a good sized army under contract and a small air force."
Hunter was still puzzled. "And you support all this
through gambling on football?"
"That's correct, Major," Gus continued. "There is
so much money around, these days. There is enough
real silver on this continent to make a lot of people
very rich. But because a lot of the former population
now lives in Free Canada, and that other territories
aren't as, shall we say, industrious, a lot of money
that's around eventually comes to places like the
Northeast Economic Zone, or to the Coasters or to
Football City."
"But I've got enough money to last me a lifetime,"
Hunter said. "Why should I want more?"
"Because you never had money before," Fitz said to
him, putting the diamonds aside and looking him
straight in the eye. "So you've got yourself enough
money to last a lifetime, have ya? Hah! You can never
have enough money. Can't you see that? It's no longer
like the old days, Hawker. This is a brave newtworld,
my friend. My daddy, Pod rest his soul, used to tell
me: 'Money talks and bullshit walks.' That's truer
today than when he said it. And the sooner you realize
it the better.
"You have to stop living in the past, man. You
thilk you're up to date, but you're wrong. Dead
wrong. You went and played war with ZAP, and a fine
outfit they were too. But it was nothing more than you
reliving your life before the New Order. It was like you
were in the Thunderbirds and with your old squadron,
too. Well, that's more like reliving your chitdhood.
262
And you were being taken care of, just like in the service.
"Aye. Some people don't need money-someone
who's living on his own in a shack in Florida or in
Maine, huntilg his own food, clothing himself.
What's he got to do with money? Nothing! What's he
need money for? Nothing! Well, half the people left
on this continent are living like that. And, I have to
thilk, they enjoy it!
"But how long could we survive like that? We're
men of technology, Hawk. We need it to survive. Or at
least I do. And you do, too. We need the machines.
They are our lives. We're specialists. The hunter, the
survivor, he's a paleolithic. He's able to get by. But
can you? And for how long?
"So I know what you're thilking. You lived up on
that goddamn mountain for two years. Big deal, I say
to that. Because you told me in the same breath that
you were dying to get back. To come down off your
fucking mountain. To fly again. Well, until you sprout
wings, Major Hunter, you ain't flying anywhere un-
less you got an airplane. And an airplane is technol-
ogy. And technology costs money. And you witl, from
this day on, need money. The more you get, the more
you'll need. It's the curse of the 'Specialized Man,'
Hawker. Like always, there are the 'haves' and the
'have-nots.' You just became a 'have.' "
Hunter was astonished at Fitz's speech. It was an
admonishment only a good friend could give to an-
other. Hunter knew it was true. He was behind the
times. Like it or not, this was the New Order. He
couldn't change that. At least not right away.
263

"Major Hunter," Gus said after a white.  "Please. Come meet with my superiors. See Football City for
yourself. It's a verytworthwhite enterprise, and, as I
said, my employers are very interested in seeking your
advice, your help in matters of grave importance."
"Look at it this way, Hawk," Fitz said, returning
his attention to the diamonds covering his desk.
"They'll be able to pay you a lot more than I can."
"But there's much more at stake here, Major," Gus
said. The tone of his voice was absolutely grim.
Studying him, Hunter thought Gus looked like a man
of 40 going on 62. Another veteran with the weight of
thetworld on his shoulders. "We in Football City are
being threatened. We are facing an enemy-dark
forces, gentlemen-that, if successful, witl wreak
havoc across the continent and ruin what little bit of
stability we have in America now."
Hunter and Fitzgerald were sitent for a moment.
Both were surprised that something like the stability
of the continenttwould affect someone like Gus. He
seemed like a 100-percent mercenary.
Fitz had to ask: "Are you serious?"
"Deadly serious," Gus said, his face going dark.
"Just who is this threat?" Hunter asked.
"I can't say at the time, Major," Gus said. "All I
can say is that you witl get all your answers from my
employers in Football City."
"And if I don't go?"
"Then the continent witl be in utter chaos in less
than a year." Gus replied, his somber but urgent tone
not letting up.
"I'd like to help you out," Hunter said. "But I've
264
got to have some kind of clue of who you are fighting here. I'm assuming that someone wants to take over
Football City?"
Gus hesitated, then answered, "Yes, that's correct."
"But you've got yourself a nice big army there,
no?" Fitz asked.
"That's also true," Gus replied.
"Then," Hunter pressed. "Why is it so serious?
Who's controlling these 'dark forces?' "
Gus was sitent for a long time. Then he looked up
and choosing histwords carefully, said: "My employ-
ers are convinced the orders to destroy Football City
are coming . . . from Moscow,"
265

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
two days later, Hunter was flying the F-16 past
the old St. Louis "Gateway to the West" arch. The
giant white arch was now decorated with tens of
thousands of flashing neon lights-beacons that
could be seen for miles, enticing people to come and
spend theiiugityer and gold in Football City.
It had taken him two days to say his goodbyes. He
had arranged to have $50,000 of his $200,000 split
between Al and Zal. Fitz gave him a bellyful of JP-8
fuel free, and bombed up the F-16 for half the
normal price. The Irishman agreed to keep in touch
by radio, just to see what was up, but also to keep
Hunter apprised of the comings and goings of the
Mid-Ak planes that still occasionally put down at
the Aerodrome on their way to New Chicago.
He spent the good part of his last day with Aki
and Mio. Hetwould miss the two Oriental bisexual
beauties. Their baths. Their comforts. Their enter-
taining nights. They cried when he told them he was
Leaving.  He promised, perhaps too hastitly, that hetwould return.
In the end, he had agreed to follow Gus on to
Football City only as a stopover on his trip to the
Coast.   He  felt  an  obligation  to  make  it to old
California, just in case some of the ZAP pilots and
crew had made it there. Always in the back of his
I mind were thoughts of the general and the captured
[ pilots and the others from Otis being held in Boston.
1 He couldn't let them down.
The flight from Syracuse to Football City took less
than two hours and gave Hunter a chance to road
| test the new, improved F-16. It was good to get back
j in the cockpit of the souped-up jet. He tested his
unique, M-61 cannon six-pack along the way and ittworked perfectly. The plane itself felt lighter, faster,
stronger.  He was glad he had taken the time in
Syracuse to overhaul it himself. Now he knew that
every nut, bolt and screw had been installed and
tightened by only himself.
He landed at the former St. Louis airport. The
place looked a little like The Aerodrome; SAM sites
ringed its perimeter, a dozen or more ack-ack guns
did too. Soldiers in brown camouflage uniforms were
moving everywhere. The airport was busy. Cargo
planestwould take off here to lilk up with the big
convoys heading west. Because the city was so close
to the Badlands, the airfield was the last stop for
any stragglers in the convoys to put down, and live
to tell about it.
A welcoming committee was waiting for him. It
included Gus and two men who were introduced to
267

him as Max and Murray. They had a stretch limousine waiting to bring him first to his quarters, then to meet their boss. But Hunter insisted on shutting down the F-16 himself. He trusted Gus, and the man assured him that the jettwould be well cared for and placed under heavy guard. Only thentwould
Hunter agree to leave it in the care of the airfield's
ground crew. All he took with him was a duffel bag
containing a change of clothes, his M-16 and his bag
of silver.
The  limo ride  through  Football  City  was  eye-
popping. It was obvious why no one called it St.
Louis anymore.  The place no longer even faintly
resembled that old city.  A massive reconstruction
project had been undertaken. Gone were the slums
and the  seedy downtown business district.   In  its
place a city of gambling and entertainment estab-
lishments  had  been planted.   Now the downtown
contained block upon city block of casinos, night
clubs, restaurants, barrooms, hotels and what he was
sure  were  high  class  whorehouses.   The  new  city
stretched for a mite in every direction. The streets
were so brightly lit from the establishments' mar-
quees, that street lights weren't needed. There were
people everywhere, walking, talking, drilking, eat-
ing, leaving one casino to duck into another.
There were all kinds of people. Soldiers, airmen,
cowboys, Canadians, chitdren, couples-some who
could only be described as tourists-who looked as if
the bomb had never been dropped. And there weretwomen. All kinds oftwomen. He saw showgirls
walking down the street in their costumes. He saw
268
hookers, fine looking mamas of all races. Young girls, oldertwomen,twomen dancing naked in the
windows of casinos. Women dressed like men. Possi-
bly some men dressed liketwomen. He saw a lot oftwomen wearing men's suitcoats, vests, ties, hats-
and minilkirts. Otherstwore only bathing suits.
Some were even topless. Everywhere he looked, he
sawtwomen.
"Thetwoman to man ratio is 3-to-l," Gus told
him.
"This places makes Las Vegas look like a crap
game in the backroom," Hunter said, his eyes glued
to the window of the limousine.
"That's right, Mr. Hunter," Murray said. "It's
more like Disneyland. You do remember Disney-
land, don't you?"
Murray was a small, balding man around 50 years
old. Huntertwouldn't be surprised later when Gus
told him that Murray took care of the books for the
city. He may have been one of the few accountants
to survive World War HI. Max, a tall, thin, schol-
arly type around 40, was the city lawyer, a nearly
ceremonial job in a place where just about every-
thing-short of murder and rape-was legal.
Gus was the fix-it man. They alltworked for a
man they called The Boss. His real name, Huntertwould find out later, was Louis St. Louis, or, bowing
to the local dialect, Louie St. Louie. He was the
kingpin of the whole operation; the person, accord-
ing to Gus, who conceived of the city, designed it,
financed it, buitt it, and now reaped the profits. It
was hard to believe he'd done it all in less than five
269

years. But Hunter knew Louie St. Louie was now at
least $200 million richer, and according to Gus, the
man was very anxious to meet the pilot who had
delivered his diamonds.
They turned a corner and ahead of them loomed a
mammoth stadium.  It covered more than 20 city
blocks,   and  was  magnificently  lit  by  at  least  a
hundred sky-high light towers. The outside walls of
the stadium were made of marble, with authentic
gold inlay. Thousands of flags and banners flew in
the breeze above its walls. It had a retractable dome,
many ramps and walkways leading in and out, plus
two very tall needle-nose towers, one at each end,
that afforded anyone sitting in them the best seat in
the house. The whole thing was beautiful-a beauti-
ful monstrosity.
They pulled up in front of the stadium so Hunter
could get a good look at it.
"Major Hunter," Gus Said. "You wanted to know
why we call this place Football City. Well, this is
why."
"You play football here?" Hunter said, looking at
the awesome structure.
"Well, not just any football, Major," Gus said.
"Professional football. Football people who can re-
member what the old NFL was like can enjoy."
"And let me guess," Hunter said. "Football every-
one can bet on."
"That's correct, Major," Gus said. "The revenues
we need to survive here in Football City come from
betting The Game."
"The Game?" Hunter asked. "You make it sound
270
like there is only one game played here."
"That's  quite  correct,   Major,"  Max told  him.
"There is only one game. A game that never ends."
"What?"
"It's true, almost," Gus continued. "It's just one
long game of football. It doesn't end until the season
ends and the season is three hundred days long. The
Game goes on, day after day, twenty-four-hours a
day. The teams-and there are only two-are made
up of five hundred men each. They substitute con-
stantly, man for man, and team for team. The gametalways goes on. The point spread is always changing
as the players enter and leave. The betting always
constant."
In the pre-war days, Hunter loved football as
much as the next guy. But a perpetual game'?
"People can bet by the periods, quarters we used
to call them," Max explained. "Or by the halfs, or
by a match, which is four quarters. Some high
rollers witl bet by the day, or the week, or the
month."
"The diamonds you pilked up for us?" Gus
asked. "They were payment from a man who had
bet the entire three-hundred-day season."
"And lost?" Hunter asked.
"And lost," Gus confirmed.
"Lost two-hundred-million," Murray the account-
ant interjected. "That's the kind of money we are
dealing with here."
"The final score last year was seventy-six thou-
sand, nine-hundred eighty-one to seventy-three thou-
sand, four-hundred fifty-two," Gus said. "It was
271

pretty close until the end when the Gold team
suffered injuries to six of its quarterbacks in less
than two weeks."
"The Gold team?" Hunter asked.
"Right," Gus answered. "The two teams that
always play each other are the Gold and Sitver. A lot
of the players are actually NFL players who were on
teams when the war broke out. We scoured both
coasts for good players. A lot of them are from Texas
too. They are terrific athletes, and they make good
money. Trouble is, there are so many of them that a
lot of the players don't even know the majority of
their teammates."
"But the place is empty right now," Hunter said,
noting the lack of hustle and bustle that he imaginedtwould be associated with such an occasion.
"That's correct, Major," Max the lawyer said.
"Our season witl open again tomorrow. It's our
biggest holiday of the year. Mister St. Louis witl
thrown out the first football and the game witl be on
again, for another three-hundred days."
Hunter was fascinated at the idea. Sports as a city
life? A never-ending football game? Bets from a
piece of silvertworth a dollar to nearly a quarter of a
bitlion dollars?
They drove on, soon arriving at a palatial estate
containing a building that was a cross between a
hotel and a cathedral. It was surrounded by a high
wrought-iron fence that stretched for a mite square.
Many soldiers were on guard outside the fence;
many tanks and armored personnel carriers were in
evidence. Several small SAM positions were also
272
directly placed around the perimeter. Inside the
fence there was an area the size of a small city park,
complete with trees, brooks and rolling greens. It
was a golf course at one time, Hunter realized and
now the place was still well-kept-and well-guarded.
Hunter estimated another 200 or so soldiers pa-
trolled these interior grounds.
The building itself, tall and red, with a rotating
red beacon on top, was surrounded by a wide func-
tional moat. It was at one time an exclusive golf
club-cum-hotel, maybe a Hyatt or a Sheraton, before
someone came in and did some extensive renova-
tions. The building was big enough to house hun-
dreds if not thousands of people. But as he soon
learned, now only one man lived there: Louie St.
Louie.
A quarter mite long roadtwound through the
pleasant grounds leading to the moat. Four check-
points also marked the way. The soldiers checked the
limo at each checkpoint, and carefully scrutinized
Gus, Max and Murray. Although all three were well-
known in these parts, the soldiers went about their
job professionally. Something about them sparked in
Hunter's memory, but he couldn't grab hold of it.
The last checkpoint was at the bridge, which was
lowered for the limo to cross the moat.
Five minutes later, after a tour of the ornate lobby,
Hunter was ushered in, alone, to the lush living
quarters of Louie St. Louie, the man who served as
designer, bankroller and, for all practical purposes,
king of Football City. The room was huge. One wall
was taken up by a long, well-stocked bar. Another
273

looked like it doubled as a movie street. An im-
mense window faced the east and provided a view
out over the grounds of the former golf course. The
remaining wall was covered with pictures of football
players and scenes from football games.
Sitting in a chair looking out the window was
Louie St. Louie. He was a tall, white haired-man of
about 60, dressed in an all-white, three-piece-suit. A
dignified chin off-set his ruddy complexion and a
quilk, down-home smite. He rose immediately and
greeted Hunter like a long-lost son, putting a bear
hug on him that threatened the airman with suffoca-
tion. Hunter detected a distinct twang in his voice
when he spoke.
"Major Hunter," Louie beamed. "This is certainly
an honor to meet you, sir. I am grateful for that,
shall we say, little favor you did for me."
"My pleasure," Hunter said.  The twang regis-
tered: Louie St. Louie was definitely of Texas stock.
"Well," St.   Louie said.   "Come on  in,  boy,  sit
down and talk to an old flyboy,twould you?"
"You're a pilot?"
"I was," Louie said, heading for the room's wet
bar. "Scotch, Major? Made yesterday."
"Sounds good," Hunter said, settling in a chair
near the large window. Out on the grounds he could
see a couple oj hundred of the estate's soldiers doing
calisthenics. Others patrolled in and out of the dots
oftwoods that marked the course.
St. Louie returned with two glasses and an unla-
beled bottle of Scotch.
"I haven't flown in years," St. Louie said, pilking
274
up the conversation. "Not real flying anyway. I have
a T-38 at the airfield. Fly down to Texas every great
white. But I'm too busy here."
"You flew before the war?" Hunter asked, taking
a taste of the bitter, strong Scotch.
"Before and during," St. Louie laughed. "B-52s.
Stationed in Guam, moved back to California, when
the shit hit. Me and my squadron took out hah* the
goddamn Russian Pacific fleet with cruise mssiles
before they made us stop having so much fun. Fired
the little buggers right off our wings. Go up with
eight of them at a time. We must have flown fifty
missions during the three weeks, bombing those
Commie bastards right across the Pacific, all the way
back to Guam, for Christ's sake."
There were a few moments of silence as St. Louie's
eyes wandered off into space. Hunter knew the man
was thilking about the Great Betrayal, the stab in
the back, brave men lost for no good reason.
St. Louie suddenly came back to the present with
the clap of his hands and a great smite.
"But gosh darn it, Major, I sure admire your
flying. I saw you guys perform once when I was up
in Boston, before the Zone went Mid-Ak."
"That seems like a long time ago," Hunter said.
"That's how things are these days, Major.  We
remember what it used to be like. Before the war.
Before the New Order. Ever since, things seem to
take longer. You can't move like you used to. I miss
it."
"So do I," Hunter agreed.
"You've seen our city?"
275

"It's quite a place."
"And it's good for the people, Major. We've
brought back more than half the original population,
and thousands of people visit us every day. It gives
them some excitement in their lives. There's not
much excitement any more if you ain't a pilot or a
soldier. People spend most of their time cooped up
in their homes or wherever they live. They don't
want to take a chance being out at night with all the
scum roaming around the continent. But there isn't
a whole lot that you can do at home either. Ain't got
TV like we used to. No radio really. No new books.
Football City gives 'em someplace to go. Something
to do. Some lilk with the past. It's safe. We got
sports. We got eating places. Music. Entertainment
╗╗
...
"Women ..." Hunter interjected.
"Wooo-eee, do we ever!" St. Louie laughed,
reaching for the bottle to refitl his glass. "They just
come from all over, Major. They like it here. They
ain't bumping around some small town somewheres
or getting raped or kitled."
"Sounds like it'stworthing fighting for," Hunter
said, his eyes traveling back to the soldiers dritling
out on the fairway.
"Now, Major, I must confess something," St.
Louie said, draining his Scotch. "We have a surprise
for you."
"Surprise?"
St. Louie laughed. "Yes," he said, getting up to
push a button. "I want you to meet our commander
of my private security forces."
276
7
The security forces, the soldiers patrolling St.
Louie's mansion and grounds, and now visible out
the window, dritling in the field below. They seemed
famitiar to him.
"Captain," St. Louie called into an intercom.
"Would you come in here please? Major Hunter is
waiting to meet you."
Hunter stood and saw St. Louie was wearing a
look of undeniable delight on his face. The door
beside him opened and a man in battle fatigues
walked in. He, too, was smiting.
Hunter looked at the man. He was stocky, ruddy
complexion and a mass of black hair.
Then the face registered.
It was Captain Bull Dozer . . .
277

CHAPTER NINETEEN
He put a bearhug on Dozer. It was so good to see
the man again. It was as if everything had come full
circle.
"I can't believe it," Hunter told him. "What the
hell are you doing here?"
"Just trying to earn a living," Dozer said, smiting
broadly.
St. Louie poured a drilk for the Marine captain
and the three of them sat down.
Well, Hawk," Dozer began. "We finally did make it
to Fort Meade; problem was, the place was empty."
"So what did you do?" Hunter asked.
"Well, there wasn't a soul anywhere around the
base, and it had plenty of food and provisions," Dozer
continued. "So we left the citizens there with a few of
our guys who wanted to stay put for a white. They
stayed for about a year, but then had to leave before
the territory went Mid-Ak."
Dozers' troops had voted to stay with him. They
respected his intelligence and sought his guidance. He
correctly surmised that in the anarchaic continent, an
army for hire might be in need in some places. So the
278
7th Cavalry walked west. They set up camp here and
there, sometimes occupying abandoned or near-aban-
doned towns when possible. Some of these occupa-
tions lasted several months or more. The local
population-once they realized that Dozer's troops
weren't rapists or New Order zealots-welcomed the
well-armed, professional unit. The countryside was
filled with gangs of gunmen and raiders during these
early days. But none was so foolish to tackle an entire
Marine battalion.
The 7th graduallytworked by its way to the Missis-
sippi, andtwould have probably walked right through
the Badlands if they hadn't landed in Football City
first. The city was just in its forming stages. St. Louie,
knowing a ready-made security force when he saw it,
offered to hire the whole battalion to help protect
Football City and train its own fledgling army. The
7th voted to accept the offer and had been in the
employ of St. Louie ever since.
"I knew you were coming, Hawk," Dozer said.
>    "And, I'm glad you're here. You're not a minute too
soon."
St.  Louie started to say something, but caught
himself at the last moment. "We'll talk business later,
Major," he said,  cryptically.  "Have you seen our
Grand Stadium?"
Hunter detected the cautious switch in St. Louie's
voice.
"I was a big football fan before the war," he said,
pilking up on the subject. "I'm glad to see it didn't
die out completely, like just about everything else."
"It didn't, Major," St. Louie said, back to his
relaxed self. "And ittwon't either. Itwon't let it. It's
279

too . . . too American."
He slapped his knee with a crack for emphasis.,
"Well," Hunter said, feeling some of the excitement
too. "I hope I can catch a part of a game white I'm
here."
St. Louie looked at Dozer. "Why, didn't they tell
you, Major?" St. Louie asked.
"Tell me what?"
"Major," St. Louie said with a smite. "Tomorrow,
at Opening Day. You're going to be the guest of
honor."
280
CHAPTER TWENTY
The next morning, Hunter was sitting in St. Louie's
special box at the Grand Stadium. The grandstands
were fitling up with people-the place held more than
250,000 and every seattwould soon be taken. More
people gathered outside to watch the action on two big
TV streets. Football City had the onlytworking TV
system on the continent and they put it to good use.
Hunter watched as a hundred players each from the
Gold and Sitver teams went through their pre-game
warm-ups on the field. Bands were playing. People
were cheering. Footballs flying through the air. A
contagious excitement ran through the crowd. Hunter
felt good inside as he took it all in. There was nothing
on the continent to compare to this. Not in the old
Northeast Economic Zone days of Boston, or Texas or
out on the Coast. This was, for want of a bettertword-traditional. Traditional and civitized.
Hunter sipped on a gigantic Bloody Mary. The
night before was a pleasant blur. More pilot talk with
St. Louie during dinner, more reminiscing with Dozer.
281

This led to more drilking at St. Louie's estate. Then
he was chauffcured to his suite of rooms at the city's
finest hotel, followed by yet another tour of the town
with Gus and the Marine captain as tour guides. Free
drilks. Free gambling chips. A showgirl named Ali-
cia. Her underpants were hanging on his bedpost
when hetwoke up. It took him a white to realize it-
but he decided that this must be a vacation, the first
one he'd had since his college days.
St. Louie was in the box with a couple of dozen
other guests. The man had promised to talk business
with Hunter after the game, so the airmen decided
there was nothing to do but sit back and relax. Dozer
was out on the field, supervising the security effort,
his men sprilkled throughout the crowd in addition to
Football City's regular army troop. Back in the box, a
squad of scantity-clad waitresses made sure everyone
was well-cared for. At the stroke of noon, both
teams-1000 players in all-took the field. The game
was about to begin. Suddenly the stadium's PA sys-
tem sprang to life:
"Ladies and gentlemen!" the speakers boomed
with an anonymous announcer's voice. "Welcome to
Opening Day!"
The crowd responded with a thunderous cheer. The
vibrations shook the whole stadium including St.
Louie's box. Hunter felt a jolt run through him. Just
like the old days, he thought.
The announcer continued: "Starting our program
today witl be the Football City Air Corps Acrobatic
282
Team"
St. Louie had told Hunter about the air demonstra-
tion earlier. The Football City leader confessed that
the city's air corps was the demonstration team; the
city only had five jets, and they were rather harmless
and antique T-33s. Despite the enormous wealth of
the city, when it came to defense, the money was spent
on hiring an army. The city's jets-slow and un-
armed-were strictly for show.
The crowd turned its eyes skyward as the jets
appeared over the stadium. Flying in a standard V-
formation the team executed a rather lukewarm series
of loops, break-ups and eights. Hunter gave them an
A for effort. The crowd, on the other hand, loved it.
St. Louie leaned over to him and said: "Someday,
Major, we'll have a real air force."
Hunter looked at him and nodded. But St. Louie
wasn't smiting. He looked more like an old man than
a dignified cowboy. "Some day, Major," he continued
with an ominous tone in his voice. "We'll need it."
He went back to watching the air demo team
perform their routine. The crowd cheered with each
maneuver. Hunter added his applause, although he
could have performed the team's aerobatics in his
sleep.
Suddenly, he knew something was wrong. Other
aircraft were in the area. He could feel it. Even above
the roar of the crowd and the noise of the Football
City jets, he could hear other engines, more powerful,
more threatening, heading their way.
He turned toward the northeast. Here they come,
he thought. Just then a siren went off. The band
283

stopped playing. The crowd let out a collective gasp.
An instant later, five deadly-looking fighter planes
streaked low over the stadium.
"Where did they come from?" someone in the box
yelled.
The jets were unmarked and painted entirely in
black. They were all carrying air-to-air mssiles.
"Who the hell are they?" someone yelled as the jets
streaked over and began to turn.
Hunter began to shake with anger. He knew what
kind of jets they were. A rage began at his feet and
traveled at the speed of light to his head. He watched
in angry silence as the fighters flashed over the
stadium again and started to climb.
"Are they friendly?" someone else asked. The
crowd began to move uneasity.
The Football City air demo was in the middle of a
flyby high above the stadium. Hunter doubted if the
demo jets even hadtworkable radar or radios. And he
could tell the mystery jets were preparing to attack.
The intruder jets weren't F-4s, or F-8s or F-104s.
Not Thunderchiefs or Voodoos or Super Sabres. Nor
any other pre-New Order American design. That's
what shook Hunter as he stared at the aircraft. His
blood began to boit. He hadn't seen jets like these
since the war. He didn't thilk he'd ever see jets like
these again. But here they were, above Football City's
Grand Stadium. In the middle of the continent.
Ready to attack the unarmed performing jets . . .
"They're pirate jets!" someone yelled. Screams
came from the crowd. The impending panic of a
quarter of a million people rippled through the sta-
284
dium.
"No, they're not!" Hunter yelled, bolting from the
luxury box. "They're Russian MIG-21s! And they're
going after the demos!"
Helplessness. It washed over the stadium crowd as
the black MIG-21s attacked the unarmed Football
City T-33 jets. two of the demos were simply blown
out of the sky by the black fighters' firing their air-to-
airs. two others twisted and turned as each was
pilked up by at least two of the mystery planes. The
crowd seemed glued to its feet as the dogfight swirled
above them. Another demo was hit. Its wing severed,
it plunged toward the grandstand. The strilken planetwobbled as the pilot tried to steer it away from the
crowd. But he couldn't. Too late the people in the
stadium began to react. The jet slammed into stands
at the far end of the stadium, kitling hundreds in-
stantly and spitling burning jet fuel over hundreds
more nearby.
The horrible crash snapped the fans out of their
stupor. Panic set in. In seconds the crowd was pouring
out onto the playing field and rushing toward the
exits. Now the screams and cries were as loud as the
cheering that had filled the stadium just minutes
before. People were crushed, trampled, suffocated
beneath the on-rushing sea of bodies.
Another Football City jet was hit, right above one of
the needle nose towers. It was as if the mystery jets
were intentionally firing on the unarmed planes when
and where a crashtwould do the most damage. Again,
285

the pilot struggled to control the jet away from the
stadium. Again, he faited.
He managed to miss most of the crowd, keeping the
smoking jet level as it crossed across the length of the
stadium barely 200 feet from the ground. But the
valiant pilot could do no more. The T-33 crashed into
the base of the needle tower at the far end of the
stands. The structure shook once, teetered, then came
tumbling down. A dozen or so technicians housed in
the tower were trapped and crushed as the structure
slammed into the fleeing crowd.
High above the stadium, the last demo plane was
caught in the crossfire of two mystery jets and was hit
simultaneously by two air-to-air mssiles. It disinte-
grated in mid-air.
Then, as suddenly as they had appeared, the black
MIG-21s were gone. The attack had lasted less than a
minute. Thousands lay dead or dying. two fires were
raging in the stadium; one where the tower had fallen,
another where the jet had crashed into the stands.
Tens of thousands of fans were still scrambling toward
the exits, many others just stood in numbed disbelief.
No one quite knew what to do. No one except
Hunter . . .
He was out the luxury box door before the first
missite was even fired by the MIG-21s. He didn't have
to see the dogfight. He could hear it and know what
was going on. Knowing the exitstwould be soon filled
with panilking fans, he opted for climbing out on one
of the girders that supported the stadium stands. He
shimmied down the beam and was soon out on the
street beside the stadium. The noise of the crowd and
286
the screams of the jets high above filled the air. He
saw the first jet come crashing down. Quilkly, he
looked around, trying to get his bearings. Which way
was the fucking airport? He had to get to his F-16 . . .
Frustration. It was no use. The streets were clogged
within seconds. Injured people fell out of the stadium
by the hundreds, burnt, crying, bleeding. It was utter
chaos. Sirens were going off all around him. The
smoke from the fires inside filled his nostrits. It
smelled of burning flesh. The street was a mass of
suffering humanity. People grabbed him, some with
burning clothes, others with burning skin. Overhead,
he caught a quilk flash,of the mystery jets-their
ruthlesstwork done-disappearing into the clouds.
Theytwould be far away before he could even get to the
airport. He hated to give up so easity, but there was
nothing he could do now. In desperation, he shook his
fist at the sky.
Rescue vehicles were arriving. Soldiers appeared
and started treating the victims. Hunter looked
around and began to thilk more rationally. He was
needed here on the ground right now. People were
dying. They needed help. His heart burning with
hate, heavy with rage, he joined the rescue crews and
started administering first aid.
He stayed there the entire day and most of the
night, helping the survivors, recovering the dead. The
lights usually used for the football games were turned
to the parts of the stadium where the jet and the tower
crashed. Rescuetworkers sifted through the debris,
looking for more victims. The remains of the crashed
T-33 still smoldered in the rubble. The sirens kept
287

