SECTOR 64: Ambush

by Dean M. Cole

And here, for your reading pleasure, is our free excerpt:

Part I

“We stand now at the turning point between two eras. Behind us is a past to which we can never return …”

― Arthur C. Clarke

CHAPTER ONE

Two fighter jets sliced through the night air. A crescent moon, thin as an orange peel, cast a dim glow across the Nevada desert five thousand feet below the F-22s. Even under the waning crescent, the bright desert reminded Jake of a Spaghetti Western’s night scene. As if filmed during the day with a dark filter to simulate night, the excess visual detail seemed out of temporal place.

“Papa Two-One, this is Lima Two-Four, over.”

Air Force Captain Jake Giard scanned his fighter’s computer-generated engine indications and then keyed his radio’s transmit trigger. “Lima Two-Four, this is Papa Two-One. Go ahead.”

The radio crackled to life again as his wingman replied. “Roger, Two-One. Come up internal.”

Jake nodded and switched his radio selector to the ship-to-ship laser communication terminal. The autonomous system formed a virtual fiber optic link that allowed data to stream between the two fighters. A secure internal communication link piggybacked on the data stream. Unlike a radio signal, the laser beam couldn’t be intercepted. So, fighter crews often used it like a cell phone for air to air communication.

“Hey, Vic. What’s up?”

Over Nellis Air Force Base’s remote desert training area, they flew a tight, echelon-left formation. From his position just behind Vic’s left wing, Jake studied the moonlit silhouette of his wingman’s stealthy single-seat fighter.

“Uh … thanks for doing this. I know you didn’t have to take a flight this late.”

Jake smiled under his oxygen mask. “It’s not like I had anything better to do at three o’clock on a Sunday morning.” The truth was, he had plenty he could be doing. However, the junior pilot was having trouble completing his unit indoctrination training. Having already failed one checkride, Victor was struggling with the high workload of the unit’s close air support scenarios. Jake had volunteered to take him out for additional iterations. However, in preparation for a combat deployment, the squadron’s fighter wings were in high gear, training around the clock. So, Victor’s additional period had been relegated to oh-dark-thirty in the middle of the weekend.

“Yeah right,” Vic said. “I’m sure you’d rather be on a night training flight than partying a Las Vegas Saturday night away with Sandy.”

“Wow, you’re right,” Jake joked. He broke his fighter into a left bank and rolled away from Vic’s jet. “I’m outta here.”

“Hey … I was just kidding,” Vic said.

Having dropped below Victor’s line of sight, Jake rolled his fighter level and passed under his wingman’s aircraft. Emerging on Victor’s right, Jake pulled alongside. In the moon’s soft light, he could see the back of his helmet as Vic searched the sky to his left.

“Over here,” Jake said with a chuckle. When the young man’s head snapped right, Jake barrel-rolled his fighter over Vic, the maneuver’s wide arc carrying him clear of his wingman. It ended with Jake parked off of his wingman’s left wing, back where he had started. “This sure as hell beats working for a living. Doesn’t it?”

Vic laughed. “When my alarm went off at two AM, it kind of felt like work.” Then his tone took on a serious note. “Did you see that report on the news tonight?”

“That report? Can you be a little more specific?”

“Sorry. They found more Russian surface-to-air missiles in Afghanistan.”

Frustrated his attempt at levity had failed to distract the young officer from his unending worries, Jake looked across to his wingman and shook his head. I know where this is headed.

Fresh out of flight training, Lieutenant Victor Croft had never been in combat. Last week, the man’s jittery nerves had kicked into hyperdrive when their squadron received orders to deploy to Afghanistan’s Bagram Airfield at the end of the month. Renewed Taliban activity, coupled with enhanced weapons supplied by Iran, had NATO forces reeling.

“I’m sure they’ll have it worked out by the time we get in-country,” Jake said. He felt guilty playing down the threat. In the last year, the Taliban had employed Russian S-300 antiaircraft missiles with devastating results.

“Maybe,” Vic said dubiously. “I haven’t slept since the meeting.”

Jake remembered the white pallor he’d seen on Vic’s face following their deployment brief. Wide, frightened eyes stared from the young pilot’s light-skinned ginger face. Drained of blood, Victor’s skin glowed through his closely cropped red hair.

