Trophy (39 page)

“Come on, mate,” one of them said. “Let’s be having you out of there.”

Kukarev’s English was sketchy, but he understood the sentiment. He was very happy to be out of the water. Without his immersion suit, he already felt as if he were freezing. His helmet, with its display technology, he had deliberately left in the water. No point making things too easy for the West’s scientists. The sailors appeared not to notice as they put warm blankets about him and the boat sped back to the ship. He looked over the stern. The helmet was nowhere to be seen.

Once on the frigate and after a change into dry clothing, Kukarev was taken to the captain’s cabin. It was not a naval officer who awaited him but, unexpectedly, a civilian. The man came forward to shake his hand.

“Welcome, Comrade,” he greeted in perfect Russian with a satisfied smile. “My name is Charles Buntline. Some gin, perhaps?”

*   *   *

The two Tornadoes were close in, rushing home with wings swept, at low level. Though they used more fuel in this configuration, there was a tanker rendezvous at Hotel-96, close enough to home to avoid unwelcome attention. But you never knew. So they kept low, hiding from any high-flying bogeys that might have come out for revenge. The closer the ASVs got to home, the further the hostiles would have to fly, their own fuel state becoming ever more critical.

It was McCann who gave the alarm. He had carried out a brief upward sweep of the radar, long enough to pick up traces, but not enough to betray their own position. “I don’t like this,” he muttered. “I don’t like this at all.”

“What don’t you like, Elmer Lee? And try not to give me bad news.”

“I’ll get out and walk, if that would make you happy.”

“No such bloody luck,” Selby said with resignation. “Let’s have the bad news.”

“We got company.”

“Judging by your voice, not people we’d like to meet.”

“Nope.”

“Tell me.”

“Two bad boys. MiG-29s.”

“Oh shit,” Selby swore. “All the way out here? They haven’t got the range. They couldn’t have
flown Norway, so they must have come right down the coast, via North Cape.”

“And at low level, because I got them at 500 feet. Mighty expensive on fuel.”

“A tanker or two, then.”

“Yup.”

“They’re being bloody keen. What in God’s name is going on?”

“Don’t ask me, kiddo. I’m only along for the ride. I figure their buddies told them they were being creamed and called out the cavalry. ‘So near but so far,’” McCann began to sing.” ‘So …’”

“You’re singing again.” Selby was scandalised. “I don’t know what the hell you think you’ve got to sing about.”

“Maybe because this back-up team will be working round to close the door up ahead. Of course, they could always have
their
back-up team too, I guess.”

“You’re a barrel of laughs, Elmer Lee.”

“That’s me. 01’ Elmer Lee, the laughing barrel.”

Flacht said: “From Three-One. Two MiG-29s up ahead at 500 feet, moving on an intercept course from left to right. 130 miles.”

Hohendorf remained silent.

“Axel …?”

“I heard you.” Hohendorf fell silent again.

They were 320 miles from Norway’s long and
rugged western coastline, and were soon to cross the Arctic Circle on their way south.

“Body’s out there on our left,” Hohendorf went on after his pause. “They’ve got F-16s on the airfield. Why haven’t they come out? Our friends out there are well within intercept range.”

“The MiGs would have done a low level well out to sea. They have probably not been detected.”

“The satellites might have seen something.”

“They don’t always see everything.”

Hohendorf knew that was true. Because he trusted his own aircraft, did not necessarily mean he had complete faith in all forms of technology. Blind faith was not sufficient to keep a man alive.

“I think,” Hohendorf said, “there may be other reasons.”

“Such as?”

“Perhaps we shall find out when we get back.”

“If we
get back.”

In Fighter Control at November One, Caroline Hamilton-Jones watched the tactical screen with mixed feelings. She felt anger and bitter sorrow for the tanker crew, elation and relief for the Goshawk pair, and confusion about the whole incident. What had really happened out there? What was the aircraft Goshawk had been escorting? Why wasn’t November One sending re-inforcements to help the Goshawk patrol?

She knew the answer immediately she’d asked
herself the question. To begin with, reinforcements from November One would have arrived too late to have been of any use, and secondly, no one wanted a major escalation. World War III was something nobody wanted to happen. That was why no planes had come from Norway. Now, the data link said Goshawk had detected Mig-29s. They would have to fight again, and do so on their own.