blaring; no one had bothered to turn them off.
Meanwhite, people were packing up and fleeing
Football City in droves. Rumors, fueled by the fires
rising out of the rubble of the stadium, raced through
the city. Another attack was coming. Get out white
you can. Head for the hitls. Once again, civitization
came toppling down.
"Who were they?" Hunter asked Louie St. Louie.
"Whotwould want to do this?"
They were in the cellar of St. Louie's estate, in a
makeshift war room. Dozer and a half dozen other top
officers of the Football City Army were there, trying
to assess the situation. Despite his protests, St.
Louie's security forces had hustled him away from the
stadium as quilkly as they could. The first thing he
did was order his troops into the city to help the
people who were left find bomb shelters. He rede-
ployed the SAMs surrounding his estate to the down-
town area, in case a second attack did come. His army
was on full -alert, but aside from a few anti-aircraft
guns, he knew theytwould be helpless should the black
fighters return.
After leaving the site of the attack, Hunter had
caught a ride to the airport, checked to make sure his
F-16 was safe, then rushed back to St. Louie's estate.
It was early morning.
St. Louie called him to an isolated corner of the
room.
He spoke in a hushed tone. "The Famity did this."
"The Famity?" Hunter asked with some surprise.
288
"How can you be sure?"
"They're the ones who have been threatening us for
months," St. Louie said. "Goddamn criminals is what
they are! They'd be in prison or deported if it were the
old days."
"What do they want?"
" 'A piece of the action.' Protection money for not
attacking us."
"That's blackmait!" Hunter said.
"Sure as shit," St. Louie replied, angrity. "They've
been at me for months. First, they came down here to
gamble in the early days. I told my guys to keep a
close eye on them. I never liked them, but I couldn't
start kilking every shady character out of the city.
These guys spent money.
"Then, they started sending their cozy ass ambas-
sadors down here with gifts. Booze,twomen, even
drugs. Trying to get me to sign a 'mutual defense
treaty' with them."
"Mutual defense treaties are an old Mid-Ak tactic,"
Hunter said.
"Well, I'm sure they got it from these crooks that
are running New Chicago," St. Louie snorted.
"They're goddamn mafioso, is what they are."
"I hope you didn't pay them off."
"No way. I kept telling them to go to hell with their
protection money. They got mad. Sent more threats. I
got mad. Locked up two of their ambassadors for a
couple of nights, then threw their asses right out of
the city. After that it was everything from death
threats to warnings of all-out war. Luckity, I have
some pretty good intelligence guys. I was able to send
289

agents up there. They'd been warning that something
like this might happen, but I didn't thilk ittwould be
this soon."
"Howtwould you match up against them in a war? "
Hunter asked.
"We're good," St. Louie said. "Damn good. But
they've got a hell of a big army. Free-lancers, mostly.
At least sixty thousand standing. Who knows what
theytwould call up in reserves. It's an army of thugs.
Lots of tanks, APCs and trucks."
"And MIG-21s," Hunter added.
"That's just it," St. Louie said, his voice rising in
anger. "They never had an air force before. That's
why we never got one. We figured if they ever attacked
us, ittwould be by land. We have a hell of a defense
line out there called the Mississippi River. It practi-
cally surrounds the city. If you control the seven
bridges crossing it, you can keep anyone out. But
these MIG-21s change the balance of power.
And . . ."
"And?"
"Well, there's more," St. Louie ran his hand
through his white hair. "My spies tell me that they've
spotted some Russians in New Chicago."
The Russians. Orders from Moscow. Hunter had to
thilk for a moment. The late, great General Jones
had always believed that the Russians were operating,
in some form, on the continent. Their aim was to keep
things destabitized. Keep things out of kitter. Keep
the people on the continent in disarray, so they could
not become cohesive once again.
Hunter never quite bought it; his complex logic
290
process prevented him from doing so, although, he
too, had seen some evidence of it. The Russian rifles
in New York City. The whispers of collusion between
the Russians and the Mid-Aks. The East European
cargo plane he had sabotaged at The Aerodrome. It
was heading for New Chicago. Now the MIG-21s . . .
Things might seem to add up, but Hunter, as
always, needed proof. The Russian army couldn't fire
a popgun after the war in Europe. They had been
decimated, wiped out. No command structure, no
weapons, no nothing. They had had a hard time
consolidating their gains in conquered Europe. They
had to rely on collaborators-like the Finns-to do
their dirtytwork after the great battle. So how could
they be operating over here? Could they have recov-
ered so quilkly in three years? He'd have to meet a
live Russian, nose-to-nose, to believe it.
"Major," St. Louie continued. "This was the reason
I wanted to meet you. After you came through on the
diamond shipment, I knew you were the man I
needed."
"This is the 'business' you referred to earlier?"
"That's right. Major. Last week my agents told me
that New Chicago could launch a ground attack
against us within a few months. Now it looks like they
are ahead of that schedule."
"What can I do? I'm just one pilot. One plane.
You need a whole goddamned air force."
"That's it exactly, Major Hunter." St. Louie was
speaking in all earnesty. "This city is a jewel. It's the
closest thing there is to the old days. Sure, it's based
on gambling. But men are free here, Major. There are
291

very few places on this continent where anyone can
make that claim. Those criminals want it. To ruin it.
Rape it. Destroy it.
"We know this is not your fight, Major. But we also
know that you are a patriot. And patriots are also in
very short supply these days. We are hoping you witl
help us. Help us fight for this last bastion of freedom
in this part of the country. If we go, all that's lefttwould be Texas and the Coasters."
Hunter was quiet for a moment. His mind was
flashing. Western Europe. New York City. The moun-
tain. Otis. Baltimore. His rebirth in the hangar in
Vermont. The Aerodrome. The Pitts. The Stukas'
base. Now, Football City. His search, his quest, his
goal. Continue the fight for freedom. Fight for it until
the last ounce of strength in his body was gone. For
the brave men who died in the war. For the people
trapped in the horror of New York City. For Jones
and all he stood for. St. Louie was preaching to the
faithful.
"What do you want me to do?" Hunter asked.
A wave of relief came across the older man's face.
He looked like a cowboy again. "I don't care how
much it costs. I don't care what it takes. Get us some
pilots. Get us some planes. Get us some ground
personnel. Get us ammunition . . .
"Get us a goddamn air force!"
Hunter smited. He was one step ahead of St. Louie.
He knew where there were pilots and monkeys. Some
were among the best in thetworld. And he knew where
there were airplanes, also some of the best in thetworld. He also knew where there was a hangar full of
292
bombs sitting on a mountain in Vermont. Thattwould
be a start. He loved a challenge. He loved the chance
to strike a blow for freedom. Good or bad, Football
City stood for freedom. It wastworth fighting for. It
wastworth dying for.
"Mister St. Louie," Hunter said, extending his
hand to shake on it. "You'll get your air force."
Hunter reached into his back pocket. The folded
flag was still there.
293

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
The huge C-5 Galaxy cargo plane descended out of
the sky above The Aerodrome, its engines whining, its
landing gear kilking up a skid of smoke as they
touched the runway. The C-5 was the largest airplane
ever buitt. It was hah* again the size of a 747 Jumbo
Jet andtwould dwarf a 707. It could carry close to 600
troops plus their equipment. Or move a hah* dozen
tanks, APCs, trucks, jeeps, whatever. Few jobs were
too big for the mighty aircraft.
The Galaxy was a rare sight these days. So a crowd
made up of Aerodrome ground crews, was waiting
when the big plane taxiied up to its station point, its
four massive engines still screaming. Fitzgerald was at
the head of the crowd, his cigar bitlowing smoke,
checking his watch. The giant plane was right on
time.
The jet came to a stop and its engines began to shut
down. The pilot's hatch opened and Hunter climbed
out. Those assembled gave him a spontaneous round
of applause. He laughed and waved back. It had been
a month since he'd left The Aerodrome and most
everyone at the base knew he was helping Football
294
City prepare for the impending war with New Chi-
cago.
"We just can't seem to lose you, Wingman,"
Fitzgerald said, warmly greeting his old friend.
I'm just a stilk jockey trying to make a living,"
Hunter said. "You got my message. Is everything
ready?"
"Everything's set," Fitz told him. "This is a bit
rilky Hawker, isn't it?"
"Life's a rilk, these days," Hunter answered.
"How's Aki? Mio?"
"Both well and waiting for you," Fitzgerald said
with a wilk.
"Let me show you something first," Hunter said,
giving his co-pilot the thumbs up signal. Slowly, the
entire blunt nose of the jet began to lift, like a giant
fish opening its mouth. Fitzgerald could see the air
crew was already preparing to unload the plane's
cargo.
A ramp was lowered and the first materiel off-
loaded were two dozen crates of various bombs,
mssiles, RPGs, and rifles, courtesy of the Football
City Army. Next off was the first of two small, Cobra
attack helicopters. With their rotors folded back, the
bright red, diminutive choppers had the appearance
of some kind of huge, alien insects.
"Cobras!" Fitz said, with admiration in his voice.
"I been looking for one of them for years. How'd you
manage to get hold of two?"
"Ever hear of the Cobra Brothers?"
Fitzgerald had to thilk for a minute. "The Tex-
ans?"
"That's them," Hunter said. "They've been tearing
295

things up down on the Mexican border for the past
year. Things were real hot down there until lately."
"Well, I heard a lot about them," Fitzie said.
"They're the best in the business. You were lucky to
get them."
"St. Louis arranged it," Hunter said, watching as
the crews wheeled out the second Cobra. "He's a
Texan and he put out a call to his relatives back home.
That's where he got the C-5."
" 'Tis a fine airplane," Fitz said, looking at the
behemoth aircraft, then at the second Cobra. Each
chopper was armed with twin M-16 cannons, which
were placed on a turret located on the sharp snout of
the aircraft. In addition to the cannons, the helicopter
had short, stubby wings for missite firings. The two
Cobra Brothers, who weren't brothers at all, had also
ripped out the second seat in each of the choppers and
replaced it with firing control systems capable of
handling everything from small anti-ship rockets to
flame-throwing techniques.
Next to be rolled out was a larger, rather beat-up
looking helicopter. Fitzgerald was surprised to see the
battered old beast of a chopper wheeled out of the
belly of the C-5.
"And what the hell is this, Hawker?" he asked, his
brogue ringing.
Hunter only smited. The large chopper sported a
coat of chipped red and white paint, one cracked
cockpit window and a piece of rope to hold the side
hatch door closed.
"Well, I can see why you carried this monster in the
Galaxy," Fitzgerald said, looking at the beat-up heli-
copter. "It cannot fly, can it?"
296
"Oh, it does more than that, Fitz," Hunter said as
the crew finished wheeling the chopper off the C-5.
"Come aboard. I'll show you."
"Just promise not to try to get the thing airborne,"
Fitz said, inspecting a faded sign painted on the side
of the chopper. It read: MAINE LUMBER COM-
PANY. Fitzgerald could only shake his head.
Stepping inside, though, he got a surprise. The
interior of the helicopter was one long bank of com-
puters, dials, switches, lights, flashing red, green and
blue, digital read-outs, computer keyboards and video
streets. Eight crewmen scampered around the inside,
all dressed in blue flight suits and fighter pilot hel-
mets.
"Mother of God, Hawker," Fitzgerald said.
"What's this? A spaceship?"
The interior of the chopper did resemble a space-
craft. Actually it was a highly sophisticated firing
platform, convincingly disguised as a flying lumber
truck.
"Take a look," Hunter told him. He pushed a
control button and automatically a section of the
helicopter's bottom lowered, revealing a steerable mis-
site firing platform. Fitz could also see more than a
half dozen gun ports with M61 machine guns sta-
tioned at them. Three windows on the port side served
three GE Galling guns, each capable of firing 6000
rounds a minute. The walls of the craft held miles of
belts of ammunition plus a potpourri of hand weapons
from shoulder-fired SAM launchers to dozens of M-
16s and Browning automatic rifles.
"What kind of helicopter is this?" Fitzgerald said,
nearly flabbergasted at the aircraft's potential de-
297

structive firepower.
"It's an old CH-53E 'Super Sea Stallion,' " Hunter
told him. "The Texans found it in an abandoned
Coast Guard station down on the Gulf. They gave it to
St. Louie and he let me tilker with it a bit."
"I see more than a bit of your hand in this," Fitz
said, gingerly touching the computer panels. "Who
but the famous Hawker Hunter could make heads or
tails of all this computer mumbo-jumbo?"
"Well," said Hunter. "We did soup it up a little. It's
got three separate engines and we super-charged each
one of them. We can lift ten tons for one hundred
miles or five tons for two hundred miles. We have
radar jamming equipment on board, stand-off missite
firing capability, LANTERN night-fighting gizmos.
Plus we can carry fifty-five people on board, maybe
seventy if we squeeze them on."
Fitz smacked his lips. "I've changed my mind,
Hawker," he said, only half-jokingly. "You have to
take me for a ride in it some time. Show me what it
can do."
"If it's still in one piece when we get back," Hunter
told him. "You got yourself a deal."
two hours later, a C-130 cargo plane landed at The
Aerodrome. On board were Dozer, the two Cobra
Brothers, plus a 25-man Special Operation unit,
drawn exclusively from Dozer's 7th Cavalry. Each
member had volunteered to accompany Hunter on his
quest to find an air force for Football City. Dozer's
commandos had trained day and night for the past
month on air assaults, rescue techniques and special
298
weapons handling. Dozer and Huntertworked with
them separately, spending days on end, with no sleep,
practicing, training, studying. In the end every last
one of them knew theretwould be no time or leeway for
screw-ups. Football City had become their home.
Theirstwould be the first step in whattwould prove to
be a valiant defense of that city and its way of life.
Hunter spent the next two days at The Aerodrome
going over the plan with the assault force and the next
two nights, enjoying the erotic delights of Aki and
Mio. They could feel a distance in him this time,
though. His mind was a million miles away. Thilking
about the mission. Fitzgerald noticed it too. The night
before the assault team was to pull out, he split a
bottle of bourbon with his friend.
"It's a dangerous one," the Irishman told him.
"Are you sure about using minimum air support?"
Hunter nodded. "Can't muck it up with jets this
time, Fitz. We got to go in, hit them, get what we went
for and get the hell out of there. The Cobra Brothers
witl keep them busy white we're in and help us shoot
our way out."
Hunter produced a map and read it over for the
thousandth time. "The Cobra Brothers witl take off
tomorrow at dawn," he told Fitz, reviewing his scheme
one last time. "They'll arrange the refueling stop in
Quebec. Then they'll meet us here." He pointed to a
small speck of land off the,coast of what used to be
the state of Maine.
"Then," he said, "We'll all head out for the final
destination and hope we find a full house when we get
299

there." Fitzgerald looked at the map and where
Hunter's finger was pointing and then poured them
both a drilk.
"To success," Fitz said, lifting his glass to toast.
"I'll give your regards to the Mid-Aks," Hunter
tapping the point on the map labeled: BOSTON.
"I'm lucky in two respects," he told Fitzgerald.
"First of all, St. Louie has spies everywhere. Damn
good ones too. Without good intelligence, we'd be
flying by the seat of our pants.
"Second, I have one hell of a strike force. Jesus
Christ, they're good, Mike!"
"Yer just lucky," Fitz said. "Makes me with I
could go with you."
"You could do me a big favor by staying here,"
Hunter told him earnestly.
"Witl it be good or bad for my business, now?"
"Itwon't answer that," Hunter laughed. "What I
need is someone to feed the intelligence I get from St.
Louis to me white I'm out there. He has guys right in
the city for Christ's sake, watching the 'Aks every
move. I need that edge."
"Consider it done, Hawker," Fitz said. "I can still
play 'neutral' and slip a radio message to you now and
then."
"I knew I could count on you, buddy," Hunter
said, draining his drilk. "Well, time to go."
"Good luck, Hawker, my friend," Fitzgerald told
him, clamping Hunter's hand with both of his.
"Thanks, Mike," Hunter said. "I'll see you when I
get back."
300
Thirty-six hours later, Hunter was watching the sun
rise out of the Atlantic Ocean, and start its climb
across the sky. He looked around at the bivouac. It
was a smoky collection of tents and sleeping bags, two
campfires, a cauldron of hot, morning stew on one, a
pot of boiling coffee on the other.
They were on an island just a stone's throw off the
southern coast of the old state of Maine. Hunter knew
the place from his chitdhood. It was well-forested and
difficult to see from the air. There were fields large
enough to handle the three choppers on the mission.
It was barely more than an hour flying time to
Boston. Here theytwould review the plan one last
time. Here hetwould begin his war against the Mid-
Aks in earnest.
Even though the Mid-Aks now controlled the
Northeast Economic Zone, the invaders had been
wise enough to leave the Down Mainers alone for the
time being. The typical Mid-Ak arrogance didn't jell
at all with the Mainers, who, on their best days were
only downright ornery. The Mainers didn't blilk
when the coup went down in Boston. They just kept
fishing and farming and cuttingtwood. Thetwood was
turned into lumber and the lumbertwould be trans-
ported down to Boston in helicopters, and ittwould
stay that way just as long as someone was on the other
end to buy it. Boston politics was about the last thing
to concern the people in Maine.
So he knew the assault forcetwould be safe to hole
up on the deserted island, and to use the place to
launch the attack. There were 25 assault troops-each
one part of Dozer's Battalion, all veterans of the New
York City days and many battles since-the Cobra
301

Brothers, the Stallion crew of six, Dozer and himself.
He was proud of them; proud to be serving with them.
In one short month, they had squeezed in more
training than a Green Berettwould get in a year. Good
teatwork usually was the most important factor of
any military operation, and this bunch, he had to
admit, knew about teatwork.
He hadn't slept the night before. Didn't need it. He
spent the night spelling the guards and rechecking the
weapons systems in the Sea Stallion. The last intelli-
gence report he had received, sent by St. Louie, coded
and forwarded to the Quebec fueling system by the
"neutral" Fitzgerald, said that the captured ZAP
pilots were still being held in the Government Buitd-
ing. The report also confirmed the prisoners were
jaited on the floors near the top of the building and
that the security on the building's top-floor helipad,
was light.
He called the whole team together and briefed them
once again. The Stalliontwould lift off first, exactly at
noon, and, disguised as a lumber chopper,twould fly
right into the heart of the city. There, feigning engine
problems if need be, ittwould wait, with the Strike
Force hidden inside, until sunset when the Cobra
Brotherstwould arrive and start their diversionary
tactics.
Hunter had confidence in his plan. Surprisetwould
be his major advantage, but he also knew that the
Mid-Aks had rudimentary radar around the city, at
best. And bad radar meant bad SAM capability. He
was sure the diversionary actiontwould catch some-
one's attention. The plan called for one of the Cobras
to sneak into the' harbor at wave-top height, and put
302
two rockets into the side of a liquid natural gas
holding tank near a docking facitity that St. Louie's
agents had pinpointed. The target was perfect. Not
only were there no civitians around for miles, but the
Mid-Aks had foolishly set up an army ammunition
dump close by. If the Cobra made it-and its trip
required a rather peritous journey into the harbor and
up the Mystic River, Boston's main water flow that
emptied into the ocean-a third of the city along with
the Mid-Ak ammo dumptwould go up in smoke.
Hunter ordered the Stallion loaded up and soon the
big chopper was lifting off from the island base. The
Cobra Brothers waved as it ascended and turned
south, toward the occupied Mid-Ak capital. He
checked each detail of the plan once again with Dozer
and the assault force's five officers, only then was he
completely satisfied everyone was ready.
It didn't take a long convoluted explanation to the
Troopers as to why they were going to fight a thousand
miles away from home. They knew what was at stake.
Simply their way of life. Twenty-five had accompa-
nied him on the rescue mission, but all 900 of Dozer's
men had volunteered. When it came to fighting for
freedom, one usually never had to look far for re-
cruits.
The Stallion cruised down the rocky coast of the
former state of Massachusetts, pasting over many
abandoned cities along the way. The true sinister
nature of the Mid-Aks hit home as Hunter looked out
of the chopper's window at the near-desolate land-
scape of Boston's North Shore. Even after the war, the
303

area had been alive, vital,tworking for the good of the
Northeast Economic Zone. Now, it was practically
deserted. The 'Aks had made good on their promise to
evacuate the populace from all the coastal cities near
Boston, except for those unlucky souls who were slave
laborers. The invaders' mentality dictated that all the
coastal ports should be mititarized to handle the
seaborne trade. What they didn't count on-call it
arrogance, call it stupidity-was that most civitized
people were loathe to trade with the Middle Atlantic
occupying force. It was like dealing with the devit.
The Northeast Economic Zone was now the North-
east Depression Zone. Business was bad for the Mid-
Aks and it showed.
Hunter could feel the slow burn again rise up
within him as he looked at the empty cities below. The
Mid-Aks can't even make a dictatorshiptwork! Their
problem was that they weren't geared toward holding
and occupying territory. Their threat was based on
military strength, with little or no regard for consoli-
dating their gains, or for taking advantage of the
spoits of war, no matter how itl-gotten they were. Even
Ghengis Khan secured and kept alive the trade routes
he conquered. The Mid-Aks didn't. They were in it
simply for the blood-lust of war.
That's why Hunter planned to give them a dose of
their own medicine . . .
The helicopter flew right by the once bustling, now
almost abandoned Logan Airport, without so much as
a call from the field's control tower. The Mid-Aks'
lack of security was laughable. They pasted right over
SAM sites which appeared not to even be manned.
Several jet fighters sat sleeping on the runway. The
304
wreckage of a crashed airliner decorated one end of a
landing strip-wreckage no one had bothered to clear
away.
They approached the skyline of downtown Boston,
then made a turn to the north. Below was a deserted
shopping mall, its merchandise long ago stolen by the
conquerors, its buildings reduced to burnt-out shells.
Even its huge parking lot was cratered. But the
Stallion pilots found a level space big enough to put
the chopper down.
It was a clear late spring day, but no birds sang and
the trees were blossoming only reluctantly. Even Nat-
ure hated the Mid-Aks, so it seemed. The once-
colorful, profitable city was now covered in a dull,
prevaiting gray. It gave more than a few of the strike
force the shivers, although it wasn't a cold day.
The Troopers sat quietly inside the helicopter, each
man going over the part he'd play once the mission
got underway. Hunter sat in the cockpit with the
pilots, simultaneously checking the time, the weather
and the area around the shopping mall. As far as they
could tell, there was no one around to see them land.
Suddenly, a Mid-Ak armored personnel carrier
appeared in the little-used avenue next to the parking
lot. It was speeding along as if on a routine patrol,
when it slowed and then turned in their direction.
There was a sharp, instantaneous crack as every
trooper flilked the safeties off their guns all at once.
No one spoke. Hunter used his hands to urge caution
and calm, then pointed at two of the Troopers who
were given extra duties just in case this eventually
rose.
The two Marines, named Russ and Stitch, were
305

natives of Maine. They looked like it, acted like it
and, most important of all, spoke like it. Hunter had
arranged for these two only to be dressed in typical
down Mainer fashion-lumberjack boots, heavy
jeans, plaid huntilg shirts, baseball caps. Theytwould
serve as the first dodge for getting rid of the Mid-Aks.
Should they fait, the Stallion's three GE Gatling gunstwould be sighted on the APC, a split-second push of
the button away from spitting out deadly shells at the
rate of 600 per second. A two second blasttwould
evaporate the Mid-Ak vehicle and crew, buttwould
also cause ,a commotion. Hunter knew the best tactictwould be to talk their way out of it.
Russ and Stitch climbed out of the chopper, tool
cases in hand, and pretended to head for the craft's
tail section. They faked surprise when the APC pulled
up.
Six Mid-Aks leaped out of the back. Another, this
one an officer, appeared in the access hatch of the
tank-like vehicle.
"What's going down here?" the officer said, as the
Ak troops unshouldered their rifles and aimed them at
Russ and Stitch.
"Chopper broke down," Russ said in a flawless
Down Mainer accent. "Got to fix it."
"Why are you here?" the officer asked. "This is a
restricted zone. You hitlbitlies could have been shot
down by one of our SAM crews."
That's a laugh, thought Hunter as he watched the
scene from the corner of one of the Stallion's smoked
windows.
"Chopper broke down," Stitch chimed in, mimilk-
ing to the letter Russ's accent. "Didn't have no choice
306
where to land her."
"Well, looking at that piece of shit, it's atwonder
you made it down here at all," the officer said, eyeing
the seemingly bruised and battered flying beast. "Do
you have your ID papers?"
"Papers?" Russ said, innocently. "Ain't got no
papers. Don't need 'em at home."
"You goddamn lumber jockeys," the officer
laughed. "When you gonna get civitized? Everyone
needs ID papers to live in this region." He turned to
his troops and said: "Search the helicopter."
Hunter bristled. He put his hand up, indicating to
the gunner sitting at the Gatling guns* computer
controls to stand by. "Don't screw it up boys," he
whispered.
"Suit yourself," Stitch said, calmly stepping aside.
"Nothing inside . . ."
"We'll see about that," the officer said.
". . . Except the barrels of pig grease," Russ said
finishing his companion's sentence.
"Pig grease?" the officer asked, momentarity stop-
ping his climb out of the vehicle.
"Innards," Stitch said. "Traded our lumber for
twelve barrels. Strong stuff. Figure the smell might
have clogged up the engine."
He and Russ broke into a perfectly spontaneous two
second laugh, then returned the dour expressions to
their faces. The officer turned slightly pale. These
guys should get an Academy Award, Hunter thought.
The Mid-Aks troops looked to their leader for
guidance. Search twelve barrels containing bloody pig
muscle, marrow and intestines? Even the Mid-Ak
officer couldn't order his men to do that.
307

"If there were some slaves around," the officer said,
settling back down into his position, "I'd sure as shit
have them search that craft."
He sniffed the air. "Christ! I can smell it already,"
he said, putting his hand up to his nose.
Talk about mind over matter, Hunter thought.
The Mid-Ak soldiers quilkly did the same as their
officer thumbed them back into the APC.
"Get that smelly piece of shit out of here, pronto!"
he screamed at Russ and Stitch as the APC belched a
cloud of black smoke and lurched away. "I don't want
it here when I come back this way."
"Try our best," Russ said, with a smite and a wave.
Once the vehicle was out of sight, Russ and Stitch
climbed back inside the Stallion to a muted round
of applause from the strike force.
"Pig grease?" Hunter asked them, smiting. "What
the hell is pig grease?"
"Beats the shit out of me," Russ shrugged, settling
back down on his seat. "Closest I've ever been to a pig
is eating bacon and eggs."
308
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
As the sun began to set, anticipation began to rise
aboard the chopper. Each man checked his black
combat jump suit for ammo, hand grenades and the
other necessities of hand-to-hand combat. Hunter
looked around the interior of the craft. The assault
troops were ready, helmets on, faces blackened, guns
loaded. The chopper crew was ready, the pilot re-
checking his instruments, the co-pilot fine-tuning the
radar, the gunners lovingly patting their muzzles and
testing their computer terminals.
Hunter checked the sun, then gave a thumbs-up
signal to the pilot. The mighty rotors on the chopper
began to turn, slowly at first, then gaining momen-
tum. Soon, they were a blur of speed. The helicopter
started to shake slightly, then whine as the engine
came up to speed.
Hunter shook each man's hand then nodded to the
pilot. The chopper jerked once, then slowly ascended
into the air.
309

