Jim DeFelice - Going Deep

Obviously in shock.

“No shit,” said A-Bomb. “What’s up?”

“The GCI site BJ and I hit this morning is still on the air. Apparently the stinking radar dish I hit didn’t stay hit. There’s a British flier on the ground somewhere near there that they want to rescue first thing in the morning, and the squadron’s been tasked to shack the shit out of the dish and the guns on the southern side.”

“Ouch. Who’s going?”

“Believe it or not, Mongoose wants to.”

“Figures.” A-Bomb pushed the beer away. “And here I thought I’d get some sleep. Oh well — who needs sleep when you can fly?”

“You’re going?”

“Aren’t you?”

“Yeah,” said Doberman. “But I ain’t fucking happy about it.”

“Who’s happy?”

“You’re crowing,” said Doberman. “Like you’re happy.”

“Nah.”

“I’m going because it was my job in the first place,” said Doberman. “I screwed it up; I’ll fix it. You stay home.”

“Tie me to the fucking bed and I’ll bring it along,” said A-Bomb. “No way I’m not going.”

“I screwed it up,” blurted Dixon.

“Relax kid,” said Doberman. “Drink your beer.”

“I blew it. I saw the dish and then I lost it. I thought you took it out.”

“Hey, nobody blew it.” said A-Bomb. “You guys have to learn to deal with reality. Sometimes you miss.”

“You’re giving lessons on reality?” said Doberman.

A-Bomb started to say something, but then just waved his hand. “Let’s get back,” he said instead, standing. “How’d you know we were here, anyway?”

Doberman rolled his eyes, then stuck his finger into Dixon’s chest. “Him, I’m surprised about.”

“Hey, easy on the kid,” said A-Bomb. “BJ’s okay. Hell, he’s coming on the mission, too. Right kid?”

“I, uh — ”

“Look at his face, Dog Man. Kid’s a Hog driver. All we got to do is come up with a new nickname for him.”

“Like?”

“I don’t know. But BJ sounds like he ought to be on Little House on the Prairie , don’t you think?”

Lieutenant Dixon followed along as they threaded out of the club, heart pounding wildly. It had begun as soon as he heard the words, British pilot.

He was being handed a chance to redeem himself. He had to get back in the sky and grab it. Everything he had been wanted to make it right.

But another part of him said no. Another part said stay home. You’ll never make it. You’ll screw up again.

It wasn’t that he was afraid of dying. He was afraid that he’d panic again. He felt his hands trembling as he gripped for the stair rail, climbing back toward the night air.

Rosen found Tinman grumbling as he leaned head-first into the wing of the damaged Hog. In her opinion, his curses had a Celtic-Scandinavian lilt to them, though she was as clueless as anyone about his background.

“Sergeant Clyston asked me to help you out,” she called up.

Tinman grunted something in her general direction.

“What happened to the rest of your crew?”

“Go sleep. Tired.”

“What about you?”

“Work. Work,” he said, adding more unintelligible words.

Rosen surveyed the wing from the bottom. The hole had been squared off and the interior guts replaced — quick work, all things considered.

“Was the wing spar okay?” she asked.

“Checked out, yes,” he answered. “Bones okay. New lines. Check, check. Lots of work.”

I’ll bet, she thought to herself. Lots of work for a lot of people. And it wasn’t like this was the only A-10A that had been damaged — the plane Dixon had flown back was sitting not very far away, the last bullet hole being patched by an airman with a trusty drill set.

“Hey, Tinman, you got any electrical work that needs fixing?” she yelled up. “Otherwise, I’m going to bed.”

“New wink, that’s what we need,” grumbled the mechanic, pulling himself up. “But Chief doesn’t want to hear about it. Have to do this from scratch.”

“You put this aileron in by yourself?” she asked incredulously, looking at the large and obviously new wing section.

“No time to fool around,” he said, hopping down the scaffold. “Chief wants it flying tomorrow.”

“Chief is out of his mind.”

“You tell him.”

Not even Rosen would try that. “If there’s anybody who can fix it by then, it’s you,” she said.

“Thank you. I’m your friend, too,” he said, nodding. “How was Al Jouf?”

“Not bad. I was talking to one of our pilots there. Lieutenant Dixon. He’s actually kind of cute.”

Tinman shook his head, “Bad idea, sergeants and pilots.”

Rosen felt her face blush. “You need help or not?”

Something in the crusty old mechanics eye twinkled. “You help me find patch metal?”

“Patch metal?”

Rosen started to protest, but Tinman blinked mischievously. “Chief said we could have anything we need. Come, you can work acetylene with me.”

“Acetylene? Hold on a minute. Tinman? Where are you going?”

Rosen followed as the skinny old-timer walked briskly, not into the parts area, but back behind the hangar where a damaged C-130 had been stowed two days before, waiting for engine parts.

“Oh, Tinman,” she moaned. “You’re not thinking what I think you’re thinking.”

“Why not? Need new wink.”

“Wing. You mean wing.”

He shook his head up and down, pointing at the big general cargo plane.

“You mean the C-130?” she protested. “That one doesn’t need a new wing.”

“It will,” he said. “Come on. Help me get torch. Then, we need some paint.”

Mongoose nearly fell over when he walked into Cineplex and found it filled not only with all of the squadron’s pilots but a good portion of the NCOs as well.

“There you are, Major,” said Knowlington, standing at the front. He rocked a bit on his legs, smiling bashfully — as if Mongoose had caught him talking about him behind his back. A rough diagram of the GCI site Doberman and Dixon had hit had been sketched on the large easel behind him. “I was just bringing everyone up to speed on Mudaysis.”

Mongoose was so flustered he wasn’t sure what to say. Until now, Knowlington had pretty much left him to run the squadron. He actually felt disoriented, slipping into a seat near the door as the colonel relayed a generalized version of his conversation with Black Hole.

“I’m not going to kid you guys,” concluded Knowlington, “this isn’t an easy mission. It’s long and grueling, as the pilots who undertook it this morning can tell you. Cloud cover is going to be very low, which will make things a hell of a lot more dangerous. We have to hit the site at 0600. The helicopters will be coming through this way, close enough to get into trouble if something goes wrong. There’ll be a Weasel in the area, but the odds are the dish itself will stay off; it’ll be our job to make sure it sleeps permanently. Now, participation will be voluntary… ”

“Hey, I’m leading the flight,” said Mongoose.

Knowlington looked at him, nodding as if he had been going to suggest that.

“A-Bomb and me are going, too,” said Doberman. The pilot was sitting in the back of the room, arms folded and frowning. “And BJ. We’re the volunteers. We missed it and we’re going back to nail the mother fucker.”

He was so emphatic that no one stated the obvious objection — the pilots would have no, or nearly no, sleep before the mission.