Code Name: Infamy (Aviator Book 4) (17 page)

“Exactly.” Hass-man laughed to himself. Stoney tilted the radar further up, but the target disappeared. He should have had to increase the tilt to keep the bogey on the screen as they closed at 300 knots.

“He’s descending! Why is he doing that?”

“Same reason we are, to get a better radar picture. Make a note for INTEL, he has onboard radar.”

“Forty miles, check left two degrees. Bogey is seven to eight thousand.” Hass-man started a slight climb maintaining 300 knots.

“What’s the plan, Skipper?”

“I’m going to pop at one mile, zoom climb, and shoot him in the belly.” Hass-man turned the gun sight to bright. The hunter was being hunted and didn’t even know it.

“Ten miles.”

“What’s his angels?”

“Estimate five thousand now, level.”

“Five miles.” Hass-man charged his four Hispano twenty-millimeter cannons and four M2 Browning .50-caliber machine guns—a devastating punch. He briefed Stoney on the in-close attack.

“Once I pop align the radar with the aircraft data line, I’ll guide with pitch. That’ll put our guns on.”

“Three miles, check left one degree.”

Hass-man toggled on the master arm switch.

“Two miles, closure hot, one hundred plus!” Hass-man waited.

“Pop!” Stoneman screamed into the intercom at one mile. Hass pulled four Gs trying to keep the wings level. Airspeed quickly bled off as they zoom climbed.

“Go ADL, Stoney,” Hass grunted.

“Three thousand feet, left five, pull harder!” Hass-man pulled.

“Pull more!” Stony shouted, trying to get Major Hass to keep the nose on the target. When it faded he knew the nose was low.

“Fifteen hundred. Pull!” Hass-man pulled for all he had, and his radar repeater finally showed a fire queue. He squeezed the trigger. Tracer rounds filled the sky, followed by an orange eruption. Debris banged off of the Black Widow as it departed controlled flight. Now in a full stall, the P-61 plummeted with the burning Zero to the black ocean. Blinded by the explosion, Hass-man simply let go of the controls, knowing the heavy fighter would point down and accelerate. Fumbling around the instrument panel, he finally found the thunderstorm lights and bathed the cockpit in bright white light.

“You got it, Skipper?”

“I got it.” Hass-man leveled the machine at one thousand feet and let it accelerate to 250 knots before starting a climb.

“Okay Stoney, give me a vector back to Irish.”

05:42 1 July, 1945 (20:42 GMT, 30JUN)

Yokohama, Japan

Dawn broke over Yokohama as it always does. As it always will. As if nothing unusual had happened the night before. Atsugi sat on top of two concrete steps that once led to his dojo. All that remained was ash. A car pulled up and stopped; its engine idled smoothly. Atsugi closed his eyes and let the rhythmic rotation pull him away. He imagined the crankshaft spinning at 700 revolutions per minute, eight rods connecting eight pistons. Each piston fed by sequencing valves that closed for compression and the ignition cycle that would drive the piston down on its power stroke. Another revolution sequenced the exhaust valve, and the cycles would continue. The cycles would continue …

“Atsugi?” a soft voice hailed.

He refused to surrender to reality, lost in the hypnotic churning of the engine. He sat motionless, the hair on the left side of his scalp as scorched as the tunic that hung in taters from his torso. A large gash over his eye had already coagulated.

“Take the child from him.”

He felt the weight of the dead child lifted from his lap. His mind remained unchanged, undisturbed, lost in the motor’s orderly sequence that he knew would run forever … until, like his city, the fuel was consumed. Finally, he opened his eyes to see the admiral’s aide gently examining his head wound.

“Can I help you to the staff car, Commander?”

He stood and took back the child, then placed him on the top step. He looked down on the boy for a long time. There was nothing left of his own family to mourn. Backing away slowly, he turned and met the admiral’s gaze.

“Admiral-San, I will lead the attack on the East Coast of America.” His eyes burnt with the fury of the past night.

“Very well. Get in, and we will discuss it at my quarters.”