Twenty miles off the coast of Boston, the two
smaller Cobra gunships were streaking inland. They
pasted several ships who paid them no mind. Soon the
outline of the city was visible. The sun was setting
down in back of the skyscrapers which marked the
downtown. At the entrance to the harbor proper.
Cousin One waved to his partner and peeled off
toward the skyscrapers. Cobra two stayed over the
water, soon pilking up the twists and turns of the
Mystic River tributary which connected the city to the
Atlantic Ocean. Up ahead, using his infrared view-
scope in the twilkling light of twitight, he could see
his target-a large, orange fuel tank with the letters
BOSTON GAS fading on its side. A ship was docked
close by, its igloo-like compartments marking it as a
LNG tanker. He thought he could make out an East
European flag flying above it. "All the better," he
smited, as he pushed his MISSILE WAITING button
on the fire control panel.
Meanwhite the other Cobra was up and over the
city, heading for the Government Buitding. The
square, 52-story bluish structure that still had the
name of its former owners-Prudential-painted on
its peak. Below, the Cobra Brother could see the
streetlights of the city burning away, some traffic on
the roads, mostly military, and a few people ambling
down the main streets. There were SAM sites located
throughout the area, as well as AA guns. But amaz-
ingly enough, no one paid any attention to his bright
310
red chopper as it made its way across the sky above
the city.
He put the Cobra into a wide orbit high above the
Government Buitding and waited. It didn't take long
until he saw the famitiar Sea Stallion heading toward
him. A blilk of the Stallion's landing lights was the
signal he needed. He armed his TOW mssiles and
fired a short, test burst of his cannons. The waiting
was over.
Hunter was squeezed into the cockpit of the big
chopper as it approached the helipad atop the sky-
scraper. There was a token force of guards out on the
roof. Hunter could see the charred remains of the
rooftop communication shack that Jones had ordered
destroyed the day the 'Aks first moved on Boston.
Fifty-two stories below, he could see several Huey
gunships, parked on the plaza next to the building.
His memory of blasting the Mid-Aks' main helicopter
force at Otis raced through his mind. "Must have
missed a couple," he thought.
The Stallion was now hovering above the helipad,
the Mid-Ak guards looking on impastively. Choppers
probably touched down and took off from the build-
ing several times a day. There was no central flight
control. Helicopters just came and went. The guards
looked on the ^Stallion as just another visitor-al-
though, as helicopters go, a fairly grubby one.
The Stallion brazenly set down. The assault troops
were up and ready, fingers on triggers, eyes on the
helipad door which they knew led down to the interior
311

of the building. A Mid-Ak guard ducked as he ran
over to the side of the chopper. Hunter slid the cargo
door back. The soldier, expecting to see an interior as
unkempt as the exterior of the craft, stood dumb-
founded for an instant as he took in the banks of
blilking computer lights, the three Gatling guns
poised at the chopper windows and the 25 heavity
armed Troopers bracing to leap out of the aircraft.
"What the hell is going on here . . ." the guard
said, reaching for his pistol. They were the lasttwords
he ever spoke. The nearest trooper pointed his M-16
at the man's forehead and squeezed off a shot. The
guard's head exploded like a bloody egg.
"This is it!" Hunter said as he was the first to jump
off the chopper. The other guards still looked con-
fused as the assault Troopers poured off the Stallion
The 'Aks were cut down before they ever knew what
was going on, the racket of the Stallion's blades and
engine drowning out the noise of the assault team's
rifles.
In a matter of seconds, the top of the roof was clear
of Mid-Aks. The entire strike force was off the ship
and most were gathered around the door which led
down into the building. Others were at pre-deter-
mined station points around the roof, serving as
lookouts. Off to the left, Hunter could see Cobra
Brother II sweeping in to strafe the street below.
The strike force stood frozen, looking to him for the
signal to move. He looked at his watch.
"5 ... 4 ... 3 ... 2 ... 1 ... now!"
One second later, the sky to the north of them
opened up. It appeared as if a geyser of bright red,
312
fiery blood had suddenly boited up from the nearby
river and splattered to all sides. The sounds of the
explosion came next, an incredible booming noise. A
shock wave hit the building that very nearly knocked
some of the Troopers off their feet. Holding on in the
hurricane-like wind, they strained to watch a huge
mushroom of fire shoot straight up into the sky. The
whole building shook as if ittwould crumble. The city
was suddenly lit again as if it were high noon.
"Holy Christ!" Hunter whispered. Obviously, Co-
bra Brother II had fulfilled his mission.
"Go! Go! Go!" Hunter heard himself yelling and
it was no sooner said than done. The helipad door was
blown open and the strike force was pouring inside.
Below, the Cobra I started his first strafing run.
Hunter could hear the confusion begin in the street as
he followed the Troopers through the door.
Digger Foxx fell off his bed when the LNG tank six
miles away went up. He was one of the captured ZAP
pilots who had spent the last seven months locked in
the same room, an office-like affair located on the
48th floor. He had heard the helicopter come in, but
had paid it no mind. Choppers were constantly shut-
tling 'Ak officials on and off the top of the building.
This one sounded no different. He had just pushed
aside the evening's slop of a meal and was drifting off
to sleep when the gas explosion occurred.
He quilkly pilked himself up off the floor and
wiped a cut that had opened on his forehead. The
building seemed to be swaying. He looked out the
313

window only to see the blinding flash of the LNG
going up. He was certain it was a nuclear bomb and
he expected in the next moment to be swept away in
the winds of the atomic blast. Good! he thought. At
least I'll take all of these fucking 'Aks with me.
Suddenly, the door burst open. Digger expected
either to see a Mid-Ak executioner or the Grim
Reaper. Instead, the face in the door was famitiar.
"Hunter!" Foxx yelled. "What the hell . . . ?"
"Digger, old boy," Hunter said, smiting. "We've
come to spring you."
Then he was gone. Foxx could see the corridor was
filled with heavity armed, black suited soldiers. He
could hear gunfire further down the hall, and the
noise of doors being broken down.
A trooper stopped at his door long enough to yell to
him: "Get your ass up to the roof, pal!"
Foxx didn't have to be told twice. He was out the
door and bounding up the steps in a matter of
seconds.
On the street below, Mid-Ak functionaries and
soldiers were hugging for cover as the bright red
Cobra gunship turned to make another strafing past.
Cobra Brother I had already destroyed six troop
trucks and one of the Huey gunships parked in the
building's plaza. His mssiles spent, he zoomed back
down to street level and pulled a lever simply labeled
FIRE. The front of the insect-like Cobra grew a long
flilkering tongue of flame. He slowed the ship up to a
hover and, spinning in a tight, quilk 360-degree
314
circle, he set everything and everyone in range on fire.
He lifted himself out of the circle of fire and roared
off, turned and returned to puncture the street with
cannon fire again.
The Cobra made six pastes before anyone started
shooting back.
Mid-Ak soldiers inside the Government Buitding
recovered from the initial shock and started flooding
up to the top floors. They were met by the assault
force at the 47th floor lobby and a fierce gun battle
broke out. Most of the pilots were released by this
time-20 in all-plus some of the monkeys and MPs
that were being held. The rescued were herded up to
the helipad and packed aboard the waiting Sea Stal-
lion.
Hunter was everywhere during the firefight. Shoot-
ing it out with the 'Aks in the 47th floor lobby, helping
thetwounded to the upper stories, even breaking out a
window to shoot at a surprised 'Ak gun crew on the
building next door.
By now Mid-Ak forces on the outside were starting
to react. Anti-aircraft crews were unlocking their
guns, thilking that with the intensity of the flame
from the gas explosion and the strafing of the Cobra,
that a full scale air raid was under way. The gun
crews, two located on a skyscraper directly across the
street from the Government House, began opening up
at random, shooting at what they thought were air-
craft pasting over. When they realized they were
shooting at ghosts they turned their attention to the
315

hand-to-hand fighting that was raging on the top
floors of the Government Buitding and clearly visible
through the windows of the building.
The officer of one of the gun crews realized that the
helicopter with its engine running on top of the
building wasn't a Mid-Ak aircraft at all. He ordered
his crew to turn the gun around and start
blasting away. Other gunners were now also keying in
on the top of the building. two searchlights went up,
their lazing beams highlighting the huge Sea Stallion
chopper.
The gun crew officer was certain that his crewtwould zero in on the intruding chopper and blast it off
the top of the building. But he heard a strange
whirring noise behind him. When he turned to look,
he was staring down the barrel of a flame tube on the
nose of the Cobra gunship. He saw a spit of flame
leap out of the muzzle then was aware that his clothes
and those of his gun crew were suddenly engulfed in
flames. He could clearly see the face of the helicopter
pilot. It looked grim, fierce, determined. The next
instant, he felt the sensation of his face melting away.
There was no pain. He pasted from life to death so
quilkly, his nerve endings were dispatched before the
sensory messages reached the brain. A moment later
he was little more than a pite of cinders blowing high
above the streets of Boston.
The assault force located and freed the remaining
ZAP monkeys and MPs. Then, theirtwork done, the
Troopers started slowly moving back up toward the
roof. Explosive experts left behind powerful delayed
reaction bombs in their wake. All of the pilots and
316
liberated prisoners were soon aboard the Stallion.
Huntertwould be glad later that he supercharged the
engines, as there were nearly 80 people jammed into
the Stallion's cabin.
Meanwhite, the Wingman and a force of six troop-
ers were holding off a large force of Mid-Aks on the
observation deck of the building. The deck was lit by
ultra-violet light, giving a dark spooky feeling to the
place. Tracer bullets flew back and forth as Hunter's
small group pinned down the 'Aks with a continuous
stream of fire. It was only when he was certain that all
the prisoners were free and aboard the Stallion that he
began moving up toward the roof himself.
The second Cobra had sped to the scene and was
now adding fire to the conflagration that was the
street below. Both small ships weaved back and forth,
taking out AA guns that threatened the Sea Stallion,
white continually strafing anything that moved near
the Government Buitding.
Hunter finally reached the top floor, flipped his last
grenade down the stairwell and bolted out onto the
roof. The Sea Stallion was hovering by this time,
Troopers in the doorway were waving him along.. The
side gunners were blasting away with their M61
cannons at the Mid-Ak gun positions on the roofs
around the Government Buitding. Bullets seemed to
be flying everywhere as Hunter zigzagged across the
helipad toward the chopper.
Suddenly, out of the night, yet another helicopter
appeared. It was a Huey troop carrier, ferrying troops
to the scene of the action. Its pilot, already committed
to landing, was attempting to set the chopper down on
317

the helipad just next to where the Sea Stallion hovered
waiting to take off.
Someone aboard the Stallion pushed a button and
all three of the GE Galling guns locked onto the Mid-
Ak chopper. Another button was pushed just as the
first Mid-Ak troops were jumping off the Huey even
as it was still five feet above the helipad. The Gatling
guns opened up with their strange, buzzing sound and
inslantly cut the Huey into two sections. Half the ship
came crashing down onto the helipad, its rotor spin-
ning witdly, chopping up the troops that had just
leaped from the strilken craft. The tail section of the
Huey, its rear stabitizing propeller still swirling, went
flying off the side of the building, plunging along its
side and into a crowd of Mid-Ak troops below.
Hunter had to duck out the the way of the rotor
pieces of the doomed helicopter, but now was up on
his feel and running toward the Stallion once again.
More Mid-Aks had reached the helipad door and were
blasting away al the big chopper. The assault force
gunners were returning the favor with a vicious stream
of lead. Somewhere, someone had fired a shoulder-
launched SAM and it streaked by, spraying the heli-
pad with sparks and fuel exhaust and adding to the
pandemonium on the roof of the building.
Hunter finally reached the door of the Stallion and
the pilots prepared to lift off when something caught
his eye. It was just a glint of light reflecting off a metal bar on the uniform of one of the building's defenders.
It struck a note in his head, and he turned and
stopped. Then, as the incredulous assault force looked
on, Hunter dashed back across the helipad, dodging
318
the flames of the burning Huey chopper and the
blizzard of lead. He reached the man with the metal
bar on his shoulder and started dragging him back
across the pad toward the Sea Stallion.
The gunfire around them had increased twofold as
more and more 'Ak gunners found the range. Finally,
Hunter again reached the edge of the Stallion's door,
and with the help of the Troopers aboard, lifted the
man's body onto the chopper. He then leaped just as
the Stallion started to pull away, two Troopers grab-
bing him by the seal of his pants in order to prevent
him from falling to the streets below.
The ship was out away from the building and
pilking up speed as he was finally hauled aboard.
Bullets were still zinging past them as the chopper's
door was closed and secured. Only then did he slop to
lake a deep breath. It was the most intense combat he
had ever experienced and it had seemed to have gone
on for hours. Actually, the rescue mission had lasted
less than 15 minutes.
The Cobras were now lilked up and leading the
way out of the burning city. The three choppers raced
toward the open sea, reaching the harbor and lowering
down to barely wave-top level. The harbor contained a
number of Mid-Ak warships, targels of opportunity
that Hunter just could not pass up. He ordered the
Stallion's missile platform lowered, and the large
acquisition system turned on. Instantly, bits of infor-
mation started popping up on the video display termi-
nals. Computer lock-on firing systems started firing
the small, guided mssiles at the anchored ships. Each
missile packed a mighty wallop of HE3X explosive.
319

Targeted to hit each ship below the water line, a dozen
mssiles flew out independently and found their mark.
Soon, after a dozen brilliant explosions, the bottom of
Boston Harbor was home for a good part of the Mid-
Ak occupying fleet.
The chopper force quilkly left the land behind and
were out in the safer confines of the Atlantic Ocean.
Only then did Hunter turn his attention to the man he
had dragged aboard. With a gang of Troopers gathered
around him, he turned the body over. The man was
dead, a bullet had caught him in the throat. But it
was his uniform that interested Hunter. It was green,
not brown like the standard Mid-Ak soldier, and of a
completely different texture.
Hunter began stripping the man's suitcoat off, then
his shirt. The bars he wore on his collar indicated that
the dead man was a captain. But a captain in what
army? That's what Hunter wanted to know.
He ripped away the man's shirt collar and found a
tag with the number 561 stitched in. He flipped the
label over and then had his answer.
There was writing on the other side of the tag. Not
English, as one might expect a Mid-Ak soldier's
uniform to read.
"What the hell kind of writing is that?" one of the
Troopers asked. "Dixieland?"
"Nope," Hunter said, pushing the dead man away
from him and concentrating on the writing on the
collar. It wasn't any kind of language found on the
continent, not naturally anyway. His mind went into
its flashback mode. The Kalashnikov rifles they had
found in New York City. The East European cargo
320
plane he'd sabotaged. The MIGs over Football City's
Grand Stadium. None of that had convinced him
before of Jones' grand conspiracy theory. But now he
had the proof positive.
The label indicated the shirt had been sewn some-
where in the Ukraine. The man wearing it was a
Russian.
321

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
They had pulled it off, with very little damage to
themselves. Three strike force memberstwounded was
the final toll, none of them seriously. They had
struck-hard-in the heart of the Mid-Ak empire and
left it burning. They had rescued a talented group of
pilots and ground personnel and taught the Middle-
Atlantics a lesson theytwouldn^t soon forget. There
was nothing more valuable than good security. It was
a blow that the 'Akstwouldn't recover from for some
time.
Hunter found himself thilking about Jones as the
helicopters raced north, back toward their hiding
place off the coast of Maine. The generaltwould have
approved of the mission, especially its outcome. He
could almost hear the old man's voice, whispering in
his ear: "Goodtwork, Major. Detonating that LNG
facitity was the next best thing to nuking the goddamn
place." Looking back through the chopper's window
toward Boston, he could still see a glow over the
horizon as the city burned. "This one's for you,
General," he said quietly.
They made their way back to the small island where
322
they grudgingly gave the Russian a proper, if hasty,
burial. Hunter was now convinced, beyond a shadow
of a doubt, that the Soviets were involved in a
destabitizing effort on the continent. He may have
rationalized away the Kalashnikovs in New York City,
the East European plane at the Aerodrome and the
MIGs over Football City. But now he had solid proof.
Logically, there could only be one reason a Russian
soldiertwould be protecting the headquarters of the
Mid-Ak occupying force-a deep concerted agree-
ment between the two evit hierarchies so involved that
lowly Russian troops were now guarding Middle-
Atlantic installations. Was it any different in New
Chicago? He thought of little else during the trip
back to the Aerodrome.
He was glad to see the rescued pilots and monkeys,
most of them close friends from his days with ZAP.
He explained his plan to provide Football City with an
air force to counter the threat from New Chicago. The
Famity, he told them, was closely, if secretly, allied
with the Mid-Aks, and by implication, the Russians.
With no prodding they unanimously agreed to join the
fight. Nearly a year in Mid-Ak captivity had neither
dulled their courage, enthusiasm or, on a deeper level,
their patriotism. Most were former military anyway
who yearned for the old days. A fight for freedom was
just what they needed after being cooped up for so
long.
The three helicopters touched down at the Aero-
drome just before dawn. The strike force and the
rescued pilots, monkeys and MPs were exhausted, but
exhitarated. Fitzgerald was waiting for them, cigar in
mouth, coffee cup in hand. He did a little jig when he
323

heard the attackers had taken such painful toll on the
Middle-Atlantic.
"Drilks are on me!" he yelled to the returning
warriors as they emerged from the helicopters in the
pre-dawn light. He had set up a victory banquet for
them at one of The Aerodrome's swankiest clubs.
Despite the early morning hour, he transported the
strike force-still dressed in their black fatigues-and
the rescued to the club where a full sized jazz band
played and an army of cooks, bartenders and wait-
resses were standing by to serve the returning heroes
and the freed prisoners.
Sitting with Hunter and Dozer, Fitzgerald urged
them to give him every last detail of the mission, right
down to the number of delayed-fuse bombs the strike
force had left behind. The Irishman was clearly
enjoying himself listening to the story of the stunning
raid.
"You're not acting much like a neutral now,"
Hunter mockingly scolded him, as the early bird
Welcome Back party got into full swing.
"In business, I'm neutral," Fitzgerald said, smit-
ing. "In me heart, I'm with ya all the way."
"Well, I don't know how much business the 'Aks
witl be doing in the near future," Dozer said, draining
a Bloody Mary and starting in on his second plate of
scrambled eggs. "Not unless they plan to have a fire
sale."
"We've heard from St. Louie, again," Fitzgerald
said, pulling a yellow sheet of telex paper from his
pocket and pasting it to Hunter. "It came in around
midnight."
Hunter read the message: FAMILY AIR RAID
324
EARLIER TONIGHT ON OUR AIRFIELD.
HEAVY LOSSES. CHICAGO TROOP BUILD-UP
REPORTED.
"Things are gettingtworse out there," he said,
stuffing the message into his pocket.
"Well, you've accomplished almost half your objec-
tive," Fitzgerald said. "You've got yourself some fine
pilots and ground people. Now all you have to do is
get them some planes to fly."
"That's the hard part," Hunter nodded.
"Aye, there's not much on the open market any
more," Fitz agreed. "Wright-Patterson is down to
selling World War II and Korean War stuff. Those
planes could probably fly one mission, maybe two,
then they'd plow themselves into the earth and stay
there."
"St. Louie has been trying to hire on free-lancers,"
Dozer said. "But no one wants the job. They're all
convinced that The Famity witl win this one, and no
free-lancer wants to be on the losing side."
"Yes," Fitz said. "It's very bad for business."
The three friends were sitent for a moment, then
Fitz perked up. "So what's your next step, Hawker?
Mio and Aki are standing by."
Hunter finished off his breakfast and poured an-
other drilk. "Later," he said.
With that, the airman stood and, clilking his spoon
against a glass, got the attention of everyone in the
banquet hall.
"I'm glad to see we all made H," he told them.
"Please enjoy yourselves for the next five days. That's
how long we've got before the next mission. And this
one witl be more dangerous than our excursion to
325

Boston. And when it's over, we go to Football City
and that witl be the biggest, most dangerous battle of
all."
The hall was completely sitent. Every eye was on
him, taking in everytword he had to say.
"We have dangerous times ahead, but the impor-
tant thing to remember is that we stilk together.
Together, we can do it. Together, we can put the hurt
on the Famity just like we did to the 'Aks. We can put
the hurt on anyone, whether they're from this conti-
nent. Or any other. We can make sure that if anyone
tries to deprive us or anyone else of their rights, their
basic freedoms, then they witl have to thilk twice.
Because theytwon't know where well be, or when
we'll strike. We proved it in Boston. We'll prove it
again very soon. Word travels fast these days. People
witl know who we are.
"So, have a good time now. There are plenty of bars
here at The Aerodrome. Eat up. Drilk up," he
paused and smited toward Fitzgerald, "... and tell
them to put it all on Fitzie's tab."
A look of mock horror came across the Irishman's
face as the assembled men laughed and applauded.
"Now," Hunter said to Fitzgerald and Dozer, his
speech over, "I have to go grow a beard."
With that, the airman drained his glass and disap-
peared from the hall.
"What the hell does he mean by that?" Fitzgerald
asked the bewitdered Marine captain.
No one saw Hunter for the next four days. He was
holed up in the cheap hotel room located above the
326

Broken Wing bar, on the periphery of The Aero-
drome's territory. He left orders that no one-not even
Fitzgerald, or Dozer or Aki and Mio-should disturb
him. He asked only that any reports from St. Louie
should be delivered immediately to him care of the
bartender downstairs.
Those messages started coming in at a rate of one
every two hours. Fitzgerald promptly summoned one
of his most trusted officers who shuttled the messages
back and forth, leaving them with the seedy-looking
barkeep at the saloon beneath Hunter's room.
The dispatches told a story of a deteriorating situa-
tion for Football City. War with New Chicago was
now inevitable. St. Louie's agents reported the Famity
was completely mobitized and had begun stationing
its troops near the city's extensive raitroad yards. The
Famity leaders, headquartered in the ultra skyscraper
once known as the Sears Buitding, had been making
huge purchases of oit lately. They were stocking up to
feed an army thattwould move south to Football City
by rait, river and road.
The MIG-21s had attacked the city twice more
since the raid that destroyed a third of Football City's
airfield. St. Louie was trying to purchase as much
SAM equipment as possible, but he was certain that
the Famity was intimidating most of the war suppli-
ers. His attempts to get free-lance fighter pilots was
going no better. Convoy duty was paying even better
than ever. No pilot wanted to lose his plane-or his
life-in a war between two cities that in the grand
scheme of things, apparently meant nothing.
Football City itself was all but closed down. The
party-party atmosphere was put on hold as the army
327

prepared the city for war. Most of the population left
after the first attack on the Grand Stadium and never
returned. Defensive emplacements were being erected
along the western shore of the Mississippi River, the
natural barrier between Football City and the in-
vaders from the north.
One of the last reports sent to Hunter gave the
Football City intelligence corps' estimate that the
Famitytwould attack across the Mississippi within the
next three weeks.
Thus was the situation when Hunter emerged from
his self-imposed exite . . .
On the fifth day, Fitzgerald and Dozer got a
message to meet Hunter in the Broken Wing. The
Irishman and the Marine immediately drove to the
bar, taking the necessary precaution to go well-armed,
and found Hunter sitting at the same table Fitz had
used to discuss the mission to The Pitts. The rest of
the bar was empty.
They were shocked at Hunter's appearance. He had
shaved his head and was sporting a five-dayK>ld
scruffy beard. An earring dangled from his left lobe.
His fingers were covered with gaudy rings. He was
dressed completely in leather and wearing dark
glasses.
They were at first almost reluctant to approach
their friend. Hunter's boyishly handsome looks were
long gone. The man who sat staring at him from the
table looked cruel, mean, ruthless.
Of course, that was the whole idea.
"What's the matter, boys," Hunter said, the old
328
smite returning instantly. "Too good to drilk with
me?"
"Hawker," Fitzgerald cried, pulling up a chair.
"What have you done to yourself?"
"All part of the plan, Fitz." Hunter said, motioning
the bartender to bring them a bottle. "What's the
latest from St. Louie?"
"Nothing," Dozer told him. "Not atword since last
night."
Hunter looked plainlytworried. "Things are gettingtworse, fast. We're going to have to move quilkly."
Fitzgerald almost looked embarrassed. "You know
I'll help as much as I can," he said. "But I have to at
least do it behind the scenes. I can maybe lend you a
few ground troops. But I can't send my Thuds to
Football City as much as I'd like to."
"I understand, Fitz," Hunter said sincerely. "If
capitalism doesn't survive, what good is it if anything
else does?"
"Aye," Fitzgerald said, a little sadly.
"Itwould ask you to do me a couple of favors
though."
"Ask away."
"Well, I'll need an old plane and a good pilot, one
of your guys, to come with me tomorrow night,"
Hunter explained.
"You got it."
"Then, I'd like you to hire out a couple of good
fighter-bombers. Free-lancers. Someone who special-
izes in ground support. Someone we can trust."
"Got just the team," Fitz said, smacking his lips.
"The Ace Wrecking Company. two F-4 Phantoms out
of Buffalo. Flyboy that goes by the name of Captain
329

Crunch runs them. They've helped me out in the past.
Hetwon't chilken out like these other free-lancers."
"Trustworthy?" Dozer asked.
"Very" Fitz answered. "Crunch's real name is
O'Malley. His mother and papa are from the Old Sod.
He's a good egg and his guys are top-notch."
"Okay," Hunter agreed. "Contract him. Tell him
he'stworking for me, with the promise of a lot of
business down the road."
"You got it," Fitz said.
"What else?" Dozer asked.
"I'll need the strike force primed and ready to go in
two days' time," Hunter said.
"They're already ready," the Marine said. "They've
been itching for action for three days. Waiting on you,
I might add."
"I'm glad to hear it," Hunter said. "Tell them to
get the Stallion warmed up. Also Fritz, thilk a few of
your boys might want to make some overtime?"
"I'll make sure they do. How many do you need?"
"two dozen," Hunter replied. "Plus a couple of
choppers, Hueys if you can spare them."
"Again, you got it," Fitz said, calling for more
drilks.
Dozer smited. "Now Hawk, are you going to let us
in on your plan or not?"
Hunter smited and put his glasses back on. "You
guys got about a couple of hours to kitl?"
The next night, Hunter and a pilot named Clyde
were landing an old C-119 Flying Boxcar on an
abandoned stretch of the Pennsylvania Turnpike.
330
From there, they had a two hour walk to the nearest
town, appropriately called Ruff Creek. Sitting on a
bend in the Ohio River, Ruff Creek was the point of
civitization nearest to the Stukas' hidden pirate base.
It was little more than a collection of food stores, a
handful of crowded homes and one saloon. The towntwould be the first stop in Hunter's outlandish plan to
get St. Louie his air force.
Clyde was a good guy and an able pilot. He fit the
bitl, appearance-wise. Hunter knew they couldn't
walk into a place like Ruff Creek, looking or acting
normal. Thus his exite to not only change over his
appearance, but also his karma. He had to thilk like
a pirate, or someone of their ilk, to pull this off. Clyde
already looked that way. He was rotund for a stilk
jockey, too big to make the grade if he were in the old
time military. But those kind of things were long
forgotten these days. He too, was bald, although quite
naturally. A short, black goatee gave him a sinister
look-just the effect Hunter wanted.
They reached the edge of Ruff Creek just after
dawn. There hidden in the trees, they waited, slap-
ping bugs, as the sun climbed the sky. Sure enough,
around noon, a half track roared across the small
bridge leading into the tiny town and parked outside
the only barroom. A half dozen Stukas climbed out
and stormed inside the place.
"Here to drilk their noontime meal," Hunter said
to Clyde. "Just like I thought theytwould."
They waited another two hours. More people
drifted in and out of the bar, but the pirates remained.
When Hunter figured the bandits were well on their
way to being greased, he and Clyde made their move.
331

Some of the biggest events in history were started in
motion by the slightest of moves. Atword dropped
here, a shot fired there. Hunter, himself a creature of
history, planned to set an event in motion that he
hopedtwould roll all the way from Ruff Creek to
Football City and beyond.
He and Clyde walked out of thetwoods, across the
bridge and into the saloon. Clyde was packing a
sawed-off shotgun slung casually over his shoulder,
and Hunter displayed a borrowed Uzi. No one even
turned to give them a second look as they ambled to a
table and motioned the waitress. The six pirates sat at
the bar, drilking up a storm and gruntilg to each
other in typically angry tones. There were several
other patrons in the place, each one giving the bandits
a wide berth.
"What'11 it be?" the sulking waitress asked.
"The day's stew and a bottle," Hunter said.
"New in town?" she asked.
"You might say that," Hunter answered. "Any
more like you around?"
She eyed him suspiciously.
"Looking for trouble?" she asked.
"Not trouble. Action," Hunter said with emphasis.
"We'll pay for it, too."
She looked at both of them. "I'll bring your stew,"
she said then retreated into a room in back of the bar
that served as a kitchen.
She reappeared after a white and gave them a bottle
of cheap whilkey, two bowls and a pot of stew. Hunter
threw two silver coins on the table as pay. The food
was the standard fare in this part of the country,
Hunter surmised after one bite. A few pieces of meat
332
swimming around a heavy gravy with chunks of
vegetables. Both he and Clyde were legitimately hun-
gry, so they ate heartity. two glasses of whilkey apiece
put a glow into the otherwise dreary saloon.
Meanwhite the pirates continued drilking, barely
speaking to each other by the time darkness fell. A
few more people entered the bar-shady characters
every one of them-and moved to its darkened cor-
ners. Dim red and yellow lights were switched on,
flilkering occasionally as the generator out back
struggled to produce the needed electricity.
Finally, severaltwomen appeared from the kitchen,
looking not in thetworld like waitresses. They were
wearing hiked-up skirts and low-cut blouses. Their
faces were painted with rouge and their hair dyed
almost impossible colors.
"World's oldest profession," Hunter leaned over
and said to Clyde.
"Amen, brother," Clyde replied.
two of thetwomen immediately homed in on the
pirates, but two more broke off and approached
Hunter and Clyde. One, a blonde, was extremely
attractive, in a slutty kind of way. She spoke to
Hunter.
"I hear you boys are new in town," she cooed. "Can
we sit down?"
"Sure!" Clyde nearly burst out. He had his eye on
her companion, a tall redhead.
"I'm Carla," the blonde said as thetwomen joined
them. "And this is Kitty."
"Ladies," Hunter said with a nod.
"Are you guys pilots?" Carla asked. Her hand was
already resting on Hunter's knee.
333

"Up from Florida," he told her. "Had some engine
trouble."
"Oh," Carla purred. "That's too bad. Staying a
white?"
Hunter took this cue to pull out a thilk bag of
coins.
"Maybe," he said, looking into her green eyes. She
w;as pretty. Her blond hair looked natural, her teeth
crooked but not unattractively so. She had a fabulous
if skinny shape and a lovingly wide mouth.
Her hand was slowly moving up to his crotch. "Can
I have a drilk?" she asked.
"Be my guest," he said.
A waitress cruised by with two extra glasses. Hunter
noticed that one of the pirates was watching them out
of the corner of his eye.
A few drilks and some small talk later, Car la's
hand finally made it to between Hunter's legs.
He leaned over and whispered to her. "How much
and where?"
"Five real silver pieces," she smited. "Seven for the
bigboy. We got a place upstairs. Interested?"
He was, and in more ways than one.
The room was small and cheap. Just outside the
window, the dim neon sign for the bar was flashing on
and off. They'd been horizontal for an hour. She was
gasping with delight. "You've got great hands, fly-
boy."
"Need them in my profession."
A look of interest flashed across her face. "What do
you do, honey? What are you flying up from Flor-
334
ida?"
He looked at her in the dim, flilkering light. She
was too pretty for this line oftwork.
"You into blow-zeenT' he asked.  "Like in co-
ò         o"
came:
She stopped stroking his bald head. "You've got
some?" she asked excitedly.
"Have I?" he laughed. "Got a whole plane filled
with it!"
"You do?" she asked, eyes wide, lilking her lips.
"We can only get it around here when those asses
Stukas decide to get laid for real. That's how they pay
M
us.
Interesting, Hunter thought.
She snuggled closer to him. "I'm real good on
coke," she whispered.
"Sorry," he said, "Coke's for my boss. I just got to
figure a way to get it to him."
"I thought you said you were flying it up from
Florida, honey."
"I was, until the radiator went on the old crate we
were using," he said with conviction. "Now we can't
fly it more than five miles before we have to take it
down again and fitl the water tanks. That's why we're
sitting in a shitty burg like this. We're following the
river as far as we can to New Chicago."
"Youtworking for the Famity?" she asked, a trace
of amazement in her voice.
*'You know too much already, babe."
She tried again to snuggle close. "Come on," she
breathed in his ear. "Give Carla some coke and she'll
send you to heaven."
An odd choice oftwords, he thought.
335