She glanced up at the gallery where Jason and the Air Vice-Marshal were in the company of the senior controller. The AVM had arrived quite unexpectedly. She had not given this much significance: Thurson was by now well known for his unannounced visits. But now something within her was saying that perhaps his presence was connected with the havoc far out there over the Norwegian Sea.

After all, Jason had already been up on the gallery when Thurson had arrived and had seemed to greet the AVM without surprise.

She turned again to the screen. A computergenerated window near the right hand border displayed the tactical situation as seen by the Goshawk crews. In the tenseness of the room, she knew everyone there was willing them to survive.

Flacht said: “I’ve got them nicely plotted. 100 miles and closing. Another Skyray? Or are you going for a Krait?”

“We’ve got the same old problem, Wolfie. We can’t fire until they actually act like hostiles. We
may have the tactical advantage, but they have the political. For now. What I cannot understand … is why they are here. I have to assume they don’t know their boy in the Krivak has ejected, and are still on the job of stopping him.”

“And us. They’re here for revenge too. They’ll certainly know what happened to their friends. They want our blood.”

Hohendorf sighed. “So we’ll keep our weapons ready. They did not come all the way out here for a Sunday stroll … but we must still challenge. We must let them know we have seen them.”

“Then this could be a knife fight.” That would mean the short-range Kraits, perhaps even going to guns.

“It could, Wolfie. But perhaps they’ll decide to go home instead.”

Flacht would not bet his life on it, but he illuminated the distant targets with no attempt at deception, sending out an open but neutral challenge. He had to take the risk and force the Soviets to make the first aggressive move.

Immediately, the MiGs changed course for a head-on pass. No warning tones of either infrared or radar tracking sounded on his and Hohendorfs phones. Both Goshawk aircraft remained close to each other, separated by less than 500 meters.

The MiGs still came on in tight formation, making no move to go into an attack phase.

“Perhaps you are right,” Flacht muttered, as
the range closed. “Perhaps they have decided to go home.” He sounded hopeful.

“Perhaps …”

The hope was short-lived. Thirty miles out, the warning tones erupted with unnerving suddenness. Infrared. They were being scanned for a short-range missile attack.

“Break!”
Hohendorf shouted to Selby.

Each already knew what he had to do. They went for a cross-over. Selby, on the right, broke left and stayed low. Hohendorf broke right and went high. The tones died immediately, but Hohendorf knew the Fulerums’ combined radar and infrared scanning systems could work independently or in concert. The pilots also had their own version of a helmet sight. The close-in fight was going to have to be conducted ferociously and swiftly. Time was life.

McCann’s head swiveled this way and that, scanning the world outside the cockpit. This was his job now. This close, the fight had to be conducted more visually. There was still head-down instrument work, but in the main it was an eyeball job.

He glanced at the attack display, seeing what was up on the HUD in front of Selby. The tracking box was dancing to the left as Selby’s 7G turn put them on the tail of their MiG. As long as Selby kept it that way, it would only be a matter of time before he got a Fox or gun solution. The MiGs’ first pass had
been baulked by the rapid break and the division of height. The trick was to deny them another chance.

Seconds. That’s all it would take.

The MiG pilot was no beginner. While in the turn, he quarter-rolled onto his back, pulled into a steep dive then pulled his nose up as he completed the split-S to head off to the right.

Selby had been quick to recognize the maneuver and reversed his own turn quickly, banging out the boards to help tighten the turn so that, as the Fulcrum began its own tight pull up, he was still there hanging on to its tail pipes. He kept the air brakes out and wings spread, but full power on too.

The MiG pilot had a counter to that. He suddenly seemed to rocket skywards. Selby brought in the air brakes. Like a hound unleashed, the ASV hurled itself upwards, sweeping its wings as it did so. It began to catch up, but the Krait’s twin seekers were still not happy with the kill parameters.

Hohendorf had found himself a long way from where Selby was fighting for his life. His own Fulcrum was no easy meat either. It was clear that the MiG-29 pilots did not want a long-range engagement, having seen what had already happened to their comrades. They had deliberately decided on a close-in tangle, where they had hoped that their high agility would win the day. But it was not working out exactly as planned, for they had not reckoned on the ASV’s improved agility and massive reserves of power.