CHAPTER 21

05:15 Local, 1 July, 1945 (21:15 GMT, 30JUN)

USS Suwannee, Java Sea

Twenty-four Hellcat propellers turned, twenty-four pilots prepared themselves for the coming fight. Behind them were nine Avengers. The air hummed with anticipation as adrenalin surged through every member of every flight crew. The entire wing was ready for the maximum effort. Kid Brennan was number one on the bow, positioned to be first to launch off the deck. He’d have a very short deck run and knew the position was reserved only for the best. He wanted to live, wanted to go home safe and sound to his wife and son, but now, at this point in the operation, he couldn’t think of them. He was locked in on the mission and getting off the deck. It was a zero sum game, pass or fail. Either the engine and propeller built enough end speed for him to fly, or it didn’t. Pass he flew, fail he crashed in the ocean and was run over by the boat.

He had become such a part of his Hellcat that he didn’t even consider the flight control inputs that would be required to transition his crouching Hellcat to flight in such a short distance. A lit wand circled in the pre-dawn darkness in front of his left wing. Kid pressed hard on the foot brakes and ran his power up to thirty-six inches of manifold pressure. The R-2800-10W stabilized, and he checked his engine instruments. Good enough, he thought and saluted.

Returning the salute, the flight deck officer touched the deck and ducked under Kid’s wing as he jammed the throttle to forty-eight inches of pressure and released the brakes. The three fat blades of the Hamilton Standard propeller dug into the humid air. Pressure from the massive propeller compressed the air and caused a cloud of vapor to form on the hub. As the RPM increased to maximum, the condensation trailed down the blades and off the tips swirling around the fuselage as the aircraft rolled forward.

Creeping toward the bow, Kid sensed he would not achieve his required end speed and pushed the throttle past the detent into emergency combat power. Water injected into the cylinders cooling them, while the super charger boosted the pressure to maximum. As he left the Suwannee’s bow, he glanced at his air speed indicator—five slow. He let the nose fall slightly, using twenty of the forty feet of deck height to get the few precious knots he needed to fly. In ground effect, he transitioned to instruments and kept the vertical speed indicator needle on zero.

His blood surged through the Hellcat, and her red hydraulic fluid flowed through his veins. One instrument. Unified. Each firing of a cylinder or vibration registered in his subconscious. He felt the wind over the wing and knew instantly she would fly. He had raised the landing gear handle as the wheels left the deck; now with them up and locked, the Hellcat accelerated rapidly and ascended off the dark ocean surface as the gear doors clunked shut. Pass.

Circling overhead the Suwannee, dark specters slowly gathered on his wings. When he counted eleven, he checked his watch, circled once more, and then turned to begin his NAV route. Pushing the power up to thirty-six inches of manifold pressure, he began a slow climb. At 10,000 feet, he shifted the super charger on the R-2800-10W to high gear and snapped his oxygen mask in place.

Leveling at 25,000 feet, he looked ahead to the dark island of Borneo and then east. Light waves glanced off the atmosphere and reflected off the ocean surface as the day began to wake. In contrast, Borneo reflected nothing, absorbing the light, hording it to heat itself. Its dark outline contrasted with the surrounding water, allowing Kid to easily see the coast. Looking left and right he took an account of his chicks. He was especially concerned with the new guys, the nuggets, so named because of their shiny, new gold ensign bars. He had four in his group, the most junior of which was wobbling on his right wing.

Glancing past his flight as he turned north, Kid took in the dawn, a shocking display of the color spectrum that never ceased to captivate him. Below him, black gave way to gray and then green as the sun broke the horizon, splaying shafts of red across the sky. Red sky in morning, sailors take warning! He pulled down his goggles and prepared for battle.

Kid knew he was not the only predator stalking the skies. He knew his Japanese counterpart was already airborne. Each as deadly as the other. The horizon turned blood red in anticipation of the carnage. Red sky in morning, sailor’s take warning, indeed! He contemplated the irony. And that nature, no mere spectator, conspired against them both. Clear skies would ensure the gladiators clashed. Fire would consume them. Gravity would pull them to their deaths when vanquished. Either the sea or the jungle below would swallow them whole. Where nature was concerned, which side was victorious did not matter. The cosmic order was set, the chaos of war would rein no matter which flag was saluted, and the laws of physics were the only laws that would ultimately prevail.