"Sorry. No way," he said, getting up and putting his
shirt on. He took out a handful of coins and put them
on the bed.
"See ya around," he said, walking out the door.
"C'mon Clyde. Time to go."
He could hear Clyde huffing and puffing in the
next room. The sound was followed by a few curses
then the unmistakable sound of a belt buckle being
done up.
"Pay her and let's split," he called.
Clyde opened the door and joined him in the hall.
Hunter gave him the thumbs-up sign. Clyed wilked
and nodded.
"Mission accomplished," he said.
They were quilkly down the back stairs of the
building, across the bridge and into thetwoods. At just
about the same time, Carla was whispering thetword
"Coke," into the ear of one of the Stukas sitting at the
bar.
336
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
The engines on the old C-119 spit once, coughed a
cloud of black smoke then kilked to life. Clyde
brought the engines to trim and wiggled his flaps.
They groaned in response. Hunter couldn't have
found a better crate to past off as a drug-carrying
flying shitbox, he thought.
It was the day after Hunter and Clyde had set the
table at the saloon in Ruff Creek. Now, next to the
Flying Boxcar sat the Sea Stallion, brought in under
the cover of darkness to the stretch of Pennsylvania
highway that was 20 miles south of Ruff Creek and
now glistening in the pre-dawn light. The 7th Cavalry
strike force, their breaths like smoke in the cool,
spring morning air were dressed in clean, black fa-
tigues. They sat around the big chopper cleaning their
weapons and applying charcoal to their faces. To a
man they were in high spirits, if anxious ones. Most of
them wanted to get this phase of their mission over
with so they could return to Football City, where
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many had famities and loved ones, and fight a more
tangible enemy. They had come a long way since
riding the JFK over from Europe.
two jet black Hueys waited next to the Sea Stallion.
two squads of Fitzgerald's best troops-Territorial
Guardsmen-complemented by the original ZAP
MPs, waited inside. The Guardsmen were dressed in
their standard World War II-style uniforms, complete
from their tin pot hats to their GI boots. Volunteers
all, Fitzgerald promised his men an extra full month's
pay and a bottle of Scotch for going on the mission.
The MPs, just lately sprung from prison, were ready
for anything. Hovering overhead nearby were the
Cobra Brothers, on the lookout for any unwanted
guest to the early morning confab.
Parked further down the long straight of highway
were two identical-looking jet fighters. They were the
F-4 Phantoms known as The Ace Wrecking Company.
Commanded by Captain Crunch O'Malley, the two
fighter-bombers and the four-man crew, had hired out
for special missions-ground support, air superiority,
convoy duty-almost since the dawning of the New
Order. Both planes were decorated in lettering remi-
niscent of an oldtime circus train. "No Job's Too
Small, We Bomb Them All," was the motto painted
on the side of each, an impressive "1" and "2"
designating the jets' tail fins.
Parked at the very end of the highway-turned-
runway was Hunter's F-16. Red, white, blue and
waiting, it was bombed up and ready to go. One of the
Crunch pilots had flown it down for him, a favor he
greatly appreciated. It was like seeing an old friend
338
again-a friend that had been neglected for too long.
He was soon to change that . . .
Hunter conferred with Captain Crunch, and, their
plan straight, gave the signal for the strike force to get
ready. He climbed into the C-119 beside Clyde and
started to taxi. The F-4s followed close behind. The
assault Troopers gave him the thumbs-up sign as he
pasted the Stallion and started his take-off roll. Phase
two was well underway.
"The Stukas witl probably need more than a hook-
er'stword that a snowbird is coming through," he told
Clyde once the Flying Boxcar was airborne. "That
means it's up to us to convince them. Once we do,
they'll be lilking their noses trying to get us."
He checked behind him just in time to see the
Crunch jets take off. Theytwould immediately climb
to 50,000 feet, high above the pirates' rilky-dilk
radar, and orbit there, providing air cover just in case
a stray bandit jet detected the C-119-that was,
before Hunter wanted them to.
He steered the old plane toward the north.
"So first we've got to rattle the town a little," he
said, sighting the small vitlage sitting on the bend in
the Ohio. "Hand on ..."
He put the old plane into a dive, pulling it up at
barely treetop level. The C-119 engines, devoid of the
luxury of mufflers, were screaming with a roar thattwould wake the dead-or the dead drunk.
two of the town's seedier residents were sitting on
the steps of the saloon, suffering from chronic hang-
overs and waiting for the bar to open so as to treat the
condition properly. The sun was just peeking through
339

the pine trees in the east when they heard a low, dull
drone. It got louder and closer with every second. The
men had just enough time to cover their ears.
They looked up to see the big gray hulk of a plane
past witdly over the center of the town. It was so low,
it clipped the top of a chimney on the building across
the street, showering them with a load of red brilks
and debris. Then, with a mighty roar that shattered
many of the town's remaining windows, the plane
disappeared over the trees to the northwest.
That done, Hunter steered the aircraft northeast.
Within a minute he was looking down on starkly
famitiar terrain. Trees, hitls and rock. That was it.
They were over Stuka territory. Up ahead the hidden
base lay. It was even hard to see in the daytime, the
shadows of the pine forest surrounding it, bathing it in
a protective shadow of darkness. It made no differ-
ence to Hunter; he could have flown back to the place
blindfolded.
Again, he dropped down as low as possible and
gunned the engines. Clyde was sitting with a firm grip
on the suicide handle, a smite chiseled on his face.
This Hunter was an incredible pilot, but also a crazy
man, he was convinced. Buzzing a pirates' base like
this was like kilking nestful of hornets.
Of course, in Hunter's mind, that was the idea.
A half dozen lowly Stuka sentries on guard duty
were the first to see the Flying Boxcar heading toward
their base. Huddled in the single watchtower, they
had all justtwoken up. They knew the trilk of being a
340
guard for the Stukas was just to wake up before the
pilots did. It was an easy life because, except for three
prisoners who escaped a few weeks ago, nothing ever
happened. Few people who crashed or were forced
down at the base ever lived long enough to tell anyone.
So it added up to endless days and cheap-whilkey
nights.
But now something was on the horizon. The low
drone of the approaching engines arrived a half min-
ute before the airplane itself. When it came into view,
they saw it was big and silver and flying low. It
couldn't be just another captured airplane the pirates
were herding home, because a quilk count of the
fighter jets on the runway revealed that all the Stukas
were accounted for.
Yet this odd-looking plane was heading right for
the base. The situation had never come up before; the
guards really didn't know what the hell to do. Finally,
when it looked like the plane wasn't going to swerve
from its path, one of them pushed a button which set
off an air raid siren.
Sluggo was the new pirate leader. He had just
recently replaced the deposed and deceased Jaws as
top man. He was in the middle of an opium-induced
hangover when the siren went off. The sound echoes
strangely about his fitthy living quarters.
"Gawd damn guards," he muttered, lifting his
soporific body off the cot and walking to the window.
"I'll cut them up if theytwoke me up this early for
nothing."
He looked out the window and immediately saw the
C-119. It was coming in low, its engines sounded like
341

they were straining and one of them was smoking
slightly. Engine overheat was the first thing to pop
into his mind. The next thing was a conversation he
had had with one of his lieutenants some time in the
drug-filled swirl of the night before. A whore, Carla,
had told his boys that a snowbird was pasting through
the area, trying to make its way up to New Chicago.
It was supposed to have had a broken radiator. Had to
stay by the river. Carrying a half ton of cocaine.
"Bingo!" Sluggo laughed. He smacked his lips.
The plane he saw past over the pirate base with a roar
was sotwobbly, he knew it had about five more miles
max before ittwould have to set down. The likeliest
spot, probably in the valley on the other side of Stuka
Mountain. If he could get his ground troops mobi-
lized, they might be able to get it white it was still
down.
The whole base was up and awake with the blaring
of the klaxon. Sluggo, barely zipped into his pants,
was shoving his men onto the big Deuces and pointing
them toward the road leading to the valley.
"There's an old shitbox plane, down in the valley!"
he was screaming at his underlings, "It's filled with
blow. Get it! Get it!"
One pilot ran up to him a guy named Rat.
"I'll go up and shoot the mother down," he said,
running toward one of the Stukas F-100 Super Sabres.
Sluggo just managed to grab him by the collar of his
leather flight suit.
"What do you have?" Sluggo yelled at him. "Dog-
shit for brains? You shoot that goddamn plane down
and that blow is scattered to the winds! Those snow-
342
bird pilots witl dump it before they let us get them in
the air. You know that. Now get in the Gawd damn
truck and play soldier!1'
By this time a small caravan of pirates-guards,
ground mechanics and pilots, a hundred in all-was
wending its way down the road toward the valley. A
skeleton force of 50 were left behind to watch the
store.
Sluggo was in the lead truck and seven followed
behind. They reached the bottom of the mountain and
had a clear look into the valley. There, through
spyglasses, Sluggo saw his prey. Sitting near a bend in
the Ohio River about a mite away was the C-119, its
two crew members feverishly trying to fitl the radiator
on its right engine.
The pirate convoy lurched forward and started to
race toward the plane. But just as they were closing in
on it, the pilot had its engines going and the silver
beast began to taxi. By the time the bandits reached
the bend in the river, the C-119 had taken off.
"Shit!" Sluggo yelled. "Someone get me a map!"
A map was instantly produced and Sluggo pored
over it. The next likely landing spot for the plane was
12 miles to the north, on a stretch of highway that ran
close to a tributary of the Ohio.
"Stay in your trucks!" Sluggo yelled to his troops.
"Stay in your fucking trucks! We're moving! We're
moving!"
The pirate column pushed on. They kept the Flying
Boxcar in view most of the time. It was following the
twists and turns of the river, flying low and slow and
trying to preserve its coolant as long as possible.
343

"Ha!" Sluggo yelled, withing he had a beer to
drilk for breakfast. "We got him next time!"
The plane was flying so slowly Sluggo's column
could see the straight patch of highway just about the
same time the pilots of the C-119 did.
"Yahoo!" Sluggo was yelling witdly, his head, neck
and half body hanging out of the window of the truck.
"We do some blow-zeen tonight!"
Sure enough the C-119 set down on the highway,
two miles down the road from the advancing pirate
convoy.
"Go! Go! Go!" Sluggo was yelling, the driver of
his truck flooring the accelerator on the already
speeding truck. The pirates in the back were being
unmercifully bounced around as the Deuce careened
down the long-deserted highway.
But again, Sluggotwould be denied. Just as the
pirates closed in, the pilot gunned his engines and the
plane was airborne again.
"Jesus!" Sluggo yelled, shaking his fist at the sky.
"You mother! I'll get you!"
"Hey, boss," Sluggo's driver had the guts to sug-
gest. "Why don't we get back to the field and get a
couple of planes up to follow him?"
If Sluggo was armed, hetwould have shot the man.
"I'm surrounded by morons," he said. "How far away
do you thilk he'd be by the time we turned around
and went all the way back there? In another 50 clilks,
he's over the Death Chitdren's turf. And we've lost
him. He knows we're after his ass, now. We got him
next time he comes down!"
Sluggo studied his map again. There was an aban-
344
doned airfield 15 miles away, just off the highway. Ittwould be a natural landing place for the snowbird,
because it was next to a lake that was fed by the Ohio
River.
"That's it!" Sluggo said. "We got him now. I can
taste that blow right now!"
The column pressed on, breaking the old 55 miles
per hour speed limit on the highway by plenty in an
all-out effort to reach the next landing spot for the
snowbird.
Twenty minutes later, the pirate convoy reached the
old airfield. Sitting at the end of the runway was the
elusive C-119, one of its engines smoking heavity.
"Up yer nose with a rubber hose!" Sluggo yelled
upon seeing the apparently disabled plane. "He burnt
the engine right off the old bird. Now it's ours for the
pilking."
He ordered his driver to floor the truck and soon the
nine pirate vehicles were racing across the wide-open
field in a helter-skelter motion, each one intent on
getting to the plane first.
The bandits were too busy trying to feed their
insatiable drug habits to notice the helicopter partially
hidden in thetwoods on the other side of the lake . . .
Despite the breakneck race, Sluggo's truck was the
first to reach the C-119. He held up his hand, and all
the other pirate trucks reluctantly streethed to a halt
about fifty yards from the plane.
"Now listen up, you boneheads!" he said, climbing
on the hood of the Deuce. "Let's not forget who's the
345

top man around here. I say who gets dibs on the any
blow inside that plane."
"What about us!?" a pirate named Zonk yelled.
"We want some too!"
His comment was greeted with a chorus of "Me,
too!" from the other pirates.
Sluggo looked out on the 100 or so bandits. "Hey!"
he yelled. "When we iced old Jaws, you guys were
sucking up to me like no one's business. Now, if
anyone here wants to go where old Jaws went, then he
can just step his ass forward right now!"
The pirates were sitent-so sitent, if they listened
hard enough, they could have heard the sound of two
jets approaching . . .
Sluggo knew no onetwould call his bluff. He looked
out on the gang of pirates, ground crew guys mostly.
It never faited to amaze him that guys so stupid knew
how to fix a supersonic jet fighter. They were like
mice. They liked to be led.
"Okay," he yelled, jumping down from the hood.
"That's better. Now, me, Rat, Mal and Eddie are
going inside the plane. The rest of you guys wait
here."
Again, a sullen silence fell over the bandits. It was
almost quiet enough to hear the two F-4s heading
their way ...
Sluggo climbed inside the plane, his .45 drawn. It
was filled with large bales, 50 or more, all tied tightly
with bale and heavy duct tape.
"No one home," he said, putting his gun back in
his belt and drawing out a Bowie knife. "Those
flyboys are long gone. They'll never be able to show
346
their faces anywhere again after losing this much of
the Famity's blow."
"Quilk, Sluggo, rip one open," Mal the pirate said
after following the top pirate into the otherwise empty
plane. "Let's see what we got."
"It's got to be pure," Rat said, actually salivating at
the thought of all that cocaine. "The Famity doesn't
buy stuff that's been stepped on."
"I'll step on you, if you don't shut your mouth,"
Sluggo said, threatening to slap Rat on the side of the
head.
Sluggo gently punctured one of the bales and a thin
stream of white powder .flowed out. He reached down
with a cupped hand and captured a pite. Wearing a
toothy grin, his eyes closed, he put the powder up to
his mouth and tasted it.
A look of horror came across his face.
"What the fuck!" he screamed. "This is sugar!"
"What!" Rat screamed as he lunged at another
bale, cutting it open and tasting it for himself. He
immediately spit out the substance. "It is fucking
sugar!"
"We've been screwed!" Sluggo screamed.
"Hey! Listen!" the pirate named Eddie said, cock-
ing his ear toward the plane's door. "What's that
noise?"
The four pirates froze. It was a high whining noise.
Getting louder. They looked out at the rest of the
pirates, who had also heard the sound.
As they watched, one of the pirates out in the field
shouted something and pointed to the northeast.
Instantly, the gang started to scatter.
347

Sluggo jumped from the plane just in time to see the
two F-4s of The Ace Wrecking Company bearing
down on the open field. Each plane dropped two
cannisters. Sluggo knew they were filled with napalm.
He also knew they were sitting ducks . . .
The four napalm bombs exploded simultaneously,
dispersing a tidal wave of flaming gasoline jelly all
over the field and the desperately fleeing pirates. More
than half the bandits were incinerated where they
stood. The flames engulfed the pirates' trucks and the
C-119, trapping Sluggo and the other three bandits.
The F-4s climbed out and swung back around for
another past. This time they came in with cannons
blazing, pilking off the remnants of the pirate force,
sometimes two or three at a clip. The two fighter
bombers went around for a third time, and managed
to pilk off several more pirates, before streaking off
toward the south.
In thetwoods across from the small lake, a Huey
helicopter started its engine and slowly began to
climb.
"That's a doggone pity," Clyde said, looking at the
aftermath of the sudden, deadly effective air strike. "I
kind of liked that old Flying Boxcar."
"Yeah," Hunter, sitting beside him, said. "It's a
real shame."
Most of the fifty pirates left behind at the Stuka
base went back to sleep almost immediately after
348
Sluggo's itl-fated column left in search of the snow-
bird. The day had dawned bright, hot and sunny, and
outside was no place to be with a hangover, which the
majority of the pirates were suffering from. Most just
drifted off, with nothing much else to do, to wait for
Sluggo to return and portion out the cocaine.
Back on the Pennsylvania Turnpike section turned
runway, the F-4s of The Ace Wrecking Company were
being re-armed. The Sea Stallion and one of the black
Hueys were warming up, their complements of strike
force ready and waiting inside. High above, the
gigantic C-5A Galaxy orbited.
The second black Huey landed and Hunter and
Clyde jumped out. They shook hands and headed for
their assigned stations; Clyde to the Sea Stallion,
Hunter to warm up the F-16.
His plane was ready to go in less than a minute. His
six cannons were fully loaded. On his wings were four
500-pound iron bombs, plus four air-to-ground anti-
personnel mssiles. The F-4s carried simitar loads.
The Stallion's Galling guns were twisting and turning
as their operators put them through a last effectability
check and the big chopper's loaded missite platform was
lowered and raised once to make sure everything was
intworking order.
Hunter saw the strike force was ready. He ran
through one last instrument check in his cockpit, then
started the F-16 on its take-off roll. He lifted off
smoothly, the same old excitement running through
his body as the plane broke the bonds of earth. It was
good to be flying the '16 again. He really felt nowhere
as much at home as in the cockpit of the remarkable
349

fighter.
In quilk succession, the rest of the strike aircraft
took off. The F-4s were quilkly airborne and riding in
formation with the '16 in the lead. The Stallion lifted
off, followed by the Hueys and the Cobra Brothers.
The five choppers fell into formation, with the Cobras
in front, the Stallion in the middle and the Hueys in
the rear, and turned to follow the fighter jets heading
north.
On the steps of the saloon in Ruff Creek, the two
town drunks sat, still pilking pieces of chimney brilk
out of their hair. The day was getting hot and they
withed the bar ownertwould wake up and open for
business.
They had all but forgotten about the crazy pilot
who had severed the chimney across the street with his
low flying antics. Probably the Stukas again, they had
reasoned in their hungover minds, chasing some poor
bastard out of the sky. Someone should stand up to
those assholes some day, they had said. Put an end to
the bandits' harassing of the Creekers and stealing of
all the whores.
Suddenly, they heard another rumbling sound, this
one ten times louder than the low flyer a couple of
hours before. They looked up in amazement to see
three jet fighters-not Stukas, either-flying in for-
mation, pasting directly over the town and heading
north. The planes were followed by five helicopters,
flying so low, the two drunks could see armed soldiers
staring out the windows at them.
One of the drunks waved. One of the soldiers waved
back. Little did the drunk know that hetwould never
350
see a Stuka pirate in Ruff Creek again.
For the second time that day, the sentries in the
watchtower at the Stuka base were rudely awakened.
The rumbling of the approaching strike force was
shaking the legs of the tower. Empty liquor bottles
from the night before crashed to thetwooden floor. One
of the guards managed to reach the air raid siren
button, and the wait warning signal started up again.
Hunter checked with the Phantoms and all three
jets greened up. He did one last instrument check,
then climbed to 13,000 for his pop. This air striketwould be a pleasure.
Hunter went in first, dropping two of his 500-
pounders and scoring a direct hit on the Stukas'
maintenance hangar. The building disappeared in a
cloud of smoke. Captain Crunch followed, putting
two bombs right on the base's control tower. Crunch's
second Phantom made it three-for-three burying one
of the pirates' barracks and igniting a fuel tank
nearby.
Hunter climbed, put the F-16 into a tight 360 and
came back in, dropping a third 500-pounder on the
storage facitity where he, Al and Zal had once been
held prisoner, and a fourth on the sentries' watchtower
100 yards away. Crunch took out another storage
building and his partner added another load into the
already burning fuel tank.
The target thus softened up, the assault choppers,
on Hunter's orders, moved in.
"LZ is hot," Hunter radioed the Stallion pilots, as
351

he streaked in to strafe the runway. "Drop down quilk
and keep the props moving."
Some pirates were still running out on the runway,
trying to get to their gun positions, or taking shots at
the jets flying over. Others were firing rifles and
machine guns at the descending troop helicopters.
"Cobras!" Hunter called into the radio. "Soften
the LZ witl you?"
The two Cobras seemed to appear form nowhere
and strafe the bandits as they dove for cover. Cobra
Brother One stayed on the tails of five bandits who ran
into a concrete bunker next to the runway. Pausing to
hover for a moment, the Cousin soaked the structure
with his flamethrower. The five bandits emerged,
completely engulfed, and ran witdly until they were
mercifully shot down by Cobra Brother two.
The Sea Stallion was the first to come in. The
Troopers, led by Dozer, leaped from the craft before it
even touched down. They were met by a band of
determined pirate guards firing a variety of weapons
from behind the parked F-lOOs and from the ditches
lining the runway. A sharp firefight immediately
eruped. The assault team hit the pavement and
started pumping lead into the pirates' positions. The
battle was at such close quarters, the pirates were
hurling hand grenades and the Troopers were pilking
them up and throwing them back. The pirates fired
shoulder-launche SAMs right into the assault team.
The attackers returned the fire with their RPGs.
All the white, the Cobras were making breakneck
strafing runs, using their flamethrowers and TOW
mssiles, flying so close to the defenders' lines, the
352
pirates had to duck.
Hunter had lowered his flaps and landing gear and
flew as slowly as possible over the battle. White most
of the fighting was taking place on the Sea Stallion's
port side, Hunter saw a group of 20 or so daring
pirates, trying to sneak up on the chopper's starboard
side, and attack it from the blindside. That was their
mistake; the starboard side hid all three of the chop-
per's Gatling guns.
"Stallion," Hunter radioed. "Goofballs on your
backdoor. Lock on."
"Roger, '16," the call came back. "We see them."
The bandits were detected on one of chopper's target
acquisition video streets just as they started to
charge. In less then a second, the chopper's shutters
opened up to reveal the guns. Inside, the gunner
pushed a button. In an instant, every pirate was
severed at the waist by a one-second, computer-
controlled burst from the chopper's Gatling guns.
"Hueys!" Hunter called, after twisting and flying
back over the runway. The two Hueys came in,
landing on either side of the Stallion. More of the
strike force Troopers jumped out and joined the fray.
By this time, bullets were flying everywhere, as were
RPGs and cannon shells. The airwash from the
choppers gave the appearance that the battle was
being fought in a windstorm. Hunter continually
pasted over the battle scene, adding cannon fire when
and where it was needed.
Although they were outnumbered, the strike force
quilkly gained the upper hand on the runway. The
pirate guard broke and started to retreat, half heading
353

for the nearbytwoods, the other toward the graveyard
of wrecked planes at the far end of the landing strip.
Dozer and the Stallion troops pursued the bandits
into the sea of twisted metal, smashed jet engines and
burnt out fuselages. There were many places for the
bandits to hide, .and the assault team had totwork
each plane, one at a time, to flush out the defenders.
Meanwhite, the choppers themselves were catching
fire from the bandits in thetwoods and from some of
the perimeter AA guns. One of the bandit gun crews
had leveled their guns and were blasting away at the
choppers on the runway. Hunter quilkly twooped in
and put a air-to-surface missite right into the AA nest,
sitencing the gun.
The Ace Wrecking Company Phantoms reappeared
and started buffeting thetwoods hiding the pirates
with murderous cannon fire. At the battle of the
airplane graveyard, Dozer called Hunter on the radio.
'"16? Dozer here. We got a nest of snipers. Can you
put an arrow in that 707 wreck?"
"Roger, Captain," Hunter answered. "Heads up."
Hunter turned, and bore down on the target. He
immediately began pilking up anti-aircraft fire from
all over the field. Below, he could see the group of
pirates, hiding in the burnt out cockpit area of the
wrecked convoy plane, training their machine guns on
the assault Troopers. Sighting through his HUD, he
squeezed the firing button and felt the resulting kilk
as the air-to-surface missite left his wing and instantly
impacted on the pirates' nest. He pulled up, turned
left and looked back through the bubble canopy to see
the missite had done itstwork.
354
"Thanks, '16," Dozer radioed. "We owe you a
beer."
"No problem," Hunter called back. "I'm pilking
up the tab when this one's over."
The battle was slowly winding down as the attack-
ers started to take control. Hunter made several more
pastes over the base, just to make sure. The place was
almost totally aflame. The airplane graveyard was
burning. A small forest fire had started. From the air,
it appeared that every building was either raging out
of control or smoking heavity-every building except
one-the black building at the end of the landing
strip and away from the fighting.
High above, the C-5 Galaxy circled the base,
waiting for his call. Once he was sure the big plane
could come in safely, Hunter radioed its pilots.
"Galaxy. '16 here," he said. "Runway clean. Join
the party, witl you?"
"Roger, '16," the C-5 pilot radioed back. "Looks
like we've been missing all the fun."
"Heads up down there," Hunter called to the
ground force commanders. "C-5 coming in, followed
by the F-4s and the '16."
A chorus of 'Roger" echoed back through his
earphone.
The huge silver Galaxy descended onto the runway
like a giant, graceful bird. It touched down smoothly,
kilking up a minimum of smoke and dirt as its dozens
of wheels touched the runway. A small parachute on
the plane's tail helped slow down the big craft with
runway to spare.
The F-4s came in next, side-by-side, their wheels
355

touching the landing strip at precisely the same in-
stant.
By the time he brought the F-16 in, the Galaxy's
wide-flap mouth was open and Fitzie's monkeys,
mixed with some from the old ZAP, were fiting out and
forming up outside the huge airplane. Also aboard
were twelve of the rescued ZAP pilots. He knew they'd
be itchy to get into the action. He taxied up to the
staging area, shut the engine down and jumped out of
the jet.
Dozer and the assault force officers were waiting for
him. He shook hands with them, saying "Beautifultwork. What about casualties?"
two dead, sixtwounded, none seriously. The land-
ing strip was littered with bodies of dead pirates. The
surprise attack had decimated what was left of the
Stukas.
"It's hard to believe that some of these guys are
actually pilots and mechanics," Hunter said to Dozer,
looking at the carnage on the tarmac. "Drugs. And
greed. That's what kitled them. What a waste."
Then he turned his attention to the matter at
hand . . .
The black hangar was still locked up and appar-
ently untouched. As before, Hunter quilkly pilked
the lock on the doors and swung them open. To his
great relief, he saw the twelve F-20s were still there.
"There they are, boys," he said to the army of
monkeys standing around him. "Get 'emtworking. We
have an hour, ninety minutes tops!"
With that, the mechanics methodically attacked the
sophisticated jet fighters, removing the engine cowl-
356
ings and lifting the engine access hoods. The ZAP
pilots each staked a claim on one of the jets, admiring
the beauty of the rare airplanes. For them, it was a
dream come true. A week ago, they were languishing
in the Mid-Ak's skyscraper prison. Now, they were
about to pilot one of the most sophisticated jets ever
made.
Outside, he could hear occasional gunfire. The
Cobras were still airborned, supporting the attack
troops as they chased the remaining pirates through
thetwoods.
"Where the hell did they ever get these planes,
Hawk?" Dozer asked.
"Beats me," Hunter said, running his hand over the
fuselage of a F-20. "They're right from the factory,
never been flown."
"I admit I don't know anything about airplanes,"
Dozer said. "But these look like beauties to me."
"Beauties is thetword," Hunter agreed. "Long ago,
the government didn't even want to buy these babies.
Thought theytwould be too much plane for the pilots."
"Too much plane?"
"That's right," Hunter answered. "They can fly
and turn faster than some pilots can handle it. The gs
can be tremendous, even when the plane isn't kilked
in all the way. The '16 is the same way. In many
respects it's hotter than these planes, but I'm partial
to it."
"Well, either way, St. Louie witl be happy to see
them, I'm sure."
Hunter nodded slowly. "Yeah," he said, moving to
help one of the monkeys check an engine. "If we're
357

not too late.'
Within an hour, the first of the F-20s rolled out of
the hangar. The pilot, the former ZAP flyboy named
Digger Foxx, was in the cockpit. He gave the thumbs
up signal, pushed his throttle and started the take-off
roll. Every eye was on the F-20 Tigershark as the
plane sped down the captured runway. Suddenly, it
leaped into the air. A cheer went up. The pilot did a
neat 180 and the brilliant red and white fighter came
in low over the field, wagging its wings.
Dozer shook Hunter's hand. "Success!"
"Yep," he said. "One up, eleven to go."
They watched as the plane sped off toward the
north for its first refueling stop at the Aerodrome.
In two hours' time, all of the F-20s were success-
fully launched. A special squad of explosive experts
had blown up the pirates' F-lOOs after stripping the
planes of any usable parts and munitions. The rest of
the attacking force climbed into their aircraft and they
too were soon airborne and heading for the Aero-
drome. All the white, the pirate defenders in thetwoods, under the mistaken notion that the main pirate
forcetwould soon return, had continually peppered the
assault team during the F-20 take-offs. Dozer's men
had returned the fire, but stayed at their positions on
the perimeter of the base.
Finally, everyone was gone. Hunter was the last to
leave. As he started his takeoff roll, a few mortar
358
rounds came crashing down onto the runway, coming
close, but missing by enough so as not to cause any
damage.
He yanked the throttle back, left the ground and
put the F-16 into a tight turn. Streaking back low over
the landing strip, he deposited four bombs in succes-
sion onto the runway. The bombs, specially made
blockbusters, cratered the landing strip beyond repair.
Then he put the F-16 into a streething, steep climb.
When he reached 40,000 feet, he leveled it out,
knowing he was high enough for his jet engine to emit
the water condensed contraits.
Far below, a few of the beraggled pirate defenders
crawled out of thetwoods to claim what was left of
their base. The place was a total wreck, the bodies of
their dead comrades were everywhere. They were
mostly in a state of shock, having no idea who the
attackers were or how they came to know that the F-
20s were hidden there. Only latertwould they discover
that one of the three prisoners who had escaped in the
hot air balloon weeks earlier had led the raid.
One of the pirates looked up and saw something
moving high above the destroyed base. He told his
comrades and together they watched as a huge "W"
formed in the sky.
It was a sight theytwouldn't soon forget . . .
359

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
two days later, the sun was shining over Football
City. The city was under a complete war footing.
Everywhere, tanks, APCs, howitzers, military trucks,
moved through the streets. White St. Louie had found
problems equipping his air force, buying land weap-
ons was no problem at all. And, strangely enough,
neither was manpower.
It was precisely at noon when they heard them
coming. The low distant rumble, more akin to thun-
der than anything else. Getting louder, getting closer.
The sound was deeper than the noise of the attacking
MIG-21s. Soon, every eye in the city was looking
upward, hand over brow to shut out the bright sun.
St. Louie was at the Grand Stadium when he heard
the noise. The place had been turned into the main
staging area for Football City's armed forces. Alltwork
at the stadium stopped as the soldiers looked up.
Then someone yelled: "There they are!"
St. Louie looked up. Sure enough, high up he could
see six dots, flying in a chevron, emerging from a
360
gigantic cumulus cloud. Right behind were six more.
He felt an excitement run through him. Had Hunter
really pulled it off?
He got his answer as the jets descended, and then
flew in formation right over the stadium. They peeled
off, one by one, with professional precision and made
their landing approach to the battered, but still oper-
ating, Football City airport.
He immediately jumped into a jeep with three of his
staff officers and was at the airport just as the third
pair of F-20s were coming in.
"My God!" he exclaimed. "They're beautiful!"
Within minutes, all 12 were down and taxiing to
their holding stations. Next the big C-5 landed,
carrying the Sea Stallion inside, plus the Cobras. two
C-130s circled the field once, and set down, carrying
Fitzie's army of "volunteer" monkeys, the ZAP me-
chanics plus Dozer's strike force.
"Look!" one of St. Louie's officers said. "They
look like F-4s!"
It was true. Captain Crunch and his F-4 Ace
Wrecking Company had decided to join the Football
City forces-free of charge, St. Louietwould find out
later.
The final plane to land was the lone F-16. St. Louie
made sure he was at the station point when the jet
taxied up.
The canopy popped and Hunter jumped out. St.
Louie, overjoyed that his city now had not just an air
force, but probably the most sophisticated air force on
the continent, couldn't resist putting an old Texas
bear hug on Hunter.
361