Even so, as Hohendorf was finding out, in the hands of a master practitioner the Fulcrum could make things very difficult.

Flacht’s head was being banged about from side to side by the violence of the maneuvering and his own attempts to keep an eye on their wily opponent. Every time the Krait got a pulse, it would break off as the MiG-29 danced out the missile’s kill envelope. He hoped Hohendorf would not let the Fulcrum get within gun range. The MiG’s gun was supposed to be phenomenally accurate. Four rounds on target and that was it, he’d once heard someone say. As far as he was concerned, four rounds were four too many.

He craned his neck, looking up and behind at the vulnerable spot behind the tail. No MiG. No tracking alarm either. Where was he? Check the display.

There he was, low down on the deck; but he wouldn’t be able to stay there for long. The MiG was no match for the ASV low down. The ASV’s swing wing gave it the edge. No other aircraft had the same handling.

Flacht knew Hohendorf had seen their opponent, for the nose of the Super Tornado went down like a bird of prey homing in on its kill. But the MiG was rising again from the depths.

At last the Krait had lock-on and had begun its electronic, modulated hissing. Hohendorf always
thought the sound chilling. It was as if the twin seekers were slavering.

The MiG was pulling over the top, clearly hoping to come down behind, either to try for a tail shot, or to get the ASV in the helmet sights.

Bmmmmmmmmmmmmmm …!

“Scheiss!”
Hohendorf heard himself say for the second time that day as he again found himself on the receiving end of an incoming missile. He pulled into the vertical, heading for the sun.

Flacht had been looking upwards and had seen the flash of the launch come from the inverted MiG. It was a helmet launch, the fire control system linked to the angle of the pilot’s head rather than to the aircraft’s attitude. The MiG’s pilot must have been looking through the top of his canopy too.

Flacht immediately began a sequenced launch of six decoy flares and hit the IR pulse jammer.

Hohendorf waited as long as he dared, then chopped the throttles. Anything the Fulcrum could do, the ASV could do better, and with variations.

He didn’t wait for the speed to decay completely but ruddered the aircraft over on a wing in an apparently untidy stall. He knew he had no fear of spinning out of control because the aircraft’s spin prevention system would ensure it did not. He could do what he wanted. The MiG couldn’t.

As the Tornado fell seawards, its tail pipes relatively cool when compared to the high blazing sun or the flares, the Soviet missile fed itself upon the
hotter options after having first been seduced by the unreachable, glowing ball in the heavens.

“That’s your last shot,” Hohendorf muttered, feeling the sweat dampening his skull.

He slammed the throttles into combat burner and again the Tornado leaped away on swept wings, opening the fight distance. He wheeled the aircraft round tightly for the run-in. The MiG had turned too and was coming head-on.

The Krait seekers were going mad with joy. Hohendorf launched just as the MiG sent another missile at him.

Simultaneously, both aircraft broke hard to deceive the respective incoming missiles. But the MiG pilot had left his launch a fraction too late and had been forced to take avoiding action before he had properly achieved lock-on. Also the Krait was faster than the Soviet missile, and more accurate.

The Fulcrum exploded in a ball of orange fire as Flacht again dispensed more decoy flares and Hohendorf put the Tornado into a series of G-intense 90 degree turns, all the while increasing his distance from the missile. In the end, its imperfect lock caused it to take the flares instead.

Flacht heaved a sigh of relief.

“I heard that sigh, Wolfie,” Hohendorf said. “Were you worried?”

“Worried? Of course not.”

Hohendorf smiled, and searched the sky for Selby. He felt good.

*   *   *

“Looks like we’re the only ones at the party again,” McCann said. “Two-One have got their meat. C’mon, Mark! Let’s get this joker.”

“What … do you … think … I’m doing, you … colonial ape? Picking at … my sodding … navel?” Selby’s grunts punctuated his words as he strained against the crushing G-forces.

He’d hauled the ASV into a turn that was approaching 9G. The MiG-29 was determined to keep the fight as close as possible. God alone knew how far from Two-One the fight had taken them. McCann had seen the end of the fight from his display, but had told Selby nothing about distance. No time to worry about that now. If this MiG scored, distance would cease to be relevant.