Mayday (37 page)

They were under the cloud cover now, and the light was subdued but consistent. He stared through his gun sight. Several times
he almost pushed the button, but the Straton would sway out of his bull’s-eye. He glanced up. He was only a few minutes from
the front of the storm. If the Straton got into the black clouds, his chances of holding a trail formation were zero. “Homeplate!
I have turbulence. Can’t hold it steady!”

Sloan’s voice cracked in his ears like a whip. “Shoot the goddamned missile!”

For an irrational moment Matos thought of ramming the Straton’s high dome. He went as far as to give a slight forward impulse
to his control stick, and the motion carried his fighter closer to its target. Suddenly, he pulled back on the stick and backed
off. What held him back was not a fear of death but something he had seen, with a fighter pilot’s highly developed sense of
peripheral vision, from the corner of his left eye.

As he slid back and above the Straton, he looked down at the airliner’s left wing. The flow of hot exhaust gases from the
Straton’s number-one engine had stopped. Then the number-two engine cut out. Matos looked quickly to the right and saw that
the two starboard engines had also stopped producing power. He jammed his thumb on the transmit button. “Homeplate! Homeplate!
The Straton is flaming out! I say again, the Straton is flaming out!”

Sloan’s response was quick, and his voice was as excited as Matos’s. “Are you positive? Where are you? Can you see it clearly?”

Matos composed himself. “Yes. Yes. I’m right on its tail. No vapor trails. Flame out.” He watched as the Straton began its
slow, powerless descent toward the sea. “It appears that the autopilot is still flying it. Its speed remains at three-forty.
The rate of descent is increasing. It’s dropping. Going down.”

“Stay with it, Matos. Stay with it. I want you to see it hit the water.”

Even the scrambler, thought Matos, could not mask the vengeance in Sloan’s voice. “Roger, Homeplate.” Matos had already begun
his descent to follow the dying airliner. He could see that it was still steady on its 131-degree heading, and its glide would
take them both directly into the thunderstorms. Matos slammed his hand on the dash panel. “Shit!”

“Situation report,” said Sloan tersely.

“Roger. Rate of descent is twenty-one hundred feet per minute. The airspeed has slowed to two-ninety. The wings are level
and steady. It still appears that the autopilot is engaged.” He broke the transmission, then hit the button again. “Homeplate,
there are thunderstorms just ahead. I may lose them shortly.”

“Matos, you son-of-a-bitch, your mission is to keep that fucking aircraft in sight until it crashes. I don’t give a shit if
you have to follow it to hell.”

“Roger.” Matos put James Sloan from his mind and concentrated on following the plunging Straton. The first scattering of oversized
raindrops splattered against his canopy. Within seconds, his visibility had dropped to less than a half mile, then a quarter
mile, then five hundred feet. Matos edged as close to the Straton as he dared, but the increasing turbulence made any tighter
formation suicidal. There was no reason to throw his life away—not anymore.

“Situation report.”

“The Straton is down to forty-eight hundred. Airspeed and descent rates are constant. No power in any engines. They’ll hit
within two minutes.” As he looked up, the huge silver outline of the Straton blended in with the heavy rain and gray clouds,
then the airliner faded from sight.

“Roger. Understand two more minutes. Do you still have visual contact with target?”

“Stand by.” Matos peered into the grayness in front of him. Now that the Straton was no longer visible, he was afraid of colliding
with it. Almost involuntarily, his hand pulled back on the control stick. He considered trying to track it with his radar,
but the calibration would take too long and it would not work well at this close range.
Damn it.
He was becoming frightened. At this distance he knew he wouldn’t see the airliner until it was too late to take evasive action.
He pulled back further on the control stick.

“Matos! Do you have visual contact?”

“Visibility near zero. Heavy rain. Turbulence.” Matos’s eyes darted around to all the places where the Straton might be, but
he saw nothing. Sheets of water ran from his canopy and a bolt of lightning cracked behind him, suffusing his cockpit with
an eerie luminescence.
Fuck this.
The only way he’d find the Straton again was if he rammed into it. His hands were shaking as he pushed on the fighter’s throttles
and pulled back hard on the control stick.

As the fighter began to climb out of the storm, he hit the transmit button. “I have the Straton in sight again,” he lied.
“Straight ahead. Twenty yards. All conditions remain the same.”