"You did it!" St. Louie told him. "You just might
have pulled our asses out of the fire!"
"Not yet," Hunter said, cautiously. "We still have a
lot oftwork to do and a tough fight ahead of us."
"I know it," St. Louie said, his initial exuberance
disappearing. "And things have gottentworse."
Hunter turned the plane over to the airport ground
crew and sat down in a long abandoned airport coffee
shop with St. Louie. A bottle appeared. Dozer joined
them.
"What's the situation?" Hunter asked.
"Bad," St. Louie said, pouring out three drilks.
"We've spotted advance elements of Famity troops
sitting right across the river from us. Our recon boys
tell us their main columns are stretched on the road
and the raits from here all the way back to New
Chicago."
"Any tanks, howitzers?" Hunter asked.
"A few, not many," St. Louie said, a slight note of
relief in his voice. "But they've got a lot of artitlery, a
few rocket launchers, and some heavy mortars. They
have it all loaded up on tractor traiters, old semis,
Diamond Reos, things like that. It appears like
they're moving some of their troops by train and the
rest plus the equipment by truck."
Hunter took another drilk and thought for a mo-
ment. "Where are they getting all the fuel to move
them? Those big rigs need diesel and I'm sure they've
got gasoline-powered vehicles, too."
"You're right," St. Louie said. "Our spies have seen
them hauling fuel in old gasoline trucks-Mobit,
Exxon, Sunoco-you name it."v
362
"But, where is all the petro coming from?"
"Well," St. Louie said. "It's coming from New
Chicago. The Famity has an oit storage area-a big
one-right near the downtown. Ships come in off the
lake and unload. Mostly under contract to East
European concerns, I might add."
"And, what was this about some train yards up
there?" Hunter asked, refitling his glass.
"That's right," St. Louie said. "Big marshalling
yards right next to the oit storage farm. That's where
they've been staging their troops."
Hunter was getting an idea.
"We'll need bombers," he said suddenly.
"Fighter-bombers?" Dozer asked, trying to read
Hunter's mind.
"No, not just fighters," Hunter said. "I mean
bombers, too. Big stuff. Nothing fancy, just good
enough for one bombing mission."
"But where the hell are we going to find planes like
that now, Hawk?"
"All we have to do," he said, "is find one man. If
we do, we'll get our airplanes."
That man's name was Roy From Troy.
St. Louie's spies were good; they located the carni-
val-barker-turned-airplane salesman in two days. He
had just returned from a selling trip to Canada when
St. Louie's agents spirited him away, and with the
help of one of the Cobra Brothers, got him to Football
City in a matter of hours.
He nearly fainted when he saw Hunter.
363

"My God! I heard you were dead," he said to the
airman. "They said the Mid-Aks got you over Balti-
more. Or was it Otis?"
"Wishful thilking," Hunter told him. They were
standing in St. Louie's command center in the base-
ment of his mansion.
"Okay," Roy said, getting down to business as
usual. "You guys got me here in the middle of the
night, so I hope it's for doing a deal."
"We want bombers," Hunter told him simply.
"Bombers? I thought you were strictly fighters?"
"We need anything that witl carry bombs a long
way," Hunter said.
"Bombers are rare these days," Roy said. "Good
ones anyway."
"I told you," Hunter said, already seeing dollar
signs in Roy's eyes. Some things never change. "We
don't need fancy. We just need something that's going
to make one mission. That's all."
"Well, they are still in short supply," Roy said. "For
some reason, bombers don't last as long as fighters."
"What have you got?" Hunter asked.
"Well, we'd be scraping the bottom of the barrel at
Wright-Patterson.''
"I said, 'Nothing fancy.' " Hunter reminded him.
"It's going to cost," Roy said, holding his hand up
in mock caution.
"We don't give a bull's ass what it costs," St. Louie
told him, the anger evident in his voice. "We're
fighting for our lives here, mister."
"Okay," Roy said, dropping his huckster front for
the first time that Hunter could remember. "I can see
364
I
you guys are in a bad way here. Everyone on the
continent knows you are. I got bombers. But I'm
warning you. It's old stuff."
"How old?" Hunter wanted to know what he had
totwork with.
"Would you believe everything from a few B-24s up
to a B-58 Hustler?" Roy said.
"B-24s?" Hunter said. "Liberators? They were
retired at the end of World War II."
"Well, just about," Roy said. "But, you gotta
remember, I'm in the airplane salvage business, too.
We found a couple of B-24s that got stuck in the snow
way up in Canada. Happened in 1943. They were
heading over to Europe when they had to put down at
an emergency strip because of weather. Well, the
weather turned out to be a blizzard and it iced them
right over. Preserved them perfectly. No one ever
bothered to dig 'em out, until the Free Canadians let
me do it. In fact, they paid me to get them out. I did
and the boys at Wright-Patterson did them over real
nice."
"But witl they fly?" Hunter wanted to know.
"Shit, yes," Roy said. "Carry a shitload of bombs
for you, too. Stitl got the Norden bombsights in them,
for Christ's sake. They're collector's items, but you
guys can get them for cheap."
Hunter looked at St. Louie, who shrugged.
"What else you got?" Hunter asked.
"I got four B-25 Mitchells. Got 'em from a flying
club down south that didn't want the Mid-Aks to get
them. They're also in good shape. These were ship
busters from the South Pacific. Got double cannons in
365

the nose, one on top, two on each side and one on the
ass. Buy all four I'll give you a deal."
Hunter nodded. "Mitchells were a good plane.
That's what Doolittle bombed Tokyo with. What
else?"
"Got twelve B-29s," Roy continued. "Real good
shape, only saw a little action at the end of World War
II, and minimum stuff during Korea. I found them at
an air museum out in California.
"I've got a lot of B-47s. Strange airplanes. No one
wants them. They're stretched-out fighters. Long
wings and bodies. Carry three guys, but two sit like
they're in a fighter, one in back of the other. I'd hate
to go a long way in one. They threw them together in
the 50s, just so they'd have a jet that could make it to
Russia carrying the Big One. You can get them for a
song. I'm looking to get rid of them."
"You said you've still got a B-58?" Hunter was
almost afraid to ask.
"The Hustler?" Roy said. "Yep. I got one. It's got
to be the last one in existence. First big bomber to go
supersonic, you know. And I don't mean one clilk
over the line either. I talking about Mach 2-plus!
Another stretched out fighter. Like a big F-106 Delta
Dart. Fucking this is too big and it's got some mean
engines. But I'll tell you something: it sucks up the J-
P8 like crazy, but that shitbox can haul ass. Scares
you to be moving that fast in something that big."
"What's left?" Hunter asked.
"I got a few C-130s," Roy said. "Just fixed them
up. They could help you out. You can open the back
and roll bombs out. Plus you put everything from a
366
popgun to a howitzer in them. That's what they used
'em for 'Nam. Spectre gunships, they called them. Or
Puff the Magic Dragons."
"C-130s are good stuff," Hunter agreed. "We can
always use a few more. Is that it?"
"Just about," Roy said, trying to thilk. "Your boys
kidnapped me before I could get my sales book. Or
my girls."
"That's a pity," Hunter said.
"Yeah," Roy said, taking out a notebook. "So
which ones do you want?"
Hunter looked again at St. Louie, who nodded.
"We want all of them," Hunter said.
Roy From Troy's notebook dropped at the same
instant as his jaw. "All of them?"
"That's right," Hunter said. "We need them all."
"I'm talking about almost forty planes. What the
hell are you guys gonna do? Fight World War II all
over again?"
Hunter smited. "Something like that," he said.
They cleaned Roy from Troy out of his stock and
made him a rich man. It was by far the biggest deal of
his life. The planes started arriving the next day,
flying in from Wright-Patterson, carefully avoiding
the Famity's airspace during the trip. St. Louie used
some of the diamonds that Hunter had delivered to
him as payment for the bombers.
But more importantly, Hunter managed to hire
most of Roy's pilots to fly the planes, just for the one
time. The diamonds helped but, in most cases, once
367

the pilots heard that they'd have a fleet of F-20s flying
cover for them, plus Hawker Hunter in the lead, they
knew the odds of their getting back were greatly
increased.
The main target was the oit yards right in the heart
of New Chicago. Hunter knew that an army moves on
oit-more so than its stomach. Hitting the Famity's
fuel supplytwould hurt-hard. Maybe not right away.
But some time, when the fighting reached the critical
level, the enemytwould turn and the oittwouldn't be
there.
Trouble was, except for a few outdated and grainy
photographs, Hunter had little information on the
target area. He didn't want to rilk sending a photo
recon plane up now, for fear of tipping his hand to the
Famity. But there were crucial questions thattwould
have to be answered right away. Oit facitities always
proved to be tough targets. For instance, how much of
the bomber force should concentrate on the oit tanks
themselves? One or two bombs in the right place and
the tanks witl blow themselves up. Yet, as the Allies
found during World War II, sometimes you can bomb
the shit out of a refinery, and manage only a brush fire
for your trouble. He wanted to hit the raitroad mar-
shalling yards at the same time, but the oittwould have
to have priority. That meant the very first plane intwould have to score a direct hit on a large oit tank,
hoping to set off a chain reaction thattwould destroy
most of the oit farm and free up much of the bomber
force to concentrate on the raitroad yards and the city
of New Chicago itself.
That's why hetwould be flying the lead plane . . .
368
For the next two days, he pored over maps and
planned the approach of the mission. He knew hetwould have to fly the lead in one of the B-24s, because
it was slow and yet could carry the good-sized bomb-
load he'd need.
Problem number two was getting the bombs. Be-
cause of St. Louie's connection in Texas, he had a
fairly stable access to guns and ammunition. The
people in Texas, probably more than anyone else,
knew what price freedom. They*also realized that if
the Famitytwon this fight, they, the Texans,twould
probably be next. To those ends, they supported St.
Louie as much as possible. Cargo planes from Texas
arrived at Football City's airport every hour, carrying
ammo, supplies and food. The material necessities of
war.
But aerial bombs were a different story. And this
was where Fitzie came through for Hunter again.
White they were back at the Aerodrome, fueling the F-
20s for the flight to Football City, Hunter drew Fitzie
a map. It gave directions to a mountain way up in
Vermont where a small airstrip was hidden. Fitz was
able to rent two massive Sky Crane helicopters from a
legitimate lumber company in Free Canada. Using
the map, a highly-paid salvage crew made its way to
the airstrip and dropped down running hooks to the
cratered, debris strewn runway. It took them the
better part of a day to clear enough area for the Sky
Cranes to set down. Then, they broke the lock off the
small hangar located at the edge of the field. Inside,
369

just as Hunter said, was an eye-popping huge cache of
bombs, air-to-air mssiles and napalm. Using the Sky
Crane's best-in-thetworld lifting ability, the crew tied
the bomb crates together and started lifting the
ordnance out. It took them two days oftworking
around the clock. Finally the entire mother lode was
sitting in Syracuse, where ittwould take three trips by
the C-5 to lug it to Football City. In a few days,
Football City was well-stocked in aerial bombs. It was
another legacy from General Seth Jones. It was
almost as if he had foreseen the need for the ordnance
some day and that's why he had led Hunter to the
base that cold day.
But the recovery mission had a much more personal
meaning for the Wingman. Using a smaller map, the
salvage crew foreman located an unmarked grave near
the edge of the strip. He was carrying a heavy bronze
plaque made in one of Fitzie's machine shops. At
Hunter's request, the man laid the plaque in the grave
and ringed it with boulders.
It read simply:
General Seth Jones-Hero & Patriot
Thus, one more loop was closed in Hunter's mind.
Preparations continued. But a strange thing was
happening. As Roy from Troy had told them, the
impending war between Football City and the Famity
was on the lips of everyone across the continent, friend
and foe alike. Word got around fast in these days.
Suddenly, volunteers had begun to pour into the city.
Many were Texans, but others were from all over-
370
Free Canadians, Coasters, exited Zoners. ,
"Volunteers for freedom," Hunter commented to
Dozer as they watched from a balcony of a building
downtown the soldiers flood into the city. "People on
this continent never forgot what it was like before the
New Order. Before it was itlegal to carry the flag, or
mention the stars and stripes, or fly with it painted on
your airplane. Before the New Order or the Mid-Aks,
or the Famity. Before the Russians stabbed us in the
back. They may have forgotten about TV, and cars
and paper money. But they never forget about free-
dom."
Dozer nodded in agreement, but Hunter knew he
had to say more. He felt a fire start in his belly. He felt
an anger build in his brain. He felt a lump form in his
throat.
"They never forgot that they were . . ." he started to
say, but, again, had to stop for a moment and regain
his composure. Looking at the troops-volunteers-
like the original Minutemen, walking past, heading to
take up positions along Football City's defense line.
He knew theytwould fight a battle that some-maybe
mosttwouldn't survive. But still they continued to
come ...
He felt something burst inside him. A flame ignited
in his heart.
"God damn it!" he finally blurted out. "Look at
them! They never forgot they were once Americans!"
Thetwords stung in his ears. His mouth went dry.
Fluid collected in the corners of his eyes. "God damn
it!" he said. "I'm an American!"
He looked at Dozer. Tears were also forming in the
371

Marine's eyes. The tough leatherneck turned away
and gazed out into space. "I'm an American, too,
Hawk," he said quietly.
They stood in silence and watched the volunteers
move through the city. Hunter knew thistwould be the
biggest fight of his life. Bigger than over the Rhine, or
anything with ZAP. This was against a very real
enemy. One who, like the Mid-Aks, was in bed with
the Russians. One who shared with the godless Sovi-
ets the same twisted ideal of government by slavery.
Slavery of the mind and body.
Well, tomorrow, theytwould start to do something
about that.
372
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
The next morning the strange armada of bombers
began to form up on the Football City's airport
runways. There were the two B-24s-Hunter in one of
them-warming up next to the B-47s. The B-29s were
already rolling, as were the C-130s. The cranky B-58
was sprouting black smoke and was, by far, the
noisiest plane on the runway. The two-engined B-25
Mitchells looked small compared to the other flying
brutes.
Bomb crews raced between the planes, loading a
bizarre collection of ordnance aboard the planes. The
napalm and high energy bombs from the Vermont
hideaway were divided up equally among the
bombers. After that, it was catch-as-catch-can.
Everything from anti-personnel bombs in the B-29
Superfortresses to a pair of 18,000-pound block-
busters the B-58 was carrying. Hunter's B-24 was
loaded with dozens of small incendiary bombs, 3,500
pounds in all. The B-47s were outfitted to drop
napalm; some of the C-130stwould drop delayed-fuse
anti-personnel bombs white otherstwould drop barrels
filled with stilks of TNT. Hunter hoped ittwould all
373

make for one hell of a fire.
Riding shotgun for the bomber forcetwould be the
F-20s. All 12 of them rolled off the runways first. The
F-4s of The Ace Wrecking Company went next; they,
too,twould ride escort. St. Louie's spies told Hunter
that bombers could expect MIGs to intercept them
over the target area. If they did, theytwould have
formidable opponents in the F-20s and the Phantoms.
The spies also reported that the bomberstwould find
the raitroad yards and the oit facitity ringed with
hundreds of AA guns and SAM sites.
Hunter, as mission leader, radioed all the aircraft
commanders in the force-38 in all. Each one
checked off preliminaries leading up to their ready
point. Hunter had held a briefing before the take-off,
where last minute information on weather, fighter
strengths and other details had been gone over. The
mission had been planned and discussed and planned
some more, but there was no getting around the fact
that things tended to look a whole lot different up in
the air than they did on a map.
Very few of the bombers hadtworthwhite targeting
systems-the exotic equipment had been stripped
from the planes long ago. Knowing this, Hunter had
to plan the mission around providing the bomber
pilots with targets they could visually acquire quilkly.
The groupstwould be flying in at one minute intervals,
and he wanted to keep radio talk among them to a
minimum so as not to help the AA crews home in on
the radio frequencies.
Hunter checked his own plane, the antique B-24
Liberator, and found everything intworking order. He
looked at his navigator, Captain Dozer, specially
374
trained for the flight, and gave him the thumbs up
signal. Dozer returned the salute. Both men smited.
They had managed to find what had to be the last two
girls in the city the night before and bedded them. It
was better going into the jaws of death knowing that
you had tasted life's one great pleasure at least one
more time.
There were eight other men on board. A competent
copilot named Ernie and seven of Dozer's marines.
The 7th Cavalry, and some of the Football City
special forces, had been pressed into service as gun-
ners aboard the bombers. In fact, anyone who could
point a gun was recruited. Like everything else in the
daring bombing mission, the air crews had been
improvised. It gave a whole new appreciation to the
phrase "Flying by the seat of your pants."
Once he was certain every plane had checked out,
Hunter rechecked the instruments in his own aircraft.
Everything appeared A-OK. Time to go. He brought
up the throttle and released the brakes. "Okay, every-
body," Hunter said into his radio as the B-24 lurched
forward. "Follow me."
The bomber force's flight path had them follow the
Illinois River right up to New Chicago. They were
flying high, at 40,000. Hunter's plan called for the
planes to line up in pairs and triples, forming a train.
The idea was to disguise the bomber force by making
it look like a convoy to someone looking up from the
ground. Though ittwould be unusual for a convoy to
be pasting through Famity airspace, it was not un-
heard of one drifting off course and fighter strengths
375

being what they were, no one bothered if a convoy
pasted overhead once in a white.
This cover gave the bomber crews a good look at the
preparations being made on the ground by the Famity.
They were, in atword, extensive. By the time they flew
over Peoria, they saw the roads approaching the
capital were clogged with military traffic. The raits
were the same way. Hunter, taking it all in from the
lead plane in the force, withed he could unleash his
bombs on these targets too. But he knew that every
vehicle he saw moving down below had to run on fuel,
and fuel was the major objective of the mission.
The flight lasted only a little over an hour before
they were on the outskirts of New Chicago. They were
still fifteen minutes away from their objective however,
when their convoy cover was blown.
Hunter saw the MIGs first. They were still 20 miles
away and a mite below them, too far for them to pilk
up the bomber force on the shitty MIG on-board
radar system. But Hunter knew it was just a matter of
time. There were two of them, possibly on a routine
mission, possibly heading to bomb Football City. He
was determined that theytwould never make it, no
matter what their destination.
"Tigershark Leader," he radioed to the fighter
escort commander, flying several thousand feet above
the main bomber force. "Group Leader here. We've
got company. Twenty-five clilks out. My five o'clock."
"Roger, Group Leader," the answer came back.
"We see them."
"Okay, Tigershark," Hunter called. "Keep an eye
376

on them until we form up, then intercept."
"That's affirmative, Group Leader."
Hunter knew that the F-20stwould handle the
MIGs with no problem. But he also knew the MIG
pilotstwould detect the bomber force and radio the
information back to their base.
"Everyone else, get ready," he told the rest of the
bomber pilots. "We're probably going to get a recep-
tion before we reach the target area."
Behind him, the bombers broke from the fake-
convoy pattern and tightened up into boxes of fours
and fives. There was strength in numbers, truer than
ever in bombing missions. The combined number of
guns aboard the bombers, plus the force's compacted
flying area,twould give attacking interceptors some-
thing to thilk about before they plunged in amongst
the aircraft.
In less than a minute, the bombers were lined up in
their proper attack formation. Some planes increased
airspeed, white others dropped back. As planned,
Hunter and the other B-24 were in the lead, followed
by the four Mitchell B-25s. Behind them were the
twelve B-47s, flying in three four-plane diamond
formations. Coming next was the odd duck flight-
the seven C-130s surrounding the B-58 Hustler, which
had been bucking and shooting black smoke the
entire way. The aging bomber had to make the trip
flaps down and landing gear deployed just so it could
reduce its airspeed to that of the propeller-driven C-
130s. The dozen B-29 Superfortresses brought up the
rear.
The two Famity MIG pilots broke through a cloud
bank and stumbled upon the bomber formation now
377

about four thousand feet above them. Both pilots
couldn't believe it at first. Neither could their flight
controllers back in New Chicago.
"Chicago!" the first pilot radioed, a trace of panic
in his voice. "Raghead Leader here. Do we have a
convoy coming in?"
"Negative, Raghead Leader," came the reply.
"Well, we have visual with a large force approach-
ing two-two-niner from southwest, heading your way."
"Raghead. Please resend. Flight ops says large
force impossible."
"Chicago. Tell flight ops we're less than ten clilks
from large force. Bombers. All types. Need instruc-
tions."
"Raghead. Need ID. What kind of bombers."
There was a pause in the transmission, then: "Chi-
cago. Sounds crazy. We have visual on what looks to
be old B-24s, Mitchells. A group of B-47s. At least
seven C-130s. One plane that's smoking heavy. Maybe
a dozen B-29s in the distance."
This time the silence was on the Chicago control-
ler's end.
"Raghead two," the controller radioed the flight
leader's wingman. "Do you copy Raghead's sight-
ò         O"
ing?
"That's affirmative, Chicago," was the answer. "I
count thirty-eight planes in all."
"Raghead Leader," the controller radioed. "Let me
remind you of the disciplinary action for fiting false
reports ..."
At that point, Raghead Leader snapped out. "Lis-
ten you assholes, I'm looking at the belly gunner of a
B-24 Liberator. I know it sounds like a dream from
378
World War II, but these planes are real and they are
heading your way. Now please give us instructions or
we are going to vacate the sector."
All the white, Hunter was monitoring the radio
transmissions. He had to chuckle at the MIG leader's
plea to convince his controllers that he wasn't seeing
things. But now, as those controllers decided what to
do, he could detect another voice, in the background
at Chicago flight control, barking orders. The voice
was speaking in a heavy accent, and alternating
between English and a foreign tongue. Hunter lis-
tened very closely. He needed to hear only three or
fourtwords of the foreign language until his suspicion
was confirmed. Dozer was listening in and heard it
too.
"That sounds like a Russian voice on Chicago
control," Dozer called to him.
"It is," Hunter said coolly, though he was begin-
ning to burn inside. "I'm not surprised. They're
obviously controlling the MIGs, and probably a lot
more in New Chicago."
"Looks like those East European planes you told
me about were carrying more than Mid-Aks to Chi-
cago," Dozer said.
"Just like those East European oit tankers on Lake
Michigan," Hunter said. "Well, that's okay with me.
It witl only make this mission a little sweeter."
"Tigershark Leader," Hunter radioed. "Intercept."
"Roger, Leader," came the reply.
With that, four of the F-20s streaked past him,
diving down on the MIGs. The Famity jets never
knew what hit them. One F-20 pilot locked on to
Raghead two in the dive itself and launched a Side-
379

winder. The missite dashed unerringly to its target,
striking it almost head-on. The jet went up in a ball of
flame and smoke. The pilot never had a chance, his
flaming corpse was ejected by the explosion and was
seen plummeting to earth along with the hundreds of
pieces of wreckage.
"We are under attack!" the pilot in Raghead One
screamed.
"ID attacking aircraft," Chicago tower radioed
back.
"For Christ's sake!" the panilking pilot shot back.
"They're F-20s!"
"F-20s?" the controller asked. Hunter, still listen-
ing in on the Chicago frequency, could hear a great
amount of shouting and confusion coming from the
New Chicago end.
"Raghead," the controller called. "Confirm F-20s."
Silence.
"Raghead One, confirm F-20s."
Stitl silence.
"Raghead?"
Ragheadtwouldn 't be answering anything except
the doorbell in hell. The MIG-21 had taken two
simultaneous Sidewinder hits and had simply disinte-
grated. No wreckage. No parachute. Just a puff of
smoke.
"Target ahead!" Hunter called into the micro-
phone. "Ten miles. Drop to assigned altitudes and
let's get this party hopping."
With that, the two B-24s and the four B-25 Mitch-
ells dropped down to barely 100 feet off the deck.
Hunter had known all along that the only way they
could successfully attack the oit tanks was to come in
380
low, below the radar that controlled the Famity's AA
guns. He was bombing on sight. There were no video
acquisition aids, no HUD street, no fire-and-forget
mssiles. This onetwould be down and dirty.
Hunter could see the target off in the distance but
straight ahead. Past the skyscrapers around New
Chicago, there was the raitroad yard and then the oit
storage farm. There were easity 120 large round tanks.
A couple of smokestacks were stilking out at each end
of the facitity, spouting flames of burnt off gas.
Hunter nosed the B-24 down even lower. That's
when the flak started coming up. Puffs of harmless-
looking but all too deadly smoke. He knew if one hits
the wrong spot-like in the fuel-laden wing or the
bomb bay-he and his crewtwould be one with the air
in a matter of seconds. They started pilking up small
arms fire too. The plane was low enough that a well-
placed bullet could also send them off packing to the
Great Beyond.
The warning the MIGs had sent back had alerted
the Famity's defenses. As he pasted the eight-mite-to-
target mark, the air was suddenly filled with hundreds
of flak explosions. St. Louie's agents were right again.
The oit farm and the city were protected in depth by
AA guns.
He ordered the gunners in the nose and in the tail of
his ship to start firing back. He could see Famity
soldiers on the ground shooting at them with rifles
and machine guns. Then the mssiles started coming
up.
"We're getting SAMs!" he radioed the rest of the
bomber force. "Take evasive action."
There were hundreds of them. Big ones that looked
381

like flying telephone poles and other small ones that
he knew where shoulder-launched. It was like the sky
was filled with Fourth of July rockets. He weaved in
and out, up and down in order to confuse the radar
equipment in the A A guns and the SAM launchers.
He could see the B-24 on his right was doing the same
thing. The air actually became bumpy with flak and
the wash from the SAMs' exhaust.
Six miles to target. He pasted over the heart of the
city and the air became even more intense with anti-
aircraft fire. He could actually see gunmen in the
windows of the buildings in the downtown section of
the city firing at the bombers. It was incredible. Hetwouldn't be surprised to learn that just about every-
body in New Chicago carried a gun, and they were all
firing them at the attacking bomber force.
Three miles to target. Hunter's B-24 finally pasted
over the city and was above the huge raitroad yards.
Thousands of troops were scrambling below. If any-
thing, the amount of anti-aircraft fire increased. He
called for the Mitchells to move up alongside the B-
24s. Strength in numbers. Together the six old air-
planes, looking like a scene from a World War II
movie, plunged on toward the target.
At two miles to target, they were aware of a new
threat. There was a flak train moving alongside of
them, firing away at the Liberators and the Mitchells.
The gunners in all six planes returned the fire, at first
aiming at the guns and then finally hitting the loco-
motive pulling the train. There were also towers
scattered around the raitroad yard, manned by troops
with shoulder-launched SAMs. But the planes were so
low, the soldiers had to shoot down at them as they
382
streaked past.
Suddenly, one of the Mitchells got it. A SAM
landed smack in the cockpit area, destroying it in-
stantly. The B-25 flew on for a few ghostly seconds,
then plunged into the raitroad yard, hitting a fuel tank
car and causing an explosion.
The five remaining planes pressed on. Hunter knew
the bulk of the next flight of the bomber force-the B-
47s-were right behind, but he could only guess how
they were faring. He had an open line to them, and all
of the planes in the strike, and could hear the usual
calls between planes to start evasive actions, watch out
for the flak towers and so on. But so far, he had heard
of only three planes taking hits. One of them was the
lead B-47. It had taken a SAM in one of its engines
and had crashed into one of the taller skyscrapers in
the city.
Meanwhite, high above them, the F-20s were tan-
gling with two squadrons of Famity MIG-21s, Even
down 2-to-l, the Tigersharks were making mincemeat
of the Russian-buitt fighters, as evidenced by a flam-
ing MIG that had crashed off to Hunter's right. By
switching back and forth to the enemy's frequency, he
could clearly hear Russian voices intermixed with
ones speaking English. Russian pilots flying the
MIGs? No surprise. It was yet another suspicion of
his confirmed. He was glad to hear, though, that most
of the radio talk coming from the enemy pilots had to
do with the fucking F-20s. "These planes are just too
damned good," he heard one enemy pilot say.
"What's next?" another pilot yelled. "F-16s?" That
comment made him with for an instant that he was in
the '16, tangling with the MIGs. But now he was less
383

than one mite from the oit farm. He returned his full
attention to the matter at hand.
He gunned his engines and opened up a lead on the
other planes in his flight. Thirty seconds later, he was
right over the farm. Hetwould head for the largest
tank, the three other planes in his formation now
following behind. He saw a large, silver colored tank
with thetword CHIGAS painted on its side, sitting
smack in the middle of the complex. The tank, which
was prominent in the old photos he had studied,twould be his target. He pulled back on the old,
steering wheel style controls and the B-24 rose slowly.
"Open bomb bay doors!" he called into the micro-
phone to his bombardier, who was located in the
forward compartment right below the B-24's flight
deck.
100 feet ... 50 ... 25 ...
"Now!" he yelled to his bombardier, who flipped a
switch letting the hundreds of incendiary bombs
tumble out. Simultaneously he yanked the controls
back and put the big plane into a climb. He knew the
Mitchells and the other B-24twould do the same
maneuver. He pitched the plane to the left and looked
back. The fire bombs had covered the oit tank and
were burning like lights on a Christmas tree.
But nothing was happening . . .
It was like everything stood still. He knew he had to
get lucky on this one. One of those bombs had to
touch something off, or the party wasn'ttworth com-
ing to.
"C'mon Jones," he implored to the spirits in him-
self. "Light the match."
Suddenly, one of the fires hit the right spot, proba-
384
bly a feeder line, and the tank exploded with a
tremendous blast. The shock wave buffeted the B-24,
so much so, he and Ernie the co-pilot had totwork
together to keep the plane level.
"Jesus!" Dozer yelled, nearly thrown from his seat
by the blast. "What did you hit?"
"Probably a tank used to store jet fuel," Hunter
said looking back at the conflagration he had caused.
The Mitchells and the other B-24 had roared in and
ignited smaller tanks nearby. Within 15 seconds of his
drop, about a tenth of the huge oit facitity was
exploding and already burning.
He radioed back to the other bombers.
"This is Group Leader," he called. "B-47 flight. Go
to Plan B. Drop early. Repeat. Drop early. We took
the oit tanks. You take out the raitroad yards."
"Roger, leader," came the replies.
He called back to the B-29's flying five minutes
behind him and bringing up the rear. "B-29 flight
leader, what's your ETA over the city?"
"One minute, Group Leader," the answer came
back. "We hear you've caused an instant oit shortage
in New Chicago."
"That's correct," Hunter confirmed. "Play Mrs.
O'Leary's cow, witl you? Drop your incendiaries over
the city. Chicago's been long enough without a big
fire."
"You got it, Group," the B-29 leader called back.
"You pulled the inside straight, Hawk," Dozer said,
looking out the B-24's porthole at the flames below.
"It pays to be flexible, Captain," Hunter said with
the smite of relief. "That tank farm is going to burn
for days as it is. Wait until the C-130s drop their TNT
385