“Be calm, grasshopper,” Jake said. He hoped the poor imitation of a Japanese sensei would allay Vic’s continuing apprehension. “You’ll be fine, your training will take over once you’re in combat, trust me.”

“Trust you?” Vic asked. The humor in the lieutenant’s voice was good.

Victor thickened his soft hillbilly accent in the way that endeared him with comrades—and also won him favor with the Las Vegas ladies frequenting Nellis Air Force Base’s officers’ club. “Why, because you’re from the government, and you’re here to help me?”

Exaggerating his own Texan accent, Jake said, “Oh yeah, I forgot, you Appalachians don’t cotton to us governmental types.”

Victor laughed. “Yep, us hillbillies have a special place in our heart for outsiders. Now, squeal like a pig, boy.”

Jake’s laughter broke as a tremendous shockwave, coupled with a blinding flash, rocked his fighter. Overtaking them from behind, a bright ring of lights had rocketed between the two aircraft.

“Shit! What the hell was that?” Jake said. Recovering from the shock, he adjusted the controls, reining in his battered fighter.

“I don’t know. It must be doing Mach four or better—” Victor faltered as the object broke right. “What the hell?”

Bolting right, it made a ninety-degree turn, changing direction in an instant. One moment it was rocketing away from them, the next it blazed eastward at the same tremendous rate without curving.

“Holy shit, nothing can take those Gs,” Vic said, thunderstruck.

“Oh my god,” Jake whispered. Blinking, he tried to clear his eyes. That’s not possible.

As if it had no mass or weight, the strange object made several more instantaneous course changes. Varying from slight angles, to complete course reversals, the maneuvers kept it near their two-ship formation.

Its zigzagging path circled the fighters twice. Then it stopped for a few moments. Matching their velocity and vector, it parked a mile off Lieutenant Croft’s right wing. A moment later, it snapped to within one hundred meters of Victor’s side of the formation, closing the mile-wide gap in less than a second.

“Whoa,” Vic said with a shaky voice. His fighter jinked away from the object.

“Easy, buddy,” Jake said. Jerking his F-22 left, he narrowly avoided colliding with his wingman. “I’m still right here.”

“Sorry,” Vic said.

“I’ve got nothing on radar.” Jake paused, taking a deep breath to reel in his emotions. “When it was in front of us, I couldn’t see it on infrared either.”

“Hey, I see something,” Vic said, panting. “There’s a shadow.”

Jake narrowed his eyes. “You’re right! I see it against the background.”

“Yeah, that’s how I spotted it.”

Gliding above the distant horizon, the ring of lights had dark voids protruding above and below. A brief eclipse of the background stars provided the only visual evidence.

“So, it’s not some kind of…” Jake paused, searching for words. “Energy source. It must have mass, it’s gotta be a ship of some sort.” Studying it, he paused, then shook his head. “But I’ve never seen anything move like that.”

“If this is one of ours, it’s way beyond anything my physics professor knew about,” Victor said.

Looking across his wingman’s fighter gave Jake a chance to estimate the ship’s size. Judging by the shadow, it was as tall as it was wide. Like a pregnant frisbee, it was broadest across its middle, where the ring of lights still rotated. Horizontally, it was roughly as long as the F-22, making it just over sixty feet wide.

“What the hell is it,” Vic asked.

“No idea,” Jake said. He couldn’t see the skin, but the silhouette’s bottom was round, and it looked like the top came to a point. “This is incredible…” As Jake spoke, the ship started closing the gap. “Hey, be careful, it’s getting closer!”

“Roger,” Vic said.

Jake’s heart raced as he focused on the ship’s middle. “Those lights…” He faltered, unable to conjure an adequate description.

“I know,” Vic said. He sounded as mystified as Jake felt.

A horizontal, pulsing ring of multicolored light seemed to rotate in the air around the object’s midsection. As the ship neared Victor’s fighter, Jake got a clearer view of its structure. As if radiating from the ship’s center, the glowing rays only extended a foot or two from the ship’s skin, but he couldn’t see any fixtures generating the energy. “I don’t see the source of the lights. They look like … raw energy.” Watching the strange ship flying in formation with his wingman was both surreal and somehow familiar.