“Roger. What is your altitude?”

“Descending through twenty-six hundred feet. Approximately one minute to impact.” As he spoke, Matos glanced at his altimeter.
Seven thousand feet and climbing. He turned his fighter northwest so he would clear the storm as quickly as possible. Even
in a high-performance aircraft like the F-18, the turbulence was jarring. He felt his stomach heave. For a brief instant,
Matos pitied whoever might still be alive on that Straton.

“Report.”

“Down to twelve hundred feet. Turbulence heavy. Clouds less dense here. I can see the ocean now. No chance of a successful
ditching in this kind of heavy sea.” The F-18 broke out into the sunshine at 19,000 feet. Matos continued to climb at full
throttle, as if the altitude would get him far away from the whole situation. Below him nothing was visible except solid,
heavy rain clouds.

“Too heavy a sea for survivors?”

“Roger.” Matos glanced down but could see only the thunderstorms he had just risen out of. He turned to the blue sky ahead.
When the F-18 continued climbing, he thought about James Sloan. Matos had heard a tone of triumph in Sloan’s voice. Not for
the first time, he wondered if the Commander was sane. It occurred to him that even the first navigation error that had started
this nightmare might not have been his own fault. He thanked God that he had not fired his second missile into the Straton.
At the worst, he was guilty of criminal negligence. He could live with that. But he was not guilty of murder.

“I say again—too heavy for survivors?”

“That’s correct, Homeplate. The seas are too heavy for survivors,” Matos transmitted, reinforcing his lie. But he, too, was
relieved. So relieved that tears came to his eyes and he took a deep breath to control his voice. “The Straton is nosing down,”
he added as he kept his eyes fixed to the distant horizon.

“Roger.”

Matos leveled the fighter at 36,000 feet. The storms were far astern and below him, and the warm afternoon sun bathed his
face. He looked down at the weather below him. Rising from the top of the large mass were the distinctive anvil-shaped clouds
that made the cloud layer easily recognizable as thunderstorms. It was, thought Matos, almost as though God made them that
way, in the beginning, so that one day man would recognize that he was approaching the forge and the blast furnace of the
heavens.

“We’re down to four hundred feet,” Matos lied. The thought that he should go to Captain Diehl crossed his mind. He had to
confess, not so much for his own soul but more importantly so that Commander Sloan would be put away where he could do no
more harm. “We are down to two hundred feet. The rain is lighter. Visibility improved. The seas are very high. The Straton
is nearly in. Nearly in. Stand by.” Matos closed his eyes tightly. It was madness. He tried to forget that his playacting
was a duplication of what was happening to that airliner. He could see it in his mind’s eye very clearly now, hitting the
towering water—

“Matos! Matos! Is it in? Is it in?”

Matos took a deep breath. “Yes.” He put a heavy tone in his voice and noticed that it was not all an act. “Yes. It’s in. Much
of it . . . broke apart in the ditching

. . . The seas are too rough . . . Most of it has already sunk . . . Only the tail . . . part of one wing remains above the
surface. No possible survivors.”

“Roger. Circle for a while to be sure.”

“Roger.”

“What is your fuel status?”

Sloan’s question jolted him. He had forgotten to monitor his fuel status for more than an hour. He’d heard stories of pilots
in combat doing that under stress. He didn’t have to look at his gauges to reply, “Critical.” He glanced at the gauges. His
climb to 35,000 feet had been a foolish indulgence. “I’m down to forty-five minutes.”

“Are you sure?”

“Maybe less. Where is that tanker?”

“Close. Heading westbound from Whidbey Island. Their last position was four hundred miles from your current position. He’ll
be closer now. Are you looking for survivors?”

“Yes. But my fuel is
critical.
No survivors.”

“Roger. Okay, okay, begin your climb and steer a heading of zero-seven-five to expedite the intercept.”

“Roger.” Without hesitation, Matos turned his F-18 to the easterly heading. He was now pointed into the worst part of the
thunderstorms, the part that towered high above his present altitude. “Homeplate, there’s a lot of severe weather out here.
The new heading is taking me further into it.” As much as he wanted to find the tanker, he wanted nothing to do with that
line of storms.