into it.
"How about the Hustler?" Ernie asked.
"Those blockbusterstwould do the most damage at
the airport, I say," Hunter said, calling the Odd Duck
flight. "C-130s, this is Group Leader. You proceed on
Plan A. Drop on the oit yards."
"Roger, Group Leader," the call came back.
"Roger, 130s," Hunter replied. "Hustler, you dou-
ble back and unload on O'Hare. Wake 'em up.
Repeat. Drop those big sons-of-bitches right down
their throats."
"That's a roger, Group Leader," the B-58's pilot
replied. "Then can I request permission to climb and
kilk this thing into afterburner?"
"That's affirmative, Hustler," Hunter radioed
back. "You'll beat us all back. Put the beer on ice,
witl you?"
"That's also a roger, Group," came the reply.
By this time, Hunter had swung the B-24 in a high
180 and was surveying the damage to the oit field.
Fully one half of the tank farm was now a sheet of
flame. And, the B-47s had done a number on the
raitroad yards. The huge napalm bombs had splashed
down upon the raitroad cars and tracks. Thousands of
Famity troops below were instantly burnt to a crisp.
Many secondary explosions were going off. The rait-
road yards were engulfed in the trademark greenish
flame that napalm was known for. As the last of the
Stratojets pasted over, the intensity of the flames
coming from the marshalling yard rivaled the ones
blazing next door at the oit farm.
386
"That's what you fuckers get for attacking a sta-
dium full of innocent people," Hunter cursed.
Now, the C-130s were just arriving over the city.
The AA fire was still intense, but the C-130s were best
suited of all to fight back. Many of the planes were
carrying Gatlings or cannons, even a few small howit-
zers. As they were pasting low over the downtown, the
gunners-mostly Dozer's 7th Cavalrymen-shot at
anything and everything that moved. At times, the
planes were actually lower than the tops of the sky-
scrapers and their gunners blasted away at any build-
ing that looked like a target.
Less than two minutes later, four of the C-130s were
through the smoke of the rait yard and depositing
their TNT cannisters into the raging inferno of the oit
yard. Their flight leader had steered them toward the
north end of the facitity, the only part of the tank farm
that hadn't been ignited by Hunter's flight's bombing
run. Taking the initiative, the C-130 flight leader had
three of his ships hold their TNT bombs and fly on
over a docking facitity nearby. A large tanker was tied
at the pier, as were hundreds of smaller boats. The C-
130s came in, their rear doors wide open. With one
kilk, the TNT barrels started rolling out and landing
with tremendous blasts on the docks. One hit the
tanker amidships, which set off an even bigger blast,
immediately sending the ship to the bottom of Lake
Michigan.
Hunter had the B-24 right over the C-130s and
really appreciated the flight leader's improvisation.
"I'll have to remember to buy that flyboy a drilk
when we get back," Hunter told his crew.
There were several other big ships at anchor in the
387

harbor. Hunter could tell they were troopships, and
therebytworthy targets. Suddenly, the two F-4s of the
Ace Wrecking Company flashed into view.
"Group Leader, Captain Crunch here," Hunter's
radio crackled. "Do you see what I see?"
"Sure do, Phantom," Hunter replied. "Make Fitzie
proud of you."
"Roger," came the reply.
Hunter watched as the two Phantoms dove at the
troopships. Small arms fire erupted from the soldiers
on board desperately trying to stop the attacking F-4s.
Crunch fired his missite first, a Sidewinder he cor-
rectly assumedtwould home in on something-any-
thing-on the ship emitting an infrared signal. The
missite impacted below the waterline, exploding in the
bowels of the ship and igniting its boiters. With a
great geyser of water, the ship was raised off the water,
cracked in two, then came back down again and sank.
"Good shouting, Captain," Hunter radioed to the
lead F-4.
The second Phantom of the Ace Wrecking Crew
took on the other warship. Someone on board had
ordered the ship's assault guns to fire at the jet,
foolishly as it turned out, because the shells were
missing the fighter by an eighth of a mite and crashing
into the dock facitity on shore. Phantom Number two
made quilktwork of the ship, first blasting it with its
cannons, then dropping two 500-pounders right down
its stack. The impact of the bombs immediately
capsized the ship, and causing it to turn hull up. A
large cloud of steam rose as the explosions ignited
under water.
"You guys make a great team," Hunter said, prais-
388
ing the Ace men.
"Our pleasure, Major," the pilot of Phantom Num-
ber two replied.
Hunter circled around again and drew even. Down
below, the B-29s were running the gauntlet of AA fire
and approaching New Chicago. Per his orders, they
spread out and proceeded to dump incendiary devices
all over the city. Hunter could see fires starting up on
block after block. More secondary explosions were
going off. One B-29 took a SAM in the tail, partially
severing it. As Hunter watched, the fatally-strilken
plane continued its bombing run then plunged into
the burning streets below.
Finally, the last of the B-29s had dropped its load
and had turned for home. The, F-20s, hardly
scratched, had dropped down by this time, having
shot down 28 MIGs and scared the rest away. They,
along with the F-4s,twould provide a more than
adequate escort home.
Hunter couldn't resist taking a final past over the
city. He counted fourteen separate major fires rising
above it. The oit farm continued to explode as did the
strilken tanker. The raitroad yards were now nothing
more than flaming debris. He could also see four large
columns of smoke rising from the direction of the
airport, indicating the Hustler had done itstwork well.
Back over the city, the fire itself were so intense, the
heated air above it buffeted the B-24 as it made its
flyover.
He brought the big bomber up to 50,000 feet, so
high, the crew had to bundle up and go on oxygen
masks.
The  engines  sprouting  pure  white  contraits,  he
389

swung the bomber back and forth high above the
burning city, carving an enormous white "W" out of
the clear blue sky.
Then, he switched to the Famity's radio frequency
and said: "Mrs. O'Malley's cow just kilked over
another lantern, boys, courtesy of the Free Forces of
Football City."
Then, he turned the B-24 south and headed for
home.
390
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
Hunter nursed the lumbering B-24 back to a safe
landing at the Football City Airport. Its engines
straining and smoking, the plane's wings creaked and
groaned the entire return trip. It had taken more than
a few hits from groundfire, yet kept on flying, plug-
ging along. The old bomber had served them well.
But he doubted if the birdtwould ever fly again. As the
crew slid through the exit hatches, Hunter remained
behind to take one long last look at the plane. All
those years frozen in ice, just to be melted out for one
last mission. The B-24's official name was "Libera-
tor." He ran his hand over the control cabin's wall,
"Perfect handle," he thought.
The airport was bustling with activity. On the way
back, he had taken advantage of a low cloud cover to
fly the B-24 over the Famity's troop concentrations
waiting now just across the Mississippi River.
He withed he could bomb up again and strike at
the New Chicago army, but there was a more pressing
matter.
391

St. Louie was waiting for him and Dozer on the
tarmac.
"Congratulations, Major, once again," the man
said, shaking his hand.
"Thanks," Hunter said. "But there were a hundred
guys up there with me." Then, changing the subject,
he asked St. Louie what the situation was with the
Famity army.
"My agents tell me there are eighty thousand
Famity troops right across the river," St. Louie an-
swered soberly. "They've got tanks and hundreds of
artitlery pieces. It's only a matter of time before they
attack."
"Tonight," Dozer said. "They'll start throwing
everything at us tonight."
Hunter looked at both of them. St. Louie's inner
grief was so apparent, the man appeared to be aging
right in front of him. Dozer looked like a man who
hadn't slept in a year. At that moment, he realized
these men were more than his comrades-in-arms.
They were also his friends.
"Well, if they are going to attack us tonight," he
said. "That means we only have a few hours to figure
out how we're going to beat them, too."
They returned to the battle command center and
took account of their forces. They still had enough
men-almost 40,000-to fitl three divisions. Thirty of
the city's howitzers were operational and were in place
along the river bank, and there was an odd assortment
392
of mobite guns, rocket launchers and tanks.
All of the F-20s were still in flying condition,
likewise the F-4s and the choppers. Hunter had
previously ordered all of the B-29s, the B-25s, and the
C-130s to be refueled, re-armed and made ready to
stand by. Even the shitbox B-58 Hustler was gassed
up and ready to go. But the surviving B-47 Stratojetstwould be practically useless to them now-they could
neither bomb low nor provide ground support. Hunter
ordered them stripped of usable parts, and their tanks
drained. But even with that, the suppliestwould soon
begin to dwindle. There was only so much JP-8 fuel to
go around; the Texans had sent all they could spare
and more. Now the pipeline was shut off. Hunter
estimated he had enough left over to refuel the
bombers once, the F-20s and the F-4s twice and the
'16 three times. Then theytwould be dry.
And dry meant grounded.
St. Louie ordered all of the city's troops deployed to
positions along the west bank of the Mississippi River.
Across the muddy waters, the Football City forces
could clearly see the Famity troops bringing up artit-
lery and digging in. Football City's ammunition sup-
ply was also low; if it hadn't been, St. Louietwould
have fired on anything that moved on the east bank of
the river. But now, every commander in the Free
Forces was under orders to "make every shot count."
On a suggestion from Hunter, Dozer sent his best
explosives men to mine the seven bridges that spanned
the Mississippi and led into Football City. He knew
that eventually, every one of the bridgestwould be
393

blown-by waiting, there was a good chance that theytwould catch some enemy troops or equipment on the
bridges when they went down.
The Mississippi hugged the Football City border
for 15 miles. By nightfall, St. Louie's intelligence
corps reported as many as 2500 of the Famity's large
guns and tanks along that stretch. There were reports
of gunboats and smaller ferries coming down the river
from the interior of the Famity's territory. Worse still,
Football City airport radar had pilked up many
airborne blips on its streets shortly before nightfall.
Hunter wasn't surprised when the enemy aircraft
report reached them in command center. He, St.
Louie and Dozer were studying an enormous map of
the city and its defenses at the time.
"One of two things has happened," he told them,
reading the report. "Either they've hired on air pi-
rates, or they've been supplied very quilkly with more
MIGs. Maybe both."
"Where the hell could they get MIGs so goddamn
fast?" St. Louie asked, the exasperation coming
through, loud and clear.
"If I had to guess," Hunter said. "I'd say the same
people who own those East European ships we saw in
the New Chicago harbor had something to do with
it."
"The Russians?" St. Louie asked, his voice still
containing a trace of disbelief.
"I'm convinced, without a doubt," Hunter said,
adding, "Finally."
"Where does that leave us, Hawk?" Dozer asked,
394
wearity rubbing his eyes.
"Well, if they commit the MIGs to ground support
or to bomb us, we can engage them with the F-20s,"
Hunter said. "But dogfights suck up fuel. We use the
fuel to fight them and we lose the F-20s in the ground
support role."
"And if we commit the F-20s to ground support too
soon," Dozer continued the theory. "The MIGs can
jump us once we've gone dry."
"That's the situation," Hunter agreed.
"What about the B-29s?" St. Louie asked.
"They've got full tanks, enough gas for two mis-
sions," Hunter answered. "I've ordered each of them
to have as many guns as they can carry standing by.
Machine guns, recoitless rifles, even RPGs if they can
handle them. They'll stilk them all out of one side,
punch holes in the fuselage if they have to."
"To use as gunships?" Dozer asked.
"Right. First, we'll have them unload what we have
left in bombs on the east side of the river, then come
back, pilk up their extra guns and turn them into
Spookys. We'll assign at least one to each bridge. The
rest witl be vectored to where they are needed. Same
with the C-130s and the B-25s. I don't know if they'll
get the B-24s airborne, though."
"How about SAMs?" St. Louie asked.
"I'm sure we'll see a lot of them. Stingers, Blow-
pipes, thetworks," Hunter said grimly.
"Whew!" Dozer exclaimed. "It's gonna get
crowded up there."
"We'll keep the choppers on this side of the river,"
395

Hunter continued. "They can help on ground support
and recon, plus watch for the amphibious crossings."
St. Louie peered at the map of his dream city. "We
just can't let any of those bastards get across the
river," he said. "If we do, we're sunk."
"We'll blow the bridges," Dozer said, pointing at
the huge map. "But I'm not so sure that witl stop
them. If they don't get across here, they could cross at
any number of points north or south of the city. We
know they've got boats they've floated down from
Peoria. And, they've got pontoon bridges. If they do
cross either north or south, we'll have to commit
troops there, and leave our center and other flank
open."
Hunter stared at the map and the markers indica-
ting the Famity's troop and gun concentrations. It was
a matter of numbers. The Famity's forces outnum-
bered Football City 2-to-l. They were better
equipped. He couldn't imagine what their strengthtwould be-materially and mentally-if his thrown-
together air force hadn't bombed New Chicago. Nev-
ertheless, what remained still added up against the
Free Forces. It had all the makings of a last stand.
Yet he was never one to give up hope.
"We'll have to take rilks," he said finally. "Do the
unpredictable. Theytwon't be expecting us to launch
all the bombers at once against them. It'll knock
them for a loop, at least for a white. But then, we'll
have to keep them off balance and ..."
Dozer and St. Louie looked at him, both saying
"And?"
396
"And," Hunter said. "Hope for a miracle."
The first shells from the Famity's artitlery started
landing on the west side of the river at precisely
midnight. The Free Forces' troops dug in along the
river bank hunkered down as the artitlery barrage
intensified. Soon, Famity guns all along the 15 mite
stretch of river were firing into the city. The night sky
was lit brighter than daytime. Streaks of red criss-
crossed above the soldiers. It was at once fascinating
and frightening.
Soon the shells were coming in so fast and loud, the
Free Forces' Troopers found their ears had started to
bleed. They bravely held their fire. Most of the
Famity's shells were going over the Troopers' heads
anyway; the target of this opening barrage was Foot-
ball City itself. Many of the beautiful buildings and
casinos were reduced to rubble. Fires erupted every-
where. The massive Grand Stadium, a marshalling
yard for the Free Forces, was taking an inordinate
amount of pounding. Fortunately, the airport, located
a few miles northwest of the stadium, was just out of
range of the Famity's gunners.
The nightmare continued for three hours. Slowly,
the proud city, once a symbol of freedom, commerce
and rebuilding, began to crumble. Small fires joined
to create larger ones. Roads were damaged beyond
repair, making the movement of emergency vehicles
next to impossible. All the white, the Free Forces
didn't fire a shot. In this, possibly last, battle, each
397

bullet wastworth its weight in gold.
Then the barrage stopped. The air, heavy with the
smell of cordite, was suddenly sitent, the only sounds
being the crackling of the fires back in the city. An
eerieness settled over the Free Forces lines. Many of
the soldiers, without sleep, could see ghosts of shapes
moving on the far side of the river 300 yards away. But
they resisted all temptations to shoot at the spirits.
It was quiet for the next two hours.
The 10 B-29s, propellers whirring, their sides
spiked with gun muzzles, lined up to take off. The sun
was just peeking over the horizon, but the Football
City airport was in the ninth hour of frantic activity.
White the artitlery barrage battered the helpless city,
those gathered at the airporttworked madly to get the
remaining planes armed and loaded and airborne.
Hunter sat at the end of the runway, his F-16's
souped-up engine turned off to save fuel, watching the
parade of aircraft from different eras roll by. First the
Superfortresses went up and formed a ring high above
the airport. Next went the nine rugged C-130s. They
took up a lower orbit north of the field. Ten F-20s
sped off next, lifting into the air in pairs. Only after
the Ace Wrecking Company's F-4s were airborne did
he start his own engine and race down the runway.
Thistwould be Football City's last strategic bombing
mission. Afterward, all the planestwould be commit-
ted to tactical support, that was, helping the Free
Forces' ground troops battle the Famity. Just about all
398
of the Vermont cache of weaponstwould soon be gone.
The deployment of the big planes bordered on desper-
ation. Whatever the outcome, the final act was under-
way.
The air armada formed up according to plan, then
flew the short distance over the city to the battle area.
Hunter, like many of the crew members, looked down
on the devastated Football City. It was practically
unidentifiable. Little remained except heaps of smol-
dering rubble. However, in the midst of the destruc-
tion, the Grand Stadium stood out. It was heavity
damaged, yet not totally destroyed. It was a tough,
solid structure and it had somehow made it through
the terrible night's shelling. Flying on a staff above its
highest point, someone had run up a shredded Foot-
ball City flag.
Hunter had to laugh as he led the planes over the
stadium. "All they wanted to do was play football," he
thought. "What the hell was the matter with that?"
He unconsciously reached to his back pocket and
felt the form of the folded flag he always kept there.
For the first time in a white, he took it out, and felt it.
His hand tingled at its touch. He remembered that
terribly bleak day in New York City so long ago when
he took it from the dead Saul Wackerman. Despite the
dire situation, Hunter felt good inside. He had been
true to histword, in any case. He hadn't forgotten. He
was still fighting. The enemy was the same. The
stakes were the same. The cause was the same. And it
all came down to onetword: Freedom. That's what
Saul Wackerman died for. As did Jones. And the
399

millions kitled in Europe. And the thousand defend-
ing Football City-those whotwould die that day. He
thought of the enemy. Those whotwould repress them.
Whotwould enslave them. The enemy may win the
battles, but he knew theytwould never win the war.
And the Free Forces may not win this fight. If not, it
may take years ... 20, 50, 80 ... 100 years. But
freedom-loving peopletwould rise up again. The sons
and daughters of these warriorstwould come back.
And then the battles witl betwon. You can kitl a man.
But you can't kitl his spirit.
He felt the flag once more, kissed it and then put it
in his left breast pocket. "The bullet that takes me
witl have to go through you first," he said to himself.
The target of the bombing mission was the largest
enemy troop concentration St. Louie's agents could
pinpoint. It was located just across the Mississippi in
the old city of East St. Louis. The Famity was using
the city as a makeshift forward headquarters, taking
advantage of its raitroad yards. Hunter hoped by
bombing the city, hetwould further disrupt the lines of
communications between the enemy commanders and
their superiors sitting in the black, ultra-skyscraper
once known as the Sears Tower back in New Chicago.
He had briefly considered flying up to New Chicago
and blasting the tower, but discounted the idea on two
points. First, ittwould use up precious resources for
less than tangible results-for all he knew the Famity
leaders might not be in the Black Tower when he
400
arrived. Second, he was a pilot and every pilot was
needed right here in Football City.
The bombing force arrived over the target area, led
by Hunter and the F-4s. The F-20s cruised high above
the airborne column, keeping an eye out for MIGs
and conserving fuel. Luckity, no enemy jets were in
the area. One by one, the airplanes unloaded their
payloads-standard bombs, TNT barrels, odd na-
palm cannisters-then turned 180s for the 10 minute
trip back to Football City. Only a handful of SAMs
appeared, indicating the bombers had taken the Fam-
ity by surprise. If they hadn't, the airtwould have been
filled with the anti-aircraft mssiles. This told Hunter
something else: The Famity either didn't have very
good radar, or had turned it off as a precaution. Or
maybe they were just lazy, sloppy, unconcerned about
the airborne threat from Football City. Hunter en-
tered all of the possibitities into his brain, to be
recalled later when needed.
The bombers and escorts all landed safely back at
Football City airport. As soon as the planes rolled into
their stations, an army of monkeys appeared and
started stripping everything connected with bombing
from the planes. In their place, they installed guns of
every size and shape. The B-29s were perforated with
dozens of small gun ports, all on the starboard side
and just large enough to stilk the muzzle of a M61
machine gun or a simitar weapon through. The C-
130s, boasting powerful engines and thus being able
to lift more, had cannons, RPGs, even small howit-
zers placed aboard, again, stilking out of freshly
401

dritled gunports on the port side. The idea, famitiar to
those close to gunship tactics, was that, in action, the
pilottwould fly the plane in a continuous 360-degree
turn to the starboard. The combined firepower of
every avaitable gun, matched with the slow, arching
turn, presented a formidable airborne threat to enemy
ground troops. Hunter estimated the gunships could
stay flying for up to six hours if needed. By that time
fueltwould start to run out. No matter. Because he
knew by that time, the battletwould either have beentwon or lost.
He watched the feverish preparations, hoping the
converted gunships could be flying within two hours.
Stitl it was only just 7 AM. They had many hours to
go in this, whattwould turn out to be, their longest
day.
On the east bank of the Mississippi River, near the
entrance to the Merritl Avenue Bridge, a battalion of
the Famity's crack sappers' regiment was waiting for
its morning meal to be brought in. The unit's com-
manders knew they still had more than an hour to go
before theytwould jump off and try to take the bridge
leading into Football City. The soldiers were confi-
dent, even cocky. They were anxious to get the battle
underway. Most had foregone sleep the night before
simply to see the artitlery barrage that had reduced
Football City to near-rubble.
"How could anyone live through that?" they had
asked themselves and each other. "We'll be playing
402
football in their stadium by noon," others said.
Most of them were mercenaries, so there was a
monetary reason to start the fighting. Their com-
manders were offering a piece of real silver for each
enemy soldier they confirmed kitled. A gold piecetwould be awarded for dead enemy officers. Plus, the
first unit to reach the Grand Stadiumtwould split a
bag of gold. The sappers, being specialists,
believed that gold was as good as in their pockets.
Their officers were confident too. The men were
well-rested and in high, if not greedy, good spirits.
They were all well-armed and looking proper in their
jet-black with red trim uniforms. Now if only the
morning mealtwould arrive, the unittwould be fully
prepared to go into action.
403

CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
Suddenly, above them, the Famity sappers heard
the distinct sound of a helicopter.
"Here's the chow," one of the officers said.
"Finally," another, a major commented. "And,
they're doing it in style-by chopper."
By this time, most of the unit was on its feet, lined
up with mess kits in hand. The chopper circled, then
came in, kilking up a good amount of dust as it
approached the four-lane entrance to the bridge.
"The Famity must be getting hard up," said one
soldier as he watched the helicopter descend. "That
chopper is a piece of crap!"
"That's straight shit, Jack," his buddy said, as the
battered helicopter set down. "And what's that shit
written on the side? What the fuck is the Down
Maine Lumber Company?"
He never found out . . .
The side shutters on the Sea Stallion dropped down
one second before the computer-fired GE Galling
guns inside opened up. Many of the 900 soldiers had
no idea what was happening. The three Gatlings,
each spewing 100 rounds a second, didn't sound like
404
ordinary guns. They had more of a mechanical,
buzzing sound, one which was almost completely
drowned out by the racket of the chopper blades. To
many of the sappers, it just appeared like their
comrades were falling for no reason at all. Even when
they caught a burst of computer-controlled bullets in
the guts, they diedtwondering what the hell was going
on.
The carnage was quilk, complete, almost surgical.
More than 700 of the sappers lay dead or dying on the
pavement. Those fortunate enough to find cover,
lived, then bolted as soon as the deadly chopper lifted
off. In less than a minute, the Stallion's guns had
taken out one of the top units of the Famity's army.
No Free Forces' soldier even alighted from the chop-
per. The warriors were sitting behind video consoles,
their triggers disguised as computer buttons. The
enemy had never fired a 'shot.
"Serves you right, you fuckers," Dozer said, peer-
ing out one of the Stallion's windows as the pilots
lifted the big helicopter away. "I hope they can fit you
all in hell."
Back at the Famity's forward headquarters in East
St. Louis, the New Chicago commanders were in
disarray. Their once-neatly pressed and clean black
uniforms were now covered with dirt and dust. The
early morning bombing raid had taken them com-
pletely by surprise, and had kitled many of their top
officers. The entire west side of the abandoned city
was on fire. The commanders had been forced to
405

move their HQ into the cellar of a partially-destroyed
building, as protection against further air raids. Their
biggesttworry was communications with the front. It
was spotty at best, giving them less and less control
over the nearly 90,000 troops under their command.
Now, to make matterstworse, they had just received a
report that their top sapper unit had been decimated
by a helicopter posing as a supply chopper.
"The fools!" one of the commanders roared,
pounding his fist on a map table that was itluminated
by candles. The bombing had knocked out all of the
headquarters' electrical power. "We've never delivered
food to them in a helicopter before! What the hell
make them thilk wetwould start now?"
"It's this guy Hunter who's behind it," another
officer said, spitting the name out. "He's the guy who
put the hurt on the 'Aks a couple of times at least.
And he's been on our ass for months, we just didn't
realize it."
"Look," a third officer said. "We've still got these
guys almost 3-to-l. We blew the shit out of them last
night. I say we jump off now. Get the thing over
with!"
"What about the big boats?" another commander
asked. "A lot of them got big firepower on them and
we're supposed to use the others to get most of the
troops across the river. Trouble is, theytwon't reach us
until noon at the earliest."
"Let our guys use the bridges," the first officer
roared. "There are seven of them, for Christ's sake. If
they can't capture two or three of them, what the hell
kind of army are they?"
406
"Right," another added. "And they've already got
a bunch of smaller motorboats. So what if the first
guys over get chopped up? If we can establish some
beachheads now, when the big boats do come down-
river, it'll be gravy."
"But most of the troops haven't eaten yet," one lone
dissenter said. "We're having one hell of a supply
problem ever since . . . well, you know, since those
Football City flyboys iced the capital."
"Screw 'em!" the officer who liked pounding on the
table screamed. "What the hell is this? A country
club? We're paying these soldiers big bucks to kilk ass
on St. Louie. That don't mean they're entitled to grub
every other God damn minute! I say send them off!
Now!"
His suggestion was met with near-unanimous, if
half-hearted, shouts of approval. Only the officer who
was in favor of feeding the troops argued against it.
A quilk vote was taken and the motion, as it was,
pasted. The officer who had protested was led out-
side, forced to kneel down and shot twice in the back
of the head. Soon after, the order to move out was
flashed to the Famity's front line units.
The shooting started a few minutes later . . .
The first shots fired by the Free Forces were from
riflemen protecting one of the bridges leading into
Football City. Just after 8 AM, a squad of sharp-
shooters guarding the Alexis Avenue Crossway saw
several figures splashing in the water under the span.
They were Famity skindivers trying to locate the
407

charges the Free Forces had placed on the bridge. The
sharpshooters peppered the water around the divers as
Free Forces' frogmen entered the river from their side
and swam out to meet the enemy. A fierce knife battle
broke out under the bridge, with the Free Forces'
divers eventually gaining the upper hand. By the time
they had returned to land, shooting along the entire
front had broken out.
There had once been a cohesive plan on the part of
the Famity to invade Football City: batter the city
with artitlery, send in sappers to take control of the
bridges white waiting for the makeshift fleet of boats
to get downriver. Now the front line officers learned the
plans had been changed. The new orders were simply
to "take the city." Every officer was on his own. Some
of the units had the benefit of rafts and rubber boats,
even some speedboats, with which to cross the Missis-
sippi. Other units simply charged across the bridges.
Stitl others decided to start their attack with a re-
sumption of the artitlery barrage and wait for the
larger boats.
Back at the Free Forces' war command center in
the basement of St. Louie's headquarters, the Foot-
ball City commanders sifted through reports as they
flooded in from the front and tried to come up with
sensible defenses to meet every threat.
Meanwhite, at the airport, Hunter was ready to
take off on the second mission of the day. The
unpredictable side of war had already begun to take
hold. The fighting was going full titt along the river
now, and the ground units were calling for air support.
The B-29 gunships were first in line to take off.
408
Originally, he had planned to send the C-130s up with
the Superfortresses. But that plan had to be scrapped
earlier when he was forced to send the C-130s and the
Cobra Brothers north to intercept a large flotitla of
Famity boats that was steaming down the Illinois
River and soon to reach the Mississippi. His air cover
over the river battle was cut in half.
Dozer was already out there somewhere, using the
Sea Stallion to harass the Famity lines of communica-
tion. The Ace Wrecking Company was also already in
action; they had delivered an air strike minutes before
on Famity troops attempting to charge across the
Gitean Boulevard Bridge in the south of the city, and
were now strafing industrious Famity amphibious
soldiers trying to cross the river on rafts and in rubber
boats.
Hunter finally took off, the F-16 loaded with three,
1000-pound anti-personnel bombs. He flew immedi-
ately to the Sullivan Square overpast, where Famity
divers had succeeded in dislodging explosives placed
there by the Free Forces.
When he arrived over the concrete bridge, a Famity
tank column was attempting to cross. The B-29
gunship was already on station and attacking the hah*
dozen tanks. He circled above and watched the fasci-
nating engagement. The World War II-vintage B-29
Superfortress must have been carrying 20 gunners,
firing everything from M-16s up to RPGs. Flying in a
low, slow circle, the gunners aboard the big plane
delivered a steady stream of fire on the tank column
below. Many of them were firing with tracers in their
ammunition, the long red streaks adding to the
409

strangeness of the battle. Troops on the west side of
the river also added to the lead shower. One by one,
the tanks halted, unable to move in the withering hait
of bullets. One tank-an M-l Abrams-exploded.
Then another. And another. The rear tank attempted
to back off, but a gunner riding in the rear turrent of
the B-29 delivered a perfectly placed RPG right under
the tank's fuel supply. It exploded with a loud
whump I causing it to blow up and over the side of the
bridge.
The remaining Famity tank crewmen tried to aban-
doiif their machines, but the ever-circling B-29 stayed
right on them, cutting down anyone who moved. In
the course of five minutes, all of the tanks were
reduced to burning hulks, and dozens of enemy
tankers' bodies littered the overpast.
Hunter turned south and spotted a fleet of about 25
motorboats trying to cross a narrow part of the river,
between the Sullivan Square Bridge and the Cardinal
Avenue span. He brought the F-16 down almost level
with the top of the water. The surprised Famity troops
saw him coming and vainly attempted to fire their
rifles at him. It was no use. He opened up with his
M61 cannon six-pack, riddling the boats, silking a
dozen instantly. Up ahead loomed the Cardinal Ave-
nue bridge. Enemy boats were also trying to cross
under the protection of the bridge supports as well as
on the other side. Instead of pulling up, he booted the
throttle and flew right under one of the spans. He
never stopped firing. Those soldiers who survived
were amazed that the streaking jet had actually come
out from underneath the bridge.
410
He stayed low, angling over and above the enemy
side of the river, dodging enemy flak as well as the
hundreds of artitlery shells that were being fired by
both sides. The air was filled with bullets, rockets,
surface-to-surface mssiles, mortar shells, tank shells,
and airplane exhaust. It seemed like both banks of the
river were aflame. The smoke was blinding in some
places. Through the smoke above him, he'd catch an
occasionally glimpse of a B-29 or one of the F-4s or
Cobras, each thilk in the middle of action. His radio
was filled with the excited chatter of war, cries of
direct hits and calls for help. The battle was already
more ferocious than anything he'd been in since World
War III.
His cannons never stopped blazing. He shot at
anything that moved. Jeeps, tanks, fuel trucks,
troops, artitlery guns. They all felt the wrath of the
awesome power of the F-16's six guns. It seemed like
hundreds of SAMs were fired at him, but he was
much too low for most of the mssiles to arm properly.
In some cases, the mssiles wandered around and
sought out the nearest source of heat. One headed for
an old commandeered Sunoco gasoline truck, that
was serving as a mobite fitling station for some Famity
vehicles. The missite impacted just behind the driver's
cab, causing the full tank of gas to explode.
His body was vibrating with adrenaline as he
continued his murderous, low-altitude run down the
river. A barge full of Famity troops was his next
victim. He placed one of the anti-personnel bombs
square on its deck, where it burst open in a ball of
flame, ripping the 200 soldiers aboard with thousands
411