“I wish he’d pull up front again. My gun camera can’t slew that far to the side,” Vic said.

Recognition smacked Jake. “Hey, it looks like they want an escort.”

“You’re right,” Vic said, then shouted, “Jake! Do you have your iPhone?”

“Yeah!”

Concentrating on flying his fighter while keeping an eye on the strange ship, he dug blindly through the bag he’d tucked into the small map pouch next to his right leg. There it is. Yanking out the phone, he turned it on—a clear violation of Air Force regulations. I think they’ll forgive this one.

“Got it! I’ll take a couple of quick shots, then drop back and see if I can capture it with my gun-camera.”

“Sounds good, just get it on something.”

Staring at the phone’s glowing, white boot-up apple, he shook the phone and growled, “Come on!”

Outside, the ship slid closer. When it parked a few feet off Vic’s right wing, his fighter lurched.

Jake dropped the phone. “What happened?”

“I don’t know. It feels like my right wing is trying to stall—” Victor’s voice cut out as the buffeting rocked his fighter left and right. Broken by turbulence-induced grunts, Victor’s voice came over the radio. “The stick is … beating up … the inside of my thighs.”

He banked left to give Victor space. “Get away from the ship.”

“I don’t know … if I can hold on,” Victor said. His voice strained as he fought to control the fighter.

Jake threw his transponder into the emergency position, alerting Air Traffic Control. Ears ringing, his pulse raced in response to the adrenaline dumping into his system. “Get the hell out of there!”

A crescendo of static rose in Jake’s helmet.

Chopped and modulated by the communication laser’s failing efforts to maintain connection, Lieutenant Croft’s panic-stricken voice broke through the cacophony, “… systems … going down … damn warning light … flashing … day, mayday, may—”

Jake switched back to their assigned radio frequency and keyed the mic. “Lima Two-Four …”

Static.

“Victor, come in …”

Louder static.

The faint glow from Victor’s engines faded, then extinguished. His fighter started losing altitude.

Jake’s mounting alarm ratcheted another notch. Slamming both throttles to idle, placing his fighter in a rapid descent, Jake tried to keep up with his plunging wingman.

The external position lights on both fighters began dimming. The static increased to an earsplitting level, and then it died. Jake’s cockpit darkened as all its electronics faded to black. All electrical energy seemed to drain from both F-22s.

Switching radios to emergency, he toggled the mic. “Mayday, mayday, mayday, this is Air Force Two-One-Five!”

No side-tone.

Shit, the radio isn’t transmitting!

He switched back to the air-to-air frequency. “Lima Two-Four, this is Papa Two-One. Come in, Vic!”

Still no side-tone, he couldn’t even hear his own voice. A quick check showed his helmet was still plugged into its socket.

Then, to Jake’s horror, both fighters started drifting toward one another. “Oh shit,” he whispered. He pulled against the stick, but the unresponsive electronic flight controls refused to budge.

Drifting toward Lieutenant Croft’s fighter, Jake’s ship started an uncommanded slow roll to the right. He yanked and jerked the stick left. Nothing. Without electricity, they couldn’t respond. Jake reached for his ejection handles and froze. Already rolling through ninety degrees, his cockpit was aimed at his wingman’s fighter. If he punched out now, he’d shoot into the top of Victor’s airplane.

He watched helplessly as his ship rolled inverted. His F-22’s dim shadow fell across Vic’s fighter. For a surreal moment, the two stared face to face across the narrowing gap as both struggled with their unresponsive flight controls.

An unnatural glow caught Jake’s attention. The mysterious ship’s multicolored ring of rotating light brightened and then flared as it rocketed away—the only evidence of its departure direction lay in the fading image burned across his retina.

“What the hell?”

Instrument lights flared back to life, and his F-22 snap-rolled left as, power restored, the electronic flight controls responded to Jake’s desperate tugging. As he rolled away, he saw the ship’s blazing departure throw Victor’s aircraft into a flat spin.

“Shit!” Jake screamed. He flipped his Raptor over, trying to keep his wingman in sight, but the night quickly swallowed the still blacked-out fighter.

He checked the radio. It was back online. “Come in, Victor!”

No reply.