Kid pushed the power up and accelerated to 250 knots. Detecting movement below and aft, he effortlessly rolled inverted, jammed on full power, and pulled to center stage. Movement metastasized into man and machine as the Hellcats fell upon their prey. A mere six Mitsubishi Zero Sen fighters climbed into the morning. They had gotten off the deck late and now were at a huge disadvantage. Kid slashed through the Zeros with a hundred knots of airspeed advantage. Two Zeros spiraled out of the fight after the pass. Kid and Robbie both scored.

He zoomed the flight to a high perch and then waited for his last division to come off the targets. In desperation, the Zeros got in a defensive circle to cover each other’s six. Kid rolled back into the fight, converting the altitude to an airspeed advantage. He would not relinquish this advantage by turning with the Zeros. It would not be a fair fight. He would crush them using the weight of the universe, gravity. It was the natural order of the day.

A third Zero fell as they slashed through a second time. Kid watched as Robbie’s division attacked again, and then saw Bug’s four Hellcats take their turn. He scanned for interlopers but knew this flight was it. He keyed his microphone.

“Kid flight: Do not, I say again, do not, turn with the Zeros. Slashing attacks from high perch. Kid is in hot.”

He wanted the flight to seem like a routine gun pattern for his new guys. Just like a training flight, get them all nice and relaxed. Maybe they can learn fast enough to survive. Kid rolled in and watched as Bugs flamed another Zero. He didn’t get a shot and pulled off returning to the high perch. Robbie got another.

There was only one Zero left, and he was good. He outmaneuvered Bugs, who didn’t get a shot off. Kid rolled in on the sole survivor, but just as he was going to squeeze the trigger, the Zero disappeared under his nose. Immediately leveling the wings, Kid pulled six Gs to get out of the fight. Pushing maximum negative G, the Zero had neutralized his flight. Rolling up on a wing, Kid saw a flaming mass impact the jungle.

The Zero was still flying. One of the Hellcats had not matched his pull and had floated out in front of the Zero, who reversed the pull and flamed the Hellcat. Twisting in his seat to look left and right, Kid realized it was his nugget. Detached momentarily, he watched as a section of Hellcats missed with long volleys. He transmitted as he rolled in. “Short bursts; don’t waste your ammo.”

Spiraling lower and lower, the intensity grew to a frenzy as section after section rolled in on the Zero. Usually the Zero would maneuver just enough to defeat the shot and then pull the same maneuver that got Kid’s wing man. After he peppered Robbie’s nugget, Kid radioed. “Okay, let’s go with singles. He is targeting the wing men as they come off.”

An unrelenting fusillade of bullets tore at the morning sky, and none found their mark. Below, a jubilant crowd of Japanese troops cheered on their squadron commander, Major Jenji.

Kid couldn’t believe the next thing he heard on the radio. His flight was running out of ammunition.

“Robbie, you’ve got the lead. RTF.” Kid was going to end this now and wanted the rest of the Hellcats to return to the fleet and get out of the way. Lagging behind the last Hellcat attacking, he rolled in. He was going to wait for the Zero to make its move, then shoot him.

But Major Jenji refused to be a compliant target. He rolled inverted and did a split-S to the jungle below. Man, this guy is good, thought Kid as he chopped his throttle to idle and followed him down. Barely clearing the aerodrome, Jenji looped back on top of Kid. Suddenly defensive, Kid made the same move. A looping fight just above the runway delighted the cheering ground troops. Neither pilot was able to get an advantage. But Jenji was bleeding off energy faster. He could not loop again. He feinted one and then went to idle and pulled hard into Kid. The last ditch effort flushed Kid in front of him.

Jenji got a fleeting shot and watched as the powerful Hellcat did a nose-high pirouette and rolled onto his six. He was done. Jenji pumped his stick, but his mirrors were filled with Hellcat. Kid held the piper on the Zero, but did not pull the trigger. Jenji reversed his turn to see that the Hellcat was gone.