of pieces of hot, deadly shrapnel.
Another mite of strafing pasted when his target
acquisition computer started flashing. An aircraft was
"hot," a half mite down the river. Looked like a
chopper-a big one. He was there in a matter of
seconds, just in time to see a heavity armed helicopter
rising up from behind the trees on the bank. They had
pilked the wrong time to take off. In one motion, he
armed and fired a Sidewinder which flew a spiraling
course right into the chopper's exhaust pipe. The
resulting explosion split the helicopter, in two, the
rotor continued to whip around and climb white the
flaming body fell back to earth. He was by the wreck
in a flash, but it was long enough for him to see the
chopper was a Hind gunship-designed and buitt in
the Soviet Union. He wasn't surprised to see that
some Russians had joined the battle. That made it all
the better. "Sayonara, comrades," he said bitterly as
he continued to fly downriver.
He had reached the southern edge of the battle zone
when he heard a call for help. Famity troops were
close to breaking across the James Street Bridge, the
second span north of the city. He immediately put the
F-16 on its tail and accelerated straight up. Attaining
the height he needed, he put the jet over on its back,
flipped over and cut the engine. Sitently, he glided
toward the James, saving precious fuel. Below him,
smoke and flames were rising from the fighting up
and down the river. He realized the Free Forces were
taking a beating, yet holding up well. And, as far as
he knew, no Famity troops had yet crossed success-
fully.
412
He saw the James Street bridge below him and
restarted the engine. The B-29 was on station, firing
away at Famity troops who had managed to drive
many APCs more than halfway across the bridge.
Suddenly, a SAM flashed up from the east bank and
caught the B-29 on its left wing. The Superfortress
shuddered once as the missite exploded. The big plane
then turned over, flames engulfing its fuselage.
Hunter could almost feel the pilot struggling with the
controls. The doomed flyer managed to aim the
bomber right at the span itself. With a tremendous
explosion the B-29 crashed square into the top of the
bridge, kitling the Famity troops and detonating the
explosives put there previously by the Free Forces.
The entire structure seem to lift out of the water then
fall. A great gush of flaming, muddy water shot up as
secondary explosions went off. By the time Hunter
was in position, the bridge-and everyone on it-was
gone.
More SAMs appeared from the east bank, so he
turned in their direction. His target acquisition video
street showed him five SAM sites foolishly erected
right in a row. Dozens of Famity troops frantically
moved about the missite launchers. It was a perfect
target for his second anti-personnel bomb.
He came in low, popped his bomb release button,
yanked on the side-stilk controller and again, stood
the '16 on its ass. The anti-personnel device exploded,
perforating man and missite alike. Looking back
through the bubble-top canopy, he saw the SAMs still
on the launchers blow, causing a half dozen secondary
explosions. "Someone should have told those boys
413

how to deploy their mssiles," he thought.
"Breakthrough on Alexis!"
It was thetwords Hunter had hoped hetwouldn't
hear, but at the same time, knew hetwould.
The call had come from Captain Crunch's weapons
officer riding in the rear seat of the Ace Wrecking
Company's F-4.
"Crunch, Hunter here," he called.
"We got you, Major," the reply came back. "We've
got a breakthrough on Alexis. They must have dis-
armed the mines or they just didn't go off. They're
pouring across right now, and our guys are going tooth
and nail with them."
" Where's the gunship?"
"They iced it, Major," the reply came back through
a haze of static. "Looks like a SAM got it. It's down
and burning right next to the bridge."
"What's your weapons status?" Hunter asked,
wheeling the F-16 around and heading for the scene.
"We got cannon enough for one more past, but no
ordnance. Wrecker two is back at base getting re-
loaded."
"Roger, Crunch," he radioed back. "Let's do a one-
two. I'll go in first. Just watch out for our troops."
"Roger, Hawk."
He arrived over the bridge to see hundreds of
Famity troops charging across the span. It was the
only bridge that had not yet been blown and it seemed
as if all of the enemy troops on the east side of the
river had converged on it. Many, in fact, had reached
414
the other side, where they were met by the Free Forces
infantry. A sharp firefight was in progress around the
approach to the bridge that once served as a toll
island. The wreckage of the B-29 was burning a short
distance away.
As planned, he went in first, dropping his last
remaining anti-personnel bomb in the middle of the
bridge, then opening up with the six-pack all the way
to the east side. A couple of shoulder-launched SAMs
flashed by him, but he virtually ignored them. The F-
4 came in right behind him, chopping up more enemy
troops, and momentarity stopping their flow across
the bridge.
He wastworried about this situation. The Alexis
Bridge was two-tiered and had up and down spans,
buitt in a time when the out-going used the upper
span and the in-coming traffic the lower. The Famity
soldiers were flooding across both of them, with the
troops on the lower spantsomewhat immune from the
strafing attacks.
He had to gamble. The Famity had either discon-
nected the explosives on the bridge supports, or, for
whatever reason, the charges just didn't go off. He
had to go with the second option. Neither he nor the
Phantom had enough ammo to hold off the invading
troops, and the rest of the Free Forces aircraft were
tied up elsewhere.
He brought the '16 down low again, lowered the
flaps and the landing gear, and prepared the air
brakes. He had to get under the bridge to see if the
explosives were still there. To do so, he'd have to slow
the jet down "to a crawl, almost stall it under the
415

bridge, just a split-second for him to give a look
around. It was an old Thunderbirds' trilk; no other
pilottwould even dream of trying such a maneuver
under a bridge span. But he was looking forward to
seeing if it could be done.
He approached the bridge and hit the air brakes.
The jet's computer brain set as if the plane was
coming in for a landing. The throttle went back
automatically and the nose came up. The Famity
troops crossing the bridge saw him coming and started
firing at him, a tempting target because he was going
so slowly. He zig-zagged a little to deny them good
aim. In a few seconds he was nearly under the bridge,
wagging his wings to prevent the jet from plunging
into the water just 30 feet below. The condition he had
set up was as close as one could get to hovering in a
jet, unless that jet was a VTOL Harrier.
He gave the underside of the bridge a quilk scan,
then hit his throttle. The engines kilked and a second
later he was back up to speed. Mission accomplished.
The explosive charges were still there.
Now all he had to do was ignite them. The wire
controls leading to the detonator on the Free Forces'
side were probably damaged in the fight, or, perhaps,
the man with his hand on the plunger had been kitled.
Huntertwould rely on the six-pack to finish the job.
He radioed the Free Forces' commander battling to
stem the flood of Famity troops coming across the
bridge. He told him of his plan to shoot the explosives
and ice the Alexis. All of the Free Forces' troops had
to be prepared to get behind cover. He told their
leader that when they saw him do a quilk four-point
416
maneuver, his soldiers should hit the deck. The
ground commander, his troops outnumbered 6-to-l
and battling the attackers with bare hands,twould
have hung up on anyone else but Hunter. But know-
ing full well the reputation of the Wingman, he pasted
thetword to his troops. "When the F-16 goes fancy,
everyone duck!"
Hunter did a quilk loop and approached the bridge
again low over the water. The fire from the Famity
troops was much more intense this time. They were
shooting at him from both levels of the bridge as well
as the east side of the river. He kept the F-16 slow and
steady as he approached the span, wheels down and
air brakes engaged.
Slowly. Down a little. The cannon shottwould have
to find its way through the bridge's under structure to
hit the TNT package. Up a hair. A little to the right.
The Famity was now starting to bring across tanks
and APCs as the battle on the west side of the bridge
turned into a simple holding action for the Free
Forces' troops. Hunter figured there were probably a
couple of hundred attackers on the west side already,
and as many as a 1000 coming across the bridge's
double decks.
Just 100 yards out. To the left. Steady. Now! He
flipped the jet on its right wing, then its back, its left
wing and upright again. That was the signal. The
Free Forces' troops hit the dirt. Hunter pushed his
weapons' trigger. A burst from the six-pack homed in
on the explosive packages as if they were radar-
guided. One package ignited, instantaneously blowing
the 10 other charges.
417

He had pulled back on the '16's side-stilk at the
last possible instant and rode right up the side of the
bridge, clearing it just as the TNT went off. There
was an incredible explosion followed by a horrible
creaking of bent metal so loud he could hear it in the
cockpit above the noise of his engine and the non-stop
radio chatter in his earphones.
When he flipped the jet over again, he saw the
bridge had separated, the center span was gone and
the two ends were twisting downward. The charging
Famity troops and vehicles that weren't blown up with
the center span, couldn't stop their momentum in
time and plunged into the water below. Those troops
caught on the east side were now cut off. The Free
Forces' troops re-emerged and began to slaughter
them. In a matter of a minute, the attackers' flow
across the Alexis bridge was severed and hundreds of
enemy troops kitled.
It was just about then that Hunter ran out of
ammunition.
Football City airport was the scene of mass, if
controlled, pandemonium. As Hunter was making his
final approach for landing, he could see eight of the
12 F-20s preparing for take off. These were his
reserves-his last two aces in the hole. Time was
running out, he had to play them.
The battle, still only a few hours old, had already
changed. The C-130s, sent north to meet the Famity
flotitla saiting toward the battle scene, had sunk
nearly half the collection of heavity-armed tugboats,
418
river barges and assorted yachts-turned-PT boats,
before they ran out of ammunition and were forced to
return. Trouble was, as many as 150 of the enemy
craft made it through the air raid and had arrived at a
critical part of the fighting. Football City com-
manders all along the front were frantically calling for
air support against Famity troops that were now in the
boats and crossing the river en masse. Artitlery fire
from the east side had, if anything, increased, rivaling
the intensity of the barrage the night before. The only
difference was this time, the Free Forces' troops were
the targets, not the once-glamorous buildings of Foot-
ball City.
The F-20s, loaded up with the last of the 1000-
pound bombs,twould go after the Famity gun em-
placements. The returning C-130s, some with as
many as 30 gunports dritled into their starboard side,twould rearm, refuel and join the remaining B-29s, the
choppers, the two B-25s and even the cranky B-58,
and go after the enemy amphibious forces.
At this point, Hunter honestly had no idea which
way the battletwould go. The Free Forces' were
outnumbered by at least 3-to-l, a disadvantage he had
hoped to offset with the use of Football City's air-
power. And the Famity's energy crisis. The Free
Forces were fighting valiantly, but, after all, they were
made up almost two thirds of untrained volunteers.
The New Chicago army was a well-trained band of
thugs. Paid soldiers. They were fighting for money.
The Free Forces were fighting for their lives and a way
of life. Was he foolish enough to thilk that could
make a difference?
419

But there was something more. He had a very
strange feeling in his bones. It was very intense, so
much so, his thilking was becoming blurred. The
feeling hit him just as he was landing. By the time he
was taxiing the '16, he was visibly shaking. Something
was wrong. Very wrong. Far off. Getting closer.
He had just pulled up to his taxi station when he
heard St. Louie's voice come over the radio. He was
calling from the airport control tower.
"Hawk! Get up here now!"
Hunter climbed out of the '16 and sprinted over to
the structure and up the stairs. In the control room,
he found St. Louie and a group of Football City
officers crowded around a radar street. Their expres-
sions ranged from extremely concerned to outright
panic.
"Hawk," St. Louie said, the normally measured
voice rising an octave with concern. "You'd better see
this."
Hunter moved to the radar street and took a look.
The round, green video display had an arm of light
sweeping 360-degrees every five seconds. At first, he
saw nothing unusual-just blips of the Football City
aircraft he knew were operating in the area. Then the
light arm swept up to indicate the air traffic coming in
from the northeast. He gasped.
"Holy shit!"
Now at least he knew what had caused the strange
feeling that had come over him. He waited for the arm
to sweep up to the northeast again. When it did, he
knew he wasn't seeing things. There were at least 100
blips on the street, heading south-southwest.
420
T
"They're coming this way," St. Louie said.
Hunter had felt them. As always, he knew, just by
the feeling, seconds, even minutes before any radar.
This time his special extrasensory perception almost
overloaded and short-circuited.
"They're not just MIGs," he said, looking at the
street but actually knowing without its aid. "They're
coming at us with everything. SU-14s, Mirages, Super
Sabres, Starfighters."
"Christ!" one of the officers yelled. "What do we
do?"
Hunter was still trembling, not with fear but with
hate. Hate for the Famity. Hate for the Russians.
Hate for the people who kitled Saul Wackerman. Hate
for the people who kitled Jones. Hate for the people
who kitled his country.
He felt a curious strength wash through him. He
suddenly not only felt stronger, his mind became
clearer. Clearer than it had ever been before. He knew
what he had to do.
"Evacuate the airport!" he yelled. "Quilk! They're
heading this Way to ice us! Right here! We've got to
get everything off the ground!"
The officers went into action, grabbing radios and
contacting the various crews of the planes waiting to
launch. Within seconds, the take-off procedure was
sped up. The half-minute between take-off protocol
was dispensed with very quilkly. Now the planes were
rolling down the runway at the rate of one every 10
seconds. St. Louie got on another radio and started
contacting the Football City aircraft already airborne.
He was primarity concerned about the F-20s. They
421
twouldn't be able to come back and load up on mssiles
and ammo.
Hunter heard none of this. He was out of the
control tower in a flash. Now, he was running. Run-
ning to the F-16. A band of monkeys wastworking on
it. He didn't remember even talking to them. He was
thilking of all the time he had put in back at the
Aerodrome,tworking on modifications to the F-16.
Now he was glad he did it. His mind was clear but
racing fast. Next thing he knew, he was rolling down
the runway, his cannons filled with ammunition, his
wings weighted down by 20 Sidewinders, five times
the number normally carried on a F-16.
"Got to give these boys a reception," he thought as
he took off and turned toward the northeast.
At the same time, the battle at the Mississippi had
again taken a dangerous turn. It was now obvious that
another large enemy force had been held in reserve to
see the outcome of the initial attack. When the Free
Forces' held their own, the Famity commanders,
acting on orders from the top men in the Black Tower
back in New Chicago, threw their reserves into the
fray.
At the front, most of the Free Forces were getting
their first look at what was left of the enemy flotitla.
Most of the enemy craft were tugboats outfitted with
heavy field cannons and RPGs. Others were actually
small cargo ships and barges that once plied the
Grand Lakes. The boats served two purposes for the
Famity. Some transported reserve troops from shore to
422
shore white others used their firepower to keep the
Free Forces' defenders occupied.
Every aircraft fighting for Football City had now
joined in the battle. The rearmed Cobra Brothers
were braving the violently choppy, shrapnel-filled air
above the river to fly low and scorch enemy landing
craft with their special flame-throwing weapons. The
Stallion, with Dozer aboard and operating on the hit-
and-run, attacked several key targets in the enemy
rear. The Marine captain had also toyed with the idea
of bolting up to New Chicago and blasting away at the
Black Tower, just to take out the brains of the new
Famity attack. But like Hunter, he knew the situation
at Football City was desperate, and that the Free
Forces needed every gun they could get.
423

CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
Hunter could feel the weight of the 20 Sidewinders
cause the wings of the F-16 to bounce. No matter. He
had reinforced the jet's body and wings long ago and
was confident that the airplane could handle the
strain.
Whether the pilot could or not was another
matter. . .
He was boiling with hate. Too much hate. It was
affecting his reflexes, his logical way of thilking and
his inner vision. He couldn't wait to intercept the
incoming Famity air armada, although he was out-
numbered 100-to-l. This could be it, he kept thilk-
ing. This could be the end of the line. But he didn't
care. And that's what was bothering him.
He knew that none of the other Football City
aircrafttwould be able to leave the river battle to help
him. With the arrival of the enemy boats and reserves,
that situation was beyond desperate. Anything short
of divine interventiontwouldn't be enough to turn the
tide.
Tangling with the force of enemy planes coming his
waytwould be no different. He was good. The best, in
424
fact. But one jet against 100? Even he doubted it. But
he vowed long ago to go down fighting, and if this was
to be his fate, so be it. He realized he felt just as Jones
did when he launched his one-man war against the
Mid-Aks. Some things aretworth dying for. He re-
membered his rebirth on the mountain in Vermont the
day Jones died. He hadtworked and sacrificed and
almost without feeling it, had changed since then as a
man and a pilot. The innocence was lost. He hoped
something was gained. For the first time ever, he felt
ready to meet his destiny.
Suddenly, his target acquisition system started to go
crazy. The Famity aircraft were just over the horizon.
There were so many of them that even the '16's
sophisticated radar system couldn't handle them all.
In fact, the number of blips showing up on his radar
street was only serving to confuse his on-board com-
puters. If he set the Sidewinders on computer-com-
mand fire, they tootwould become confused and
possibly detonate prematurely, ittwould all be too
much for the machines.
So he had to take a chance. First, he armed all the
mssiles at once. Then, he flipped the weapons release
switch from "Automatic" to "Manual." Finally, he
coolly shut his radar off completely. He closed his
eyes, took a deep breath and let "the feeling" over-
whelm him, blast through him, take him apart and
make him whole again.
When he opened his eyes, he knew he could carry
out this attack entirely on instinct.
Then he saw them. First, there were the MIGs. At
least two dozen of them, all of them painted shiny
black and riding out front, looking for any opposition.
425

Next came the Mirages-20 of the French-buitt
fighter-bombers, each one armed to the teeth with
Exocet mssiles. Then came 32 SU-17 Fitters-the
Russian-buitt' fighter-bomber he and his squadron
faced in the battle over Europe. He was certain that
no Famity pilot had enough smarts to fly such a hot-
shit jet. That led him to the only other conclusion.
There were Soviet pilots behind the controls. The rats
had come out of their holes.
The remaining 30 or so planes were made up of
rogues-F-104 Starfighters, F-100 Super Sabres, some
A-4s, a few A-7s, even some ancient F-94s. The planes
in this rogue group had one thing in common: they
were all types of aircraft favored by the air pirates.
The circle was thus closed, he thought. The Famity
and the Soviets had finally openly teamed up with the
aerial bandits.
The enemy aircraft were flying in a tight formation,
spread out over two miles. It was a tactic indicating
they were expecting to be intercepted. He knew his
plane was already showing up on their radar systems,
but he could have cared less. He was witling to let
them use their electronic eyes for this fight. Hetwould
use his own.
He was 15 miles from them and closing when he put
the '16 into a steep dive. Within a half minute, the
enemy formation was right above him, but no fighters
had broken off from the main group to chase him.
That was exactly what he wanted. It told him that a
Soviet pilot was the group leader and he was using
inflexible Soviet tactics. The crude Soviet military way
of thilking discouraged individual shows of initiative.
Junior officers, whether they were on the ground or in
426
the air, had to adhere to the higher officers' plans, no
matter how flawed or itl-conceived. The goose-step-
ping, group-thilk spoke of everything wrong with the
Soviet mind, and it had infected their system ever
since they staged their completely phony revolution
back in 1917. In this case, the infection had turned
into a disease-a deadly disease.
On the other hand, Hunter was an individual. He
thought for himself. That was the very heart of his
people. He was more than a number. He was a human
being. He could act and react as his instincts and
experience and his inner vision told him to. He was
free in his actions. They were slaves to theirs. He knew
the formationtwould stilk together no matter what. It
was their biggest mistake.
He let the attackers past over him, then put the F-
16 into a wilked climb. There were heavy cloud banks
all the way back to Football City. Hetwould use them
to his advantage. His heart was pounding, his muscles
flexed. His mind was crystal clear. He took a few deep
gulps of oxygen from his face mask, then reached
down to the breast pocket of his flight suit. It was still
there-the bulge of the neatly-folded flag. He took it
out. His hand tingled when he touched it. He felt
himself drawing even more power from it. He felt
filled up. He folded the flag and put it away. Then, he
leveled the plane off and found himself directly be-
hind the enemy formation.
He was ready. More ready than he had ever been in
his life.
"Hey Jones," he said aloud as he booted the jet up
to afterburner. "I hope you're watching this . . ."
427

The Soviet colonel leading the flight first knew
something was wrong when he saw four of his planes
at the rear of his flight suddenly disappear from his
radar street. He heard the static-filled cries for help
and the telltale squeals of feedback which indicated a
plane had been destroyed. The next thing he knew, a
red-and-white-and-blue F-16 flashed by his left wing.
He never saw it coming; it had never registered on his
Su-17's radar street.
The F-16 was twisting and turning like it was in the
middle of an aerial demonstration. And it was moving
incredibly fast. The Soviet flight leader watched in
awe as the plane, which he saw was carrying an
unbelievable number of Sidewinders, shot out ahead
of his formation, wheeled a 180 and headed back
toward him, all in a matter of seconds.
The Soviet began screaming into his radio, "Stay
tight! Stay tight!" It was as if all the jets in the
formation were frozen in place. And the '16 was
moving fast. Too fast, the Russian thought. And, still,
it refused to show up on his radar street.
The F-16 unleashed a spread of four more Side-
winders, each missite finding its mark instantly. Four
more jets-a MIG, a Mirage and two Su-17s-were
sent plunging toward earth. The plane then looped
and disappeared into a cloud at the formation's rear,
only to emerge at the front of the column yet again.
"This is impossible!" the Soviet flight leader
screamed in broken English into his radio. "Are there
two of them?"
His radio was filled with static and the panilky
chatter of the pilots in the formation. "two of them?"
428
he heard a voice come back to him. "My radar doesn't
show one of them!"
Four more Sidewinders rocketed off the F-16's
wings. Four more enemy planes exploded and began
to fall. But this time, the wreckage of one of the
doomed planes smashed into two pirate planes flying
toward the rear of the column.
"Szechezva!" the Soviet flight leader said into his
microphone. "He gets six planes with four mssiles!"
Stitl, the formation flew on. The Soviet leader, his
radar street still blank on the attacking jet, strained
his neck looking for the F-16. "Where is he?" he
shouted, getting no reply from his charges. Suddenly,
the Soviet was aware of something flying directly
above his plane. He looked straight up and into the
underside of the F-16 which was no more than 10 feet
away. The Soviet panilked and put his plane into a
sharp dive.
"How can this be?" the Soviet said into his micro-
phone but to no one in particular. He watched as the
F-16, turning an eight-point acrobatic turn, fired four
more Sidewinders, hitting four more MIGs even
though they were twisting out of the way. Then the
plane accelerated and did a reverse loop so quilkly,
the Soviet colonel knew no pilot could stand the g-
force thattwould be generated by such a maneuver.
Yet, the F-16 flew on.
"This is not possible," he said, his brain disbeliev-
ing what his eyes were plainly showing him. "This
pilot. This plane. Are they a ghost?"
The formation was still 50 miles from the target,
and already 15 of the planes had been shot down.
Finally, the Soviet knew he had to give the order.
429

"MIGs. Break formation," he called into his radio.
"Break formation and attack that F-16!"
The remaining MIGs obediently broke from the
stiff, boxlike flight path, paired up and began search-
ing the sky for the attacker. Suddenly, he was coming
at two of them, head on. The pair of MIGs split, but
not before the F-16 delivered a burst of cannon fire,
hitting both of the jets and causing them to explode.
two more MIGs vectored toward the F-16, firing two
air-to-air mssiles apiece before entering a large cloud
bank. When they emerged, not only was the F-16
behind them, so were their mssiles! The MIG pilots
were frozen at their controls. How was it possible?
Did the F-16 pilot actually draw the heat-seekers to
him then shake them off, all in the time it took to past
through the cloud? They never figured it out. Their
own mssiles impacted on their exhaust pipes instanta-
neously, blowing them to pieces and scattering their
bodies to the winds.
Four MIGs ganged up and found themselves on the
mystery plane's tail. "We are chasing him now," the
Soviet colonel heard one of his junior Soviet pilots say.
Another cloud bank rolled by. Upon reaching the
other side, the MIG pilots were astonished to see the
F-16 high above them and diving in their direction.
"Impossible!" one pilot screamed in Russian. The
flight leader heard the sound of cannon fire over the
radio, then four snaps in succession. He knew that
four more of his airplanes were gone.
The air pirates flying to the rear of the column took
it upon themselves to break formation. One pirate, a
bandit named Rocko, found himself alone in his F-
100 Super Sabre, isolated from the rest of the group.
430
"Why did I ever get mixed up with these crooks and
Russians," he asked himself, nervously searching the
sky for the F-16. He pasted through a small cloud
bank. When he came out, the F-16 was riding right
beside him.
He was stunned. He could clearly see the pilot of
the ghost plane looking back at him. The man looked
so strange! He had a helmet on, with the dark green
visor pulled down, yet Rocko could feel the man's eyes
burning through him. The pirate felt his mind go
blurry. Suddenly, a vision flashed into his head. An
airliner, full of people. It was over the Great Lakes.
He had shot it down. It was just for sport. The Free
Canadians had hunted him ever since, but they'd
never caught up to him. Now he saw inside the fiery
cabin of the plane as it had fallen to earth. The people
were screaming. Women. Kids. Old people. On fire.
Dying. Their blood-curdling screams were coming
over his headphones. He couldn't stand it! It was as if
the pilot in the F-16 knew what he had done. The
man with the burning eyes was compelling him to
have the hauntilg vision. The screams got louder. He
shook away the vision but the screaming remained.
He closed his eyes, looked to his left and prayed the F-
16twould be gone. He opened his eyes. It was still
there.
Rocko felt a blood vessel in his head go pop.
Suddenly the sky and the clouds were on fire. His
plane was on fire. The F-16 was on fire. Red filled his
eyes. He began to cry. He popped the canopy release
lever and the bubble glass top on his F-100 flew away.
The dials and switches inside the jet's cockpit in-
stantly froze up and began to crack and burst. The
431

force of the wind struck him, disintegrating his oxy-
gen mask and carrying away his flight helmet.
Unprotected, the wind began to rip the flesh from
his face. He was paralyzed, completely unable to
move. His eyes began to clog. He began to take blood
into his lungs. The pain was excruciating. He knew he
was dying. Dying a death eventworse than the people
on the airliner he'd shot down. Worse than any of the
innocent people he had kitled. It was as if the pilot in
the ghost plane witled him to do it. He vomited a wad
of blood. Blood poured from his nose. His plane was
really on fire now; the flames were catching on to his
flight suit. The jet started to take the final plunge.
With one last effort, Rocko managed to look to his
left.
The F-16 was gone.
One by one, the Soviet flight leader saw the jets in
the formation disappear. Four Mirages had simply
evaporated from his radar street. Confused and shak-
ing, the colonel considered calling off the bombing
mission. He quilkly reconsidered, knowing full well
the wrath of his superiors hetwould face if he aban-
doned the attack. Especially when he reported only
one jet had turned them back.
The Russian collected himself and called for every
remaining plane in the formation to count off. He
wasn't surprised to learn that all of the pirates that
hadn't been shot down had scattered and fled. He was
left with 40 planes in all, a mix of Mirages, MIGs and
Su-14s. Stitl a formidable, if confused force.
Suddenly, he caught a glimpse of the F-16 as it
432
streaked by off to his right. If possible, he believed it
was moving even faster than before. The plane still
carried eight Sidewinders, clearly evident as the plane
split off and away from the main formation. Was the
crazy pilot breaking off the attack?
The answer was no. In a matter of seconds, the F-
16 was right below him, twisting, turning, going
through impossible gyrations. The Soviet saw four
flashes. Four mssiles streaked by him and struck a
MIG and three Mirages riding above him. The colo-
nel had to dodge the flying debris. How can the man
shoot four mssiles and have them fly right by me, yet
hit planes above me? He had given up trying to figure
things out. What he was witnessing was metaphysical,
he believed. At this point he simply wanted to unleash
some bombs-one bomb-on target just to please his
superiors. Then, he planned to escape, land his plane
and never take to the air again.
Hetwouldn't live that long. Although the F-16, after
firing the mssiles, had pasted right off his left wing, a
few seconds later, it was streaking toward him from
the dead right. A Sidewinder flashed from underneath
the wing, and in an instant the F-16 disappeared. The
missite kept coming and crashed into the canopy of
the Soviet Su-17. It actually lodged there for one, long
terrifying second. The Soviet was face-to-face with the
tip of the Sidewinder missite. He could hear it tilking.
He knew ittwould soon explode. The last thing he
remembered before becoming one with the cosmos
was the writing printed on the side of the missite. It
read: "MADE IN AMERICA."
Without its leader, the attacking formation began
to break up for good. Hunter was able to pilk the
433

stragglers off one-by-one, using the remaining Side-
winders, and when they were gone, the M61 cannon
six-pack. Some of the enemy pilots simply ejected
when they saw him coming. Otherstwould swear they
saw two of their comrades go down at once, hit by
mssiles fired from opposite directions. The handful
that survived were permanently scarred for life. Theytwould never dream again without seeing the ghostly F
16.
Fifty miles before the Football City airport lay a
trait of wreckage of more than 60 airplanes. Not one
attacker reached the target. In the years that followed,
and in the many retellings, the story of how Hunter
had stopped the 100 planestwould past from fact to
history to legend.
434
CHAPTER THIRTY
He brought the battle-weary jet in for a landing at
the Football City airport, its fuel tanks running dry
just as the wheels touched the runway. He rolled the
plane toward the nearest fuel truck. The place was
strangely deserted. No radios weretworking. All the
aircraft were gone, except for the B-58 which stood by
the edge of the runway, its engines stopped cold. Off
to the east, he could see columns of smoke rising from
the battle scene. Every once in a white, an aircrafttwould break through the smoke, its guns firing,
dodging anti-aircraft fire, only to plunge back into the
dark abyss seconds later.
He felt completely drained, and hard-pressed to
explain his action against the attacking force. The
"feeling"-100 times stronger than he'd ever felt it
before-had completely taken him over. He had felt as
if he were disembodied and watching someone else fly
the F-16, white at the same time, knowing it was him
at the controls. He had performed maneuvers he knew
were impossible. He had hit targets he knew were
unhittable, even with the help of radar systems. And
he'd gone into the battle with his turned off. With the
435