“You’re running out of time! Eject! Get the hell out of there, Lieutenant!” he ordered. As if trying to will the event into existence, Jake visualized his small-framed friend yanking on the jettison handle.

Switching back to the emergency radio, he transmitted, “Mayday, mayday, mayday, this is Air Force Two-One-Five!”

“Air Force Two-One-Five, this is Nellis Radio. Please state the nature of your emergency,” replied the air traffic controller, her voice maddeningly calm.

Before he could reply, night turned day in a brilliant explosion as Victor and his F-22 slammed into the desert floor.

“No!” Jake screamed.
#

Tires barked as his fighter touched down. Jake extended the airbrake. The fighter decelerated. Heavy hearted and in an anguished mental fog, he struggled through the after-landing checks.

“Air Force Two-One-Five, proceed to the end of Runway Two-One-Right, right on taxiway Alpha, left onto the ramp. A security police detail is waiting to pick you up.”

Security police? They’re not normally involved in crash investigations.

“Uh … roger, Nellis Tower, Runway Two-One-Right, right on Alpha, to the ramp,” Jake repeated. His tone was flat, dutiful. Finishing his landing rollout, he saw the promised security detail’s flashing lights ahead on the right.

He finished the after-landing checks. What happened to you, buddy? Why didn’t you eject?

Hoping to spot his downed wingman, he had remained on scene. Jake had made multiple low passes, searching the small, speed-blurred patch of desert his landing lights illuminated. All the while, he’d monitored the frequency of Victor’s portable emergency radio. In spite of numerous calls from Jake, it remained silent.

The post-crash fire had raged for thirty minutes, only faltering after it consumed the cache of jet fuel and combustible metals. When the rescue helicopter arrived, its crew performed an extensive search. After an additional thirty minutes, they reported: “No sign of ejection.”

Out of fuel and hope, Captain Giard finally obeyed air traffic control’s incessant orders and returned to base.

Now that he’d landed, Jake slowed his F-22. Reaching the end of the runway, he turned right onto taxiway alpha as instructed by air traffic control. Ahead, the swarm of security police vehicles generated a myriad of flashing lights. The strobing red, blue, and amber colors reflecting off every surface of his cockpit were an unwelcome reminder of the ship’s strange lights.

Turning left onto the south end of the ramp, he nosed the fighter into the U-shaped formation of vehicles. Locking the parking brake, he finished the after-landing checks.

Ground support personnel, casting nervous looks at the assembled security police vehicles, hooked up the ground power unit. With the GPU connected and powering the aircraft, he received a thumbs-up from an airman that looked ready to bolt. Jake acknowledged the clearance and killed the fighter’s engines. To his surprise, the airman did bolt.

As Jake’s canopy rose, a security police squad, weapons drawn, stormed the plane. Jake was looking down the muzzles of eight M-16 automatic rifles.

“What the hell is this?” he shouted over the whine of the ground power unit’s turbine exhaust.

“Out of the plane, sir!” screamed a large sergeant. The noncommissioned officer was pointing his Beretta nine-millimeter pistol at Jake’s head.

Overwhelmed by the night’s events, Jake stared incredulously at the armed squad. Shaking his head in resigned capitulation, he unbuckled his safety harness and unplugged his helmet. Climbing from the cockpit, he started backing down the boarding ladder. Halfway to the ground, he was ripped from the metal steps and thrown face-down onto the ramp. He could feel several muzzles pressed into his back.

“What the fuck!” Jake yelled. His breath lifted a small dust cloud from the tarmac, its asphalt surface warm against his face.

“Don’t fucking move, Captain.”

He continued to struggle. “I haven’t done anything. This is bullshit!”

The cold steel muzzle of a large caliber pistol pressed against the back of his neck.

Jake stopped struggling.

The sergeant, now calm and inches from his ear, said, “Captain, I have my orders, and they don’t come from any higher, and they don’t get any more serious than this. I assure you, this is not bullshit.”

The muzzle lifted from his neck.

“Now, are we done here?”

Panting, Jake nodded.

In less than five seconds, the sergeant cuffed him and dragged him to his feet. “Thank you, sir.” Grabbing Jake’s left elbow, he led him to a security police cruiser. The sergeant opened the door, stuffed him in the back, and slammed it.

