Fly Boy (20 page)

“I’m getting echoes on the fishpond!” Jacko screamed out. “Coming hard and fast, coming from the ground … north by northeast … fifteen degrees.”

“How many?” Jed demanded. “How many do you read?”

“Nine … no, ten … no, twelve.”

“Can you determine their course? Are they on intercept?”

“I can’t tell … maybe … I don’t know … Wait, they’re breaking off into two groups … no, three.”

I knew that could mean they were heading in different directions for different targets, or it could also mean they were going to come at us from three directions.

“This is flight leader to formation,” Jed said over the radio. “We’re going to take some evasive action. Follow my course and altitude change. Davie, give us the course change
now
.”

I read out the course change, and could already feel us
gaining height. As I was giving the last coordinate, the plane started to bank sharply.

“What is their distance?” Jed asked. His voice was—as always—calm.

“Less than a mile and closing,” Jacko reported. “They’re breaking off into pairs, but at least a few pairs are on an intercept course. They’re coming after us.”

“This is flight leader to squadron. All eyes open, prepare for contact.”

There was nothing I could do as a navigator except add an extra set of eyes. I stood up, pushed aside the curtain, and stepped into the cockpit. I suddenly felt much more exposed. I
was
more exposed. All above me was the glass of the canopy. Anxiously I looked around, but I could see nothing but the black night sky, some thin clouds above, and more open sky with twinkling stars. I couldn’t see anything that mattered.

“Closing from the back,” Jacko screamed loudly.

“Tail end Charlie, be aware,” Jed said over the radio. “Expect—”

“We have contact!” screamed a voice over the radio.

I looked back in time to see an enemy fighter plane zip past the last plane in our formation, bullets streaming out of it. More bullets were making their way toward it as our gunners returned fire! Then a second fighter appeared, and a third and a fourth! All four ducked and dodged between the Lancs before disappearing into the darkness.

“Anybody hit? Any damage?” Jed asked.

“Affirmative. This is CF8 and we’ve taken fire!” a voice called out. “Some damage to my elevator, I think. The controls are floppy.”

“Can you maintain—”

Tracers streamed by our starboard wing. A fighter came up from below and streaked by us, and our guns started firing, the pounding sound of shells, and I saw bullets chasing after it and—

“I got him!” Glen screamed, and at the same instant black smoke erupted from the engine of the fighter.

There were flames coming from the plane, allowing me to follow him as he slipped to the side … He slowed down … He was stalling. Jed banked sharply to port and the enemy vanished from my view, but he was going down, the pilot maybe already dead. That plane wasn’t going to be worrying anybody anymore.

“Aircraft on the port quarter!” Glen yelled. “Coming fast and—”

“I see him!” Sandy screamed, and he began firing.

I saw tracer bullets flying through the air, and then saw and heard and felt as they tore into our port wing! The enemy plane disappeared, with bullets from Glen chasing after it.

“He missed the engine—I think,” Jed yelled.

“More planes, more fighters, closing from behind and—”

There was an explosion and sparks flashed, and the whole plane staggered and shook. I had to grab on to the roof support to stop myself from tumbling over. There was a rush of air and the navigator’s curtain blew in the breeze. Part of the canopy had been shot out! The plane started to dip violently and I was thrown forward into the back of Scottie’s seat. He was covered with blood and the side of his head was gone.

Panicked, shocked, my stomach lurching into my throat, I tried to push myself away, but I couldn’t. I was held in place by gravity as the plane continued to dive.

I yelled, “Jed, Jed, Scottie’s been—”

But Jed was slumped forward over the yoke, a gash in the side of his head, blood seeping from a wound in his neck. We were going down!

My mind froze, as if I couldn’t understand or believe what I was seeing, what was happening. Scottie and Jed were both dead or dying—at the very least unconscious—and the plane was going down. I had to do something, grab my parachute or—

Drew had been at his position in the nose cone, but now his head appeared beneath Scottie’s inert body, and he started to push past him to get up and into the cockpit. There was a look of complete shock on his face and he was covered with blood as well! He was struggling, trying to climb up as the plane continued to scream down—we were gaining speed as we dove. If we didn’t get out of it soon, we were all going to die! We had to level out if we were going to have even a chance of getting to the escape hatches. That was our only hope, and every second counted.

“Help me!” I screamed. “Help me!”

I grabbed Jed from behind and he yelled out in pain. He was alive! For a split second I stopped—I didn’t want to hurt him—but then I began again. I had to pull him off the yoke or we were all dead.

Jed was big, and both his weight and the momentum of the plane made it almost impossible to dislodge him. Drew, who was still trying to climb up from below, wedged himself
against Jed and started pushing him. As we hauled him back, I reached over and grabbed the yoke, yanking it as hard as I could with all my might, trying to pull us out of the dive.

There was so much force, so much momentum, that I couldn’t pull it back. I strained with every inch of my being, every ounce of my strength, and slowly the plane started to react. The dive lessened just a bit, and then more and more. It was working. I kept pulling back until we were in a controlled descent, and then finally we flattened out.

“What’s happening? What’s happening!” Sandy yelled over the intercom from the tail of the plane.

“We’ve been hit! We’ve been hit!” Drew screamed. “Jed, Scottie—they’re hurt!”

“Should we bail?” Jacko hollered.

“Affirmative!” Drew yelled. “Affirmative, get ready to—”

“No!” I screamed. “Do not bail!”

Drew glanced over at me. He looked crazed, panicked.

“Not yet! Help me get Jed out of the seat!” I yelled.