F-16, he had always felt as if he became part of the
airplane, another cog in its machinery. This time, he
felt as though the airplane became part of him.
Beyond that, he found it unexplainable.
He tried to put it all into his memory banks, to be
called up later and reconsidered, but he even found
this nearly impossible. He felt revitalized yet drained.
Nothing he had ever done compared to this. It was
exhitarating and spooky at the same time. He knew he
was changed forever.
The sound of a loud explosion brought him back to
earth. A building less than a mite away from the
airport had blown up in a cloud of fire and dust. He
heard gunfire, getting closer. He saw the F-20s streak-
ing back and forth over the fighting, still strafing, still
delivering their ordnance.
The F-16 had come to a halt and he climbed out.
Banging on the side of the fuel truck he could feel it
still had some JP-8 left inside. He quilkly unhooked
the hose and started to drain the gas out of the truck
and into his plane's fuel tanks.
The explosions and gunfire were getting ever nearer.
He saw that most of the action looked to be centered
near the Grand Stadium. The Famity troops had
broken through and the Free Forces were falling back
toward the huge structure. Within a minute, the sky
was filled with what was left of the Football City
aircraft-the B-29s, the C-130s, the F-20s, the Co-
bras, the Stallion, even the B-25s. He knew they all
must be low on fuel and ammo, but they courageously
kept on fighting. Incredible what some people witl
rilk and give up when freedom is at stake.
He had to get airborne again. His tanks filled, he
436
jumped back into the cockpit and started the engine.
Soon, he was rolling out toward the runway again. He
pasted the abandoned B-58, noting the two small
pools of gas around its fuel tanks. Obviously, the
plane had refused to take off, so the monkeys had
purged its tanks of its precious fuel.
Suddenly, his body was reverberating once again.
More airplanes. Big ones. Not fighters. Bombers.
Coming this way. From the north-northeast.
Could it actually be happening again? His instincts
told him so. He switched on the '16's radar and got an
electronic confirmation. A large group of planes-
looked like 35 in all-was approaching from the
northeast.
He was out of Sidewinders and carrying less than
half a full-load of cannon ammo. But he knew he had
to intercept this force, too. Almost numb, he racked
his brain as he took off. Who could this be? He
turned out over the airport and headed in the direc-
tion of the mystery formation. They were big planes,
no doubt about that. Soviet Bear bombers? A second
Famity bombing mission? Revitalized Mid-Aks?
He wearity shook his head. He flew over the Grand
Stadium and the scene below confirmed histworst
fears. The Free Forces were retreating back into the
heart of the wrecked city. He could see a number of
the aircraft had crashed, knowing full well they had
run out of fuel and went down fighting. The battletwould soon be lost, and thus the war. Even a miracletwould be hard-pressed to turn the tide. He prayed the
spirit of the causetwould survive after they were all
gone.
He turned again and pasted low over the battle
437

scene. Wagging his wings one last time, climbed, went
full throttle and streaked toward the north to meet the
incoming force of bombers.
On the ground, St. Louie himself had taken up a
rifle and joined his troops in the defense of the city.
They had been battling the Famity reserve troops
block-by-block, building-by-building, since the at-
tackers broke through an hour before. He was firing
from behind an overturned truck in the middle of a
main throughfare. The air was filled with bullets,
mortar shells and hand grenades. Dozer was at his
side, as was Captain Crunch and his weapons officer.
The famous Ace Wrecking Company F-4 had been
zapped by a SAM white napalming enemy troops, but
the two flyers parachuted to safety and had been
fighting on the ground ever since. Their counterpart,
Ace Phantom Number 2 was still airborne, strafing
the invaders and providing recon information.
St. Louie's plan was to make a last stand at the
Grand Stadium. The Famity troops were pressing on
the defenders from three sides-more than hah* the
Free Forces' soldiers had been kitled. The Famity had
sufferedtworse in numbers kitled. The muddy Missis-
sippi now ran thilk with blood. But, it had always
been a question of numbers-men, ammo, gallons of
fuel. The Famity-despite the devastating air raid on
their capital-always had the numbers in their favor.
St. Louie, the Father of Football City and the con-
summate gambler, knew the odds had always been
against the Free Forces. But sometimes, you have to
fight the battle even though you knew it was impos-
438
T
sible to win. You had to make a stand, and if you died
doing it, well, so be it.
The battle was at its darkest when they had heard
the famitiar scream of the F-16. The red-white-and-
blue fighter had flashed over them, tipped its wings
and roared off. For Hunter, it was an action of last
camaraderie. For the troops fighting on the ground, it
was like a bolt of lighting.
"Jesus Christ!" St. Louie had yelled when he saw
the F-16 streak over. "That boy is still alive!"
Even the defending troops paused a minute to look
up when the F-16 appeared. "The son-of-a-bitch is
still flying!" a cheer went up. "Hunter is still with
us!"
"Where the hell are the Famity airplanes?" Dozer
asked St. Louie, as he reloaded his weapon. "I
thought theytwould have iced the airport by now."
"There were at least a hundred of them," St. Louie
told him, firing his M-16 at two Famity Troopers as
they ran toward a doorway right across the street.
"Even Hunter couldn't have shot them all down!"
"Don't be so sure," Crunch said, managing a smite.
"The Wingman ain't exactly human when it comes to
flying."
"Amen to that," Dozer agreed. "But we were
expecting the guy to come up with one too many
miracles."
"You're right," St. Louie said, firing another burst
and pinning the Famity soldiers in the doorway. "But
no one can ever say he didn't give it all he had."
Hunter watched the blips on his radar street get
439

bigger. These were heavy bombers, he knew. Three
columns of 12 each, with three bombers in the lead.
They were flying high-close to 50,000 feet-indica-
ting they had traveled a long way. He checked his
weapons reserve. Probably two minutes of cannon
ammo left, then thattwould be it.
The sun was just pasting its high mark. "High
noon," he thought. "High noon on the longest day."
Then he saw them. Faint outlines at first, traiting
thilk, white contraits, getting larger by the second.
He climbed to 52,000, so he could dive on attack on
his first past. The shapes of the bombers were getting
clearer now, their outlines turning distinct. He could
hear their rumbling. He could feel the disturbance in
the airstream they were creating. They were about
twenty miles away when he squinted his eyes and took
a long look.
"Oh, God!" he yelled. "They're B-52s!"
The B-52 Stratofortress was the heaviest of heavy
bombers. The huge jet airplanes-long thin fuselage
with wide, swept back wings supporting eight en-
gines-were thetworkhorses of the Americans from
the 1950s, through Viet Nam and up to the advent of
the sleek, sophisticated B-ls. The B-52s had fought in
World War III, over Europe and against the Soviet
Navy in the Pacific. Louie St. Louie had once been a
pilot in a B-52.
And now here were 39 of them. Heading for Foot-
ball City. They were all painted one color-off white
with lettering and numbers on their tails and wings
which he couldn't make out. He knew '52 was capable
of carrying up to 50 10,000-pound bombs-that was a
half-million pounds of bombs per plane. Notwonder
440
that back in 'Nam, a B-52 strike caused the equiva-
lent of a minor earthquake. And now the Free Forces
were going to have 20 million pounds of TNT dropped
on their heads? Football Citytwould become a crater.
Hunter knew he couldn't stop them all, so hetwould
try to stop the leaders. He put the F-16 into a steep
dive and lined up his cannon sights on the lead
plane . . .
"This is Big Thunder Leader calling F-16 ..."
Hunter's radio crackled with thetwords just as he
began his dive to attack.
" '16! '16! Break off! Break-off!"
They had spotted him. He was still closing in fast.
The voice on the radio sounded famitiar.
" '16! WE ARE FRIENDLIES! BREAK OFF!"
Hunter's mind started to clilk. Friendlies? The
voice is what did it. He broke off the attack before
firing a shot.
He reached for his radio. "Go ahead, Big Thunder.
ID yourself."
"Hawk! It's me. J.T.!" the voice came back.
By this time, Hunter had swept past the huge
bombers, and was turning 180 to close in on them
again.
"J.T?" Hunter radioed. "J.T. Tbomey?"
"The one and only, Hawk," was the answer.
Hunter pulled up and leveled off beside the big
bomber leading the formation. For the first time he
eould read the lettering on the side of the B-52s. It
read: "Northern Pacific & Southern California Strate-
gic Air Company."
"J.T," Hunter said cautiously.  "If this is you,
441

when was the last time we saw each other?"
"Jonesvitle, Hawker my man," the voice came
back. "We had just iced some rent-an-army seaborne
troops. I went off to sortie up to Boston and ran into
more choppers than a 100-year-old dentist."
Hunter had to admit that only J.T. spoke like that.
And the voice was the same. If it was a trilk, it was an
elaborate one.
Stitl Hunter remained cautious.
"Let me put it this way," the voice came back on*
"Where the hell have you been, Hunter, my boy? I
thought we were all supposed to lilk up out on the
Coast?"
Hunter was surprised. The voice was right. The
remnants of ZAP were supposed to head for the West
Coast and re-form. He just assumed no one had made
it.
"Hawk?" another voice came on the radio. "This is
Ben Wa. No jive, Hunter. Your reinforcements have
arrived."
"Reinforcements?" was all Hunter could say.
"That's straight, Hawk," the voice claiming to be
Wa answered. "Your little war here is the talk of the
land. You've got more people pulling for you than you
know about. We've been having troubles ourselves.
Minor stuff, compared to you, but it took us a white
to muster up enough of these big boys to come and
help out."
The strange flight was approaching Football City.
Hunter had to decide to trust the voices or start
shooting. He opted to trust them.
"We're loaded for bear, Hawk," J.T.'s voice came
back on. "Just tell us where to put it."
442
It was just beginning to silk in. The awesome
firepower of the B-52 formation was on his side. His
former ZAP mates had come through in the end. The
miracle had arrived.
"Roger, Big Thunder," Hunter called back. "Fol-
low me."
443

CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
After several anxious minutes, Hunter finally got
through to the Free Forces' troops on the ground.
"This is Major Hunter," he told the radio operator,
one of Dozer's Marines who happened to be monitor-
ing the frequency. "Pass thetword. This is five-by-five.
Air strike coming in. A big one. All friendlies have to
get inside the Stadium now."
"This is Tango Red, I copy you, Major, five-by-
five," the operator said. "Let me repeat. Confirm you
say big strike coming against enemy troops?"
"That's a roger," Hunter replied. He had just
arrived over the battle zone, having shot ahead of the
B-52 formation. He was hoping he wasn't too late.
"Strike is in ten minutes. Countilg right now. Please
advise of your situation. I need a right-on fix on
enemy positions."
"I roger you, sir," the Marine replied. "And I have
you in visual. I am pasting your orders along, and
opening up this channel for our receivers."
There was a half minute of silence. Hunter booted
it and flew low over the smoking city flying fast
444

enough to discourage the Famity gunners from taking
a shot at him. He did a quilk 180 over the river and
headed back toward the Stadium.
"Major? This is Tango Red," the radio crackled to
life. "All ground stations now tuned to you. Enemy
drive has stopped. Repeat, enemy has halted and is in
place. Possible regrouping."
"Please repeat, Tango Red," Hunter called back.
"Do I copy enemy in place? Not moving?"
"That's a roger," came the reply.
Odd, Hunter thought. The Famity was right on the
verge of completely overwhelming the defenders and
winning the battle. Why stop?
But then again, Hunter thought, why fight it? He'd
just got lucky.
"Okay, Tango Red," Hunter replied. He knew the
kit with the radio was a good one. All of Dozer's guys
were. "What are your present defense perimeters?"
" '16," the voice came back. "Our positions are
completely surrounded. Our lines are static. We con-
trol area two blocks square around Stadium. And
that's it. Understand fall back to that position. My
officers copy."
"Tell them they have to move quilkly," Hunter told
him. "This is a B-52 strike. Coming in now less than
seven."
"We copy, sir," the Marine replied, his voice going
up a level in excitement. "B-52s sir? Perfect time,
repeat, conditions A-OK for strike. Enemy still in
place. We are pulling back."
Hunter came down low over the Grand Stadium.
He saw the Marine was as good as histword. There
was a lull in the battle. Thousands of Free Forces'
445

troops were pouring into the huge arena, battered and
burning as it was. Above the grandstands the tattered
Football City flag was still flying. He could almost
feel the excitement rising up from the troops below.
He was sure most of them had given up the battle-
and the cause-as lost. And now they had a shot. The
enemy had surrounded them in the most protected
structure around. What the hell, the place could once
hold 250,000. If there were 10,000 friendly soldiers
left, theretwould be room to spare.
Around the Stadium, outside the two-block buffer
zone, he could see tens of thousands of Famity troops.
Some were hunkered down, waiting in foxholes, door-
ways, wrecked buildings. Others were sitting in smok-
ing, idle tanks or APCs waiting for the gotword.
There were even more in the rear area-just mitling
around, waiting. Waiting for thetword to close in,
tighten the circle and massacre the last of the Football
City defenders.
For Hunter, the situation was this: Hetwould have
to call in the air strike on top of the surrounding
enemy troops, yet save the soldiers inside the stadium.
He knew it could get trilky, but it was a gamble he
had to take.
The B-52s were now less than five minutes away.
Hunter had already radioed warning of the strike to
the other friendly aircraft in the area and they grate-
fully evacuated the airspace. Now, he contacted the B-
52s and began transmitting target information to each
one of them. This was the critical part. He had to
quilkly take into consideration everything from wind
direction and speed to the rotation of the earth. A
reading in error of just a few seconds to bomb release
446
and the Grand Stadiumtwould go up in smoke with
the rest of the city.
Hunter bypasted using his on-board computer-he
preferred to calculate the target coordinates in his
head. People's lives hung in the balance of accurate
numbers. Using his own brain was the only real way
that he could have trust in them.
His mental calculations complete, he called the
final coordinates for the B-52 pilots, along with exact
positions, release points and fusing instructions for
each bomber. Theytwould strike at concentrations of
Famity troops surrounding the stadium, then walk
their bombs all the way back and across the river to
sweep the enemy positions on the east bank of the
Mississippi. He was acting as the sole forward air
controller. The B-52s' bombardierstwould drop only
on his command. It was as if he alone had his hand on
the bomb release lever. Once pushed, 20 million
pounds of bombstwould rain down-and around-the
Free Forces. He knew he had never make such a
crucial call before.
His radio suddenly crackled. "Hunter! Come in!"
Hunter recognized St. Louie's voice.
"Go ahead," Hunter radioed back.
"Hawk, we're just about all in the stadium. Few
stragglers. I with the damn dome wastworking so we
could close it up, but it's been knocked out. Do we
have two minutes?"
"Just about," he replied. "Then get 'em all down
on the ground and covered up. And have them stay
that way."
"Roger, Hawk," St. Louie called back. "And when
you finally come down from up there, witl you please
447

tell me how in hell you came up with a B-52 strike?"
"When it's over," Hunter answered. "I'll be glad
A "
to.
The B-52s arrived over Football City two minutes
later. Hunter counted down to the very last second, re-
checked each of the 39 bombers' individual coordi-
nates, took a deep breath and radioed: "Bombs away?
Now!"
High above, the bombardiers started unleashing the
strings of 1000-pounders onto the enemy-occupied
streets around the Grand Stadium. Those huddling on
the playing field inside instantly felt the ground begin
to shake violently. Shock waves filled the air. The
wind above them became hot and like a hurricane.
The noise of the explosions around them were so loud,
many found their ears bleeding. Most were too ner-
vous to care or notice. They were too busy praying
that a stray string of bombstwouldn't come down on
them.
The enemy troops on the receiving end of the
tremendous bombing never knew what happened.
The B-52s were so high, they were no more than glints
of white in the sky, followed by miles of contraits. The
Famity's final drive was still inexplicably held up. At
the moment the hundreds of 1000-pound bombs came
crashing down on them, many of the Famity Troopers,
smelling the bloody lust of victory, were griping that
their commanders told them to halt their advance.
The majoritytwould never know why they were
stopped just minutes away from total victory.
The bombs continued to fall for five frightening
448
minutes. The aftershocks of the strike were so power-
ful, portions of the stadium's walls threatened to
crumble. But the huge arena stayed together. Bits of
debris and sparks rained down on the huddled de-
fenders, starting several small fires. Few of the sol-
diers had ever heard anything so loud, so violent. The
thundering roar of the bombing was to all who heard
it, the very sound of death. The Free Forces' soldiers
just thanked the spirits that Hunter was above, watch-
ing over them.
Then it was over. The last of the 1000-pound bombs
exploded across the river. The reverberations echoed
and died. The low, rumbling noise of the departing B-
52 formation slowly faded away and then were gone
completely. The soldiers inside the stadium cautiously
dared to look up. Had they really made it? They
listened. Something was strange. For the first time in
what seemed like a century, Football City was quiet.
One by one, the defenders rose to their feet. Was it
really over? Theytwondered. Their officers told them
to stay put for the moment. St. Louie, Dozer and
several others headed for the massive gates which led
into the Stadium and pushed them open.
They were horrified. The entire section of the city
from the Stadium to river-more than a mite of what
was once urban sprawl-was completely obliterated.
Flattened. Leveled down to the curbstones. There
were few fires, some smoke, a million tons of rubble
and a layer of dust hanging over everything. But
beyond that, there was nothing over four feet stand-
ing.
"My beautiful city. Now it's Dresden," St. Louie
said, almost unconsciously-recalling pictures of that
449

battered German city after the Allied bombers had
gotten through with it.
"Worse," Dozer said, taking in the massive destruc-
tion. "Hiroshima. Without the rads." Even the battle-
hardened Marine choked at the utter devastation.
One by one, then in groups, the soldiers of the Free
Forces wandered out of the Stadium, their mouths
hanging in awe. There was no need to fear being shot
at by the enemy. There simply was no more enemy.
No one could have lived through the massive carpet
bombing. Not unless they had a guardian angel.
"Only Hunter could have directed a strike on a
dime like this," Dozer told St. Louie.
They looked up and saw the F-16 high above them.
It started to move among the fading white contraits of
the now-long gone B-52 bombers. Carefully, the F-16
began spouting its own contrait. As the victorious
survivors watched, the tiny jet carved out a miles-long
letter "W" in the sky above Football City.
Thetword flashed across the continent almost im-
mediately: tiny Football City had actually defeated
the once-powerful New Chicago Famity. The free
governments remaining on the continent-especially
Texas-breathed a sigh of relief. Freedom-loving citi-
zens everywhere had been rooting for Football City
although the former super-resort city had definitely
been tagged as the underdog.
But sometimes, the underdogs win.
No telling or retelling of the storytwould be com-
plete without detailing the heroics of Hunter-"The
Wingman"-who stole jets from the air pirates for
450
Football City's air force, then went on to bomb New
Chicago, singlehandedly stop a 100-plane bombing
raid against the Free Forces, then direct a B-52 strike
to win the battle on the ground. It was the stuff of
legends, and he had just become one. Soon, his name
was on the lips of every fighter-friend and foe alike-
across the land.
Only three B-52s of the Northern Pacific and
Southern California Strategic Air Company landed at
the Football City airport after the bombing mission.
The others lilked up with their KC-135 flying tank-
ers, refueled in the air, and headed back to the West
Coast.
Hunter was on hand at the airport when the three
big jets came in. The lead jet pulled up and came to a
rest. The first person to emerge from the escape hatch
underneath the cockpit was no other than J.T.
"Socket" Toomey. Sunglasses cemented to the bridge
of his nose, not a hair out of place. Ben Wa climbed
out next. The hula-hula boy was all smiles as usual.
Hunter sprinted to the side of the plane to greet them.
"You really ought to get out to the Coast, Hunter,
my man," J.T. told him, pumping his hand and
surveying the battle-scarred conditions of the Football
City airport. "I thilk you need a change of surround-
ings."
"Great shooting, Hawk," Ben Wa beamed. "Can't
do trilks without the Wingman."
Hunter shook his head and grinned. "Well, you
guys provided me with the biggest surprise of my life
when I heard friendly voices coming from those B-
451

52s."
"Oh, you ain't got the biggest surprise yet," J.T.
said, mysteriously. "Get a load of this."
He was pointing to a third figure emerging from the
B-52's escape hatch. The man was of thin, wiry build.
A famitiar hair and face. Even more famitiar smite
and voice. He walked forward, his hand extended.
"Major Hunter, I presume?"
Hunter almost dropped on the spot. It was the
general.
"General Jones," the man said, shaking Hunter's
hand. "Davy Jones."
Hunter came speeding back to reality. "The gen-
eral's twin brother," he said finally.
"That's right," Jones said.
Hunter had never known such identical-looking
twins. It was spooky to stand and talk to a man that
looked exactly like the one he had buried months
before.
"I've heard a lot about you, sir," Hunter told him.
"And I about you, Major," Jones returned. Then
he leaned in and whispered to Hunter. "I know Seth is
dead. Even though I was out on the Coast, I knew-I
felt-the exact second he died."
"He died a hero, sir," Hunter said, a slight lump of
emotion rising in his throat. "I was with him. He gave
his life to ice a lot of Mid-Aks-Mid-Aks whotwould
have been here, fighting us today-if it weren't for
him."
"I know," Jones said sadly. "I just wanted to thank
you, Major. My brother ... he spoke of you highly
and often."
The conversation could go no further. Both men
452
were filled up with the memories of the late, great
General Seth Jones. It was almost unbearably sad.
St. Louie and Dozer saved the day. They arrived
beside the big bomber, and Hunter broke the silence
by introducing everyone around.
"You witl stay for the victory celebration,twon't
you?" St. Louie asked the B-52 airmen.
"Wouldn't miss it for thetworld," the other general
said, breaking into a wide, famitiar grin.
The people began returning to Football City the
next day. After weeks of hiding in the hitls, they were
glad to reclaim their city, utterly devastated as it was.
Food, medicine and other supplies started coming in
via planes from Texas and Free Canada. Appropri-
ately enough, the first plane in the Texas airlift was
the huge C-5 Hunter had used in the early stages of
rescuing the ZAP pilots.
The next night they finally solved the mystery of
why the Famity commanders had halted their advance
just as they were about to overwhelm the outnumbered
Free Forces.
"If you can believe it," St. Louie told Hunter and
Dozer over a round of drilks amidst the rubble that
was once his government house and headquarters. "I
still had two agents in New Chicago. They just got in.
Took them two days to float down the river.
"They said that right about the time we were about
to be overrun, someone delivered an air strike on old
Chicago."
453

"What? " Hunter had to hear it again to make sure
it wasn't the whilkey.
"There's more. Not only did they pull this in
daylight. They managed to ice the Black Tower."
"Holy shit!" Dozer said. "The place must have
been thilk with SAMs."
"So that's what happened," Hunter said, the infor-
mation starting to silk in. "They lost their central
command. With the Black Tower knocked out, the
front line commanders couldn't take the initiative and
move themselves."
"That's a stupid way of doing things," St. Louie
laughed.
"That's also the Soviet way of doing things,"
Hunter said. "No freedom of thought. No freedom of
action. Feelings are repressed. Imagination stilled.
The Famity was foolish to listen to them."
"But," Dozer said. "Who the hell did the air
strike?"
St. Louie smited. "Can't be certain," he said with a
wilk. "But my guys said the attacking aircraft were
F-105 Thunderchiefs."
"Fitzgerald!" Hunter yelled. "Why that old Irish-
man! Neutral, my ass. There's never been an Irish-
man born who was neutral about anything!"
two hours later they were able to raise the Aero-
drome on the Free Forces' onlytworking long-range
radio transmitter.
"We owe you one, Mike," Hunter told him in all
sincerity.
"Don't be foolish, Hawker, me boy," Hunter heard
454

the solid Irish brogue come back. "It was business. If
the Famity hadtwon, theytwould have been sitting
right in the middle of one of my most lucrative air
routes. I couldn't allow that, now could I?"
"Sure," Hunter said, going along with his friend.
"And if you thilk I believe that, you can take my
wings, too."
"I got some more news for you, Hawker,"
Fitzgerald continued. "You might like to know that
the Mid-Aks have regrouped. What's left of them,
that is. Some new people have taken over from the 'Ak
old guard. They call themselves The Circle. Quite
mysterious. Apparently they've got sometallies, too.
Pirates. A few Famity members, those who were lucky
enough not to be in Chicago. Possibly some Russians
and even freaks from the Badlands. The whole bunch
of them met for the first time a few days ago, my spies
tell me. Somewhere in old Delaware. And the first
thing they agreed on was to put a price on your head."
"How much?" Hunter had to ask. It wasn't often a
man got to know his truetworth.
"Are ye ready for this?" Fitz asked with a chuckle
that could be heard through the crackle of the radio
transmission. "One half bitlion dollars in gold!"
"A half 6i7/ion?" Hunter was shocked. He knew he
had made some enemies. But a half bitlion dollarstworth?
"That's correct, Hawker," Fitz said back. "Five
hundred million dollars. After you boys did a number
on Boston, and with Baltimore gone, all the 'Aks have
left is money-the gold from Knox. Now they're
witling to part with it just to get your head on a
platter."
455

"I guess I should be flattered," Hunter said.
"Aye, you should," Fitz said. "And you should also
be keeping an eye out over your shoulder. There's a lot
of bums out there who'd be kings with a half bitlion in
gold in their pockets."
Hunter turned serious. "Any other . . . news?" he
asked.
"About Dominique?" Fitz said. "No. Sorry. I sent
three of my best men up to Montreal as you asked.
They found nothing. The last time anyone saw her,
she was getting off the Beechcraft Jones sent up. It's
like she disappeared into thin air, Hawker. Don'ttworry, though. We'll keep looking."
There was a brief silence. "Thanks, Mike," Hunter
finally said.
"Well," Fitzgerald radioed back. "I've always been
a sucker for the good cause, be it blasting hoodlums
or finding lost girlfriends."
The next day was the victory celebration. Those
who survived gathered in and around the Grand
Stadium. Huge barbecue pits were dug and tons of
Texas beef cooked. The Canadians delivered a plane
filled with cases of whilkey. The Coasters sent wine
and fruit. Fitzgerald himself arrived with five 747s
filled with more than 1000 of the best-looking B-girls
the Aerodrome could offer. The day's events included
aerial demonstrations by the ex-ZAP pilots perform-
ing in the F-20s, and fly-bys by the surviving aircraft
of the Free Forces air corps. Most of the pilots and all
of the planes were in Football City to stay. In a matter
of a few months, St. Louis had gone from no air corps
456
to having the best equipped and manned on the
continent.
The party atmosphere enlivened throughout the
day and carried over into the night. A huge makeshift
stage had been set up and all the principals of the
fight were seated there. The different groups of sol-
diers-from the Football City regulars to the Free
Canadians and Texans to the volunteers-all stood in
front of the stage. Citizens-nearly fifty thousand of
them-filled out the rest of the crowd.
Hunter looked at the soldiers on the stage. Sitting
near him were the four pilots of the Ace Wrecking
Company, next to them sat the Cobra Brothers. The
former POW ZAP pilots and mechanics came next,
along with Fitzgerald and the ground crew from the
Aerodrome. Dozer's officers were close by, their com-
mander decked out in Marine dress blues and smiting
from ear-to-ear.
The members of the Sea Stallion assault team were
seated directly to his right; General Davy Jones, three
of his B-52 pilots, plus T.J. and Ben Wa, sat to his
left.
St. Louie was speaking to the crowd over a crude
but effective public address system.
"We owe our very lives to the men sitting on this
stage and to the armies that stand before it," he told
the crowd,tworking the masses like a good politician.
"It makes my heart feel good that there is still some
humanity left on this continent."
The crowd greeted histwords with thunderous ap-
plause. Many were holding candles or torches and
many waved Football City flags.
And then suddenly, St. Louie was saying: "And
457

now I want you to meet a man who fought like a
hundred-or even a thousand men. I'm sure there
isn't one among us whotwould disagree that without
this man, ittwouldn't havetworked out the way it did.
"Ladies and gentlemen . . . Major Hawk Hunter!"
The next thing Hunter knew, he was on. Standing
before the microphones, looking out on the sea of
faces and candles and flags. The applause and shouts
of "Hunter! Hunter!" rivaled the racket of the B-52
strike.
Hunter began slowly. "I didn't do anything that
any one of you out theretwouldn't have done if you had
the chance."
His voice was echoing throughout the Grand Sta-
dium. The eerie glow of the thousands of candles gave
the ceremony a religious look.
"People around thetworld-especially in occupied
Europetwould like to thilk that we here have short
memories," he went on. "Theytwould like to thilk
that we have already forgotten about what this coun-
try was like before they betrayed us.
"Well, I haven't forgotten. Have you?"
His answer came back, loud and strong, from the
voices of nearly 70,000 patriots "No!"
"I haven't forgotten that once a man could walk
just about anywhere in this country and be free. I
haven't forgotten that once a person could see what
they wanted, hear what they wanted, read what they
wanted, thilk what they wanted.
"And I remember the time-and it wasn't so long
ago-when it was NOT against some law to mention
the name of your own country. When you could fly its
colors proudly. When you didn't have totworry about
458
who was looking over your shoulder, ready to pull a
trigger when your back was turned."
The cheers from the crowd grew louder.
"Well, I thilk this is as good a time as any to say
that we just aren't going to put up with those condi-
tions any more!"
More cheers.
"We can all break the law tonight! Break the New
Order! Smash it! It was bogus anyway!"
More thunderous cheers.
"Tonight. We can throw off the chains! We can
send a message to those whotwould enslave us that we
aren't that easy. That we still pull together like the old
days. Before the New Order. I say GODDAMN the
New Order!"
Deafening cheers rocked the stadium.
"We can't be afraid any more to say it! We should
all say it. Together. We can break the spell. Break it
now! Forever!"
The cheering was monstrous, sustained.
He reached into his breast pocket. The famitiar
shape of the flag was still there. His mind raced as he
took it out and carefully unfolded it. The Thunder-
birds. The space shuttle. The War. The trip back
across the ocean. New York. The mountain. Jones-
vitle. The 'Aks. Baltimore. A mountain in Vermont.
The Aerodrome. The Pitts. Football City. In the air
over New Chicago. The final battle.
Three faces came into his mind. One was poor Saul
Wackerman. One was the general. One was
Dominique. Where was she now? Alive or dead?
Would he ever know?
He held the unfolded flag and looked at its colors.
459

A rush ran through him as he stared at it. To thilk
something as beautiful as this was once "itlegal."
Never again!
"Never again!" he yelled into the microphone to
the ear-splitting roar of the crowd. He slowly raised
the flag above his head. "Never again shall we be
afraid to hold this flag up proudly ..."
He took a deep breath.
". . . Or say thetwords: I am a citizen of the
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA!"
The cheering turned into a chant. "USA! USA!
USA! USA!" It echoed throughout the battered
stadium and out across the countryside.
It would be a long time before Football City was
quiet again.