Jake stared out in confused disbelief. “What the hell did we stumble into, Vic?”

CHAPTER TWO

Exhausted eyes stared back from the interrogation-room’s one-way mirror.

“Damn it, Captain, what were you doing in that area?” The voice echoed off the tiled floors and walls. With only a four-legged rectangular table and two metal chairs occupying its center, the room offered little sound absorption.

Turning from his reflection, Jake locked eyes with the major. For what felt like the hundredth time, he said, “Sir, as I’ve been telling you for the last twelve hours, Range Control assigned us that training area.”

For the hundredth time, the major stared back, unblinking and unbelieving.

Knuckles rasped against the room’s single door.

With a disgusted sigh, the major shook his head and turned toward it. “Come!”

The door creaked open. A nervous Air Force airman stuck his head into the room.

Major Tinsdale glared at him. “Damn it! I left clear instructions that I was not to be disturbed.”

“Sorry, sir. You have a call from a General Tannehill. I tried to tell him you were busy—”

“No, no, no, I’ll take it,” the major said standing, all annoyance evaporating. “Just sit there, Captain, I’ll be back.” Grabbing his notepad, he strode angrily from the room.

The airman nodded at Captain Giard and followed the major out.

Hearing the door lock, Jake turned back to his image in the mirror. A steady dripping sound emanated from a floor drain at the room’s center. The ticking second hand of an old government issue wall-clock, hanging over the door, added its maddening rhythm to the staccato dripping noise.

Studying his weary face in the one-way interrogation room mirror, Jake tried to make sense of the situation. It was obvious they knew the two of them had encountered the ship. However, every time he tried to bring it up, the major redirected him. Tinsdale kept returning to the subject of airspace and timelines. It’s as if he thinks we conspired to be there at that particular time.

Given nothing to eat and only enough fluids to keep him awake, Jake didn’t think they’d let him free anytime soon, if ever.

Jake heard the major shouting unintelligible commands as he came down the hall.

The door flew open, and in a storm, Major Tinsdale erupted into the interrogation-room. Throwing a stack of papers on the desk in front of Jake, Tinsdale paused, took a deep breath, and sat across from him, head hanging down.

To Jake’s surprise, the major looked up with a contrite expression.

“Captain, I owe you an apology.”

Stunned, Jake sat back, trying to understand the rapid reversal. Was this some kind of interrogation technique? Was the major propping Jake up, just so he could knock him back down?

Reading the distrust, the major raised his hands, palms facing Jake. “It’s ok, Captain. I give you my word, this is not a trick.”

“Then what the hell is going on?” he asked. Belatedly, he added, “Sir.”

“Apparently, you have friends in high places.”

His confusion doubled. “What?”

The major shook his head. “You’ll be briefed later.” He pointed to the stack of papers. “But, before you can leave, you have to sign these.”
#

Lying in bed, gazing at the ceiling, Captain Jake Giard ran fingers through his short dark hair. His entire body ached with a bone-deep exhaustion. He hadn’t slept in the eighteen hours since the disastrous encounter.

Jake knew sleep wouldn’t be the restful reprieve from reality he needed. Only a dark prison waited—a place where he would relive the freakish encounter and the loss of his young friend, ad nauseam.

Shifting, he propped another pillow under his head and looked outside. The city’s uncountable sodium-vapor streetlights set his bedroom walls awash with an orange glow. The drawn curtains of his window revealed a beautiful panorama. Viewed from his east Las Vegas apartment on the side of Sunrise Mountain, the city lights painted across the valley below twinkled like a sea of chipped orange glass beads. From Jake’s remote vantage point, the buildings and lights of the Vegas Strip constituted a small portion of the scintillating mural painted across his bedroom window.

The cool, crisp springtime breeze ruffled the curtains, creating a welcome distraction. Jake felt his body relaxing as a coyote’s howl drifted down from the desert mountainside. A lonely sound, it matched the darkness of his mood.

His body jerked with a waking spasm as a jet engine’s distant roar drowned out the coyote’s wail, claiming dominance over the night air. Muffled by distance, the airplane’s din rolled like thunder off the surrounding mountains.

“Great,” he muttered.