“Navy three-four-seven, this is Rear Admiral Hennings. Commander Sloan is on the phone with the tanker. These are your instructions—the
tanker is cruising at thirty-one thousand feet, so you might as well get to that altitude to meet it. The weather should be
better at that altitude than down lower.”

“Yes, sir.” Although Sloan had mentioned the Admiral earlier, Matos had no idea who Admiral Hennings was. But the voice was
reassuring. Any vague misgiving that Matos had concerning Commander Sloan’s intentions was put to rest. He pictured the electronics
room crowded with officers and men, all trying to get him home. He looked out of his windshield. He was already above most
of the weather at 35,000 feet. Now he had to descend slightly to meet the tanker. “The climb has taken—is taking—a great deal
of fuel. I’m really low, sir.”

The Admiral’s voice came back, gentle, fatherly.

“Take it easy, Peter. The tanker is cruising at five hundred knots. He’ll be on station within twenty-five minutes. A few
minutes for the fuel hook–up and you’ll be heading back. Here’s Commander Sloan.”

Sloan’s voice filled Matos’s earphones. “It’s important to stay calm, Peter. Practice fuel-conservation techniques. Keep us
filled in.”

Matos pictured himself flaming out just before he reached the tanker. He was glad that Sloan was so calm. It wasn’t Sloan’s
ass. “Roger. Can you arrange air-sea rescue just in case?”

“Roger that,” said Sloan. “Way ahead of you. Some of the air-and-sea rescue for the Straton is closing in on your area, including
F-18s from the Nimitz. Plenty of help out there, but don’t think about that now. Hightail it to thirty-one thousand and call
me when you’re leveled out.”

“Roger. What’s the frequency of the rendezvous?”

There was a long silence in his earphones. Matos was about to call again when Sloan’s voice came on. “I’m speaking to the
tanker on a frequency that is not available on your set. I just requested that they put one of their radios on your channel.
They have a voice scrambler set to yours, so leave yours on. Give them a call now. Their call sign is Cherokee 22.”

“Roger. Break. Cherokee 22, this is Navy three-four-seven. How do you read me? Over.”

Matos waited in the silent cockpit, then transmitted again. “Cherokee 22, Cherokee 22, Navy three-four-seven, how do you read?”
He waited, but there was no answer. “Homeplate, Cherokee 22 does not respond.”

“I can’t read them on your channel either. Stand by.” After a few seconds, Sloan’s voice came back. “They are having radio
problems on most of their command channels. But I hear them fine on their administrative channel, which is patched into my
interphone. We can work around their problem. I’ll relay messages between you. But they’re homing in on your channel with
a radio navigation homing device and, of course, they’ll have you solidly on radar soon. In the meantime, you have to leave
your radio set to this channel. Their homing equipment and radar will lead them in.”

“Roger.”

“And leave your voice scrambler on, too. Try to call them every five minutes. They’ll be on voice scramble. If they hear you,
they will tell me. Then you can go back to regular communications directly with them.”

“Roger.” Matos slid his transmitter override button to the continuous position. As long as he was transmitting a signal he
knew he could not receive any messages, and hearing any voice, even Sloan’s, would have been reassuring. But the first priority
was the tanker.

Matos turned on his radar. He watched the tube as it glowed luminescent green. He adjusted the knobs and looked for the tanker,
which should have been on the outer edge of his range by now. Not only did he not see the tanker within the 500-mile limit
of his scope, but he saw no other aircraft either. He spoke into his open radio. “Homeplate. Where the hell are all the aircraft
that are supposed to be out here? I don’t see the tanker on a bearing of zero-seven-five, and I don’t see anyone else.” He
released his transmit override and waited for the reply.

Sloan’s voice came back quickly. “Matos, the tanker sees
you.
The rescue aircraft in your area see you. Your radar has been the problem from the beginning when . . . I can’t say anything
of a confidential nature any longer. Other aircraft are on this frequency now, and we have to maintain the security of this
test. Be careful of what you say from now on. Resume your continuous radio signal and keep working your radar. You’ll rendezvous
with the tanker shortly.”

“Roger. I have to release the missile to cut down on weight and drag.”

“Negative. That’s no longer possible Too much airto-sea traffic in your area now. We don’t want another . . . Do you understand?”