He didn’t react, although I knew he must have heard me.

“Now, Drew! I need your help
now
!”

He started to pull Jed over and the whole plane began to bank to the port side.

“No, no, from the back!”

I kept one hand on the yoke and with the other fumbled around with Jed’s safety harness until I undid the clasp. At the same time Drew unlatched the back of the pilot’s seat, which folded down. He wrapped his arms around Jed’s waist and pulled him. Jed was screaming in pain. At least we knew he was still alive, but for how long? There was so much blood.

As soon as Jed was clear, I dropped down into the seat, slammed the back up, and settled my feet onto the pedals.
We were out of the dive and flying flat and level. The plane was now under my control. Out of habit I pushed the stick forward and the plane dipped slightly. I pulled back and levelled us off.

“This is Davie!” I called out over the intercom. “I’m at the controls!”

“Are we bailing? Are we bailing?” Jacko asked.

“No, not yet.” I tried to make myself sound calm. I
needed
to be calm. “Jacko, are there any more fighters on the radar?”

“What?”

“Are there more fighters? Are we still in contact?”

“No, nothing, nothing … they’ve left us for dead! We need to bail out!”

“I need you to stay calm,” I said. “I need everybody to stay calm. Glen and Sandy, stay active. Keep your eyes open in case somebody is coming looking for us. Jacko, I need you in the cockpit, please.”

I looked over my shoulder at Drew. He was hunched over Jed, whom he’d spread out along the floor.

“Drew, how is he? … Is he …?”

“It’s his arm. A major artery was cut, but I’ve applied a tourniquet. The bleeding has almost stopped.”

“And you—where were you hit?”

“I wasn’t.”

“But the blood—you’re covered with blood.”

“It’s not mine.”

Scottie
… I looked over. I saw again the gaping wound on the side of his head. Blood was splattered all over the canopy. His uniform was stained and soaked.

“Oh, my Lord,” Jacko said as he appeared over my shoulder.

“I need you in the flight engineer’s place,” I said.

He hesitated for a split second and then responded. He undid Scottie’s harness and eased him out of the seat. I tried not to look as his body flopped to the side, brushing against my leg. I held firm so as not to put pressure on the right pedal. Jacko slipped into his seat.

“I need to know our altitude, heading, and approximate position.”

“We’re at almost two thousand feet. We have enough height to bail out!”

“We’ve got time and altitude. What is our position?”

“What does it matter? We’re somewhere over occupied France, so what does it matter?”

“It
does
matter. I can get us closer to home before we bail.”

“Are you sure?”

“The controls are good and—” Just at that instant my eye was caught by flames on the port side!

“Fire in one of the port engines!” Glen screamed from the top turret.

I looked over. The inside port engine was on fire. I had to put out the fire!

“Jacko, do you see the four lights on the far right of the console?”

“Yes. Yes. One of them is red.”

“That’s the engine temp for the inside port engine.”

Instinctively I reached over to the side. I pulled back the throttle controlling the disabled engine—there was no point in feeding it fuel—while at the same time I pushed forward the throttle on the remaining port engine to compensate for the loss of power on that side.

“Right below it is a switch. There’s a safety cover to protect it. I need you to flip it up and then push the
button. It’s the fire extinguisher for that engine. Do you understand?”

“Yes … yes, I understand.”

My eyes shot from the engine to him, and then, as he hit the switch, back to the engine as a stream of foam shot out. The flames died, as did the engine. We were now flying on three engines.

“I still need that heading.”

“What?” Jacko questioned.

“The heading, give me our heading! What direction are we going?” I realized I wasn’t sounding calm anymore.

“Oh, sorry. North by northeast.”

“Okay, I’m going to have to bring us about. Everybody hold tight.”

I executed a smooth, long bank, making sure not to stall or slow down or lose any altitude. We didn’t have enough height to play with.

“Watch the compass. Let me know when we’re on a heading of exactly three thirty degrees south by southwest, okay?”

Jacko didn’t say anything.

“Do you understand?” I screamed.

“Understood, yes … We’re coming around … almost due north … now northwest … Okay, still coming, coming—”

“Just tell me when we’re on the right heading,” I said, cutting him off. “Drew, how is Jed doing?”

“The bleeding has stopped, but he’s lost a lot of blood. He’s barely conscious. I’m going to give him some morphine. He’s in a lot of pain.”

“Is there any chance he’ll be able to jump?”

Drew didn’t answer—which was an answer. Of course
he couldn’t jump, and even if he did and somehow survived the landing, there’d be no way he’d get the medical help he needed to live.

“Glen and Sandy, keep your eyes wide open. We have no radar and no wireless right now to warn us. If they’re coming, they’re going to be coming from above, so keep your eyes high.”

“Okay, coming up to the mark,” Jacko said.

I started to pull us out of the bank.

“And now!”

I levelled the plane out. “Okay, we’re about two hours, maybe a bit longer, from the coast. I’m going to hold us steady until then. Jacko, I need you to go back on the wireless, try to find a navigation beacon, get some air support, and let them know what’s happening.”

“Sure, mate.” He got up from the seat.

“Drew, have you given Jed the morphine?”

“Just finished.”

“Good. I need you to go below. We have to lighten the load.”

“You want me to release the bombs?”

“Yes, it’ll let us gain speed. The faster we get home, the faster we can get Jed help.”

“Home?” he said incredulously. “What are you talking about? We have to bail out. We’re down to three engines, and the captain is gone!”

“He’s not
gone
. He’s here and alive and I can’t just leave him. He has only one chance, and that chance is me being able to land this plane!”