Frustrated and exhausted, Jake slid out of bed and stepped across the cool tiles. Pushing the billowing curtain out of the way, he walked to the center of the wide window, intending to close it. Movement in his peripheral vision drew his attention. Two miles to the north, on Nellis Air Force Base Runway Three-Left, two hundred feet from where he’d been accosted by the Base’s Security Police, Jake could just make out the twin, fiery-blue jet-plumes of an F-22 Raptor on a takeoff roll.

The solo fighter was a poignant reminder.

“Damn it! What happened to you, Vic?”

He slammed the glass pane shut. Snapping the curtains closed, he turned and walked back to the bed. Collapsing backward onto its soft surface, Jake stared through the ceiling.

What the hell was that thing?

“I can’t even tell anybody about your death,” he said to the empty room. He shook his head sardonically. Great! The UFO contactee is talking to his dead friend. “Wonderful.”

The day spent in the interrogation room had left Jake confused and questioning his decision to reveal the appearance of the strange ship. Not that Major Tinsdale had allowed any elaboration on the subject.

He was under strict orders not to mention the event to anyone. He knew it was standard protocol not to discuss aspects of a mishap during an investigation, but these orders encompassed everything: personnel, equipment, aircraft, and timelines—before and after the accident.

Ordered to act as if the flight had been cancelled, he was not to discuss the night’s events, nor mention Lieutenant Croft’s status. Since when did a man’s death become a status?

Not that he’d had the opportunity to talk with anyone. Under virtual house arrest, Jake had been instructed not to leave his home. Relieved from duty, he was to spend the remainder of the day and subsequent night resting. Major Tinsdale told him to expect additional instructions the following morning. However, he wasn’t sure how that information would arrive. Perfectly functional the previous day, neither his iPhone nor his home phone worked now. Even his Internet was down. Also, a nondescript Government-Issue sedan sat parked out front, its occupant hidden in shadow.

The mortgage-like stack of documents he’d signed promised forfeiture of his left nut and first born should he ever discuss any aspect of the night’s events.

A metallic chime yanked Jake from his thoughts. It was the doorbell. He checked his watch: 10 p.m.

Rocked by a sudden epiphany, he sat bolt upright on the mattress. “Sandy!”

He jumped out of bed and scrambled to the closet, searching blindly for his robe. Can’t believe I forgot.

The doorbell rang again.

“I’m coming!” he yelled. Sliding to a stop on the tiled foyer, he opened the door.

His girlfriend, Captain Sandra Fitzpatrick, pointed an admonishing finger. “You’d better not be starting without me—” Seeing his face, she stopped. “Oh my god, baby. What happened?”

Looking into her deep blue eyes, he felt the day’s tumultuous stress drain from his body. “I love you.”

Eyes softening and stepping through the door, she enveloped him in her sensuous arms. “That’s not an answer, but I’ll accept it for now.”

“Thank you.” He nodded toward her embrace. “By the way, that’s my job.”

Ever the competitor, she raised a skeptical eyebrow. “I’m allowed to comfort you.”

Jake gave her a meaningful look. After a moment she capitulated, allowing him to wrap her up in his strong arms. Fiercely independent since their first meeting in Air Force flight school, Sandy was loath to let anyone do anything for her. As an Air Force fighter pilot, it was a character trait that had served her well. It was only during their private moments that she lowered the ever-present shield and exposed her soft feminine side to Jake.

Melting into him, she snuggled her cheek into his chest. Her limpid blue eyes stared deeply into his. “I’ve missed you.”

“I missed you too, baby,” he reassured her.

She leaned back in his arms. “So, what happened to you this morning? You didn’t call or text me after your flight.”

“My phone went on the fritz,” he said, only half-lying.

“Your home phone too? Both of your phones are going straight to voicemail. I didn’t know your home number had voicemail.”

“It does now.” Apparently.

“How was your flight?”

Unwilling to lie outright, he changed the subject, guiding her toward the bedroom. “I thought you were coming here so I could help you relax.”

The previous night—only a few hours before his and Vic’s fateful flight—Sandy had complained that the next day’s schedule included a grueling twelve-hour battery of tests on a new F-22 avionics configuration.

Sweeping her up, he carried her the remaining distance to the bedroom.

Sandy wrapped her arms around his neck.

Jake smiled. In a French accent, he whispered, “Mon amour, your velocity-induced accelerated stall has firewalled my adiabatic lapse rate.”

“Oh, I love it when you whisper dirty pilot talk to me.”

Laying her gently on the bed, Jake grasped the top of her flightsuit’s full body-length central zipper. Drawing it down, he slowly exposed her heaving breasts, then her dimpled abs, and finally the top of her lace panties. With a devilish grin, he said, “There’s my favorite landing strip.”

“It better be your only landing strip, Captain,” Sandy said. She playfully reached between his legs. Looking into his eyes with a mischievous smile, she said, “I have the ball, the hook is down.”

“Ease up on the navy crap, or the hook might retract.”

“Yeah right,” she said, laughing. Still holding his member, she pulled him into bed.
#

WOMP, WOMP, WOMP.

The sound drilled into Jake’s brain. Again, he reached for the fighter’s instrument panel, pressing and then punching the cancel button in a futile effort to reset the incessant alert blaring from the flashing master-caution panel.

WOMP, WOMP, WOMP.

Frustration mounted as the fighter’s computer still wouldn’t accept his inputs.

My friend is dead, and now my fighter is dying too.

WOMP, WOMP, WOMP.

Even the alert sounds wrong … oh shit.

Dragging himself from the nightmare, his arm rose from the sheets and fell on the alarm clock.

The noise continued.

With a start, Jake realized it was his home phone that was ringing. He’d left the handset in the living room. “Guess it’s working now.”

Sandy stirred, mumbled something unintelligible, and went back to sleep.

After a quick kiss to the top of her head, he leapt from the bed. Sprinting through the living room and sliding to a stop in front of the phone, he checked the number.

No name displayed, but he recognized the area code: 202. From his many calls to the area’s Air Force offices, he knew it very well. Washington D.C. This should be it.

After a hesitation, he answered. “Hello.”

“Is this Captain Jake Giard?” asked a feminine voice.

“Uh … yes. Who’s calling?”

“This is the Pentagon’s office of Air Force Tactical Operations, Planning, and Development. Please hold for Captain Allison.”

Before he could protest, inane elevator music told him she’d already placed him on hold. He was usually happy to hear from his old combat wingman. However, this morning he worried the line would be tied up when the real call came. Hurry up, Richard.

While waiting, Jake thought about the last time he’d seen his and Sandy’s old flight school buddy, Richard Allison. He’d been in a hospital bed, only five hours after a near brush with death.

In spite of his impatience, he found himself wondering how Richard was handling ground duty. If only that bullet hadn’t found its way into his engine.
#

— Twelve Months Earlier —

“Target is fifteen kilometers at two-seven-niner degrees. Estimate entry into Maverick missile range in thirty seconds,” Jake said to his wingman.

“Roger, Gunslinger One-Three. Gunslinger Two-Six has visual on the target, now at heading: two-seven-eight, range: eleven kilometers. Target acquisition complete, missile armed,” said Captain Richard Allison.

As Richard called out his target data, Jake, from his position off of the right wing of Richard’s ground-attack configured fighter jet, was completing the same process for his target.

“I have lock-on, launching now,” Richard said.

The Maverick missile roared as it left the FA-16, rapidly accelerating toward an ill-fated anti-aircraft missile launcher.

A shudder passed through Jake’s fighter as his missile also ripped into the night sky. “Second missile is on the way.”

The Mavericks bore down on the two anti-aircraft weapons. A brilliant flash illuminated the desert as the missiles struck their targets, detonating the warheads and rocket fuel on both launchers. The fireballs incinerated everything within two hundred meters.

“That should do the trick,” Richard said.

“Roger, Gunslinger Two-Six. Let’s do a quick BDA and head home.”

“Roger, keep in tight,” Richard replied as he turned inbound.

Beginning his post attack Battle Damage Assessment, Jake scanned the infrared display. After a few seconds, he smiled. “Scratch two more SA sixes.”

“That’s two less Surface-to-Air Missile launchers to dodge. I wish the Pakistani’s would stop this crap from crossing the—” Captain Allison’s radio transmission cut out mid-sentence as a stream of tracers sliced through the darkness directly in front of the two aircraft.

“Break left!” Jake screamed.

With the bright orange tracers slicing between the two fighters, Jake banked his fighter hard right, narrowly avoiding the wall of lead.

“Crap! That was close,” Jake said. “Must have been a Zeus.” It was the common nickname for Russia’s deadly four-barreled ZSU 23-4 anti-aircraft gun. Good thing he missed. That rate of fire with high explosive shells… The thought sent an involuntary shudder down Jake’s spine.

“I’m hit, I’m hit!” Richard screamed over the radio.

“Oh shit!” Jake said. He toggled his radio. “Gunslinger Two-Six, how bad are you hit? Is it flyable, over?”

No reply.

“Gunslinger Two-Six, Richard, what is your situa—” a bright explosion flashed from the direction Richard had turned. To his relief, Jake saw the silhouette of a parachute canopy briefly outlined by the light of the exploding fighter jet.

Rolling his aircraft to bring weapons on the ZSU, Jake jumped into the job of protecting his wingman.

Another burst of fire shredded the night. Like flaming orange basketballs, a new volley of explosive twenty-three millimeter shells rose from the desert floor, blindly seeking out his aircraft. Apparently, the weapon’s operator knew not to turn on his radar. That mistake would attract Jake’s HARM radar seeking missile. Still, his initial success against Richard’s aircraft had made the enemy gunner overconfident. His odds of repeating the original feat were nil. Firing again into the screaming darkness merely supplied Jake with a bright orange dotted line pointing to the source of his friend’s demise.

His last Maverick missile locked onto the anti-aircraft gun’s infrared silhouette. Lifting the guard, Jake fingered the missile launch trigger. “Bye, bye.” With a pull, he launched the missile. It rapidly accelerated toward, and then destroyed the ZSU in a brilliant explosion, briefly bringing daylight to another small patch of desert.

“Good shooting, Gunslinger One-Three,” Jake heard over the emergency frequency.

He breathed a sigh of relief at the sound of his downed wingman’s voice. “Keep your transmissions to a minimum, Two-Six. After all my hard work, I don’t want a load of artillery raining down on you. What’s your condition?”

“I’ll live, but this is Indian country, so hurry with the cavalry already,” Richard said. Apprehension seeped through his humorous façade.
#

Jake heard an electronic click as the inane hold music ended. “How the hell are you, buddy?” Richard asked.

Leaning against the bar top separating the apartment’s kitchen from its dining room, Jake looked at the ceiling. He took a deep breath and slowly let it out. “I’ve been better. Sorry I haven’t called, things have been … crazy here. How’s the leg?”

“It’s better. As a matter of fact, I just returned to flight status.”

“Listen, Richard, I’ve got—”

Not pausing to let Jake finish, Richard kept speaking. “In the meantime, I’ve been assigned to a special unit in the Pentagon. Actually, that’s why I’m calling.”

“I’m sorry, Richard, I have something going on here. As much as I’d love to catch up—”

“I understand,” he interrupted again. “I’ve been watching your situation develop. We need to talk.”

“Richard … wait, what do you mean? What do you know?” Jake asked, confused.

“I’d rather not discuss it over the—”

Jake’s frustration boiled over. “Damn it, Richard, nobody wants to discuss this thing. Every time I try to bring up details, they cut me off. I haven’t been able to tell anyone what really happened!” Lowering his voice, he looked toward the bedroom. “I haven’t even told Sandy.”

Richard ignored Jake’s rant. “You’re meeting me in DC tonight.”

What the hell? How can Richard be involved in this? After an extended pause, Jake said, “Okay.”

“I’ll tell you more tonight. You’re booked on a noon flight out of McCarran. An e-ticket is waiting for you at the United counter.”

“Okay, Richard,” Jake said. His mind reeled. “I’ll … see you tonight.”

“Good, tell the lovely and talented Captain Fitzpatrick hello for me. And, tell her she’s still the second best fighter pilot I know.”

“You bet,” Jake said. He grinned in spite of the confusion. “It’s quite chivalrous of you to place yourself third.”

“In your dreams, buddy,” Richard said through a laugh.

Continued….

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SECTOR 64: Ambush